Launch Party, Woman's Hour and more
21 July 2009
I have written a diary almost every day since I was about 8 years old, but it seems I’m not nearly so prolific when it comes to blogging! It’s a habit I suppose, and one I’ve not quite got into yet. I can’t believe my last update was about a month ago - a lot has happened since then.
There was a party to launch Lady of the Butterflies to start with. It was held at Jaffe and Neale bookshop in Chipping Norton and I can’t thank Polly and Patrick, who own the bookshop, enough for making it such a lovely and enjoyable event. The shop looked so pretty, decorated with butterflies and we had butterfly cakes to eat too! It was totally overwhelming to see huge displays of Lady of the Butterflies, not least because I think Preface have done such a wonderful job with the jacket. The onscreen image of it does not do nearly enough justice to the lovely glitterly gilding round the edge, nor to the gown. (I think I first fell in love with history as a child partly because of the pretty dresses, so this is very important!) My own little daughter dressed up as a butterfly for my party, complete with wings, ‘feelers’ - and a wand! A fairy butterfly, then.
I was persuaded to do a reading, which I’m normally completely happy to do, but it is slightly more daunting when faced with a shop full of familiar faces. Rosie de Courcy, my editor at Preface, made a lovely speech, which I found very moving because she very kindly compared Lady of the Butterflies to Daphne Du Maurier’s ‘The King’s General’ which, as you’ll see from my first blog, is one of my favourite books. I still have the original copy which my Mum bought for me for £1.35 in 1974. Rosie also told a very amusing story about how she had to read ‘Lady of the Butterflies’ against all adversity, battling with a printer which would only churn out ten pages at a time. It was a long manuscript of 660 pages, so perseverance was required!
It was lovely to see people at the party who have played such a part in giving Lady of the Butterflies wings. Rosie, and my agent, Broo Doherty, who gave me so much support and encouragement while I was writing it, and then was responsible for finding it such a wonderful home at Preface. Also Louise from Butterfly Conservation, with whom it is my great privileged to work to help raise awareness of the plight of Britain’s butterflies and make sure that future generations can enjoy them just as Eleanor Glanville did.
A couple of days after my launch, I went to Bath, since Somerset is where the book is set, and signed copies in Toppings and Mr B’s which are wonderful independent bookshops in which I was quite happy to browse for hours.
What else? I went to BBC Broadcasting House to record an interview for Radio 4 Woman’s Hour, which is due to be transmitted this week. This was a rather surreal experience for me, because I worked at Broadcasting House (or BH as we called it) for 10 years when I was in the press office at Radio 1. In fact, I slept there on a regular basis! The great thing about BH is that since the BBC broadcasts through the night, the building is open 24 hours, which meant that when me and my friends and fellow Radio 1 rock chicks went to gigs and missed the last train home, which we often did, we were not left wandering the streets. We became well known for keeping duvets stuffed under our desks for just such an occasion. Those were the days! I’m still a rock chick at heart, and I think it’s my leather biker jacket that must have prompted Jane Garvey, who interviewed me for Woman’s Hour, to comment that I didn’t ‘look very Cotswold’! The interview was fun. Though I think I talk too much!
Which is just what I’m doing now, probably. So I shall end, by saying that I did another signing in the Cotswold Bookstore in Moreton-in-Marsh on Saturday. I was made to feel very welcome by Tony and all the staff. We enjoyed more butterfly cakes, made by loyal customers, and there beautiful butterfly decorations that had been cut out and painstakingly hand glittered by Nina.
Now I am off to do a talk in Perton, which is near Wolverhampton, I think!
Have your say