June 2008

Well, I really don't know quite where to start this quarter. Go and get yourself a cup of tea and make yourself comfortable, because this could be an epic diary entry.
So much has happened since I last wrote, and most of it has been completely unexpected. I delivered my new novel to Penguin in the middle of April and very quickly heard back from Mari, my editor, to say that she absolutely loved it. Hugely relieved, and totally delighted, I finally breathed out and thought, aah, that’s that then. But then a series of rather dramatic events unfolded that were, on the whole, completely out of my control and I cannot go into the ins and outs and the whys and wherefores but suffice it to say that I now have a new publisher and a new agent.

This sort of thing doesn't happen very often in the publishing world. There’s a lot of loyalty and gentlemanly dealings involved in publishing, people tend to stay with the same publisher and the same agent for life (though you are, apparently, allowed to change both once, but only once, otherwise people start whispering about you). If, at the beginning of the year, you'd told me that such a thing would come to pass, I'd have slapped you and called you an arse. I don’t like change, and I’m a very loyal person, but I’m also a very philosophical person so I am taking all this enforced change as a GOOD THING and as much as I’m really sad that two such wonderful, long-standing  working relationships have come to an end I am now looking forward to the future a great deal.

Random House are my new publishers and will now be in charge of publishing the new novel, which, at the moment (and, as ever, subject to any amount of change) is entitled The Secret History of Melody Browne. It’ll be out as a Trade Paperback (one of those big jumbo sized ones that don’t fit in your handbag) in April 2009, followed swiftly and hotly a year later by the next novel which is to be (*cue fanfare*) a sequel to Ralph’s Party!

I always said I would never do a sequel, because generally I am fed up to the back teeth with my characters after a year or more in their company and want to create a fresh cast of people to play with. But ten years is a long time (yes, ten years) and I thought it would be fun to see what that decade has meant to Ralph, Smith, Jem et al. I’ve only just started it, but I think it's going to be fun.

But rewinding a book or two to the last one, 31 Dream Street did very well as a paperback – four weeks in the top ten and really healthy sales – and not only that, but it's just won an award! Yes, an actual prize, with a trophy and a cheque and everything! I was shortlisted for the Melissa Nathan Award for Comedy Romance just after I wrote my last diary entry, and I kept thinking, well, that's nice, but Dream Street's not very funny and all the other books on the shortlist are – it’ll never win. But it did! It was a lovely evening, hosted at the very cute Studio Valbonne on Kingly Street. I chatted with my lovely friend Maddy Wickham (aka Sophie Kinsella) and lots of people from my new publishers (who used to publish Melissa Nathan before she very sadly passed away three years ago at the heart-breakingly young age of 37) and then we were entertained by Jo Brand who was incredibly funny, and a real champion of Chicklit. Winning was a real adrenaline rush. I shouldn't imagine I’ll ever win a literary award again so I savoured every moment. And then Jascha and I decided that the night had peaked and made a sly getaway, my handbag straining under the weight of my huge Perspex trophy, to the posh Indian over the road for a late night curry. My only regret about the whole evening was that my mother wasn't around to witness it. It would have made her burst with pride.

Another event that my mother would have LOVED to have been around to witness was the marriage in Italy of my middle sister, Sacha, to Lee, her partner of eighteen years and father of her children. Jascha and I and the girls got to Italy a few days before the wedding and spent three nights in a rather strange resort just along the coast in a town called Loano. One of the strangest thing about this strange resort is that it doesn’t come up in English on a Google search and I was convinced before we got there that it was some of kind of white slavery scam, that we would check in and then be hurled into the back of a white van and driven miles across Europe in blindfolds. Luckily, it was just a hotel, if a bit of an odd hotel, and sadly the terrible weather meant that we spent rather more of our three days there squashed into our minuscule 10x10 bedroom and equally minuscule  kitchen/diner/living room/second bedroom watching videos on Jascha’s laptop than we might ideally have wanted. As it was off season, the only other people on the resort were two hundred or so Salsa dancers from across Europe, attending a Salsa conference at the hotel. Lots of glittery shoes and too much make up and men trying to look macho to compensate for being Salsa dancers.

The weather didn't really improve when we arrived at the seaside village of Celle Ligure along the coast for Sacha and Lee’s wedding weekend and we spent much time indoors or outside wearing knitwear. But on the morning of their wedding, the sun blazed, the air was balmy and it was the most beautiful, romantic, elegant day any bride could ever dream of. Thirty of us watched them marry first in the municipal office in the village, then we all headed back to the cliff top villa of our family friends, the Buzzis, for the best canapés I have ever had in my life and loads of champagne. We were served delicious pasta and a local speciality, Branzino al sale, then cake and cake and more cake. Sacha and Lee left that evening for a flight to Capri where they spent four nights on honeymoon. And then it started to rain again ...

We had better weather a month earlier when me, my girls, my old friend Sarah and her baby boy Elliot all drove out east to spend a weekend with our friends Jon and Angie who live in Westgate on Sea. Jon and Angie used to live in a small cottage in west London. They now live in a gigantic Victorian villa with fifty eight bedrooms and a ballroom (practically). We got drunk outside a bar in Margate and we saw my old college friends who live up the coast, and we had a picnic on the beach and a gorgeous sunset walk along the seafront from Margate to Westgate. Visiting old London friends who've decamped to less extortionate parts of the country is always an eye-opener and leaves you yearning for other lives you could be living. Imagine having the sea on your doorstep, a huge house, possibly even a pool, and no mortgage. But then, imagine a two hour drive to see my sisters, no decent Thai food, NEVER BEING ABLE TO AFFORD TO LIVE IN LONDON AGAIN. No, I'm not ready for it yet, but it is endlessly tempting.

The sun was out again for Jascha's brother’s wedding at the end of April. Seb used to be a photographer then woke up one morning and decided he wanted to be an airline pilot instead. He trained in South Africa and then got several hundred flying hours under his belt whilst working for Air Asia in Kuala Lumpur. He also met Mabel while he was living there, a lovely young girl from the Philippines. They fell in love then spent a couple of years toing and froing between London, Kuala Lumpur and the Philippines until finally, at Marylebone town hall, they got hitched in front of all of Seb’s friends and family. (When Mabel’s visa is finalised they will get married in a church in the Philippines.) It was a wonderful day, culminating in a really good old-fashioned night in the pub, complete with champagne, delicious food, dodgy speeches and karaoke. I have rarely seen Seb look as proud and as happy as he did on his wedding day and I now look forward HUGELY to the arrival of small Seband Mabels!

Well, I shall bring this marathon diary entry to a close with an update on my little girls. Evie turned one on the 16th May – and took her very first steps on the 15th May! Since then, however, she has gone right off the idea of walking and instead gets around the place in a position that I find hard, even as a writer, to find words to describe. You would really have to see it to appreciate it, but it is half way between a crawl and a bum shuffle and is most inelegant. The rest of the time she scoots around the place using anything that moves; chairs, tables, wheeled toys. She has started talking and can say about fifteen words now, her favourite being ‘hello’ which she calls out to anyone and everyone we pass, with a little wave of her hand. She's just learned ‘no’ and says it in a very posh accent, like the Queen; ‘nayo.’ ‘Evie, are you  lovely?’ ‘Nayo.’ ‘Evie, would you like some milk?’ ‘Nayo.’ She is very funny.

Amelie is going through one of her ‘I’ve decided to be good’ phases. Sometimes Amelie gets pleasure out of being as awkward and cross and obstreperous as possible, and sometimes she likes to be angelic. When she is an ‘angelic’ phase I tend to think, ‘aha, that’s it, I’ve cracked it, my amazing parenting techniques have finally paid off.’ I know better than that now and just enjoy the good times until ‘grumpy Amelie’ makes her return. She just received her first school report, which was, as she pointed out, ‘all ticks.’ I gave her a Polly Pocket.

Well, that’s it for this (bumper) quarter. Except to say this: Wayne and Colleen got married in the same venue as me and Jascha! Which is particularly strange as I thought they'd decided to stop hosting weddings there after our reception (things got broken, champagne got pilfered, someone's foot bled all over the marble floors and I think they were a bit disturbed by the vision of fifty thirtysomething Londoners pogoing to Gordon is a Moron).

Next quarter I will be telling you all about:

1. Amelie's fifth birthday party
2. Our holiday in Devon
3. My 40th birthday celebrations (or ‘the Festival of Lisa’ as Jascha has been referring to it),

and, I sincerely hope, nothing else whatsoever.

Thanks for all your support with 31 Dream Street, thanks for making it another bestseller, thanks for all the amazing comments in my guestbook and thanks for sticking with this diary entry until the bitter end.

See you in September!

Lots of love,
Lisa xxx

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Previous updates:

• March 2008
• December 2007
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• Lisa's Big US Tour
• April 2002
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• September 2000