Interview with author Andrew Clover

Welcome Andrew Clover, who is on a blog tour to promote his new book, The Things I'd Miss. I used to like reading Andrew's column, Dad Rules, in the Sunday Times Style magazine. I miss it! So it's pretty cool to be able to ask him a few questions here...

First book you remember reading?
A Fly Went By by Dr Seuss. I was walking through my brother’s room, I kneeled down to read it, and I still remember finishing it and thinking: I just read a whole book on my own! I can’t tell you what the plot was. I think it involved a fly, which went by.

How do you decide on what book to read?
Well I write literate love stories, so I read up the best stuff in that genre (Beautiful Remains, One Day, Where’d Did You Go, Bernadette..) While

BOOK CLUB REVIEW: The Dinner (Herman Koch)

On a summer’s evening in Holland, two middle class couples meet for dinner at a rather pretentious restaurant.

Over the course of the meal, a dark and troubling secret is revealed about their teenage children.

Billed as a ‘Marmite’ book – you’ll either love it or hate it – the story hinges on our perception of the unreliable narrator, Paul, as we begin to question his motives and morality.

In fact, the dinner went down universally well with book club. The lack of ‘likeable’ characters wasn’t off-putting and we agreed that it was a story that drew the reader in.

A short book, set in one place and time (with the use of flashbacks), it reads like a well-made play, set over three acts.

Apologies for a belated BOOK CLUB BOOK REVIEW: Apple Tree Yard (Louise Doughty)

My goodness! What’s happening? Nothing since March and then I go a write two in one day. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: blog posts are like buses. Well, mine are anyway.

This is a partial review. It’s more like a letter to explain why it’s not a review. Of the dog-ate-it variety.

You see, the thing about writing a book blog is that you really need to read books. Ordinarily this is not a problem for me. However, of late, I’ve been using the little bit of me-time I have before I go to sleep to do something other than reading. Never fear, this is not going to be too gratuitous. Although it does involve YouTube.

BOOK REVIEW: H is for Hummus (Joel Rickett and Spencer Wilson)

Forget advice. Forget bath oils and cupcakes. When a friend has a baby, buy her this book.

What better initiation into modern parenting than this seriously funny, tongue-in-cheek ABC.

A is for Apple, B is for Ball, blah blah blah....
Get up to speed with the realities of modern day toddlers and their  busy schedules with this essential handbook, in which A is for Allergy, B is for Babyccino and C is for Controlled Crying.

For parents who love nothing more than a good laugh at themselves, this gorgeous little rib-tickler, which I was introduced to by my good friend @kchickman, is a perfect way to keep you sane

Author Gabrielle Kimm on researching historical novels

Gabrielle Kimm

A warm welcome to Gabrielle Kimm, who is on a blog tour with her new book The Girl with the Painted Face. She's dropped by to Book Club Mum to tell us what it's like to be a historical writer...

Thank you so much for inviting me onto your blog!

I’m often asked why I’ve chosen to write historical novels – and there’s a simple answer. It’s all because of Victorian poet, Robert Browning.

BOOK CLUB REVIEW: Revenge Wears Prada (Lauren Weisberger)

This was chosen as a good light-hearted summer read and as such, the consensus was: it delivered.

A sequel to the phenomenally successful The Devil Wears Prada, the story catches up with our heroine Andy Sachs ten years after her tumultuous stint as assistant to the infamous Runway magazine editor Miranda Priestly.

The original book was adapted for the big screen with Meryl Streep playing the devil herself Miranda, who is widely acknowledged to have been based on real-life Vogue editor Anna Wintour, for whom Weisberger once worked.

Andy and Emily, her former arch-enemy and co-assistant at Runway, have since joined forces to start a high quality bridal magazine called The Plunge.

Solving the sock issue with Funky Giraffe

Snugly: Benjamin

“Excuse me; did you know your baby’s lost a sock?” This is the constant, well meaning inquiry of strangers and the answer is always a resounding: "Yes". Yes I know it’s fallen off, of course it has. Socks are incapable of remaining on babies' feet for more than five minutes. And I'm too slovenly a mother to spend my life reapplying them.

I remember this problem with my first baby. I tried little sock harness things (got lost once worn) pram shoes (fiddly and annoying to get on) - in the end I think I just made sure his feet were covered with a blanket. But second time around, I resolved to tackle the problem afresh and research what solutions are out there on the market.

CHILDREN'S BOOK REVIEW: Spaghetti with the Yeti (Adam & Charlotte Guillain, illustrated by Lee Wildish)

This book has the kind of wacky off-beat humour reminiscent of Aliens Love Underpants - if you’re familiar with that seminal work.

Like the Underpants books, it rattles along with fast-paced rhyme and is illustrated with bright and detailed scenes.

The central character – a boy called George – decides to go and discover the Yeti, taking with him a backpack, hat, map and tin of spaghetti.

Setting off up a steep mountain path, he bumps into three monsters – none of whom turn out to be the yeti, but instead three creatures named, in turn, Betty, Hetty and Netty. Each one has contrasting advice on what the yeti will like to eat. When he does eventually discover the yeti, George is delighted to find that he in fact only eats spaghetti.

BOOK REVIEW: Instructions For A Heatwave (Maggie O'Farrell)

It’s a catchy title, and one the marketing people must have been rubbing their hands with glee about, given the soaring temperatures that quickly followed the book’s publication.

But I would say the title is exactly what lets this novel down.

Recently retired bank manager Robert Riordan goes out for a newspaper as usual and doesn’t return, prompting his wife to call on her three grown-up children to play out a very domestic drama in which secrets are uncovered and relationships explored.

The heat wave scorching London in 1976, when it is set, keeps a cool distance. Just a few references to aphids and water restrictions establish its presence, with no sense of a wider national event.

GUEST BOOK REVIEW: The Conspiracy Kid (E P Rose)

I’m delighted to present this review by Anna, a Grande Dame (but young)! of book club. An avid reader, she’s always great for a book recommendation, so I was very interested to read her verdict on this latest offering from the author of Beyond the Valley of Sex and Shopping.....

The Conspiracy Kid is a great read. I loved the witty and fast-paced prose; it was a real treat to pick up each night and was written so fluidly that I finished it in no time.

It follows the many eccentric but loveable characters who become part of the conspiracy kid fan club, where enrolment is automatic on the reading of a poem crafted by Edwin Mars.

Mars is a central character and for me could have been Adrian Mole’s cooler and more successful twin brother.

BOOK CLUB REVIEW: Tiny Sunbirds Far Away by Christie Watson

We meet our 12-year-old narrator, Blessing, in Lagos, living with her parents and older brother in an air-conditioned apartment in one of the city’s most affluent streets.

But soon Blessing’s father has an affair and leaves, forcing the rest of the family to move to a village in the Niger Delta, to live with her mother’s family. Plucked from a comfortable life to one without running water or electricity, Warri seems appalling to Blessing, who says: "I opened my eyes as wide as they could go, to let in all the differences”.

She tells us what is not there - healthcare, hygiene, education – but as she forms relationships and learns about her environment, she describes beautifully what it does contain with humour and warmth.

Blessing becomes close to her grandma, a strong, wise character, who decides to take her on as a trainee midwife attending to women in the

Author Louise Candlish on the highs and lows of a writer’s life

Louise Candlish

Louise Candlish is on a blog tour with her new novel, The Disappearance of Emily Marr. She's dropped by here at Book Club Mum to tell us about the highs and lows of a writers life...

In the ten years I’ve been writing novels, I’ve learned that the general perception of a writer’s life is that it’s a good gig. Nice work if you can get it. In fact, hardly work at all when you think about it. I’ve written before about how insulting it is to be told by someone that he or she would love to give up work altogether and ‘just’ write.
Naturally, I make it my business to put these innocents right. Yes, there are joyous parts of this existence, but it is a full time job (and more) and, like all full-time jobs there are sweet spots and dark moments, highs and lows. And if you’re the kind of personality drawn to the sort of stories I am – emotional, dramatic, mysterious – then the chances are you have the type of heart that experiences those highs and lows very intensely. Here are five of each:

GUEST BOOK REVIEW: The House We Grew Up In (Lisa Jewell)

I am delighted to present a guest review by Super Speedy Reader Mum - aka - my friend Jackie....

When Book Club Mum handed over this book and then sneakily suggested: "perhaps you could write a review?" I surprised myself by agreeing. Lisa Jewell is one of my favourite authors and I'd finished her most recent novel, Before I Met You, a week ago with a joyous bounce and a greedy eye for her next page turner.

With this book, The House We Grew Up In, still unread, my theme was going to be how good it is for children to learn to play on their own, and how my children learned to do this while I, in the interest of good parenting, sat in the garden and chomped through pages and let them get on with it.

This book isn't a romance though. This is a sad book. It's sad in a reflective, thoughtful, gently peeling back the wallpaper sort of way.

BOOK REVIEW: Life After Life (Kate Atkinson)

Life After Life charts the many lives – or possible lives – of its protagonist, Ursula Todd.

Born in the middle of a snowstorm in 1910, she dies before even taking a breath because the umbilical cord is wrapped around her neck, the doctor and midwife kept away by the weather.

On the next page, her birth is a very different story - the doctor has managed to get there in time and the baby is saved.

Thus the novel unfolds, with Ursula’s idyllic, Merchant Ivory-style childhood regularly peppered with untimely death. A baby is smothered by a cat, a child slips off a roof, two girls drown playing in the waves, a murderous paedophile roams the countryside and Spanish ‘flu is hard to avoid.

Author Lisa Jewell is heading this way on a blog tour....

Before I Met You is the latest novel by  Lisa Jewell, author of The House We Grew Up In and After The Party. It's a love story set in bustling, grungy '90s Soho, and 1920s bohemian London. Lisa will be sharing her inspiration for the 1990s section of the book with a guest blog here at Book Club Mum this Friday. So don't forget to drop by for a blast from the past - Cool Britannia, the Primrose Hill set and the time when telephone numbers were still exchanged on pieces of paper... 

From the sick badge to Looks of Envy.....

Look at this jewellery. Gorgeous, isn't it?

In terms of accessories, I’ve been wearing the same brooch for the last few months. I say brooch, it’s really more of a badge. A badge of honour for parents of babies with reflux.

It’s so versatile – I’ve worn it with absolutely everything since Ben was born. Though I find it really sets off a manky old fleece particularly well.
Here's a picture:

BOOK CLUB REVIEW: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

I don’t normally do this, but with a smash hit thriller so famously full of twists and turns, I’m going to include SPOILERS. How exciting! I’ll give you good warning when they’re about to kick in...

Nick and Amy Dunne are preparing to celebrate their fifth wedding anniversary, but things aren’t good with their marriage. The couple, in their late 30s, have moved to his home town in Missouri after they both lost magazine jobs in New York, victims of the recession which looms as a motif in this unsettled world.

Before any anniversary celebrations can begin, Amy disappears in mysterious circumstances. There are signs of a struggle at the Dunnes’ home, but things don’t add up.

Gripping to the end, what happened to Amy is revealed to us in first person narrative by both Nick and Amy alternately.

Guest post by author Janey Fraser - plus chance to win a copy of her new book, Happy Families

I'm delighted to welcome Janey Fraser, author of The Playgroup and The Au Pair, as she stops by on the blog tour for her new novel, Happy Families. Here, she asks: Am I the only one who embarrasses my kids? 
Happy Families is out on Thursday. There are three copies up for grabs, simply post a comment for a chance to win.* 

I don’t mean to do it – well, not all the time – but I do seem to have an unhappy knack for putting my foot in it. Take the other day when one of my children did something which made me so cross that I gave her a sound telling off. In front of half a dozen of her (gob-smacked) friends.

So what happened? Instead of apologising to me for doing what she shouldn’t have, my offspring turned the tables and told me off instead. ‘What will my friends think ?’ she demanded. ‘You’re so embarrassing!’

Oh but I can do better. There was the time I drove one of them to school, still in my dressing gown because, despite getting up at 6am, I’d run out of time to get dressed. Unfortunately, one of the teachers at school came up for a word…... My son, squirming in the front seat, has never let me forget that one.

Happy Families blog tour is popping in soon....

Author Janey Fraser will be visiting the blog on Monday with a very funny post: Am I the only one who embarrasses my kids? I'm guessing no. There'll also be a parenting questionnaire and three copies of the book up for grabs so remember to come along and have a read.... 

WIN: Orchard Toys Rhyme Robber game

I’m afraid imaginative play is really not my strong point as a parent. One sentence that can bring me out in a cold sweat is: “Mummy, let’s play the caravan game”. This involves, as I’m sure you’ve guessed, playing out going on a caravanning holiday. Packing, travelling, unpacking, cooking, eating, sleeping – that bit never lasts long enough.

I’m either surreptitiously reading Twitter on my phone or I suggest that my little boy gets started with the packing and I’ll join in once I’ve – erm – yes – well.....

Which is why I'm so grateful for Orchard Toys, which have been a vital string to my bow as a parent.