Imogen Clark's Blog, page 4
June 28, 2024
Table for Five!
It’s a publication day for me – always the oddest feeling. My second book writing as Izzy Clark TABLE FOR FIVE is out today. It’s my tenth published novel and as ever I’m delighted and terrified in equal measure.
On one hand the book being released into the world is the culmination of a significant amount of blood, sweat and tears. (Actually, not so much of the blood if I’m honest.) I work so hard on creating a new book, as do the fabulous team at my publishers, and publication day is when it all comes together. A cause for much celebration all round.
Yet publication day is also a little bit scary too. The book to which I have given my all, from initial concept to the final round of edits, is out there and anyone is entitled not only to a view but also to share their thoughts with the world at large. It is hard to describe just how nerve-wracking it can be as you wait to see how the book is being received, and authors across the world complain of injury caused by the repetitive strain of refreshing their Amazon page to see both reviews and chart position.
TABLE FOR FIVE by Izzy Bromley is here and available to order in all good bookshops and online in paperback, ebook and an audiobook narrated by the inimitable Imogen Church who did such a splendid job with Izzy’s first book THE COACH TRIP. You can grab yourself a copy by clicking this handy link HERE.
I hope you enjoy it!
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June 26, 2024
Glorious London!
London can be busy and dirty and overwhelming at times, but when the sun shines it really is a world-beating city.
I’m here for a conference though so I’m missing all the blue skies.
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June 15, 2024
Well, hello there!
This was a magical moment. A walk on the beach in Wells-Next-the-Sea was interrupted by this. He/she just swam up to me, popped out of the sea and said hello.
What a privilege!
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June 6, 2024
May 2024 Newsletter
Hi there.
Ribbons! You know what that means, don’t you? I’ve been in a craft shop which is invariably because I’ve seen something on Instagram and have come over all arty. I cleared out my drawer of shame not that long ago so now there is plenty of space for lots more started and unfinished projects! This time it’s a crocheted cardigan (I needed a hook in a size I didn’t have.) Let’s see how far I get before it gets subsumed by other things.
Anyway, hello and welcome, especially if you are new to my newsletter. I promised a GIVEAWAY this month so if you’re interested in that then keep reading (or skip straight down to the bottom – it’s up to you!)
So let’s dive straight in with the news.
What am I writing?Well, I’m still in the middle of next year’s Imogen book (working title – A Question of Loyalty.) I say the middle but I have actually gone beyond the halfway point. The book is set in Ripon, London and Sicily in the 1980s and some time nowish so there’s plenty to get my teeth into. My characters are starting to feel more like friends than strangers so it’s always nice when that happens. I have to deliver the manuscript to my publishers by the beginning of August so I’ve set myself a deadline of the end of June to finish the first draft. Hopefully I’ll hit that but if not I have given myself a little bit of a buffer.
In other book news, the new Izzy Bromley title Table for Five is out in a month so I’m building up to that. (Did I mention that I’m giving copies away below?!) Publication is always scary but somehow I get less nervous about Izzy’s books than Imogen’s and so I can enjoy the process a bit more.
Where have I been?Early in the month I was down in London to watch my third daughter’s end of degree show. You may know that she has been at Drama School for the last three years studying Musical Theatre and the final shows are the culmination of all the students have learned.
Now I know that I might be slightly biased, but it really was FAB-U-LOUS! What a talented bunch of young people, and there wasn’t a dry eye in the house when my girl sang. Super-proud Mum moment.
After the London trip and some time at home, I went to Turkey to walk part of the Lycian Way, an ancient route along the southern coast of the country. The Lycian civilisation prospered from around 450BC to 540AD when bubonic plague and invasions from the Romans and the Arabs pretty much finished Lycia off. However, signs of the ancient people are still scattered all over the hillsides. We regularly had to walk around stone sarcophagi which were strewn across the paths.
The walking was extremely hard (and hot) and we didn’t see a human soul most days. We did meet plenty of tortoises, a very helpful dog and quite a few large spiders though. At one point there were flames leaping out of the ground (as a result of escaping methane gases.) It was all very dramatic.
Here are a few pictures to give you a taste but as ever there are more on my Instagram and Facebook pages.
What have I read?I’ve been reading a bit of non-fiction this month and I reread the fabulous None of this is True by Lisa Jewell which I recommended in a previous newsletter, but here are some of my new fiction suggestions.
Whale Fall by Elizabeth O’Connor is set in an isolated community on an island off Wales in 1938. Manon, a capable young woman, born on the island and now working and caring for her father and younger sister, aspires to a life on the mainland. When two anthropologists arrive and offer her a job helping them she believes that they offer her a chance at a new life. The book is a beautiful study of possibility and betrayal.
The House of Mirrors by Erin Kelly is a pacy literary thriller. In 1997 two very different women meet and a string of murders and mysterious happenings occurs. Fast forward to the present day and the daughter of one of the women receives mysterious notes that she doesn’t understand and which don’t sit with what she knows about her family. A twisty turny story with fascinating characters and a nod to 20th century fashion.
The Trees by Percival Everett opens with a series of brutal murders in the deep south of America. This would be strange enough but alongside the murdered bodies lies the same corpse which someone keeps stealing from the morgue and putting back in crime scenes. The book is a dark satire which aims squarely at racism and police violence. The author’s dialogue made me laugh, but the book is clever and highly thought-provoking.
You’d Look Better as a Ghost by Joanna Wallace is definitely a comedy and is also pretty dark. Claire is your run-of-the-mill serial killer who gets caught up in someone else’s mystery and soon finds that her dark secrets are in danger of being exposed. If you can look beyond the fact that she murders people on a whim then this is a funny book with messages about how children can be damaged by those who are supposed to love them.
Drumroll please!
And now, as promised, the giveaway. I have TEN copies of my new Izzy Bromley book to give away. Here’s what it’s about to whet your appetite.
Abbie Finch loves her job.
Unfortunately, her boss doesn’t love her.
When she finds herself unexpectedly unemployed, Abbie realises that she’s let all her friendships fall by the wayside and has no one to turn to.
Lost and lonely, Abbie decides to leave her comfort zone and join the neighbourhood café’s community table. There she meets aloof, elegant Ethel, down-on-his-luck Bob, colourful, chaotic Dawn and recently relocated Viraj. Friends? Not yet. But when they decide to help the homeless people in their community by staging an extravagant fundraising event, will something that began as a good deed help Abbie find a way back to herself—and make lifelong friends at the same time?
So, if you’d like to win a signed copy all you have to do is reply to this email and tell me who you would most like to drink coffee with. It can be anyone, alive or dead, famous or not. Just tell me who’d pick and why, and I’ll choose my ten favourite replies. I’m afraid that this giveaway is for UK residents only. I’m so sorry – blame postage costs.
And that’s it for this month. Next month I will have been to London on a writing conference and on another exciting walking trip so watch this space for all the news on those. In the meantime, don’t forget to send me your entry for the giveaway and pop by to my You’d Look Better as a Ghost by Joanna Wallace if you want to chat books! There’s always a warm welcome in there.
I hope to see you again next month and until then happy reading,
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The post May 2024 Newsletter appeared first on Imogen Clark.
April 30, 2024
April 2024’s Newsletter.
In an ideal world, I’d have captured these bluebells in my local wood basking in full sun with a glorious blue sky as a backdrop. As it turns out, I’m just grateful it wasn’t raining. But enough moaning about the weather. I have resolved to stop. (For another resolution made this week check out my Random Thought here.) No more.
So, what’s new with me? Well, I can’t keep on top of the weeds in my garden. There just aren’t enough hours in the day or resolve in the spirit to do it. I’m starting to wonder how bad weeds really are – I mean, will lives be lost if I don’t eradicate them? And I have planted out all my little baby veg plants and those beds are weed free – for now!
Where have I been?As I mentioned last time, this month I was in Tuscany leading a Writers’ Retreat. I had a fabulous time and met some fascinating women. I suspect I might have learnt more from them than I taught them. The joy of any of these intensive experiences is that you get so much more bang for your buck than if you all just went out for coffee together once a month. As trust builds and barriers are lowered, people become much more open and share their amazing experiences and wisdom. What begins with a bunch of strangers ends as a team with a very special bond. It’s a wonderful process.
I went up the Torre del Mangia in the main square of Siena for the first time. I do like a high place. The views were fabulous and the square looked a long way down. I also went back to the library in the cathedral with its incredible illuminated manuscripts. Breathtakingly beautiful. As ever, there are many photos over on Instagram but here are a few to give you a taste.
Book NewsAs I promised last month, I now have more details about my forthcoming book A Borrowed Path. It will be published on 24th September and if pre-ordering is your thing then you can do that HERE.
Here’s a little taster of what the book is about.
Eve has always had a tricky relationship with her mother, Agatha, and returning to Fox House, the family home, hasn’t made it any easier. When Eve’s daughter, Lyra, and granddaughter, Skye, unexpectedly turn up, it becomes clear that four generations of women under one roof is a recipe for trouble. Not least because Lyra clearly needs help but refuses to say why.
Lyra decides she wants to live in the ramshackle cottage in the grounds, but when Agatha announces she’s promised it to a man called Dylan, Eve and Lyra are mystified. Who is he, and what reason could Agatha possibly have for giving him the cottage?
Because it seems that it’s not only Lyra hiding things. Agatha has secrets she has never had the courage to tell Eve. Is now the right time to finally reveal the truth? And if she does, will it give them the relationships they’ve all longed for—or will it drive them further apart?
Being both a daughter and now a mother of three girls, the relationship between mothers and daughters fascinates me. In this book, I really wanted to explore the Philip Larkin poem This be the Verse. If you’ve never read it then you can find it here. When I first came across it I didn’t have any children and, in the self-absorbed way of the young, I thought about what my parents had done to me in the way they brought me up. (I know! So introspective!)
But now I am a parent for four adult children myself, the poem takes on a completely different hue and has haunted me a little. It’s the conviction with which Larkin states that I will have done something to them, the inevitability of it that I find disturbing.
Anyway, I wrote a book about it – kind of.
But before then, though, we have a new Izzy Bromley title to look forward to! Table for Five will be published on 24th June and here’s the blurb for that one in case it tickles your fancy.
Abbie Finch loves her job.
Unfortunately, her boss doesn’t love her.
When she finds herself unexpectedly unemployed, Abbie realises that she’s let all her friendships fall by the wayside and has no one to turn to.
Lost and lonely, Abbie decides to leave her comfort zone and join the neighbourhood café’s community table. There she meets aloof, elegant Ethel, down-on-his-luck Bob, colourful, chaotic Dawn and recently relocated Viraj. Friends? Not yet. But when they decide to help the homeless people in their community by staging an extravagant fundraising event, will something that began as a good deed help Abbie find a way back to herself—and make lifelong friends at the same time?
This one is also available to preorder.
At the moment, I’m in the thick of writing the book for 2025, currently titled A Question of Loyalty. I’m spending a lot of my imagination time in Sicily in the 1980s which I’m enjoying. I was there then and you can read about that in a Substack Random Thought here.
One of the things I do when I’m writing is to research things as I go along. They generally have something to do with the story but often not much. At the end of the day, I close all the pages down on my browser and I often smile at how random they are. So just at the moment, I’m posting the most random of the random research pages on my Facebook page. The algorithm really isn’t going to know what to do with me when I’ve finished but I’m having fun.
What have I read?It’s been a proper mixed bunch this month but here are four that you might enjoy.
My Favourite Mistake by Marian Keyes is a glorious romp through the life of Anna Walsh. Daisy Buchanan said it was ‘furiously funny and stealthily profound’ and I really can’t top that. Like all Marian Keyes’ books, she covers difficult subjects with a feather-light touch and the Walsh family stories are all glorious. In fact, in reply to a recent reader post in my Book Café asking which literary character I would like to come to dinner, I requested any member of the Walsh family. I love them all.
A Change of Climate by Hilary Mantel is also about families but goes about telling its story in a very different way. Mantel writes with gentle humour as well but, as you might expect, this is much more literary in style and asks if there any transgressions that can never be forgiven. The story shifts between modern day Norfolk and an ill-fated mission in South Africa and looks at the deterioration of a marriage under the strain of a tragedy.
Karma by Boy George is the pop icon’s second autobiography but as he says himself, he has learned a lot since he penned the first one. From his childhood in 60s London in a big Irish Catholic family to the present day, he writes with great humour and self-awareness and a raw honesty about his mistakes. I was fascinated by his descriptions of the end of the 70s when culture was on the cusp of huge change. Because of my age, I recognised most of his references making it a trip down memory lane for me. I listened to him narrate the book and love how he bursts into spontaneous laughter at his own absurdity.
A disclaimer on this next one. Victoria Connolly is a friend of mine but I so enjoyed her new book that I wanted to recommend it. Introvert Abroad is a travel memoir about Victoria’s recent forays into solo travel. I don’t think she’ll mind if I say that her naivety about how airports work is totally charming, but despite her lack of experience she can be surprisingly brave when she wants to be. As someone who travels a lot on her own I really enjoyed sharing Victoria’s adventures.
And that’s your lot for this month.Coming up in May I have a walking holiday in Türkiye, a new country for me. There seem to be an awful lot of hills on our route so I’ll let you know how I get on. As ever, please check out my Instagram for photos and my Facebook page for chat. And if you’re looking for a warm community with fab book recommendations then pop over to our Book Café.
So, until next month, happy reading.
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April 24, 2024
Bluebell Season
It’s bluebell season here in Yorkshire. Despite the mud and the rain and the very chilly skies, up they push.
It’s not as good a crop as it sometimes is and the lack of warmth means that we don’t seem to have the scent, but they are still a sight to behold.
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April 7, 2024
Writers’ Retreat in Italy.
I’m so lucky to be back in the Tuscan countryside for the third time teaching a Writer’s Retreat.
And look. This time I have some help!
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April 2, 2024
It’s my monthly newsletter!
Where have I been?
Well, Croatia for a start. We hadn’t seen our boy since Christmas so we nipped over for a cheeky weekend. It’s the first time since he’s been there that we’ve gone out of the capital. We took a trip out to Plitvice National Park to see the lakes. It was breathtakingly beautiful but I was glad it was early in the season. I imagine it gets hugely busy in the summer.
I also spent some time in Lincoln which is one of my favourite cities. It was a flying visit but I had time to wander up Steep Hill very early in the morning and enjoy the solitude.
Final destination was London where I was wedding dress hunting with my three daughters – not for me, I hasten to add but for my eldest girl. It was such good fun and tears were shed. We also saw Operation Mincemeat. If you happen to be in London then I thoroughly recommend the show. It was excellent.
Book News!
Well, last month I promised you news and, as good as my word, here are not just one but two hot-off-the-press book covers for you. This is a proper sneak preview of A Borrowed Path because as I type this no one has seen this cover yet but you. I’m delighted with them both and am now really looking forward to getting my hands on the actual books. Table for Five, the next Izzy Bromley title will hit book shelves on 25th June which isn’t far away. A Borrowed Path is currently slated for the end of September but until the book goes up for pre-order I can’t confirm that. As soon as I know though I’ll let you know and share the book description with you too. In a nutshell, though, it’s a book about four generations of women from the same family living under one roof. Can you imagine the drama?! More about that next month.
My 2024 book covers.
Writing wise I’m up and running with my 2025 book A Question of Loyalty. The section I’m writing at the moment is set in 1981 so I’m immersed in all things eighties which is very nostalgic for me. I was fourteen in 1981 and just learning who I was. My character is twenty-one so her experience of life is different but I’m still trawling my memory for useful snippets to add texture and colour (and when that fails me there’s always Google!)
What have I read?
I’ve been a bit literary in my reading in March so my recommendations reflect that.
This month’s book recommentations.
In Memoriam by Alice Winn is a beautifully written debut novel about a group of young men thrust into the clutches of World War I before their time. Although too young to enlist, they do so to please others or because they feel it’s their duty. They are then forced to deal with the horrors of war before they have even finished growing up. It’s a very moving and surprisingly pacy read.
The Hunter by Tana French is a sequel to her previous book The Searcher but it can be read in isolation. Set in a rural community in western Ireland, it’s the story of a scam and how it affects a small town. When the conman is found dead on the nearby mountain tensions build, accusations fly and loyalties are tested. There are some great characters and the dialogue is fabulous.
The Wren The Wren by Anne Enright is another Irish novel (I can’t seem to get enough recently.) This one is about the relationship between mothers and daughters and each of their expectations. Nell, the daughter, is keen to escape and build her own life but can’t get away from the shadows of a past she doesn’t really understand. Her mother Carmel has kept much hidden but when Nell leaves home it brings old wounds to the surface. And there’s a domineering poet – what more does a book need!
Finally, and in a lighter vein, The List of Suspicious Things by Jennie Godfrey is a coming of age novel set in Yorkshire in 1981 (which is quite handy for my current WIP I realise as I type this!) The Yorkshire Ripper has the north of England terrified and so Miv and best friend Sharon decide to try and solve the murders themselves, focusing on anyone who seems suspicious to them from their immediate acquaintances. The girls manage to uncover no end of secrets and as a result learn far more about growing up than they could ever have expected.
And that’s everything for this month. If you enjoy my newsletter please consider sharing it with your friends. You could mention my books too! It’s hard to get the word out into the world, and word of mouth recommendations are absolutely the best kind.
Don’t forget that there are lots of book recommendations in my marvellous Facebook Book Café where the suggestions are always of the ‘you must read this’ variety and the coffee is always hot. If you’re more interested in visuals then hop over to my Instagram account. I’ll be in Italy in April so if that’s your thing then you might like to look at my pictures.
In the meantime, have a great month and happy reading.
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March 18, 2024
At the ballet
Croatian National Theatre, Zagreb
I’m here at the ballet. My son isn’t in tonight’s pieces but it’s great to see all the people I hear him talking about on stage. What a privilege.
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March 7, 2024
A Flying Visit
Lincoln is one of my favourite cities – that’s why I set In a Single Moment there. And I was lucky enough to be there very early this morning.
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