Kerry Hudson's Blog, page 10

The paperback landeth

Hello, I cannae believe it’s been a whole beautiful, brilliant year since Tony Hogan came out. And this Thursday the 4th July the slightly smaller but equally as lovely Tony Hogan paperback comes out. I was so scared this time last year. I mean actual blind terror. I’m less scared now (except of…not being able to write any more, not being able to pay the bills, tripping when I get out of the shower and having to be rescued naked, my hip flexors, running out of butter, Rhianna videos, the hairdressers). Anyway, my point is, like all things, I’m trying to enjoy it as much as I can. Would you like to do something to help me celebrate? Yes? You wee smashers you.

Here are some things: 

1. I’m having a blog tour. Please make the hosts glad they hosted me and me glad I wrote them by reading, commenting, retweeting…you know the drill. Here are all the places: 

I start today over at The Writes of a Woman blog talking, fittingly, about the inspiring women in my life; my family of fishwives, and how the stories they spun became the story I wrote. Next I’m off to the Little Reader Librarywhere I’ll talk about the thrills (and terrors) of the first rollercoaster year of publication. On the 4th I’ll take you to beautiful beach-side bookshop, with delicious cake and a cinema projector as I conjure my fantasy bookshop over at Writer’s Little Helper. On the 5th I’ll be clicking my mouse to see what Catherine Noblemade of Tony Hogan… and on the 6th I’ll be discussing the inspiration behind the book over at Today I’m Reading. As a woman who loves London it made sense for me to share some of my favourite London writing spots with Zehra Cranmer (and all of you) on the 8th and the next day I’ll be hot-footing it over to A Salted to talk about writing that ‘difficult second novel’. If you want a little taster then why not visit my mate Russ’s website where he asked me 20 very good questions…which I then answered.

2. Enter the competition and get a book for FREE (yes, the book is Tony Hogan) all you need to do is tweet me with a Tony Hogan soundtrack suggestion with the hashtag #tonyhogantune and you might WIN. There’s ten (ten!) books up for grabs.  

3. If you read and liked/loved/were mildly indifferent but are prepared to be creative Tony Hogan please leave an online review somewhere…it really does make a difference.

4. Wish me luck as I visit London’s Indie’s on Friday with goodie bags of 1980’s sweetie smackerie and a big ‘please be nice to me this sort of thing makes me nervous’ smile.

So that’s me. Let’s do it. 

 

Would you like a sneak peek?

…of the Penguin US Tony Hogan cover? Yes? OK…here it is. There will still be a few changes here and there before publication in January but this is the gist of it….bloody blistering eh? Bloody beautiful. I am delighted.

Otherwise I’m preparing for the UK paperback launch of Tony Hogan on 4th July this includes writing articles, doing a blog tour, shopping for Smash and Angel Delight and working out how far across London my little 1970’s red folding bike will actually take me. And, still in marathon training, I am running. I am doing an awful, awful lot of running (and toast eating too). Wish me luck! 

 

The longest Tumbl ever...

Hello. I am watching Parks and Recreation in the background. I’ve just eaten an apple, rosemary ham and emmental cheese in slices and I am absolutely, totally knackered. There, just setting the scene (and asking for more than the usual slack on typos). 

In the last two weeks I went to the West Dunbartonshire Booked Festival. I did a solo talk (they’re the scariest events by far…just you and a piece of paper that made sense when you practiced it at home). It was the nicest event I’ve done in ages. Members of the knitting group made cake and Allan and Richard, the organisers, looked after me so well. In the morning I walked along the edge of Loch Lomond it was pretty bloody lovely.

I was home a day before a flew off to the Festival du Premier in Chambery. Along with a host of French debuts, seven international writers are selected by a reading committee. My fellow Brit was the absolutely lovely Elizabeth Haynes. In between events (including a translation session where everyone in the room was stumped by ‘Angel Delight’) I ate a lot cheese, visited a wonderful Hammam I at first suspected was a brothel (it wasn’t, they had mint tea, no brothel has mint tea) and wandered the rainy but gorgeous streets of Chambery. One of the audience gave me a bunch Lily of the Valley from their garden. Again, pretty bloody lovely.

THEN… a day after that I went up to Tynemouth where I stayed in a beautiful guesthouse, stuffed myself with fish and chips and then stuffed myself into a wetsuit to be rough-tumbled by the North Sea during a surfing lesson that left my dignity in shreds, roses in my cheeks and me with every intention of trying to conquer a surfboard again….all in the name of journalism…so far the piece is mainly me explaining why I needed lots of cake and chips for sustenance. This is why…look at the beast of a day I took on…

THEN, THEN I came home and packed up all of my things put half of them in storage, filmed a wee film for Random House, then moved to a new little shared flat in Shoreditch. 

THEN…then it was the Author’s Club Best First Novel ceremony. All of Team Tony Hogan turned out (my editor, agent, publicist, and two of my closest friends) to…see me be the bridesmaid again. That’s five times, five, I’ve donned the shortlistee peach taffeta. On Monday night the brides were Ros Barber and I J Kay both very deserving indeed. Like all good bridesmaids I enjoyed the party, drank, ate, was merry and genuinely grateful just to be at a celebratory occasion. I would like to get to wear the big white frock at some point though…

Hello? has anyone made it this far? Thank you if you have. My next event is TONIGHT. It is FREE and is part of the Holloway Arts Festival.

Then on Saturday I’m taking part in the debut event at Stokey Litfest. I have pretty much campaigned for this spot, I am a novelist squatter on the panel, and the organisers have been lovely and let me squeeze in so please do come. It’s free and in a really good bar in Stokey.

Phew…see? Aren’t you just knackered reading that? I’m off for a wee nap.   

    

Come see me and other people

So I am no longer slave to office cubicle or, as Douglas Coupland so rightly called it, the veal pen. I am now a full-time writer and freelancer of um…words. Yes, that’s it, Kerry Hudson: Word Freelancer. Catchy right? If only I hadn’t already ordered my business cards which say, enigmatically I like to think, only ‘Kerry Hudson’.

Anyway, as accustomed as I have become to sitting on my morning commute responding to multiple writing work emails with a croissant jammed under one armpit, my headphones cord choking me, and my coffee clamped scorchingly between my knees, I am very, very happy indeed. 

So much so that I went out celebrating and caused carnage on the dancefloor below ( wearing jeans, t-shirt and trainers - the best dancing clothes obviously) that is, until 1am hit, when all I wanted was cheese on toast and jumper. Old age is so cruel.

This week I also got to fulfill a dream by reading at Foyles in Charing Cross. I used to go there and watch writers read and think ‘oh, maybe one day…’ It was the reading evening for The Author’s Club First Book Prize shortlist and a good event with all the right things: lovely authors, a great chair, a big, interested audience and free wine. If it hadn’t been for my unfortunate slippy dress/tall stool combo it would have been perfect. Anyway here we all are…from left: Suzi Feay, Lloyd Sheppard, Me, Ros Barber, Patrick Flanery, Sarah Ridgard…

Lastly, Scots, French people, PLEASE come see me over the next week…

Tomorrow night (20th) I’m doing a talk on the writing of Tony Hogan for Dunbarton Booked Festival at Balloch Library it’s free but you need to book: http://www.bookedfestival.info/adult-events/kerry-hudson/

Then I’m off to the Festival du Premier Roman in Chambery. I’m doing lots of events over the weekend. So if you’re in France come eat some cheese with me (that’s not an official programmed event, but still) http://www.festivalpremierroman.com/ED26/auteurs_europeens.html

I’m also doing some events in June including ‘Family Affairs’, part of the Holloway Arts Festival, on the 6th June and ‘Speak Easy’ at Drink, Shop, Do on the 12th June. 

Just as well I’m a Word Freelancer now eh? Wish me luck!

Life, work and running

Life

April was incredible but it almost broke me. After a month of working full-time, including London Marathon my busiest day job event of the year, celebrating the selling of Thirst for a near full week, and shuttling up and down the country attending the Aye Write Festival, Fire Station Bookswap, Polari and two events at Liverpool Literary Festival, I took to my bed for a full day to sleep and occasionally wake up mewling like a kitten before falling back into a sweaty slumber. Friends this is what happens when you do not allow your body to rest for 31 days. Do not do this. Actually DO do this…it was an incredible, joyful month. Here is a very tiny selection of my best bits:

Getting the Programme Director gossip in the green room at the Aye Write Fetsival after my event with Karen Campbell (she’s lovely and the lady talks sense) before proclaiming that I was off to ‘spend some time rolling about in my giant bed’ back at the hotel (it was a really, impressively big bed)// Telling the assembled audience at Bookswap that I’d take all my clothes off and dance around if the four minute warning sounded (I know, but it was the first thing that occurred to me…) and being shored up by the very funny indeed Will LeFlemming, Marie Phillips and Scott Pack // reading at the Southbank Centre and sharing a stage with the legendary Celia Imrie at Polari // spending a few days with the fabulous Simon Savidge rockpooling and eating caterpillar meringues at Liverpool Literary Festival after taking part in an event on class and publishing where the audience came prepared with (sometimes clipboards) of questions at a local community centre. As they would say in The ‘Pool is was bosker (actually I’m unsure if they would say that in Liverpool at all).

Work

On the 23rd April I posted this on Facebook ‘In ten minutes I’m going to walk into my boss’s office and quit my job to be a full-time writer. I think I’ll remember this sunny morning.’ So that’s it. As of May 17th I’m a writer proper. I can put it on forms in the occupation space and everything. I am going to focus on teaching creative writing and running my own workshops on finding the time, space and courage to make the jump and start writing your first novel. And writing, I’ll be doing lots of that too. I keep telling people I’m leaving work to go freelance but I haven’t worked out what I’m freelancing at yet. Anyway, if you want to hire me for um…something please do – I need some summer sandals and a haircut sometime this year.

Running

I am spending a lot of time in Lycra, sweating like Barry White, doing pointy finger dancing to my running compilation, knotting up my arms and legs in ‘stretches’ and doing walking lunges in front of highly amused basketball teams. Yep, I’m going to run Berlin Marathon on September 29th for Freedom from Torture. So I’m running, yoga-ing and swimming up a storm. I want to say it is horrible because otherwise everyone will be disgusted with me but actually tiny voice I’m loving it, the most painful thing by far has been dropping some dollar on these ugly (but now beloved) special trainers. Between you and me I spend a lot of time fantasising I’m in an 80’s reinvention film (think Rocky, Private Benjamin, Terminator)…it’s not in any running book but by God it works a treat.

Never let it be said I do not milk a celebration

I’m thrilled and delighted and bloody cock-a-hoop generally to say that Chatto and Windus will officially be publishing my second novel, Thirst. I have loved every minute of working with Chatto (and their paperback imprint Vintage) on Tony Hogan so I’m thrilled to do it all over again with my new book. 

It seems I was actually doing something apart from cycling on my wee red bike, eating banana splits and watching Ingmar Bergman films at Cinematheque while in Hanoi. I wrote a love story too. 

I found out on Friday staring at a piece of graffiti saying ‘Stoner’ - there was a smiley face in the ‘o’ which I took as a good sign. 

This morning finds me gulping down a bucket sized black coffee and dancing on train platforms to this (listen you will dance with a giant smile on your face too) after a weekend of celebrations which included Mexican photography, Red Stripe and New Yorkers in Bowie masks, Soviet musicals, mock-up Japanese city plans, Guinness and folk music in a tiny pub, scampi and chips and a bedroom disco, afternoon Champagne and brownies and toddler piggybacks. Basically me just smiling like a loon for days. 

Like I say, I know how to milk a celebration. 

Never mind me what are you all up to?

Me? Working full-time again - on my commute I cocoon myself in a cave of music and dance on train platforms. Getting in my latest set of Thirst revisions in (yeehaa!) by the skin of my teeth, fueled by cake (porny picture thereof below) and Day Nurse and True Grit (yes, true grit my friends). Seeing some beautiful films like In the House (gorgeous cast and some fine acting) and The Late Quartet (where Philip Seymore-Hoffman broke my wee heart and had me weeping into my chocolate covered popcorn). Thinking about my next project (it might involve me travelling nomad style around Britain’s council estates). Meeting and chattering with the Green Carnation judges (lovely, just fucking lovely, the lot of em) and plowing(ish) through the books (there will be over 50, I am braced). Seeing art like the Bernadette Corporation at the ICA (as BC itself would say both dope and, like, nothing) and Black Eyes and Lemonade at The Whitechapel (it is glorious and witty and nostaligic). And writing a near-unreadable parenthesis laden paragraphs like this. 

I am also doing some stuff in April. Good, exciting STUFF: 

First up I’m at the Aye Write Festival in Glasgae appearing with the lovely Karen Campbell at 6pm on the 16th April 

Later in the month Simon Savidge will be putting me through my paces with not one but two panels at Liverpool Literary Festival. The first on Council Estate of the Mind: Literature and Class (29th April, 6.30pm – 7.30pm , Kuumba Imani, Millennium Centre Cafe, 4 Princes Road, Liverpool, L8 1TH with James Smythe and Claire McGowan) AND THEN on a debuts panel with Beatrice Hitchman, Sarah Butler, Gavin Extence and John Ironmonger (30th April, 6.30pm – 7.30pm , The Attic, 33-35 Parr Street, Liverpool L1 4JN) More details to be had on Simon’s website

Now? Now I’m going to put on old man pyjamas, eat some Marmite and toast and watch some Masterchef on my creaky little laptop.

Anyway, never mind me, what have you lot been up to? 

This is late because I am buried under a pile of work and compressed to about the size of a human Oxo Cube.

Travel friendly at least.

Anyhow, I was dead chuffed to be on this list naming Alex Clarke’s 20 possible hopeful contenders for the every-decade-and-legendary Granta ‘20 Under 40 list’ Thank very much indeed Alex.

And it was in the proper paper and everything….

I was robbed (again (not really))

So on Tuesday day I went through the Southbank Sky Arts Awards looking glass and had one of the strangest and funnest days ever. My choices in advance were simple: succumb to the terror of of P.E.N. (Posh Event Nerves as coined by my fabulously glamorous agent and Awards side-kick) or just enjoy the fuck out of it. I chose the latter. 

It was starry. Really, really starry. Julie Walters (one of my all-time heroes) accidentally nudged me and said sorry (that’s a word from her to me…I just grinned like a loon), Jessie Ware did a beautiful performance, we queued for the toilets behind Twiggy and shared a table with national treasure Grayson Perry, his fabulous wife Philippa Perry, the completely lovely Celia from Sky and Russell Kane…all brilliant company. Juliet got chatted up by beautifully tressed Cumberbatch (actually he asked her where we got our Raspberry Mojito’s but in my head that’s a declaration of love…). I finally got to meet Louise Welsh who’s been on my ‘give them a massive thank you and tell them I think they’re lovely list’ forever. Victoria Wood presented Julie with the lifetime achievement award, Melvin Bragg wrestled curling his tongue around my title and Hilary did a great video acceptance speech…I love that woman. If I’m going to lose to someone for the rest of my days, Ms Mantel’s my first choice.

So Hills got the gong and I got the fun. I squeed and grinned and stared all pop-eyed at all the starry folk like a cocktail-dressed, over-blow-dryed palomino pony. In no way did I play it cool. But I did have an absolute fucking ball.

I finished the evening eating pizza and drinking stout in my posh frock at the pub at the top of my road with a dear friend. As Tuesday’s go…yep, pretty bloody awesome really.  

Kerry Hudson: Deposhing even the poshest of events...

Hello. I am covered in toast crumbs trying to line my stomach before a 12 noon drinks reception.

I have a nice red manicure. I am moisturised to within an inch of my life. I am still wearing my pyjama bottoms and a hoodie.

In a wee while I’ll put on the black cocktail dress (that’s right people, I bought a cocktail dress) try on the 27 different shades of lipstick I’ve bought to match my ‘can’t believe my luck’ expression, hop into a taxi and go off to the Southbank Sky Arts Awards at the Dorchester where I’m hoping to see Hills continue her blaze of glory. I intend to smile ear to ear, enjoy the grub and bubbles and celebrate every minute of being nominated. 

Also, I’m aware that some of you may think I’m currently in a claw-footed bathtub filled with patisserie in Paris bemoaning my Anglo un-jutting collarbone. In fact, I’m at my kitchen table in my new lovely house, in my beloved Hackney eating lemon curd yogurt. I’m here to stay for a good long while and very happy about it too. 

Ok. I’m off to dance around my bedroom in my pants and curlers…wish me luck!