Kerry Hudson's Blog, page 14

This is a slightly grainy picture of me reading my proper, actual book. It has flaps. A blurb. An author picture thus proving I wrote it. There are no words that aren't high-pitched noises denoting excitement and amazement

News (less flash) more tiny spark

So it has been a quietish week but I thought I’d do a little update all the same. Otherwise I’ll get that guilt thing and I’ll be thinking, Jesus, I better come up with something really good to blog about, I’ve been away for a while, maybe I should invent an injury? Say I eloped? Something to do with the Marshmallow Man… Anyway, I digress. I am a bit tired today though so I’m going to use lazy bullet-points, I feel worse about it than you do. 

»> I went to see the lovely @suzyjoinson read at the launch of Her Royal Majesty (edition 12) at the London Review of Books. It was a corking evening, I met the very charming @petermoore (his book, Damn His Blood, is out in four weeks) saw DW Wilson and Ross Sutherland read, ate a gluten free cupcake, feasted my ears on some violin and kora. 

»> I am running a lot and pumping a (very) little bit of iron and generally fantasizing I’m in a working-class-girl-turned-boxer movie. Occasionally one of the gym personal trainers will wheel their black lycra’d biceps in my direction, the conversation goes like this: 

Biceps (pulling Charles Atlas type poses): Seen you here a lot. 

Me (I cannot breathe. I think the last two minutes on the cross-trainer just disintegrated my large intestine) Gnnhmmmmggr

Biceps (Lunging): What are you in training for? 

Me (now just barely able to breathe, I think there is a chunk of lung stuck in my throat): I’m training to stay sane while my first book is published

Biceps (legs dangling, staring into a mirror while he does chin-ups): What was that?

Me (Finally able to breathe though the ability to walk will take around forty minutes to return) To eat pies, eat lots and lots of pies. 

Biceps runs off at the utterance of white carbs to say seven Hail Marys

»> I’ve been writing a first person article for a Sunday newspaper’s glossy magazine. I was enjoying it until I looked at the circulation figures (2 million) and gave myself the holy terrors. It’ll be published in July to coincide with Tony Hogan’s launch.

»> The lovely Jessica Patient posted this LOVELY review of Tony Hogan. How could she know that ‘awesome’ is my very most overused word (that and lovely)

»> I saw my first ladybird of the summer. It makes me glad of heart that stuff like this still makes me smile

I did it (twice)

So the April madness is behind me. I delivered my project in my day job finishing 17 days on the trot with a 75 hour week during which I did nothing but work, eat a microwaveable plastic box of pasta, sleep and do the same all over again. Day 5 into the 17 banned my colleagues from calling it ‘our £1 million project’ because the name was terrifying. Anyway, it all went well and everyone is happy - including me - and I get my life back. 

I’ve used my few days off since to work intensively on those final Thirst nips and tucks and I sent Thirst off to my agent at 8am on Friday on a wing and a prayer with a little celebratory pyjama dance. Again, I am very happy indeed.

I thought, no, promised myself, that I would get so drunk my fingers went numb when I had a few days off from both the money job and writing job but instead this weekend I’ve eaten huge quantities (Japanese feasts, slabs of buttery sour dough toast, Bodean’s BBQ, coconut muffins, salted caramel tart, triple fried chips with yogurt and harissa). Thankfully I have also run every day - fast, short, joyful runs with my music up loud (I would like to apologise to the man who caught me doing a hyperventilated version of ‘Dirty Cash’ because I thought I was alone in the running room). I read HEFT (which chopped my beating heart into tiny pieces and then reshaped into a meat patty between its persuasive sweaty palms). I’ve been to see Brains at the Wellcome Collection (brilliant and a bit mind-boggling if you’ll pardon the the pun) and the incredible Sony World Photography prize (this is one of my favourites…)

                      

Now though it’s back to work - Tony Hogan won’t sell itself, it’s out in a mere blink-of-the-eye-eight-weeks and I’ve magazine features to write, student talks to prepare and bloggers arms to twist (I’m planning a blog tour competition with a very special prize). On your marks, get set….etc.  

Avert your eyes people it's a love in over here

Okay, so first I sent The Bookseller my ode of love and devotion and now they respond with this little doozie of a review. Bookseller, I think I’m ready to give you a drawer, maybe a few coat hangers, I’ll even let you join in with my carb Friday.* 

Seriously (seriously though Bookseller, maybe we should go on a mini-break?), this is my first review  of Tony Hogan and all the better because it is a Booksellers’ Choice, because the booksellers I know read *a lot* of books and have high standards for what they’ll recommend. It’s by Cathy Rentzenbrink of Waterstone’s and I am pleased as punch. Thank you kindly Cathy!

 

* As long as it’s understood you stick to your plate of chips Bookseller, I’ll stick to mine.

Ode To The Bookseller: A Dream Come True

Earlier this week my friend and fellow writer Jessica (@jessicapatient - follow her!) sent me a picture of Tony Hogan in The Bookseller magazine. Even in my pre-project-delivery-phase-husk-of-my-former-self-state it absolutely made my day.

It is a little mention spread over two pages but genuinely it is a dream come true for me. Years ago, when I started writing short stories for competitions and lit mags, I discovered The Bookseller and read it rapt. There was the seemingly un-understandable machinations of the world of publishing laid bare. I used to read the ‘Rights’ sections and daydream, sitting at my window in Hackney, scrolling through Zoetrope, sweating about how I would make space to write and pay the rent (some things never change…).

So good folk of The Bookseller, I thank you for making that daydream come true. I am thrilled. Being in the The Bookseller, so ‘proper’ and so ‘establishment’ (in just the right kind of way) that it is all almost starting to feel real for me. 

[image error]

[image error]

Vintage Spring

So I have been quiet I know. I am working 50+ hour weeks until my project at work is delivered at the end of April. I got a bout of brutal flu. I am squeezing in the writing wherever I can. What’s that I hear squeaking away in the corner? The world’s smallest violin? 

Alright, I’m alright and I’ll stop moaning. I’m getting a fair bit of satisfaction from the auld day-job and am gladdened to have such warm, supportive workmates. I lost a fair few pounds of Writer’s Arse while I had the flu. Thirst, my second novel, is just waiting for a bit of spit and polish (tidying of inconsistencies, strengthening of a few scenes) and then it is going off into the world. It’s all ok and I have been assured when whimpering at my desk at 8pm over a Pret tuna baguette that come May my life is going to be brilliant. Or at least I’ll have hours to waste on wandering in London again. And faffing on the internet. 

The Tony Hogan train rolls on too; I’m getting some interviews booked in, proofs have gone out to people for blurbs and here I am with a host of very talented women indeed on the Vintage Podcast. Enjoy.

                                  

See you in May good folks. 

99 Reasons Why - In which I host an ending from the lovely Caroline's new book

The very charming Caroline Smailes has a new book out. If you buy it (you should) you get a choice of nine endings. But because she is indeed lovely she gave us this one for gratis. Enjoy. 

99: the reason why I was only worth ninety-nine quid

It's been six days since the little girl in the pink coat went missing and me Uncle Phil's in me bedroom.

We've been watching the little girl in the pink coat's mam on the news. She was appealing to the public for witnesses.

'Didn't realise she had a mam,' I says, looking at me telly.

'Everyone's got a mam, pet,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

'She sold her story to The Sun,' I says, looking at me telly.

'Got a few quid,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

I nod.

'She wanted nowt to do with that bairn before all this,' me Uncle Phil says, looking at me telly.

'Do you know where she is?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

'Belle?' me Uncle Phil asks me.

I nod.

'She's safe,' me Uncle Phil says to me. 'Your mam's keeping an eye on her.'

'Can I be her mam?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

'No, pet, you're a filthy whore,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

I nod.

'Can you make Andy Douglas come back, Uncle Phil?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

Me Uncle Phil shakes his head.

'I love him,' I tell me Uncle Phil.

'Andy Douglas is your brother, pet. You didn't seriously think Princess Di was your mam, did you?' me Uncle Phil asks me.

I nod.

'You're a cradle snatcher just like your mam,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

I nod.

'Your mam miscarried when she found out I'd been banging Betty Douglas. Betty was expecting you,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

I don't speak.

'When you was born, your mam went mad and I ended up buying you from Betty Douglas for ninety-nine quid,' me Uncle Phil says.

'Ninety-nine quid?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

'I paid a hundred but got a quid change for some chips for your mam and dad's tea,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

'You bought me?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

I'm a little bit sick in me mouth.

'It was the right thing to do,' me Uncle Phil says to me. 'I got Betty Douglas pregnant straight away with Andy.'

'I'm pregnant,' I says to me Uncle Phil. 'I'm pregnant with me brother's baby,' I says, and then I throws up on me purple carpet.

'You're a filthy whore,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

'What am I going to do?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

'You're going to have the baby,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

'Have me brother's baby?' I asks me Uncle Phil.

'Then I'm giving it to Betty Douglas to bring up,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

'You what?' I says to me Uncle Phil.

'It's the right thing to do,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

'I can't—' I says to me Uncle Phil.

'It's either that or I'll make you disappear,' me Uncle Phil says to me.

I don't speak.

I'm thinking, they're all a bunch of nutters.

Good eh? Buy it. Buy it now. Here or here.

In which I conquer disbelief

Yesterday, my wonderful agent (@julietpickering) tweeted the pictures of my proofs. When I got home that night my copies where waiting for me too. I stood on my doorsteep, in the drizzle and ripped open the padded envelope, turned the bound proof over in my hands, flicked the pages, smoothed my fingers across the cover. Genuinely, I can hardly believe it is actually happening. Bound proofs are effectively BOOKS. But there are my words on the pages, it has my name on the cover and my picture on the back so I guess I can finally be sure there hasn't been some sort of mix-up - I am actually going to have a book in bookshops in a few months *insert stream of excited swears here*.

So! Feast your eyes. And if there's any reviewers/booksellers/journalists/book groups etc who'd like a proof just email me at kerrythudson@gmail.com or DM me @Kerryswindow

  

The will, the way and carbohydrates

So I have started a new writing regime and it seems to be working. Though it is only in its second day so perhaps that's a premature statement. Anyway, this isn't really about the new regime but how writers, this writer at least, write when they also work full-time. 

Like many I work full-time as well as writing novels. I'm lucky in the respect that I write fairly quickly by most standards, in that I wrote the first draft of Thirst in about six months: two of them full-time and four of them wherever I could shoehorn in a few hours with Dave and Alena, Hackney and Siberia. 

I'm really close to Thirst being finished enough I think. Like weeks away from finished enough. And by 'finished enough' I mean there's still work to do but I'm able show it to others without finding the nearest bar and getting numb-fingered-drunk at the thought of someone else reading it - though I still might do that in celebration.

But. My job. The one that pays for my nice coffees, movie tickets and jumble sale tat (and less essential things like sustenance). It is a proper job, I've worked around the same area for the last seven years but knowing it's your responsibility to raise over £1 million for a charity you're very invested in means you end up working pretty damn hard at it. Mostly after a ten hour day what I want to do is go home, put on tracksuit bottoms and mainline white carbohydrates. But I'm not alone in that am I? 

So what is the answer to that balancing act? I don't know really to be honest, I'm working it out. Right now I'm trying early mornings - 6.30 to be exact, when I work for an hour - I like the semi-consciousness. If that doesn't work next week I'll do lunch breaks; hunched in Pret muttering about donkeys and vodka when I return to my desk. I wrote almost the whole first draft of Thirst wedged under armpits on the District Line, so that's an option. I'll text myself little paragraphs in the queue at Tesco's. I'll tell everyone, they'll understand, that I just don't have time for them. I'll use the alpha-fridge-magnets while waiting for the kettle to boil.

In short, my time is short but so is the distance Dave, Alena and I now have to travel.   

My grandma had many sayings (one she was particularly fond of used the c-word 5 times) but she always said, when times were tight or we were up against it, 'Where there's a will, there's a way.'

I couldn't say it better myself.  

No longer naked...

Tony Hogan that is. So here we have it with its beautiful bold colours and graphic illustration. A wonderful set of clothes for my book. Almost ready to be seen out in the world…I love it.

The cover definitely pulls at the energy and humour of the book, the sweet parts of Janie and her family. But then there is the council estate in the background suggesting all the the things, good and bad, that comes of people living hard-up against it and in such close proximity. And there's Janie, in her jeans and t-shirt, wild hair flying behind her, jumping as though that big red balloon filled with her thoughts would simply lift her away into the bright blue Scottish sky; caught in that perfect moment before, inevitably, she'll be back on the cracked pavement slabs, feet fizzing, ready to try and reach the clouds again.