Random Reasons Why I love My Job – The Richard and Judy WH Smith Book Club

Being chosen to be one of Richard and Judy’s WH Smith Book Club picks is a really big deal. HUGE. The competition is ridiculously fierce. When Fede, my lovely editor At Two Roads first emailed to tell me that THE KEEPER OF LOST THINGS had been chosen, I misunderstood. I thought it had been chosen to be put forward for the selection process. I was delighted. Really pleased. I told Fede how pleased I was. But I sensed somehow, that he didn’t think I was pleased enough. So – I sought clarification and the penny finally dropped. The selection process had already taken place. I was in. KEEPER was a RICHARD AND JUDY AUTUMN BOOK CLUB PICK!!! Once this information had finally found its way into my brain, my reaction was much more proportionate to the magnitude of such astonishing news. I whooped! More than once. I was alone at the time, so I told my dog, Squadron Leader Timothy Bear. More than once. But there was a catch. It was a secret and it had to stay a secret until the paperback launch on 10^th August. I wasn’t to tell a soul (except for Timothy) Three months is a very, very long time to keep that kind secret. People would ask me how the book was doing and I’d have to bite my tongue and say, ‘Fine, thanks.’ There were days when I thought I would burst and Timothy got sick to death of hearing about it. I was asked to write an extra chapter for the Richard and Judy paperback edition, and a piece for the Book Club blog. And then, in July, I actually got to meet Richard and Judy and record a podcast with them (I’m not going to talk about that here – it definitely deserves its own blog post, and will be the next one I write) An author’s life can be pretty damn amazing!