Hey everyone, good morning. So are you beginning to get all set for Christmas? I think most of us have our decorations up don’t we? I’m about 50% of the way done on my Christmas shopping, but am planning on blitzing the rest on Thursday! My Christmas cards haven’t arrived yet, so I’ve that job to do still too!
This year is just so special, Amelia is completely entranced with the magic of Christmas and Santa Claus. She talks about nothing else. Last night a letter from Santa arrived for the children and she was so happy and kept asking to read it over and over. I’ve always been a Christmas nut, you all know that, but if I could put a pause button on the children I would, so that they would stay at this age forever, I’d be so happy!
Anyhow, enough of all that, because I have another talented author to introduce to you all today. Author Brigid Coady, is also published with HarperImpulse and I know you’ll love her as much as I do. She’s great fun, I had the pleasure of meeting her at a party in HarperCollins last October and lets just say it was educational! I never knew what a saveloy was until we ended up in a chipper after we left the local pub! I always thought it was a fish. But tis’ a sausage of sorts and looks like this!
So apart from loving saveloy’s Brigid, tell us about yourself.
I’m a mild(ish) mannered project manager by day, a country music loving writer by night and weekends. I love books, US TV crime shows and John Hughes movies. I collect walking sticks and spend too much time on Twitter. My boyfriend says I have an unhealthy obsession with Kenny Chesney. I’ve met Taylor Swift. I’ve been a voice over artist and radio presenter so could be the voice of your on hold phone system or stand in for Whispering Bob Harris. I read ‘The Hunger Games’ when there was only one book out.
Ok, Mrs Kenny Chesney loving Coady, just for you, here’s my favourite Christmas song of his, that ALWAYS makes me cry. Everytime. When it comes on the radio, I won’t let anyone speak so I can hear every word and really allow myself the luxury of a good old sobfest. Can you guess which song yet? It’s all about shoes my friends, listen to this! Pass the kleenex!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0a_Y1wAJ2MU
Did you cry? Go on admit it you did! I mean he just wants to buy shoes for his dying Mama. I mean heart of stone if that didn’t make you weep! Right, next question, if your life was to be made into a movie, what genre movie would it be and who would play in the starring roles?!
Definitely a romcom, probably of the Richard Curtis variety but I’d be in the Hugh Grant role. Billie Piper would play me (just so I can get close to Laurence Fox). I’m not sure anyone could do the boyfriend justice, but I’m happy to audition people for the role.
Well here’s a challenge for you Brigid, write a romcom novel of your life and I bet Richard Curtis will come out of retirement to make it into a blockbuster! Isn’t that a nice thought? Can you tell us all what genre do you write and when did you start?
I’m writing short stories for HarperImpulse and they cover a variety of genres from contemporary romance to YA with some magical realism and historical mixed in. Most of my longer length work (which I’m hoping to have published soon) are YA/New Adult. I’m interested in identity and how you work out who you are and that seems to suit younger heroines.
I’ve always been a writer of some form or other. I had poems published in the school magazine and then upset English department when I took sciences for Alevel. Even when I was studying engineering I used to find out what my flatmates English homework was and give it ago! I recently moved and found stories I was writing in notebooks whilst at work back in 1999. I have been taking writing seriously for about ten years, some years I was more dedicated than others. It has been a long haul but I was never in this for the quick fix, I don’t think any writer is.
Best advice ever there any aspiring writers – don’t be in this game for a quick fix. It takes time and patience and hardwork. All of which Brigid has in spades.
Of the characters you’ve created through writing, which one is your favourite and why so?
I created a grumpy teddy bear called Cassius T Bear, or Caz, based on my childhood teddy during a writing exercise a decade ago. I have a half written novel featuring him but this year I got to dust him off and give him a starring role in one of my Christmas short stories.
I love him because he is like Bob Hoskins in ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit?’. He is all rough and ready but he loves his Dame, the girl who owns him and who is now grown up. He feels helpless because he can’t fix things like he could when she was a child.
This teddy is auditioning for the role of Brigids teddy bear in her Christmas shortstory! (He’s not, I made that up, but it’s a cute teddy and it’s wearing a Christmas hat, so how could I not share the photo?!!) Loving the sound of this story btw!
Can you share something with us about one of your books that you’ve not shared with anyone else before?
I’ve written six kiss themed short stories, The Kiss Collection, for HarperImpulse and one of the stories is almost verbatim something that happened to me. The feelings and thinking might have been changed for dramatic purposes however…
I’m gonna need to know which of the stories that is Brigid? Or maybe I should guess when I’ve read them all! Heres a little look at the cover of Brigid’s first in the Kiss Collection, which I really loved!
What are you working on right now?
I’ve just finished NaNoWriMo and now have a very rough draft of a YA novel called Sugar Girl to work with. It is about the daughter of a rock star who runs away from having a very famous name to find out who she really is. I have a paranormal YA about stone circles out for submission and a RomCom based on a Dickens novel that I need to polish. Trying to fit it around the day job is the problem!
You’ve been busy Brigid, you’re putting me to shame! Can you share a Christmas memory with us?
I remember that every Christmas as a child and teen, I would always get at least one book. I would always have finished it by the end of the day. Yes, I always spent Christmas with my head in a book.
I think that was a wonderful gift your parents gave to you! My children get one book under the tree every Christmas that we read every night together for the month of December. I want them to grow up loving books as much as I do. So can you describe a perfect Christmas Holiday for us, who are you with, where are you, what are you eating?
My perfect Christmas Holiday is wherever my family are. We’ve had Christmases all round the world so location isn’t as important as the people. My parents are there as is my sister. The boyfriend, #flame, would be being all “bah humbug” in the corner. We would get up late and my sister and I would compare stockings (neither of us have kids so we get to pretend we’re still the babies). Then breakfast with some light present opening. We won’t eat till the evening so there will be a walk before a light lunch and a glass of champagne. Then we all will help out with the cooking, I will make the roast potatoes and vegetables which must include mashed carrot and swede. My sister and I will have bullied my mother into making cornbread stuffing. I will make a round of Christmas cocktails called ‘Sparkles’.
Then we will sit round the table and eat, drink, chat and laugh until we collapse in a heap about 9pm.
I think at Christmas we are all kids aren’t we? We used to get stockings every year right up until we got married! And I was 37 when Mr H and I got married! So I’m all for big kids at Christmas! Whats your favourite Christmas Movie?
I don’t have a favourite Christmas movie, please don’t judge me! If I had to choose one it would be ‘Die Hard’ but that is because it has Alan Rickman in it. Christmas for me is all about watching repeats of ‘The Morecambe and Wise Show’. Or watching box sets of TV series with my sister on Christmas Eve as we wrap last minute presents.
I love that you didn’t make one up just to please me! Gosh, Morecambe and Wise, theres a blast from the past! We grew up watching them every Christmas too. Here’s a clip from one of their Christmas specials. Genius!
You have to have a favourite Christmas Song though!
It has to be ‘All I Want For Christmas is You!’ by Mariah Carey. Can’t help but love it. In fact I listened to it on repeat this year all through August and September to get me in the mood to write the stories for my Christmas anthology, ‘A Stocking Full of Romance’. In fact one of the stories is named for it.
I love that cover I really do. It’s Christmas tied up with a string! Well we’ve established you are a big kid really when it comes to Christmas, so if Santa could make one wish come true for you Brigid, what would it be? Complete this sentence for me Brigid ….’All I Want For Christmas……..’
All I want for Christmas is to be with my boyfriend. Sadly not to be as he is the US and I’m here.
Oh no! That’s awful, I didn’t realise you wouldn’t get to spend Christmas together. Right, only one thing for it on occasions such as this. We need a rosemantic song. And then we’ll need chocolate. And feck it, it’s Christmas, we’ll need champagne. Here’s Mariah for you Brigid!
Did that help at all? So w hat are you reading right now? And is it a paper book or ebook?
I’m currently reading ‘The Best Thing I Never Had’ by Erin Lawless, it is an ebook and is published by HarperImpulse
That’s on my iPad too, just awaiting my attention, it looks fab! If you could pick any career in the world other than what you do now, what would it be?
If we ignore writing which is what I want to do full time instead of my current job I think it would be an actor. I think it is another form of story telling which appeals to me.
Thank you so much for being so honest and fun Brigid! I’ve loved having you over here on Mrsh’s virtual couch. I’m crossing fingers and toes that there’s a Christmas miracle and you and your boyfriend get to spend the holidays together.
If not, just think of that big kiss when you do meet up in the New Year!
So everyone that’s the end of this weeks guest interview. I told you she was lovely. If you’d like to find out a little more about Brigid Coady, you can find her here :-
