alison may, amelia berry & ally sinclair

In which I get my feminism on and feel a little bit weary

Today Elle magazine’s #MoreWomen campaign has been making headlines because of this rather pithy little video demonstrating how few women there are at the top in a range of different fields. It’s a neat visual way of making the points that most of us are already aware of – women are 50% (actually slightly more than 50%) of the UK population but less than 30% of Westminster MPs, only around 23% of major business board members, and are outnumbered my men 4 to 1 in news and current affairs programming.

And that should make me angry, but increasingly it just makes me sad, because I grew up genuinely believing that none of this stuff would be an issue for me. Yes – there was still sexism when I went to school. I remember my primary school reading books being big on sections where Peter helped Daddy do something fun and adventurous while Jane helped Mummy make the tea. I remember the maths teacher who accused me of cheating because a girl couldn’t be that good at maths. But what I also remember was being absolutely certain that all of those attitudes were a hangover of an era that was already gone.

I grew up as part of the first generation whose mothers routinely went out to work, whose grandmothers had been able to vote as soon they were old enough. I was born ten years after abortion was legalised, seven years after the Equal Pay Act was passed, three years after family planning clinics were allowed to prescribe the pill to single women. I grew up being taught to expect that my opportunities would not be defined by my gender. The big battles, it seemed, had been fought and won. I was part of the generation that would reap the benefits.

And we still find ourselves in a position where time and time again women’s representation gets to about a third and then stalls because somehow we’re visible enough by then. We have a cultural landscape where the idea that something might only be of interest to women is used as a belittling notion, whereas ideas that are mainly interesting to men are just ideas. And I simply don’t now how on earth we’re still here. I don’t know how it is that I’ve twice been in job interviews and been asked whether I thought a young woman could be taken seriously in the role. I don’t know how it is that ‘like a girl’ is a derogatory term. I don’t know how it is that I get introduced as a ‘lady author’ (Author. The term is author. Just author. Thank you).

Women went on hunger-strike, tied themselves to railings, burned their bras, so that their daughters and grand-daughters wouldn’t be in this position, and yet we are. And tomorrow I shall get back to being angry, and I shall get back on my special equal rights horse and charge back into the fray, but today I’m tired and feeling a little bit cheated, because I genuinely grew up thinking it wasn’t going to be like this.

(Song by Jules Gibb, sung at VIVA! concert November 2011 by combined cummunity choirs ‘Move On Up’ Pershore and Winchcombe, soloist Bev Harrell, musical director Alice Robin)

In which I wonder whether you can teach someone how to write a novel

I spent the weekend here:

That’s part of the Farncombe Estate in the Cotswolds where I had the pleasure of leading a tutored novel writing retreat, with the awesome Janet Gover (my co-tutor and photo taker) and the lovely writers pictured hard at work below. It was a fantastic weekend. I love tutoring novel-writing – increasingly I find that I think of myself as a tutor who writes, rather than a writer who teaches. Either way, I’m stonkingly fortunate that I get to do both.

And as a writing tutor, it irks me somewhat when I hear people saying ‘Well you can’t teach someone to be a writer’ or other words to that effect.

So that’s my question for the day? Can you teach novel writing?

Well yes. Of course you can.

Hmm… on reflection, this is turning out to be a really short blog post. I’m going to have to expand my thoughts a little, aren’t I?

Right then. Here we go.

The idea that writing is a special ethereal thing that springs forth from the great spiritual well and can not be taught be tawdry human means irks me, as a teacher, because I think it belies a fundamental misunderstanding of what teaching is.

Too often we think of a teacher as somebody who stands at the front of a room and imparts definitive knowledge. There is one right way to wire a plug. There is one right answer to 2+2. Those things can obviously be taught. There isn’t one universal right way to write a novel, so that’s just something people have to work out for themselves. Right? Wrong. Because standing at the front and saying ‘Do this. Do only this and always this,’ is a very tiny slither of what teaching can, and should, be.

Another way of approaching the question ‘Can x be taught?’ is to, instead, ask ‘Can x be learnt?’ Essentially if something involves skill or knowledge then those things have to be be learnt, and a good teacher can help a receptive student learn them more quickly or more effectively, because learning is a process. It’s a process of trying things, recognising successes and failures, revising your approach, and trying again. A large part of teaching is about suggesting what to try, identifying success and failure and helping the student revise their approach. All those things can be done more effectively with somebody, who understands both the process of learning and something about the thing you are trying to learn, holding your metaphorical hand or kicking your metaphorical butt.

What you can’t teach is passion. You can’t make somebody want to write a novel, but if somebody has decided on that path, then a good creative writing tutor can absolutely help them to get there. I was helped massively on my journey to publication by two incredible tutors – Deb Catesby, who is now a visual artist, and Julie Cohen. There are, however, a lot of not so good creative writing tutors out there, so here are my tips for finding a good tutor and the right course for you.

Work out what you want to learn. Are you writing for personal pleasure or for publication? Are you interested in exploring your creativity, or developing a skills to write in a specific form or genre? Different writing courses are different – some focus strongly on writing for publication, some give exercises in lots of different forms and genre to explore different types of writing. If you know what you want, then don’t be afraid to ask whether the course suits your needs.
Ask about the tutor’s writing experience. We’ve all heard stories about tutors running ‘masterclasses’ in genres they’ve never written or published. Find out what the tutor’s experience in the subject they’re teaching is.
Ask about the tutor’s teaching experience. Teaching is a specialist skill. Writing a bestseller or a Booker Prize winner doesn’t necessarily make you a good teacher. If you’re handing over money for a course then there’s nothing wrong with asking the tutor what they’ve taught before, or even asking if they have feedback from past students that you can look at.
Be wary of tutors who promise to impart the secret to writing a novel/play/shopping list or who offer definitive rules on what you must and must not do to get published. There is no secret. The only rules are ‘write the sodding book’ and ‘make the sodding thing work’ and I’ve just given you those for nothing.

So there you go. There are my thoughts on tutoring writing and creativity. If you’re interested in hearing about courses I’ve got in the pipeline, including next year’s tutored retreat, then head over to the Contact Me page and drop me a message with your details to join my courses mailing list.

52 Weeks:52 Books – August & September

Months 8 and 9 of the 52 books challenge are getting rolled together, which frankly is going to make September look a lot better than it actually was. In reality I’ve read one book during September and, at the time of writing I haven’t technically quite finished that one, but I very nearly almost have so I’m counting it, which means that the books I can now tick off the To Read list are:

Book 22: Alan Cumming – Not My Father’s Son

Book 23: Emily Barr – The First Wife

Book 24: Danny Wallace – Who is Tom Ditto?

Book 25: Jo Thomas – The Oyster Catcher

Which means that I’m only one book off the halfway point, and it’s only 3/4 of the way through the year. Hmmm. Ah well, maybe 52 weeks: 33 Books would have been more realistic but not such a good title, so what can you do? I guess at this stage the best thing is to just embrace inevitable failure, keep reading and then try the whole endeavour again in 2016.

As for the books I’ve read recently, they were a good bunch. Alan Cumming’s memoir was probably the standout. It’s not a standard celebrity autobiography. It’s a memoir of an abusive childhood, interwoven with the story of his grandfather which came to light when Cumming went on ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ and the story of a personal shock he was dealing with in the here and now while filming the episode. It’s incredibly well-written, with real warmth and self-awareness.

As for the others, The Oyster Catcher has a great hero – great enough that I can just about forgive it for beating Sweet Nothing to the Joan Hessayon Award in 2014. Emily Barr is always awesome, and The First Wife is probably one of my favourites of hers that I’ve read so far. And I also enjoyed Who Is Tom Ditto? I wasn’t 100% sold on Danny Wallace’s first novel, Charlotte Street; the premise felt a bit contrived and a bit thin to support the weight of the story, but Who Is Tom Ditto? is richer and more intriguing.

The idea of throwing myself headlong into reading this year was originally all about the idea that reading makes writers better. I have no doubt that that’s true, but what is even more true, for me at least, is that writing makes readers worse. I still suffer from seeing the technique over and above the story. So how do any other writers out there fare? Does writing affect how or what you read?

In which we need to talk about piggate

All this week the Daily Mail has been publishing extracts from Lord Ashcroft’s unauthorised biography of David Cameron, which has included some potentially relatively serious political stuff about Cameron’s knowledge of Ashcroft’s non-dom status and relations with military leaders for example. However, none of that sent twitter into a apoplexies. The bit that sent twitter over the edge was PigGate. Now if you’ve got this far in life without hearing about the pig, then I very strongly suggest that you look away now. It’s one of those things that, once heard, can not be unheard and, believe me, you’re happier in ignorance.

Seriously, you read on at your own risk.

Still here? Are you sure?

Right then. Well it was your choice. PigGate, for those who don’t already know, relates to the accusation that, while at university, David Cameron took part in a initiation ritual for some form of posh boy club that involved putting his – oh god, I’m not sure I can even type this – his… erm… gentleman sausage, shall we say, in the mouth of a dead pig. Now let’s be clear this is an entirely unsubstantiated claim from someone who has a major grudge against Cameron. Let’s proceed on the assumption that it’s not true (for reasons of both lack of evidence and really not wanting to get sued.) So, if it’s not true, does it matter?

Well, yes. Unfortunately for Cameron the reaction to the allegation does matter, and, from my very unscientific reading of the twitters, that reaction seems to break down into three basic types:

Type 1 – It’s an uncorroborated rumour. People shouldn’t take it seriously;

Type 2 – Well it was probably just youthful japes and high jinx. Didn’t we all do stupid things at university?

Type 3 – Any one of a range of jokes about ham face and apple sauce.

Type 3 is inevitable. I mean, it’s a rumour that the Prime Minister did adult-fun stuff with a dead pig – it would almost be rude not to make up and share as many off-colour jokes as you can think of. Type 1 is very sensible, and Type 2 is something of a worry, but what none of these reactions do is rely on the notion that the idea of the PM engaging in the sort of ritual suggested is simply implausible and unthinkable of such a fine and upstanding chap. And that, I suspect, is at the heart of Cameron’s public image problem.

Let’s be realistic – Cameron doesn’t have a BIG public image problem. He’s won one and a half general elections, and has already said that he doesn’t plan to lead the Tories into another. All he needs to do is maintain sufficient popularity to be able to choose his time of departure rather than be pushed. But Cameron’s personal public image is all tied up in the idea that he’s a new Conservative. He’s the Conservative who can be trusted with the NHS, because he knows first hand what it’s like to be the parent of a severely disabled child. He’s the Conservative who cares about ‘hard-working people’. He’s spent a lot of time trying not to be seen as an old Etonian rich boy, even thought that is absolutely what he is. And the lack of disbelief around the PigGate story suggests that he hasn’t quite pulled off that particular smoke and mirror trick.

And that is, potentially, damaging in a way that it probably wouldn’t be to a politician like Boris Johnson. Boris has never tried to downplay his fundamental hooray Henry-ness, so stories of him Bullingdon-clubbing it up fit with and reinforce a public image with which he’s comfortable. Cameron runs the risk of looking like a man who’s not really at ease in his own skin. And that’s never been a problem in the past because he’s been in competition with opposition leaders who made personal discomfort into a national spectator sport. Gordon Brown trying to do a relaxed smile or Ed Miliband shouting ‘Hell, yeah’ were moments of inept image management that turned the six o’clock news into something to be cringe-watched from behind a cushion. All Cameron has ever had to do before was look more at ease than that. But, during the Labour leadership election Jeremy Corbyn certainly looked entirely comfortable with who he is – whether the Labour party publicity machine allows him to retain that or media trains him into oblivion is yet to be seen, but looking inauthentic is, potentially, Cameron’s Achilles’ heel, and it’s not one he’s been punished for so far.

In which I muse on all things sticky

Today I am participating in a little blog splurge in celebration of the release of Rhoda Baxter‘s all new shiny novel, Please Release Me. You’ll be familiar with the notion of the blog splurge from the very awesome Midsummer Dreams Dreamathon we did a couple of months ago. Rhoda has now scandalously stolen my very original (and not at all nicked from Talli Roland when we did this) idea. Outrageous behaviour…

Anyhoo, Please Release Me is all about this:

What if you could only watch as your bright future slipped away from you?

Sally Cummings has had it tougher than most but, if nothing else, it’s taught her to grab opportunity with both hands. And, when she stands looking into the eyes of her new husband Peter on her perfect wedding day, it seems her life is finally on the up.

That is until the car crash that puts her in a coma and throws her entire future into question.

In the following months, a small part of Sally’s consciousness begins to return, allowing her to listen in on the world around her – although she has no way to communicate.

But Sally was never going to let a little thing like a coma get in the way of her happily ever after …

So today Rhoda has asked that we blog about being stuck, and, being a warm and giving type, she has provided three little prompts to get us started. Here goes…

The thing I’m stuck on now… is, obviously, my current novel-in-progress, which is not really unusual. My writing process is essentially a finely balanced mix of being completely stuck, not actually being stuck but still procrastinating wildly, and fevered last-minute writing. At present I’m vacillating between the first two states.

If I could be stuck anywhere (with anyone)… I’d go for somewhere with lots of books because even the most interesting ‘trapped for eternity’ partner is going to get annoying after a while and I’m going to need some alternate entertainment. I’d also like somewhere with sea – I was brought up at the seaside and am still slightly uncomfortable with the fact that I currently live right in the middle of the country with no edge in sight. So a library by the sea please.

As for for my ‘trapped for eternity’ buddy, that’s tricky. It would be terribly obvious to pick a Cumberbatch or a Hiddleston, but I have no idea what they’re actually like in real life. They might turn out to be terribly dull. Obviously, my perfect choice would be the Doctor, because well, he’s the Doctor, but he’s also fictional and probably not well adapted to being trapped in one place for long periods of time.

So all things considered I think I shall just take EngineerBoy, which should not be interpreted as a sign of great romance in my soul. Oh no. It’s more a case of better the devil you know. I’ve lived with him for nearly twenty years so I’m confident that he’s housetrained and unlikely to try to use the lovely books as toilet roll. Engineers also tend towards a practical approach to life so he’d probably be very handy for the mundane elements of being stuck somewhere forever. I believe that if you can’t speedily fashion a can opener out of a librarian’s stamp you can actually be thrown out of Engineer Club*. After the first couple of days all the girls who’d picked desert islands with Johnny Depp would be looking at me and thinking ‘Library and Engineer. Doh!’

Stickers… are awesome, but, sadly, generally only offered to children who’ve been good at the dentist. I feel that many areas of life could be improved with a sticker-based motivational systems. Even at the age of 29 (yeah – I’m saying 29. I like 29. I liked it the first time, and I see no reason to move on) I could definitely be motivated with a good sticker. If I got a sticker every time I finished a chapter I would totally have got recalcitrant novel-in-progress done by now. Totally.

So there you go. The polite thing to do now is obviously to download yourself a copy of Please Release Me. If you need further enticement, here’s a lovely picture of the cover…

So those are my thoughts on all things sticky. And as a last comment on that theme I shall now try to stick to (see what I did there?) blogging more regularly. I mean, I shall try. I think we all know now to get our hopes up though…

If you liked those random musings then you might also like my books. Sweet Nothing, Midsummer Dreams, and the Christmas Kisses series out now.

* This joke has the added benefit of potentially making EngineerBoy quite cross by giving the impression that engineering is simply about building or fixing mundane items. With that in mind I’d like to add that, obviously, it would be an exceptionally well-designed and quality assessed can opener – a veritable sonic screwdriver of can openers.

In which I tell you what I did on my holiday. With graphs.

I’ve just got home from my holidays. I went to Scotland – first to the highlands where there are red squirrels and pine martens and reindeer and dolphins, and second to Edinburgh where there is much festivalication and fringesomeness. And, as I did last year, I thought I’d share some thoughts on the Edinburgh Fringe shows we saw, along with some recommendations. And I thought I’d use graphs.*

So let’s start with the rundown of which shows EngineerBoy and myself managed to get along to:

So that’s quite a mix. Shall we have a look at precisely what sort of a mix. Yes. Yes. We shall.

So that shows a bit of a bias towards stand-up comedy, which becomes more marked if you factor in the ‘Comedy +’ events. But comedy is marvellous, and we got in some talks by proper scientists with Professor in front of their names as well, so it’s all good.

So, I hear you ask, how did you rate the shows you saw? Well, gentle reader, I rated them like this:

My top scorers there are the impressively eclectic pairing of the Festival of the Spoken Nerd and Showstopper! The Improvised Musical. Both of those shows were fantastic. The first is Helen Arney, Steve Mould and Matt Parker who do comedy about science and maths, and set fire to stuff. The second is an entirely improvised musical. One of them included an entirely brilliant pastiche of a song from Wicked! and it’s not the one you’d expect.

But, I hear you mutter, that’s a only one person’s opinion. Can’t you find some way to broaden your data set? Well yes. I can. As mentioned above, I took EngineerBoy to Edinburgh with me for this very purpose. Here are his scores:

It’s no surprise that EngineerBoy also liked the Spoken Nerds. He wore his ‘Stand back – I’m going to try science’ t-shirt most of the time we were in Edinburgh so going to see the nerds was really a trip to his personal EngineerBoy happy place. He also gave perfect scores to Andrew Maxwell and Alex Horne. Andrew Maxwell probably suffered slightly on my list because he was one of my favourite acts of the fringe last year, and so expectations were very very high. He was very very good, but I expected him to be, so didn’t have the thrill you get when a performer exceeds expectations. That was probably deeply unfair scoring on my part, but it’s my blog, so tough.

We saw Alex Horne performing his Monsieur Butterfly show in which he… well he sort of… well it involves…. erm… well you should definitely go and see it if you get the chance. It was brilliant. Weird. But brilliant.

I notice, looking back at my scores, that I gave Alex Horne 9.5, whereas EngineerBoy didn’t give any half points at all. This smacks of weak-mindedness and a lack of decisiveness on my part. If I’d stuck to a whole integer scoring system Alex Horne may well have snuck a perfect 10 from me too. I’ve given quite a few half points actually. I’m disappointed in myself. If half points suggest indecisiveness here’s how indecisive I am:

Anyway, I digressed. I imagine that what you’d really like to see now is the cumulative scores from both judges ranked from worst to best. At least I hope that’s what you’d like to see, because that’s what you’re going to get. Here it is:

So there you go. The Festival of the Spoken Nerd are officially and indisputably the best show of the fringe 2015. Good to have that cleared up.

A quick mention as well for the two acts tied in fifth place on the overall chart. Matt Forde is a political comedian and impressionist who does a hysterical Ed Miliband impression – see him now before we all forget who Ed Miliband is. And Nathan Caton was probably the act who most exceeded expectations, I’ve seen/heard him a couple of times on TV and radio and thought he was ok, but live he was very good indeed – relaxed, consistently funny and with a particular point of view that differentiated him from the mass of stand-ups we saw over the four days at the fringe.

There’s also a couple of acts on there that I think can feel a bit hard done by to not make the top 5 – Jess Robinson probably really deserved a 9 from me for her impression of Nicki Minaj singing nursery rhymes alone, and Richard Wiseman deserved more than an 8 from EngineerBoy but he’s a tough judge, and I’m just reporting the results – it would be Very Wrong for me to go about changing his scores just because he hasn’t done them right.**

So that’s my experience of this year’s Edinburgh Fringe in graphs (with thanks to the Festival of the Spoken Nerd for graphly inspiration.)

And as ever now you finished being blogged at, you could consider buying a book. Sweet Nothing is out in paperback now you know, and it involves comedy, romance and maths, so is potentially pleasing to nerds and non-nerds alike.

*Technically mainly charts. Yes. I know.

** ‘Right’ – ie. how I think they should have been.

In which we have a winner

Yesterday was Awesome Birthday Giveaway Day and now it’s time to announce the winner of a signed copy of Sweet Nothing and lots of other lovely Sweet Nothing and Midsummer Dreams book swag.

This was the question:

Add a comment below, telling me which Shakespeare play you’d most like to read a contemporary adaptation of and why? I’ve done Much Ado About Nothing and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Which play would you like to see as book 3 in the 21st Century Bard series?

There were were 25 entries and picking a winner was really hard, so before I announce the winner, here are some honourable mentions for those comments that didn’t quite make it to the top of the podium but made me smile.

Gill Stewart made a good bid for glory by suggesting a play that would give me an excuse for a holiday: “The Tempest, it has to be The Tempest. I was first drawn to read the play by Mary Stewart’s brilliant novel This Rough Magic which refers to it constantly. Recently visited Corfu, re-read This Rough Magic and then had to re-read The Tempest too! You can do it Alison – and it would defnitely require a visit to Greece.” Tempting, but not quite a winner I’m afraid.

John Jackson went as far as coming up with a modern title for his suggestion, which always helps. I’m terrible at titles! “As You Like It – retitled as “Whatever!””

Christine Stovell and Janet Gover had the same suggestion – The Scottish Play, and it’s certainly one of my favourite plays, but not really ideal for a rom com makeover!

There were a couple of votes for Measure for Measure, but Callydcfc gets a special mention for having a most excellent reason: “Measure for Measure. It’s got nuns in it. Who doesn’t love a good nun story?” Who indeed?

And my final honourable mention goes to Ros Gemmell who came within a hair’s breadth of the prize, and actually suggested the same play as the winner – The Taming of the Shrew.

But now… *drum roll please*… it’s time to announce the winner. And, the winner, because I’m absolutely intrigued by the idea of gender flipping this particular play, is … Manda Jane Ward. Here’s her comment: “Taming of the Shrew…as its the only Shakespeare play I really enjoyed as Kiss Me Kate. Except with the reverse…have the man as the shrew and the woman using her moxy to get her man. Howard Keel was so gorgeous and manly.” And obviously additional points were awarded for use of the word ‘moxy.’

So congratulations Manda! Please contact me with your address and I’ll get your prize in the post to you. Thank you to everyone else who entered. It was a lovely way to celebrate my book (and actual) birthday.

The 21st Century Bard Series

Sweet Nothing is out now in ebook and paperback.

Would you risk everything for love?

Independent, straight-talking Trix Allen wouldn’t. She’s been in love once before and ended up with nothing. Now safely single, Trix is as far away from the saccharine-sweet world of hearts and flowers as it’s possible to be.

Ben Messina is the man who broke Trix’s heart. Now he’s successful the only thing rational Ben and free-spirited Trix see eye-to-eye on is the fact that falling in love isn’t part of the plan. But when Ben’s brother sets out to win the heart of Trix’s best friend, romance is very much in the air. Will Trix gamble everything on love and risk ending up with zero once again?

Sweet Nothing is a fresh and funny retelling of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, set in the present day.

And Midsummer Dreams is out now for kindle.

Four people. Four messy lives. One night that changes everything …
Emily is obsessed with ending her father’s new relationship – but is blind to the fact that her own is far from perfect.
Dominic has spent so long making other people happy that he’s hardly noticed he’s not happy himself.
Helen has loved the same man, unrequitedly, for ten years. Now she may have to face up to the fact that he will never be hers.
Alex has always played the field. But when he finally meets a girl he wants to commit to, she is just out of his reach.
At a midsummer wedding party, the bonds that tie the four friends together begin to unravel and show them that, sometimes, the sensible choice is not always the right one.

A modern retelling of Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream.

In which I have a book birthday and an actual birthday

Happy Birthday to Me! Happy Birthday to Me! etc etc. And secondly, Happy Birthday to the paperback edition of Sweet Nothing which is out this week. In honour of these twin excitements I have put together a little present for one of you lovely reading type people out there. And here it is: We have got a copy of Sweet Nothing (to be signed, of course), a fab tote bag, a Midsummer Dreams notebook and bookmark, and because Sweet Nothing and Midsummer Dreams are both published by Choc Lit, there will almost certainly be some chocolate added to the haul as well. So what do you have to do to be in with a chance of owning all of these lovely things? Well you need to enter a little competition. This is how: Simply add a comment below, telling me which Shakespeare play you’d most like to read a contemporary adaptation of and why? I’ve done Much Ado About Nothing and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Which play would you like to see as book 3 in the 21st Century Bard series? The best idea and reason, based on my entirely subjective opinion, wins.

Here comes the dull bit… this competition is open from 0:01am to 11.59pm BST on August 6th 2015. It’s open to anyone 18 or over with a British or Irish postal address where the prize can be sent. One entry per person. One prize pack available. Winning entry will be selected on Friday 7th August. Good luck!

Would you risk everything for love?

Sweet Nothing is a fresh and funny retelling of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, set in the present day.

52 Weeks: 52 Books – July

Last month’s 52 Weeks: 52 Books update ended with the realisation that I needed to read 11 books in July to get back on track. In reality I managed to read… 2. So that went well. The two I read were:

Book 20: Jane Wenham-Jones – 100 Ways To Fight The Flab and still have wine and chocolate

Book 21: Maggie O’Farrell – Instructions for a Heatwave

Instructions for a Heatwave is one of those books that I’ve been meaning to read and never quite got around to. I’m glad I did, and I particularly enjoyed the second half of the story, but I did struggle to get into it. That seems to be a bit of a pattern. I race through the second half of books but it takes me a long time to get fully involved in the story. I’m wondering if that’s a side effect of being a writer – it just takes longer to get engaged with a story because of the amount of your brain that’s already full of the story that you’re working on yourself.

100 Ways to Fight the Flab was an interesting read. I don’t generally do diet books (and yes – I know that this isn’t technically a ‘diet book’ but, as the author acknowledges, all diet books say that!) I don’t really buy into anything at all to do with weight loss as an industry – the very notion makes me shudder, but Jane gave me a copy of her book at the RNA Conference this year, so I set out to read with an open mind. And I did read it. And it didn’t make me shudder. Jane’s basic premise is that joyless self-denial is not a workable long-term strategy, but there’s no one size fits all approach to weight loss or maintenance, so she offers a vast array of pick and mix (mmmm… pick and mix) tips and suggestions ranging from big lifestyle change stuff to tiny tweaks and tricks. Reading it definitely made me refocus on losing weight, and some of the tips – dark chocolate, 5:2, fanatical adherence to the pedometer – have filtered into my life or been reinforced where I was already doing them. Will reading this book make you thin if you have a lifelong problem with obesity? On its own, no, but if you’re already in the right frame of mind it could make the whole endeavour feel more manageable. Could it be helpful if you’re a healthy weight and need to maintain it, or need to lose 5-10lbs before the fatness situation gets out of hand? Yes. I think it probably could.

So those were July’s books. I’m now another two books behind schedule, so only need to get through 18 in August to catch up. Gulp!

In unrelated news, my own first novel, Sweet Nothing, is out in paperback this week. Those of you who are twitter peoples, keep an eye on @MsAlisonMay tomorrow for a chance to win a signed copy.

In which I have to remember not to lick the books

I’ve been a bit lax in the blog posting the last couple of weeks. This is largely because I’ve been mentally trying to compose a post about the Labour leadership campaign that isn’t just a series of video clips of me banging my head against a wall and then weeping gently, probably ending with a section where I jump up and down repeatedly on a picture of Tony Blair’s increasingly haunted face. I’m not sure that a post like that would really count as insightful or, indeed, interesting.

However, it’s so clear that generating a coherent opinion about Andy Burnham is basically my moral duty as a left-leaning bod with a blog and an interest in politics, that it’s hampered my attempts to blog about anything else. Fortunately today’s post brought something that absolutely, definitely has to be shared with the universe right now this very second.

Are you ready?

Ta dah!

Actual print copies of my actual novel, Sweet Nothing. Actually printed out, so you can actually hold them, and cuddle them, and lick them.* There are lots of different novelist milestones – your first finished draft; your first finished draft that’s in a state where you could plausibly show it to another human being; your first rejection; your first non-standard rejection; your first contract; your first publication day; your first review; your first horrible review; the first time one of your books gets pirated etc. And in the modern world you can do all of those without ever having a printed book. So having a printed book shouldn’t logically make you feel like any more of a ‘proper writer’ than you were the day before. You’ve still written, edited and promoted the book – all that’s changed is that somebody quite unrelated to you has had the thing printed out and glued together. But still. It’s a book. An actual lickable** book. And it’s very very exciting indeed.

So there you go. A book. It’s out in paperback on August 7th, and by total coincidence the day before that is my birthday, so next week goes my birthday and then book birthday. If you check out my twitter feed (@MsAlisonMay) next Thursday (August 6th) there might even be a special #BirthdayGiveaway to win a signed copy, which would then be yours to keep, and, if you wanted, lick. Or just read. That’s probably a better idea really…

About Sweet Nothing

Would you risk everything for love?

A modern retelling of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. First novel in the 21st Century Bard series.

And you can pre-order the paperback or pick up the ebook for just 99 of your modern English pennies here.

*I haven’t been licking them. Honestly I haven’t.

** Still wrong. I’ll add ‘books’ to my list of Things I Must Not Lick.***

*** List also includes David Tennant, other people’s cake, and leading literary agents.