On Being Binge-Read

As I wait, anxiously, for publishers to break through the security cordon screaming, ‘Me, me! Let me be the one to publish your next undoubtedly brilliant novel’, I try to keep my chins up by staying productive. So how hath this little busy bee improved each shining hour during the past week? I repaired a skirt I haven’t been able to wear for months, I made half a litre of plum vodka and a jar of pickled prunes (looking good), went for a long and bracing walk along the seashore, and wrote a bit more of a book no-one may want.

Then I bumped into someone who brought me great joy and hope in these bleak times. ‘Laurie!’ she said, ‘I’m having such fun. I’m binge-reading everything you ever wrote!’

As far as I know this is my first instance of being binge-read and I can’t tell you how cockle-warming it is. Don’t ever be afraid to tell an author how much you like their books. Well…. perhaps tread carefully if they’re terribly grand or already laden with awards. Perhaps don’t approach too chummily if there’s a research assistant or bag-carrier trailing humbly in their wake. But generally speaking you can assume that any mid-list novelist is grateful for and touched by words of appreciation. Some of us don’t get out much, you know?

 

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