Tag: comedy

APRIL: FOOL

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FOOL to think the winter was over! Sitting here today, I’ve seen sunshine, rain, hail, thunder and lightening while I work – talk about four seasons in a day, I think it was four seasons in an hour! There’s not been much going on this month. I’m waiting for final edits from my agent to come back and I’ve been on a much-needed holiday in the meantime. My son is away for a week – a whole week! SOB! – which you would have thought would be the perfect time to crack on with writing but has ended up consisting mainly of meeting with friends. School starts again next week though, and I’ll be back to the desk then with the goal of finishing up my third manuscript by summer! Fingers crossed for more rain, I suppose, or I’ll never get it done!

APRIL BOOK CHOICE

I took the opportunity while I was away to catch up on some of the CWIP Prize short listers, in preparation for meeting them at the awards party this coming Monday! Of course I’d already read a few of them, but ‘Impossible’ by Sarah Lotz was one I hadn’t heard of before and thought it looked like a good book to get lost in while I was laying on a sun bed. I was right! I enjoyed the book a lot although I’m not entirely sure I agree with Amazon’s headline of ‘a twist you won’t see coming’ … I saw it coming from a country mile away. However, it was well written with strong characters and the author clearly had fun with the world-building, which, I assume, is how it got selected for CWIP. There aren’t a whole load of LOLs in this one, but it is touching and funny and I enjoyed it very much. Hopefully see you at the party, Sarah!

APRIL TV CHOICE

GUILTY PLEASURE WARNING: The return of Grey’s for the second half of the season would usually fill me with joy but I have to say, it is SO. DULL. It’s like they took all the utterly mind numbingly boring character traits of Dr. Meredith and then made all the other actors on the show say her lines because she’s left. The scripts for Grey’s have always been formulaic… even Shonda will tell you there’s a generic way to write the script for each episode – but in the past few decades they’ve had their moments of producing some really, really great medical drama which, very simply, is why they’ve made it this far. Season 19 would not be one of these moments. I DO NOT CARE about the new interns. Giving them all the screen time with their fragility and hormones will not make me care more about them either. Worse, I don’t care about any of the old characters either. They have turned into cardboard cutouts, as dull and boring and grey as Meredith herself. So, dear reader, I have defected. I’ve been watching Old Amsterdam, which is basically another show based around a talented but flawed set of doctors, set in a busy public hospital in NYC. But it’s fresher and faster and a bit down and dirtier than Grey’s and I’m still in the first flush of getting to know the characters, which is kind of like starting a whole new relationship, and I’m enjoying it. It won’t set the world on fire, but it’s a nice way to spend the evening after a full day procrastinating about writing books.

APRIL RECIPE

I’ve reached a new low in writing/editing/eating crap this winter. Every day I pull out the same food: a cheese sandwich with marmite/cucumber/pickle – delete as appropriate –  crips, biscuits with a cuppa afterwards… and then sit eating while I work, effectively leaving my desk for as long as it takes to boil the kettle and slice the cheese. (What kind of useless writer procrastination is that?)

As a result I’ve developed what I like to term ‘Writer’s Arse’, and with the prospect of it maybe stopping raining at some point in the next six months, along with the sheer boredom of eating a cheese sandwich every day for weeks on end, I’ve decided to take a proper break and make myself something healthy and attractive, in the hope that it will make me go the same way if I do it often enough.

Today was day 1 and I made a roasted grape, pecan and goat cheese salad. You can find the recipe here (thanks Waitrose) https://www.waitrose.com/ecom/recipe/roasted-grape-goats-cheese-salad. It was bloody lovely! It took 10 minutes to make plus the time the oven took to heat up and was pretty filling too.

I halved the ingredients and used croutons I had in the cupboard rather than making my own, popping them in along with the cheese. Okay, it’s not exactly the lowest fat salad in the world but certainly better than what I was eating! And as a had to use a knife and fork, I couldn’t type while I ate either. Procrastination WIN.

MY MONTH AHEAD

Well, Monday is a VERY important night as it’s the Comedy Women in Print Prize! The wonderful Helen Lederer has pulled it off again, managing to put together authors, slebs, publishers, and a slew of witty women to celebrate all the amazing literature that’s been published in the past year – plus change the life of the lucky winner of the unpublished prize! I’m really looking forward to reconnecting with everyone and can’t wait to find out who’s won!

The rest of the month is dedicated to writing. Not much on the horizon in terms of promotional stuff at the moment… so if you are reading this and fancy having me come along to talk at an event or appear on the radio, run a quiz night, do a virtual book club… do get in touch!

Happy Springtime,

Fx

March: The longest month

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Anyone else just waiting for this month to end or is it just me? I am very definitely NOT a winter person, so this final slog towards spring always leaves me bad tempered and emotional and desperate for company while being fully, one hundred percent aware that I’m the person you least want to call for a good time. It’s also my least productive time of year to write, which is what makes it the perfect time for editing, an admittedly self-loathing task where, for the non-writers amongst you, you basically take all the work you did that you thought was great a few weeks or months previous, rip it to pieces at the behest of your agent/publisher/self and try to put it back together again without losing the plot (in both senses of the word). I actually enjoy editing for the first two thirds of a book but by the final furlong the doubt that I have written anything of worth always creeps in and by the end I always assume I’ve made everything ten times worse than it was before. Fortunately this is rarely the case. Editing – especially the final edit before submission – is a vital part of writing where you get to reshape and refine your work. It’s an opportunity to really take a good look at your characters and make sure they make sense and are consistent as well as ensuring they have room to grow. For crime writers, it’s a chance to add or remove red herrings, find places where suspense needs to increase and check that you don’t accidentally reveal how your book is going to end somewhere around chapter eight. For comedy writers, it’s an opportunity to cut gags that aren’t funny but maybe add more humour in places where the ebb and flow of writing requires it. If a book were a piece of music, the final edit before submission is that final dress rehearsal: making sure you aren’t just playing the notes in all the right places, but that you’ve thought about dynamics, ornaments, emotion and nuance, that you know your work back to front and upside down; that you’ll never be more ready to throw it out into the world that you are right now. Of course, this is where the comparison ends… being an author on submission is like playing the concert and then waiting six to eight weeks for applause, if indeed there is any to be had at all!

MARCH BOOK CHOICE:

Two books for this month, because they both deserve celebrating! The winner and runners up of the Comedy Women in Print Prize for 2021, Rebecca Rogers and Hannah Dolby have released two contrasting but equally fun books this month which deserve to go on your TBR pile!

If you like a bit of Terry Pratchett or Hitchhiker’s Guide, then The Purgatory Poisoning could be right up your street. A crime caper set in the afterlife finds Dave having to solve his own murder from his own personal purgatory, St Ives’ youth hostel c. 1992.

No Life For A Lady is a quirky Victorian mystery, centred around a young woman named Viola, who decides she would rather become a detective than marry any one of the young bachelors her father sends her way.

As one of the judges for the CWIP Prize in 2021, I’m extremely proud and excited for Hannah and Rebecca and wish them lots of luck now their book babies are out in the world! Have fun, you witty women!

MARCH TV CHOICE:

Okay – I admit it, my month has been a series of questionable indulgences when it comes to TV viewing. Grey’s Anatomy and Station 19 returned, meaning a happy withdrawal into the comforting world of Shondaland predictability. Chicago Fire is back as well, giving me the opportunity to wonder for the eleventh season in a row how on earth it is still being commissioned (and why I continue to tune in). I binged three series of Jack Ryan which left me befuddled as to whether John Krasinski is a really good actor or dead inside, and also whether anyone, CIA or no, would really be allowed to board a nuclear warship and have a chat to the captain while he prepared to start a war. I feel like this is exactly the sort of thing editors would never let an author get away with, even if it was convenient to the plot. After watching this, I feel fairly strongly that editors of TV shouldn’t be allowed to get away with it either.

Daisy Jones and the Six, currently streaming on Amazon Prime, is far from perfect either. But it’s fun, frothy, drug fuelled nostalgia for the 1970s and a ‘fictional’ (but uncannily reminiscent of Fleetwood Mac) story of the rise and fall of a world famous rock band makes for some serious ‘guilty pleasure’ viewing. I don’t think it’s brilliant: you can’t easily manufacture the magic of the Mac for TV and the whole ‘documentary’ style of the series is spoilt by the lack of any real effort to show the passing of time except for a few terrible wigs. But it has made for a pleasing watch and if you fancy kicking back with something not too awful and not too taxing either, this would be my recommendation.

MY MONTH AHEAD:

Well, mainly I’m celebrating it not being winter anymore! But my main excitement for this month is attending the Comedy Women in Print Awards, which I’m very much looking forward to. Fortunately, I’m off on holiday the week before, which means I will be able to read the shortlist of published novels before I hit up the party! Bring it on, April….

Fx

February: Old friends, new friends, no friends

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My feet have just about touched the ground again after four weeks of mayhem, starting with jetting off to Dubai for the wonderful Emirates Airlines Festival of Literature at the start of the month, which I was lucky enough to be invited to as a speaker and workshop facilitator. I don’t think there is any point in pretending that it wasn’t THE coolest thing I have done as a published author, because you’d all know I was lying. Highlights were many but included:

  • Delivering a workshop on being inspired to write and writing comedy to a sold out room!
  • Talking books and publishing and everything in between with readers, other authors, agents & generally bookish people for a whole week!
  • Being on a panel with Sudha Murty and the utterly lovely Alexander McCall Smith, and having the most fun and fascinating conversation about letter writing. You can find the transcript of my letter to Dubai here.
  • (Much later…) Discussing the merits (or not) of toilets with glass walls with Alexander and his wife.
  • Meeting a bunch of amazingly creative people and being surrounded by multi disciplinary artists from so many different places and cultures.
  • Seeing a bunch of old friends and making some new ones too. The theme for this year was ‘Old Friends’ and it couldn’t have been more perfect.
  • Sunshine and warm weather… working by the pool made for a nice change of pace!

Talking of working, I’ve been going at it like a dog. I’ve barely left the house since I arrived back and I’ve forgotten how to talk to people but my latest manuscript is now nearly ready to go out to the world and there’s another one hot on its heels that I’m two thirds of the way through already! I’m really enjoying being at the end of the process for my second novel, and excited at the ideas I’ve had for the third one, to really make it zip. Putting an extra spring in my step this month has been the fabulous news that my agent, Davinia Andrew-Lynch, has joined Curtis Brown Books and taken me with her as a client! I am very much looking forward to stepping out on this new adventure with her.

FEBRUARY BOOK CHOICE:

Finlay Donovan is Killing It by Elle Cosimano was a recommendation by Davinia, actually. The premise is simple but irresistible: a author and mom of two who’s husband has run off with the estate agent is mistakenly hired as a contract killer. If you like Stephanie Plum, you’ll love this. It’s fast paced, murderously good fun with lots of funny and familiar scenarios for the mums out there. A great palette cleanser if you’ve been getting too serious with your literature lately. I bought the audio book and it’s read pretty well – not sure about the ‘guy’ voices but it’s not as annoying as most!

FEBRUARY TV CHOICE:

There is nothing better than deliciously dark television that offers plenty of sass alongside – and Bad Sisters more than delivers. Nicknamed ‘The Prick’ by his sisters in law, JP really is the gold standard: his apparent playfulness towards his wife, daughter, mother, the neighbour and the sisters is in turns threatening, frightening, patronising, dangerous and downright evil. The sisters decide they’ve had enough and plot to kill him, but he proves a slippery fish to nail – and here is where the wonderful comedic turns can be had as the assassination attempts get more and more outrageous, with disastrous consequences. The story, in essence a ‘whodunnit’, moves forwards and backwards in time to finally reveal the who, what, where of the murder.  The only thing I didn’t think was utterly brilliant was the slightly annoying subplot of two hapless insurance agents trying to prove the women killed him to save their business from bankruptcy and a criminal action lawsuit. Yes, it was necessary to have someone investigate to create the motivation for the cover up, but I think the plot stretched a little thin at times in terms of the believability of these characters. However, it didn’t really take too much away from what was a brilliant story, beautifully shot, subtly acted and wonderfully written to keep us guessing most, if not all of the way.  

MY MONTH AHEAD:

Well it’s a quiet month for me after the storm that was February so I’ll mainly be focused on final tweaks for submission and cracking on with the next manuscript. But there’s a couple of things going on in the CWIP motherland that I should draw your attention to…. firstly, the shortlist is out and it’s fantastic! Very much looking forward to reading some of this stack that hasn’t already found it’s way to me.

Secondly… and admittedly, you don’t have long with this bit of information… but the Comedy Women in Print Prize is running a ‘Febulously Funny’ fundraiser, where if you donate, like, TODAY, you’ll be put in the prize draw to win lots of books and swag from the authors of the unpublished-but-now-published CWIP Prize books. The Prize relies purely on donations and Helen Lederer’s caffeine intake, and does great things for unpublished authors as well as championing funny female fiction – so if you’re a fan, please consider donating here. You can, of course, give generously after today, with absolutely no chance of winning anything except the adoration of all involved with CWIP!

See you next month,

Fx

The subjectivity of comedy

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Last week I made an off the cuff remark on Twitter about teenagers being worse than toddlers and it got more hits than almost anything else I’ve ever posted. Some people laughed in recognition, some mothers of toddlers were horrified at this window onto the future, some people told me off for stereotyping and one lady kindly noted ‘you reap what you sew’. Her reaction reminded me that the pressure put on women by other women is alive and well, but more than that, that comedy is always subjective (especially on Twitter).

When you’re writing comedy, it’s important to grow a thick skin, preferably right over the one you already had to grow as a writer anyway. Not everyone is going to find you funny, not everyone is going to laugh at the things that had you cackling into your laptop. For reasons I still can’t fathom, some readers consider it their civic duty to criticise comedy writers, loudly, warning others in brutal online reviews that You. Aren’t. Funny. As hard as it can be not to take it personally, you have to ignore them. Because what they mean, whether they realise it or not, is that it’s not funny to them.

And that’s okay. The golden rule when I’m writing a funny scene, or inserting a bit of witty dialogue, is that if it makes me smile while I’m writing it, there’s a good chance there’ll be other people who will find it amusing too. They might even find it funnier than I do. Or they won’t think it funny at all. At the end of the day, it actually doesn’t matter, as long your writing is good. If you produce a quality story, with strong characters and snappy dialogue, being funny is just the icing on the cake. John Hodgman is quoted as saying “don’t concentrate on becoming a better humour writer, just concentrate on being the best writer you can be. If you’re funny, the work will end up being funny. And if you’re not, the work will still end up being good.” I think that’s a good rule to write by.

JANUARY BOOK CHOICE:

The book I’ve just finished up reading is actually pretty in keeping with the story at the start of this post. Other Parents by Sarah Stovell is set in the world of competitive parenting, PTA horror, secrets and small minded mentalities. I bought it for the title and the zippy front cover and because I assumed it would have protagonists who were over the age of 30 – still a rarity in the publishing world, despite there being a huge audience of middle aged book buyers out there who might like to read about themselves occasionally. I’ll dive into this another time, but suffice to say it’s something I base a lot of book choices around – plus I’m a sucker for a pretty front cover… so I admit I didn’t read the blurb and made several assumptions about the content. As a result I kept waiting for a murder to happen… spoiler: there is no murder! But there is plenty of action. It followed a few different storylines from multiple points of view that challenged and provided enough twists and turns to keep me interested. An enjoyable, sometimes dark, sometimes witty, horribly familiar-in-places story that’s perfect as a book club/holiday read.

JANUARY TV CHOICE:

I just finished up the third and final season of Dead to Me (Netflix), starring more wonderful middle aged women Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini, supported by Prince Charming himself, James Marden. I have simply loved this oh-so-dark comedy, and was sad to see it end, although it was definitely the right time. A masterclass in getting your characters into trouble, and then really leaning into that, I have really enjoyed the way the writing shifted from comedy to tragedy with such grace and presence of mind. It’s a study in female friendship and grief that I thought was beautifully, madly, deeply done, with thrash metal, copious swearing and high farce brilliantly executed by the cast.  

MY MONTH AHEAD:

January is half gone already but the rest of it is busy! On Tuesday 17th I’ll be joining Jo Good on BBC London as one of three guests on her ‘Chewing the Fat’ segment. I’m on at 11pm if you fancy tuning in.

At the end of the month I’m getting on a plane to Dubai to take part in the Emirates Festival of Literature, which I’m pretty sure is going to be a highlight of the year! I’m running a masterclass in comedy writing and appearing on a panel with Cecilia Ahern and Alexander McCall-Smith, amongst others – plus catching up with some other writers from the region, who I haven’t seen in a really long time. I really can’t wait to devote the week to all things books, and, having lived there for nearly a decade, spend some time in my old home with dear friends too. It will be wonderful to go back to where my writing journey began, and hopefully spark some new ideas for new stories as well.

See you next month,

Fx