Meet Andrew Blackman, and enter to win a signed copy of 'On The Holloway Road'!

I'm thrilled to be introducing you to an award winning author, and fellow Londoner, Andrew Blackman. His debut novel, On the Holloway Road won the Luke Bitmead prize in 2008. I met Andrew through Goodreads about two years ago, and his novel remains one of my favourite books. I was attracted to the title, as I am from North London and know the Holloway Road well; in fact, I used to work in an office on the Holloway Road.
His novel is about two very different young men who form an unlikely friendship. They set off on an adventure together, full of entertaining twists and turns. The thing that struck me most about the book is that it is extremely well written; it reads as if it was penned by an author with years of fiction writing experience behind him.


On The Holloway Road is one of the books in my library that I want to read again.
If you haven't read it, you can enter a competition by leaving a comment on this blog post. Anyone who comments will be entered into a draw to win a signed copy of this award winning book. A winner will be picked at random on 10th May 2011.

Here are Andrew's answers to my interview questions:


Your debut novel, On the Holloway Road won the Luke Bitmead prize 2008. Can you tell us a bit more about that prize and how you went about entering the contest.

Luke Bitmead was a novelist for Legend Press who died at a tragically young age. His family set up the award in his memory, to give £2,500 and a publishing contract to the author of the best unpublished manuscript they received. I submitted my manuscript and won, and a year later On the Holloway Road was published. It’s an annual contest and is free to enter, so I’d encourage any unpublished writers to give it a try.

Your background is in journalism, and I understand you’ve written for The Wall Street Journal, and many other newspapers across America. How does writing non-fiction compare to writing fiction, and which do you prefer?

I prefer fiction, definitely. Free from the necessity to get the small facts right, I can explore larger truths. Journalism can often provide a very misleading view of the world – something is newsworthy because it’s the exception, not the rule. In my fiction I deal with people who are unexceptional in many ways, and in doing so I aim to explore what it means to be human, at least in this particular time and place. The Wall Street Journal was a great place to work, though. It has very high standards, and in my three years there I learned a lot about writing and editing my work, often under great time pressure. I stopped being so protective of my words and understood that they could be subjected to an almost infinite process of improvement.

When did you first discover your love of writing, and is there a particular author, or book, that inspired you to start writing?

I have always been quite shy, and struggle to express myself clearly in the heat of conversation - by the time I’ve thought of the right thing to say, it’s usually far too late! As a child I discovered that writing allowed me the time and tranquillity to come up with the right words and say what I really meant. In my early teen years I plunged into War and Peace, which took me months to read but introduced me to a whole new world. I loved the fact that as a teenager in suburban London I could live for a few hours each day in the Russia of the Napoleonic Wars. I decided that I wanted to create worlds of my own, to let other people visit them.

I read that you won the Daniel Singer essay prize. Can you tell us a bit more about that?

I won that prize in 2004, for an essay entitled “What is the Soul of Socialism?” I was working for The Wall Street Journal at the time, which is on the opposite end of the ideological spectrum, so I didn’t talk about it with my colleagues – I think I was the only socialist on the payroll, and would probably not have been on it much longer if they’d realised! But it was a wonderful experience, because it was the first time I’d been rewarded for writing something I really believed in. The essay was published in Monthly Review a year later – it’s still available online here – and I delivered a lecture based on the essay at the 2005 Left Forum at CUNY Graduate Center.

I thoroughly enjoyed On The Holloway Road. I found the characters very believable and realistic. Did you base the characters on people you know?

No, I didn’t base them on anyone I know. I’m always watching people, whether it’s friends and family or just people on the Tube, and if I something strikes me for whatever reason, I write it down in my notebook as soon as I get the chance. So I build up my characters from the physical attributes, facial tics, phrases and character traits of probably hundreds of different people, along with plenty of things I just make up.

Jack and Neil, the two main characters in On the Holloway Road, are very different, and yet they form a friendship based on their view of the world.

Which one of the characters can you most relate to, and why?

I relate to both of them, and in some ways they reflect different sides of my own personality. Jack is drifting, lonely, depressed, looking for meaning, while Neil is more energetic and boisterous, but also quite childlike and naïve in his expectations of people. They are both in their own ways looking for something more out of life, a way to live more authentically, and this is something I relate to very strongly.

Jack is an aspiring novelist. Is any part of the novel autobiographical?

Congratulations, you’ve hit on the only part of the book that is autobiographical! The road trip and the events are all fictional, but Jack’s struggles with his long, turgid literary novel are strongly based on my own experiences with a novel I was writing before On the Holloway Road, a novel that has not been and never will be published. I think I was trying too hard, and began writing On the Holloway Road as a way to escape for a while and find the enjoyment of writing again. I wrote fast, spontaneously, and completed the first draft in a month. To my amazement it was better than the novel I’d spent years struggling with, and so I abandoned the old one and felt very free as a result.

Jack Kerouac’s On the Road was obviously a great influence for your novel. What was it about that book that captured your imagination?

When I read the book at different points in my life, I got different things from it. As a teenager, probably like many people, I was intoxicated by the glamour and excitement of a road trip across the vast open spaces of America, the free-wheeling life of parties and hitch-hiking. But when I went back to it more recently, I was struck by the ultimate failure of Sal and Dean’s mission. For all the travelling back and forth across the continent, they keep ending up back where they started, with everything broken – for all the imagery of the straight open road, it’s actually quite a circular novel. I was interested in how a similar trip would play out in the more narrow confines of 21st century Britain.

Who are your favourite authors and what is it about their writing that you like?

I love Milan Kundera,Kazuo Ishiguro, andJorge Luis Borges, because their stories make me think about the world in a new way. Beautiful writing is not enough, for me – I look to books to introduce me to new worlds and to challenge my assumptions. A couple of writers I’ve come across more recently and been very impressed by are Preeta Samarasan and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

Is there a book you own that you’ve read more than once?

I’ve read the Tao Te Ching more times than I can count. It’s on my nightstand and I turn to it whenever I am feeling lost or confused.

What was the last book you read?

Edgelandsby Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts.

Are you reading a book at the moment?

Yes, I’m reading .A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters by Julian Barnes. I’m also listening to an audio book of To Kill a Mockingbird.

What do you think of ebooks?

Not much! I have always loved books, and currently don’t see an ebook offering anything that a physical book doesn’t (at least in fiction – in non-fiction or reference I can certainly see that the ability to search by keyword and to include videos or other material would enhance the reading experience). For me, novels are a respite from the world of gadgets and electronic screens. Everyone always tells me how great it is that I can carry hundreds of books with me at once, but I’ve never wanted to do that – one at a time is enough for me!

How important are reviews for you as a writer?

Reviews are vital, as they are one of the main ways that people find out about your book. For On the Holloway Road I didn’t get too many reviews in the national papers – just a short review in the Daily Mail – but all the reviews on sites like Amazon and Goodreads are very much appreciated. It’s also great to hear from readers even if they don’t write a formal review, but just email me or leave a comment on my blog.

How did you go about choosing a cover for your book?

My publisher, Legend Press, handled that side of things. I was happy with what they did – I’d probably have gone for something obvious like a road stretching off into the distance, but they had a graphic designer work on it and came up with something much darker and more abstract, which fits the content of the book perfectly.

What are you working on now?

I’ve just finished work on a second novel, called A Virtual Love, which is about love in the age of Twitter and Facebook, and am starting on a third one now.

Where can people buy your books?

It’s in a lot of bookshops – not as many as when it first came out in 2009, but check there first. They can always order it within 24 hours so it’s usually faster than online ordering. Or you can go online and order a physical copy or ebook from the usual suspects – Amazon UK, Amazon US, the Book Depository, Waterstones, etc. If you want a signed copy, you can buy it direct through my website – I’m currently offering free worldwide shipping (for a limited time, so might not be available if you’re reading this some time in the future!).

Thank you, Andrew, for answering my questions :) Your new novel sounds intriguing. Can't wait until it's released!




Remember, by leaving a comment on this blog post you can enter to win a signed copy of Andrew's book! This is an international competition. Good luck!!