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122 Katie Fforde | Romance Author
461 Plays2 years ago
#1 best-selling romance author, Katie Fforde is on the show to talk about her writing and publishing adventures leading up to receiving the RNA's Lifetime Achievement Award this year.
Signing up to the Patreon will give you access to the Discord server, where you'll be able to interact directly with Jamie as well as many of the previous agents, authors and editors who have been on the show. You'll also be able to see who the upcoming guests are and put forward questions for Jamie to ask them.
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The Chosen Ones and Other Tropes
Jamie, Melissa and Noami talk about the best and the worst writing tropes!
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Introduction
00:00:00
Speaker
So our podcast is called Right and Wrong.
00:00:01
Speaker
Are these your notes?
00:00:03
Speaker
Are these your notes about what we're going to say?
00:00:06
Speaker
Anything is a short answer.
00:00:08
Speaker
So how many novels did you not finish?
00:00:11
Speaker
Oh my God, so many.
00:00:13
Speaker
It was perfect.
00:00:14
Speaker
What are you talking about?
00:00:15
Speaker
This is not a good one.
00:00:17
Speaker
Ooh, a spicy question.
00:00:19
Speaker
I love it.
00:00:20
Speaker
This is it, guys.
00:00:21
Speaker
The big secret to getting published is you have to write a good book.
00:00:25
Speaker
I'm going to hear first.
00:00:29
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to the Right and Wrong podcast.
00:00:32
Speaker
On today's episode, I'm very lucky to be joined by the winner of the RNA's 2023 Lifetime Achievement Award, number one bestselling author, the godmother of romantic fiction.
00:00:45
Speaker
It's Katie Ford.
00:00:47
Speaker
Hi, Katie.
00:00:48
Speaker
Welcome to the podcast.
00:00:49
Speaker
Hello.
00:00:50
Speaker
Hello.
00:00:50
Speaker
Lovely to be here.
00:00:52
Speaker
Oh, it's such a pleasure to have you.
00:00:53
Speaker
Let's get into it because there's a lot of things that I'd love to talk about.
00:00:57
Speaker
Starting off with your latest novel, One Enchanted Evening, which came out earlier this year in March.
Overview of "One Enchanted Evening"
00:01:05
Speaker
Tell us a little bit about it.
00:01:07
Speaker
Well, this book is the third in a little series of three so far of books that I've set in the 60s.
00:01:16
Speaker
This was a first for me.
00:01:17
Speaker
I'm not writing full on contemporary novels, but actually once I got into it, I really did love it.
00:01:24
Speaker
It's about three girls who meet at a cookery college school, little school.
00:01:29
Speaker
which very, very much resembles the one I went to myself, although I went slightly later.
00:01:35
Speaker
I just thought the 60s are slightly sexier than the 70s.
00:01:39
Speaker
So I thought I'll set my books in the 60s.
00:01:42
Speaker
And these three girls meet there and they all have different reasons for being at the college, at this little cookery school.
Character Deep Dive: Lizzie, Alexandra, and Meg
00:01:50
Speaker
And they each have a story.
00:01:53
Speaker
The first story, a wedding in the country, is about Lizzie, whose mother has sent her to the school to learn to cook so she can get a suitable husband.
00:02:02
Speaker
And as far as Lizzie's mother is concerned, that means a bank manager or someone who can be a member of the local golf club.
00:02:11
Speaker
And then the next one, a wedding in Provence, is about Alexandra, who is an heiress and quite eccentric.
00:02:19
Speaker
And quite independent.
00:02:20
Speaker
And she's been living in this enormously run down but huge posh house in Belgravia without any of her guardians knowing really what she's been up to.
00:02:32
Speaker
Anyway, they find out what she's been up to and they insist that she joins them in Switzerland to go to a finishing school.
00:02:39
Speaker
Well, Alexandra gets off in Paris because she has always wanted to spend a day in Paris.
00:02:45
Speaker
She only wants a day, not too much to ask.
00:02:48
Speaker
But needless to say, things happen and she never gets to Switzerland.
00:02:53
Speaker
And then the final book is about Meg, who is the only one who went on the cookery course because she really wanted to learn to cook and use her skills professionally.
00:03:04
Speaker
She was brought up by her mother on her own.
00:03:06
Speaker
They're very close as a couple, mother and daughter.
00:03:09
Speaker
And Meg's ambition has always been to earn enough money to get a little flat or somewhere that could be their own home.
00:03:18
Speaker
Because thus far, her mother has always had to take live-in jobs.
00:03:23
Speaker
And the trouble with a live-in job, if your employer makes a pass at you, you have to leave your job and your home, which is very difficult and inconvenient.
00:03:34
Speaker
And so this is the third in the series.
00:03:37
Speaker
And Meg's
00:03:38
Speaker
Meg's mother has invited her to help her with this little hotel in Dorset.
Katie's Writing Journey and Challenges
00:03:45
Speaker
And Meg is only too happy to go because Meg really loves a challenge.
00:03:49
Speaker
And so off she sets and adventures begin.
00:03:53
Speaker
Amazing.
00:03:54
Speaker
And that's, and that's this book, the third one in the series, One Enchanted Evening, out now.
00:03:59
Speaker
Now that this is out, is this, would this be book number 31 for you?
00:04:05
Speaker
Do you know, I keep losing count because I've written the novels that come out in the ordinary way, but then I've done two anthologies of Christmas stories and short stories and a quick read.
00:04:21
Speaker
So I'm a bit vague.
00:04:23
Speaker
It might be, let's call it book 30 because I think that sounds quite good.
00:04:27
Speaker
And it may be 31, but I think it's probably, let's say 30.
00:04:30
Speaker
Yes.
00:04:30
Speaker
And all future books will be book 30.
00:04:32
Speaker
It'll always be the 30th book.
00:04:34
Speaker
I think it starts game 21.
00:04:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:04:38
Speaker
Amazing.
00:04:38
Speaker
So do you ever, having written, I mean, it's a great many books, it's an incredible accomplishment just to have had that many books written and published.
00:04:47
Speaker
Do you ever look back at your earlier writing and kind of like scour through it?
00:04:53
Speaker
If I do, I either think, oh, my goodness, it was all so fresh then.
00:04:58
Speaker
I can't write like that now.
00:05:00
Speaker
Or I think, well, I don't know really how these books got published, but there they are.
00:05:06
Speaker
So I assume they must have been okay at the time.
00:05:10
Speaker
I'm always hoping that if ever I become a very doddery,
00:05:13
Speaker
old lady and can still read but can't remember anything, I might be able to read my own books and see if I enjoy them.
00:05:22
Speaker
The ultimate test.
00:05:23
Speaker
Yes, it is a bit strange having written so many books and I can never remember them all.
00:05:28
Speaker
If I'm trying to get to sleep sometimes, I'll try and remember all my titles and I never end up with the right number, even if I've
00:05:36
Speaker
got decided what number I'm looking for, there's always books I've missed out.
00:05:40
Speaker
And I just think, well, how could I've missed out that one?
00:05:42
Speaker
I loved writing that.
00:05:44
Speaker
I mean, looking back, I always think I've enjoyed writing every book, but actually, when I'm actually writing them, I think this is really hard work.
00:05:50
Speaker
Why am I doing this?
00:05:53
Speaker
Well, I think some people say, you know, it's worth doing if it's like hard work, if it's a challenge.
00:05:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:59
Speaker
Yes, I think so.
00:06:00
Speaker
And I wouldn't not do it.
00:06:02
Speaker
When I think about retiring, I think, okay, what would I do instead?
00:06:06
Speaker
And I sort of think about it.
00:06:07
Speaker
I think, well, I'd get up and I'd go to my computer and check my emails.
00:06:11
Speaker
And then what would I do?
00:06:13
Speaker
I just, and I can't think of anything that I really want to be doing.
00:06:16
Speaker
So I think, well, I'll just carry on doing it.
00:06:18
Speaker
After all, it's not digging a ditch.
00:06:21
Speaker
So, you know, it's hard work, but it's hardly backbreaking.
00:06:24
Speaker
Yes, but there's a great catharsis to, I think, finishing something like a book or lots of creative things where you're so involved with something that you're kind of creating from scratch.
00:06:37
Speaker
And to see it in its final form, there's so much validation, I think, that comes from just completing stuff like that.
00:06:43
Speaker
It is nice actually to have created characters and giving them a story and managing to tell it in a way that people can understand it and actually feel that these people are real and these things really could have happened to them, even although it is all just made up.
00:07:00
Speaker
Yes.
00:07:00
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:07:01
Speaker
I'm going to test your memory here as well.
00:07:03
Speaker
I wonder if you can remember when you first, was it 95 that you published your first novel?
00:07:09
Speaker
Yes, that's right.
00:07:10
Speaker
So when you back then, when you were first kind of like getting into the industry and publishing and things like that, was it what was it like?
00:07:19
Speaker
Like, what was what was what were the kind of challenges?
00:07:22
Speaker
If you remember, like, was it signing with an agent, signing with a publisher?
00:07:25
Speaker
What kind of stuff did you really struggle with?
00:07:28
Speaker
I found an agent, an agent was sort of found for me by devious means, by a wonderful woman called Dr. Hilary Johnson, who's a book doctor.
00:07:38
Speaker
And then she was a scout for an agency.
00:07:41
Speaker
And she knew my work through the Romantic Novelists Association and suggested me.
00:07:47
Speaker
And I met the agent, Sarah Malloy, who I found really scary at the time, but was absolutely wonderful.
00:07:57
Speaker
And she helped me get off the Mills and Boone treadmill, which I'd been on.
00:08:02
Speaker
I'd been trying to write a Mills and Boone novel for about seven years, six or seven years, and never quite made it.
00:08:11
Speaker
I was always getting nearly there.
00:08:13
Speaker
And I was getting nearly there enough for me to keep on thinking, oh, I'm so close.
00:08:18
Speaker
I must be able to get it right this time.
00:08:20
Speaker
But I never did.
00:08:21
Speaker
But she got me off that treadmill and encouraged me to write something else.
00:08:27
Speaker
much closer to what I needed to be writing.
00:08:30
Speaker
And she managed to find a publisher for that first book before I'd finished it.
00:08:34
Speaker
So that part was easy.
Breakthrough and Career Success
00:08:36
Speaker
And then I had an amazing stroke of luck, which was being selected for WH Smith's Fresh Talent promotion.
00:08:47
Speaker
Which was like the Richard and Judy of its day, because you got reviews in all the local papers.
00:08:55
Speaker
You had rather embarrassingly cardboard cutouts of you and your fellow winners of this great thing in the cover, in the window of Smith's.
00:09:06
Speaker
Mm hmm.
00:09:07
Speaker
all over the country.
00:09:08
Speaker
And Smith's was at that time, the biggest bookseller, the most important bookseller.
00:09:13
Speaker
If you weren't taken by Smith's, you had no chance at all.
00:09:17
Speaker
It's changed now.
00:09:18
Speaker
Now it's Tesco's, but then it was Smith's.
00:09:21
Speaker
And I was lucky enough to,
00:09:24
Speaker
to have this accolade.
00:09:26
Speaker
And I was, you know, just gave me such a good start.
00:09:29
Speaker
So that's when my good luck really, really started.
00:09:32
Speaker
But I'd had eight years of hard work before I had the good luck.
00:09:36
Speaker
So I feel I was in a good position to make the most of it because I had learned my craft.
00:09:42
Speaker
I don't think it's any use to writers to have an amazing stroke of luck and get your first novel published if you don't know what you're doing, because you always have to write a second novel or a third or maybe up to 30.
00:09:56
Speaker
And if you don't know how you've done it the first time, it's really, really hard the second time.
00:10:00
Speaker
And to be honest, it's quite hard to do it the second time, even if you have learnt your craft first.
00:10:06
Speaker
Second book's always difficult.
00:10:08
Speaker
I expect you know that.
00:10:09
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:10:10
Speaker
But I mean, the main reason from people that I speak to is because you suddenly have a sort of time pressure component, which you didn't really have on the first book.
00:10:21
Speaker
Yes, and you've used up all your best jokes in your first book.
00:10:25
Speaker
The jokes you've been thinking of for years and years have suddenly all gone into your one book.
00:10:31
Speaker
And you think, yes, you chuck it all in and you say, this is delicious.
00:10:34
Speaker
And then they want you to write a second book and you open the fridge and there's nothing except a shriveled green pepper that's stuck to the bars and some mouldy old cheese.
00:10:45
Speaker
And you've got to make a book out of what seems to be nothing.
00:10:49
Speaker
But in fact, if you trawl your subconscious and you open your mind to the world, there will be enough material to write book two.
00:10:58
Speaker
But it is quite hard.
00:11:01
Speaker
And again, because you have a time constraint.
00:11:04
Speaker
Yeah, whereas you had all the time in the world to write your first book.
00:11:07
Speaker
You mentioned your agent.
00:11:09
Speaker
You're currently signed with Bill Hamilton.
00:11:12
Speaker
Is that right?
00:11:13
Speaker
That's right.
00:11:13
Speaker
But I'm still with the same agency.
00:11:15
Speaker
Sarah Malloy moved over to children's fiction.
00:11:19
Speaker
There's no one else in the agency who was at that time interested and she's subsequently retired.
00:11:24
Speaker
And I've had Bill for a number of years now.
00:11:26
Speaker
I'm not quite sure how long.
00:11:28
Speaker
And at first I thought it's going to be really weird having a man for an agent, but actually he's been absolutely brilliant and brilliant.
00:11:36
Speaker
I don't bother him too much with the soft stuff, but he's very tolerant.
00:11:41
Speaker
And in fact, for ages, I didn't used to send him my books.
00:11:44
Speaker
When I'd finished my book, I would send it off to my editor.
00:11:47
Speaker
And then I had a pathetic little email said, could you copy me in when you're sending your book to your editor?
00:11:54
Speaker
I would like to read them myself.
00:11:56
Speaker
And I thought, poor man, he's got enough on his plate.
00:11:58
Speaker
He doesn't want to have to read my boring novels.
00:12:01
Speaker
However, he's very, very sweet and tolerant.
00:12:03
Speaker
And I think the best agent ever.
00:12:06
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:12:06
Speaker
Well, that's good.
00:12:07
Speaker
I was worried when I, when I saw the, the, when you mentioned a different agent, I was worried that there was going to be some drama, but it sounds like, it sounds like everyone just was doing their own thing.
00:12:14
Speaker
It sounds like great.
00:12:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:17
Speaker
So speaking about your writing, you know, you've done this many times now, I'm sure your, your process has kind of evolved over, over the
Insights into Katie's Writing Process
00:12:26
Speaker
years.
00:12:26
Speaker
Are there any kind of like habits or rituals that you, you kind of like you've set in your way and this is how you write?
00:12:33
Speaker
I don't have that many rituals.
00:12:35
Speaker
I'm rather prone to buying lovely notebooks and starting a novel by writing things in them.
00:12:40
Speaker
And I never use more than about three or four pages.
00:12:44
Speaker
And so the notebook goes in the pile of lovely notebooks with nothing written in them because I tend to be more scraps of paper.
00:12:51
Speaker
I'm a terribly disorganized.
00:12:54
Speaker
My desk is absolute chaos.
00:12:56
Speaker
It's only recently been tidied, really recently.
00:12:59
Speaker
And it's already chaos.
00:13:00
Speaker
You can hardly see the surface of it because there's papers, there's research material, there's notes to myself, there's my to-do list, there's all sorts.
00:13:11
Speaker
There's books waiting to have quotes written for them, piled up.
00:13:14
Speaker
There's books that have had quotes written for them still on my desk.
00:13:18
Speaker
And it is just a muddle.
00:13:20
Speaker
But I think what I have really learned over the years is when something's not working, I can read books.
00:13:28
Speaker
A book.
00:13:29
Speaker
I mean, I'm writing a book now, which is quite out of my comfort zone.
00:13:32
Speaker
It's set in Dominica, which is a little Caribbean island just after a hurricane.
00:13:38
Speaker
And so it's completely different from anything I've written.
00:13:41
Speaker
But I can look at reading it back.
00:13:44
Speaker
I can say, no, this character hasn't earned their place.
00:13:48
Speaker
You know, I've put in the character because I thought it'd be fun to have character X. But, you know, she's not earning her keep.
00:13:53
Speaker
And I can recognise that quite quickly.
00:13:56
Speaker
And I say, well, the hero is not strong enough.
00:13:58
Speaker
I can do quite a lot of my own editing.
00:14:01
Speaker
which is good because although I have a wonderful editor, I have a very good relationship with, Selina Walker, I like to give it to her in the best condition that I can so she doesn't have too much to say, although she always does have quite a lot to say.
00:14:18
Speaker
But I relish that, actually.
00:14:20
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:14:21
Speaker
So very disorganised desk.
00:14:24
Speaker
When it comes to these novels, is it all very planned out or you get an idea and you run with it?
00:14:31
Speaker
Well, when I first started writing, I was much more of what they refer to as a pantser.
00:14:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:37
Speaker
And you just have an idea and off you go.
00:14:40
Speaker
But I used to write very much faster when I was younger.
00:14:43
Speaker
I really did.
00:14:44
Speaker
I used to write a book every term because when I was trying to write Mills and Boone novels, because I couldn't write during the holidays because I had children.
00:14:52
Speaker
So I could only do it in school hours.
00:14:55
Speaker
And that was a huge amount of words.
00:14:56
Speaker
And I would just rip off a chapter every writing session.
00:15:00
Speaker
But now I have to think much more carefully about it.
00:15:04
Speaker
And I don't terribly like starting a book before I've got a plot.
00:15:08
Speaker
And for this book, I did actually start before I had a plot.
00:15:12
Speaker
I had a different plot.
00:15:14
Speaker
And I thought this wasn't really quite working, but I had to go along with it because I couldn't, you know, there is a time constraint, I have deadlines.
00:15:22
Speaker
But then I found out what was going to happen.
00:15:25
Speaker
And then I wrote it all down, sent it to Selina, who liked it.
00:15:31
Speaker
But I don't do a huge amount of planning.
00:15:33
Speaker
I don't have a spreadsheet.
00:15:35
Speaker
A friend of mine was talking about having a spreadsheet.
00:15:37
Speaker
I barely know what one is.
00:15:40
Speaker
And if you say the words narrative arc to me, I have a panic attack.
00:15:44
Speaker
I just...
00:15:46
Speaker
Well, I say instinctively.
00:15:47
Speaker
It's not really instinctive.
00:15:49
Speaker
It's 30 years of experience.
00:15:52
Speaker
But I don't really know.
00:15:55
Speaker
I mean, I might do a chapter-by-chapter synopsis just quickly for my own use, but I never stick to it because what you think is a line is a chapter.
00:16:06
Speaker
What you think is a chapter is a line.
00:16:09
Speaker
So it never works out quite as you planned.
00:16:14
Speaker
So I'm not really very well organised in anything I do, I'm afraid.
00:16:19
Speaker
Well, it comes out nice and neatly at the end.
00:16:22
Speaker
So whatever you're doing, it seems to be working and you seem to have the process figured out.
00:16:27
Speaker
Well, I hope so.
00:16:28
Speaker
I mean, if it does, that's good.
00:16:30
Speaker
With so many stories now that you've penned, are you careful about sort of challenging yourself and not retreading the same ground with new ones?
00:16:43
Speaker
To be honest, I will have an idea for the book and it'll have a story and I don't think too much about it.
00:16:53
Speaker
I always want to try out new things.
00:16:55
Speaker
I won't write about anything that I don't find interesting.
00:16:59
Speaker
So I'd never write about, say, ballet dancing if I didn't want to write about ballet, if I wasn't interested in ballet dancing.
00:17:08
Speaker
Although I possibly could be, but maybe not.
00:17:13
Speaker
So I'm always interested in the subject that I'm writing about.
00:17:16
Speaker
And that subject has a story to it.
00:17:18
Speaker
It has a character who is doing it or finds out about it or something.
00:17:24
Speaker
And once I'm in the story, I don't really think about saying I want to challenge myself.
00:17:31
Speaker
And I really wanted to write a book about Dominica.
00:17:34
Speaker
Although it was a huge challenge to myself.
00:17:36
Speaker
And sometimes I wish, you know, I should have stayed with my tried and tested, but I didn't.
00:17:43
Speaker
I went with the story that was in my heart and my head.
00:17:47
Speaker
And I hope that I'll make it work eventually.
00:17:50
Speaker
Yes.
00:17:50
Speaker
Well, fingers crossed.
00:17:52
Speaker
I'm sure you will.
00:17:53
Speaker
I'd love to talk a bit about, and you touched on it briefly earlier, you did mention that you, so before you published your first novel, you were already associated with the Romantic Novelist Association.
00:18:07
Speaker
Yes, indeed.
00:18:09
Speaker
I was what they called a probationer.
00:18:13
Speaker
We call them new writers now.
00:18:14
Speaker
And to be honest, it's quite difficult to think of a name that isn't in some way wrong.
00:18:18
Speaker
But in those days, I was a probationer.
00:18:22
Speaker
And as long as you turned in a book every year...
00:18:26
Speaker
you were allowed to stay a probationer for quite a long time.
00:18:29
Speaker
Although I'm sure when I first joined, you were only allowed three shots.
00:18:33
Speaker
So I don't quite know why.
00:18:34
Speaker
I think they must have changed that rule because I was trying for quite a long time.
00:18:40
Speaker
But in fact, I didn't submit every book I wrote to the scheme because I was, by that time, as I say, I was writing sort of three a year or at least partials and sending them off to Mills and Boone.
00:18:53
Speaker
But I didn't.
00:18:54
Speaker
I was so nearly published for so long.
00:18:57
Speaker
It was why I invented the Katie Ford bursary for the person who's been trying for ages and is just not there.
00:19:05
Speaker
Because those are the people that really need the encouragement.
00:19:08
Speaker
You know, you're just your heart.
00:19:10
Speaker
You know, you think, have I made it this time?
00:19:12
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:19:12
Speaker
No.
00:19:13
Speaker
And you go back down to your slough of despondency again.
00:19:20
Speaker
So I wanted to encourage those people because I was in that position for such a long time myself.
00:19:26
Speaker
Although, as I say, looking back, it taught me my craft and I'm not really that sorry.
00:19:31
Speaker
At least if I didn't think that, I would just think, what a huge waste of time, Katie.
00:19:35
Speaker
Why didn't you take the hint earlier when people said you weren't really a Mills and Boone author?
00:19:41
Speaker
But I said, I'm going to make myself one, but I couldn't.
00:19:45
Speaker
It's too difficult.
00:19:47
Speaker
Yes.
00:19:47
Speaker
I mean, it's one of those things.
00:19:50
Speaker
It's, I mean, it's slightly different, but it's sort of similar.
Genre Challenges and Writing Under Pseudonyms
00:19:52
Speaker
A lot of people will come on and we'll talk about the writing for market kind of thing.
00:19:56
Speaker
And I think a lot of authors find success when they stop trying to write for a specific market or like, like within sort of all these constraints, which they think people want to read or people want to buy.
00:20:10
Speaker
And then they just write the thing that, that they really love.
00:20:13
Speaker
And that's usually where people seem to find success.
00:20:16
Speaker
Yes.
00:20:17
Speaker
I always say to people, it's a great mistake to follow trends.
00:20:21
Speaker
You go into a bookshop or a supermarket and you see all these books with the same cover, all writing about the same thing.
00:20:28
Speaker
And you think, oh, well, that's popular.
00:20:30
Speaker
I'll write one of those.
00:20:31
Speaker
Because it can take a little while to write the book and a little while for the whole publishing process to happen.
00:20:37
Speaker
And it could be the trend has passed,
00:20:40
Speaker
before your book actually has a chance to reach the shells.
00:20:44
Speaker
And also, I mean, if you think sort of gritty psychological crime is the thing, but you don't really like it, but somehow you manage to do it, you're going to have to go on writing gritty psychological crime that you don't really like for the rest of your career.
00:20:59
Speaker
So you might as well write something you enjoy writing.
00:21:03
Speaker
Otherwise, you've got nothing, really.
00:21:05
Speaker
Yes.
00:21:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:06
Speaker
Publishers do like to do like authors to sort of stay on brand with themselves.
00:21:11
Speaker
And I, you know, you fully understand why a reader will enjoy an author because of a certain thing that's within the books.
00:21:17
Speaker
And if you're writing, you know, some people get away with hopping genres, but it's, it's for the most part, it's tricky to like maintain a readership if you're hopping vastly between, between genres and voices and things.
00:21:28
Speaker
Yes, it is.
00:21:29
Speaker
I mean, it is possible to write something a bit different and have a slightly different name.
00:21:34
Speaker
A friend of mine, Mandy Rowbottom, is just doing that.
00:21:37
Speaker
And she's stepping away from the Second World War and she's writing as the M.R.
00:21:43
Speaker
Rowbottom.
00:21:44
Speaker
Well, it's obvious it's her and it probably says writing as on the cover, like Ruth Rendell did with her Barbara Vine books.
00:21:53
Speaker
You know it's her, but you know the books are slightly different.
00:21:57
Speaker
Yeah, that's, yeah, that's, that's good.
00:21:59
Speaker
Cause, cause then they're sort of the marketing team and such are saying, this is that author, but it's going to be slightly different to what you were previously experiencing from that author.
Involvement with the Romantic Novelists' Association
00:22:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:11
Speaker
So let's get back to the RNA.
00:22:13
Speaker
How much of an impact has the RNA had on you and your, your writing career?
00:22:19
Speaker
Well, it's been an incredible support.
00:22:23
Speaker
I found my tribe, when I first joined the RNA, I didn't go to meetings or anything.
00:22:28
Speaker
I lived in the country, well, I still live, but I didn't know any other writers and it was all quite secret.
00:22:35
Speaker
Anyway, in the back of their little publication, which we now have much better
00:22:40
Speaker
Smarter publication.
00:22:42
Speaker
Then it was a little A4, no, half A4 size magazine thing in paper.
00:22:49
Speaker
And it had a course advertised in the back of it.
00:22:52
Speaker
And I thought, well, I'll go on this course and
00:22:55
Speaker
And it was quite difficult for me to go because I had to go by train and there was some problem with the trains and I missed my connection.
00:23:03
Speaker
I arrived terribly late and I literally did not know anyone at this entire conference or little course it was.
00:23:11
Speaker
But I had seen one of the speakers on television, which was the nearest thing I had to knowing anybody.
00:23:17
Speaker
However, it really didn't matter because writers recognize each other and it was such crazy.
00:23:23
Speaker
bliss to talk to other writers, to people who understood what you were doing, what you wanted to do.
00:23:30
Speaker
And anyone you met in the coffee queue, you had things in common with.
00:23:34
Speaker
And people I met at the course, I'm still friends with today.
00:23:38
Speaker
And then I started going to meetings for the RNA and I met more people.
00:23:42
Speaker
And they've been my support system ever since.
00:23:46
Speaker
Amazing.
00:23:47
Speaker
And then that obviously led up to you becoming the president of the RNA for a tenure.
00:23:53
Speaker
Yes, I was in the olden days.
00:23:57
Speaker
The presidency was sort of passed by one president to the next.
00:24:02
Speaker
And I was the third president.
00:24:04
Speaker
But times have changed rather a lot since lovely, lovely, I've forgotten her name.
00:24:12
Speaker
Our lovely first president has, you know, she helped Jewish refugees escape from the war.
00:24:22
Speaker
So we're going back a long time.
00:24:24
Speaker
And then there was Di Pearson, Diana Pearson, who was a writer and a publisher.
00:24:29
Speaker
And she discovered people like Terry Pratchett.
00:24:32
Speaker
Oh, wow.
00:24:32
Speaker
She was amazing.
00:24:33
Speaker
And then she asked me if I would be president.
00:24:36
Speaker
And I had been chair by that time.
00:24:39
Speaker
And I didn't really think I could say no, because Di had asked me and she was quite daunting in some ways, although she was great fun.
00:24:48
Speaker
And I was very, very fond of her.
00:24:51
Speaker
But I didn't really think that I can just appoint somebody because it's not really acceptable these days not to have some sort of democracy involved with people having positions.
00:25:05
Speaker
And also I couldn't actually myself think of the right person.
00:25:09
Speaker
So I thought, well, I don't have to actually decide.
00:25:12
Speaker
I don't have to do this myself.
00:25:14
Speaker
I can pass this on to the wonderful people
00:25:19
Speaker
which now run the RNA and they will know who they want and they can make their own provision for finding the next president.
00:25:27
Speaker
And I'm sure they'll be wonderful.
00:25:29
Speaker
And I look forward to finding out who they are.
00:25:31
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:32
Speaker
Well, that, yeah, I mean, that is, I think the modern way of doing things is much more by committee and, and, uh, and as you say, democratic, um, and, uh, as you, as you kind of were announcing that you were stepping down, that you were very well deserved in, in, in being gifted the lifetime achievement award this year by the RNA, that must've felt very special for you as someone who's been sort of so connected to that association for such a long time.
00:25:56
Speaker
It did.
00:25:56
Speaker
It felt extremely special.
00:25:58
Speaker
And they spoiled me.
00:25:59
Speaker
Not only did they give me the lovely award, they gave me presents.
00:26:03
Speaker
They gave me wonderful flowers and chocolates and champagne and a beautiful piece of jewellery and a wonderful vase with my name engraved on it.
00:26:12
Speaker
I mean, really, they spoiled me.
00:26:13
Speaker
And the whole occasion at the awards ceremony was full of wonderful surprises.
00:26:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:19
Speaker
And my friend, Jo, who was doing the comparing, we'd spent all day together and she never said a word of any of the things that were going to go on.
00:26:28
Speaker
So I was completely surprised.
00:26:30
Speaker
But there was one time when we went into the room and she saw a sofa and two chairs by it and she said, oh, wow.
00:26:38
Speaker
And I thought, why is she excited about a sofa on a stage?
00:26:42
Speaker
I didn't quite get it.
00:26:44
Speaker
I didn't ask her because I thought, well, you know, for some reason.
00:26:46
Speaker
But it was because where she was going to make me sit while we did the This Is Your Life thing, which was amazing.
00:26:53
Speaker
I mean, really, it was very – I was very overwhelmed by it and very, very touched, as you can imagine.
00:27:00
Speaker
Yes.
00:27:01
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:02
Speaker
And even though you're, you're sort of stepping down as president and then sort of taking a slight step back from the, the kind of running of the whole thing, uh, will, will you still very much be a part of the RNA you'll be, um, kind of in and out and involved in?
00:27:14
Speaker
Yes, I really hope so.
00:27:16
Speaker
I don't know how much they'll want me to be involved.
00:27:20
Speaker
I really, you know, I still love the people.
00:27:23
Speaker
I still love my fellow writers.
00:27:25
Speaker
I really love helping other writers.
00:27:27
Speaker
That's the thing that gives me the big kick is helping someone on their way.
00:27:32
Speaker
It may just be helping them find an agent or
00:27:35
Speaker
or helping them actually with their writing or whatever, or just saying, keep going, you're going to get there, which honestly is all we want a lot of the time.
Katie's Homeware Line and Personal Interests
00:27:46
Speaker
People can say things like, well, don't you think you'd better take up another hobby?
00:27:51
Speaker
You're not going very far with this.
00:27:53
Speaker
And you really don't want to be told that by anyone.
00:27:55
Speaker
And which is why I would never, ever tell anyone that.
00:27:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:59
Speaker
Sometimes you just need someone to say, you've got to hang in there and persevere and eventually it'll happen.
00:28:05
Speaker
Exactly.
00:28:06
Speaker
It took me ages, years and years and years.
00:28:10
Speaker
And it doesn't take everyone nearly as long as it took me, although actually it does take some people longer.
00:28:15
Speaker
But it's still possible and people still get there.
00:28:18
Speaker
And it's lovely for me to see those people get there.
00:28:21
Speaker
Yes.
00:28:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:23
Speaker
Now, before we get to the final question, I did just want to quickly touch on on your website, katieford.com, you, you have a beautiful range of homeware and station reset.
00:28:38
Speaker
Was was that just something that you'd always kind of wanted to do?
00:28:41
Speaker
Well, to be honest, it's my daughter, really.
00:28:44
Speaker
It's her.
00:28:46
Speaker
But with the mugs, she was fed up with me complaining about mugs not being the right size or not being laid out of the right stuff.
00:28:54
Speaker
The thing with a mug, and I'm sure you understand, if it's too big, the tea has gone cold before you've got to the bottom of it.
00:29:02
Speaker
And if it's too small, not enough tea.
00:29:04
Speaker
I don't like a thick mug to drink out of.
00:29:07
Speaker
And so she said, well, if you're so fussy, you should produce your own.
00:29:11
Speaker
And so that's sort of how the idea started.
00:29:14
Speaker
And then we added in tea towels and other things I was quite fussy about and sent her a project.
00:29:20
Speaker
But it's nice because it means if I'm sending someone a book and I think somebody needs something a little special, I can give them a tea towel or a mug or a notebook or something nice and
00:29:32
Speaker
just to make it special.
00:29:33
Speaker
Although that isn't why we're supposed to be doing it.
00:29:36
Speaker
Don't tell my daughter.
00:29:37
Speaker
That's what I said.
00:29:38
Speaker
Because obviously we're supposed to be selling them.
00:29:41
Speaker
But in fact, they make great gifts.
00:29:43
Speaker
And if I have a writing course, which I do sometimes run as a way of raising money for charity, they're great fun to put in the goodie bags.
00:29:51
Speaker
So I definitely use them for that.
00:29:54
Speaker
So that's why they're good to have.
00:29:57
Speaker
But as I say, it's my daughter's project really.
00:30:00
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:01
Speaker
Because she was fed up with your complaining.
00:30:04
Speaker
She was.
00:30:04
Speaker
She was, yes.
00:30:07
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:08
Speaker
Well, that's great.
00:30:08
Speaker
And now you can't complain because you have specified the exact sizes and all of that.
00:30:13
Speaker
Exactly.
00:30:14
Speaker
If I haven't got a decent mug to drink out of now, it's my own fault.
00:30:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:18
Speaker
You'll have to make a new one.
00:30:20
Speaker
Exactly.
00:30:21
Speaker
Well, that brings us to the final question of the interview, which as always is, Katie, if you were stranded on a desert island with a single book, which book would you choose?
00:30:35
Speaker
Well, obviously I've had time to think about this over many, many years when I've been listening to Desert Island Discs and thinking, what would I choose as my book?
00:30:48
Speaker
And I don't know if this is a cheat.
00:30:51
Speaker
But I think I'd like the biggest anthology of poetry that's possible.
00:30:56
Speaker
I do really like reading poetry.
00:30:59
Speaker
I always have done since I was at school.
00:31:02
Speaker
I used to learn a lot of it.
00:31:03
Speaker
And I love poetry.
00:31:05
Speaker
And I do think quite a long poem, what's quite long from a poem can be quite a short story.
00:31:12
Speaker
You can get narrative from a poem as well as beautiful language.
00:31:16
Speaker
And it can make you think.
00:31:18
Speaker
I mean, so many of the poems that I know really well, I won an anthology as a school prize back in, you know, a long, long time ago.
00:31:27
Speaker
And I know a lot of those poems really well.
00:31:31
Speaker
And they all create the what if, make me think about what was the rest of the story.
00:31:37
Speaker
So I think if I had that with me on a desert island, I'd not only have things to read, but I'd have things to stimulate my imagination.
00:31:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:46
Speaker
Yes.
00:31:46
Speaker
And there's with poetry, especially, I mean, this is the same with most literature, but with poetry, especially there's, there's often, you know, hundreds, thousands of different ways to interpret a single poem.
00:31:59
Speaker
Um, because as you say, it's like, it's, it's, it's everything that's going on around it.
00:32:04
Speaker
It's all the, it's the gaps between the words it's in the pauses and things.
00:32:07
Speaker
And it's how you imagine filling that space.
00:32:10
Speaker
Exactly.
00:32:11
Speaker
Exactly.
00:32:12
Speaker
And how some lines of poetry are just so particularly wonderful.
00:32:17
Speaker
And you look at them and you just think they're very simple words.
00:32:19
Speaker
Why is it that they're just touching me in the way that they do?
00:32:23
Speaker
And I love that.
00:32:25
Speaker
I don't think I'd ever get bored.
00:32:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:28
Speaker
So it would be whatever the biggest possible poem anthology is available.
00:32:35
Speaker
Thank you very much.
00:32:38
Speaker
If I could pick your brain for something specific, do you have a favourite poem?
Favorite Poem and Podcast Conclusion
00:32:44
Speaker
There's one poem I was asked to choose and Harriet Walter was going to read it for me at a literary festival and it's called Patterns and it's by Amy Lowell.
00:32:57
Speaker
And it's so sad because
00:32:59
Speaker
I had to sit on the stage next to Harriet Walter, who, of course, read it beautifully, not too actressy.
00:33:06
Speaker
You know, sometimes when actors read poetry, they put too much expression in and they don't let the words shine.
00:33:12
Speaker
But it's about a woman, probably in cavalier times, walking up and down a garden.
00:33:20
Speaker
in her stiff silks and things.
00:33:23
Speaker
And then she gets a letter to hear that her husband has died.
00:33:26
Speaker
And it's so heartbreaking.
00:33:28
Speaker
And I had to sit and tears pouring down my cheeks as Harriet Walter read this poem.
00:33:35
Speaker
And it is a very beautiful poem, very tragic, but it's such a romantic novel, all in its own, all in itself.
00:33:44
Speaker
And then she goes back to walking up and down between the topiary trees in her silks.
00:33:49
Speaker
thinking about her husband.
00:33:51
Speaker
And it doesn't sound terribly sexy and exciting.
00:33:55
Speaker
Actually, if you read it, it does have everything in it.
00:34:00
Speaker
Well, it sounds great.
00:34:01
Speaker
And to bring you to tears on stage, I'm sure it's a very powerful piece of literature.
00:34:07
Speaker
It was to me.
00:34:09
Speaker
It was at least to you.
00:34:10
Speaker
Amazing.
00:34:11
Speaker
Well, it's a great choice and always great to go for a big one.
00:34:16
Speaker
But thank you so much, Katie, for coming on the podcast and sharing your writing experience, telling us about your latest novel, One Enchanted Evening, and just kind of telling us all about the RNA and all of that great stuff.
00:34:28
Speaker
It's been really great chatting.
00:34:29
Speaker
Oh, well, it was lovely.
00:34:31
Speaker
Thank you so much for inviting me.
00:34:32
Speaker
I really enjoyed it.
00:34:34
Speaker
And for anyone listening, if you want to keep up with what Katie is doing, you can follow her on Twitter at Katie Ford, on Instagram at Ford Katie, or head over to her website, katieford.com.
00:34:46
Speaker
And to make sure you don't miss an episode of this podcast, follow along on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
00:34:51
Speaker
We have a Patreon now for exclusive access and content.
00:34:53
Speaker
And for more Booker's Chat, check out my other podcast, The Chosen Ones and Other Tropes.
00:34:57
Speaker
Thanks again to Katie and thanks to everyone listening.
00:34:59
Speaker
We'll catch you on the next episode.