UK Literary Luvvies

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Stillwater said:
Mhairi Mcfarlane is the best of the best in her genre. Plus she’s got a brilliant non thirsty non preachy online presence. She’s funny as duck. She also doesn’t seem to do blurbs and isn’t part of the same ole same ole love in.
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she absolutely is. i feel like really good “chick lit” (as much as i hate that term) is so difficult to write and so few authors actually manage to get it right - she’s one of them. her books are always warm and witty reads.

you’re right about dawn o’p and the bullying thing too; there was quite a big fuss about it iirc.
 
Stillwater said:
Chick lit has sort of been retired hasn’t it. I get that. It’s really condescending. It’s just lit.
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i hope it has! i always found it patronising, but i never liked any of the alternatives (like “modern romance lit” etc either) 🤣 i usually just call them “rom-com lit” (if they follow that kind of recycled pride and prejudice plot that a lot of them do).
 
queenamber said:
Scarlett Curtis. Especially when she talks about how she’s too depressed to work… from Richard and Emma’s country mansion.
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Did you see her q+a on Instagram a couple of days ago where someone asked her how she coped with depressive episodes and she basically said "I shut down and stay in bed watching TV for several days"? Admittedly she did also say "I'm talking from a place of privilege" or words to that effect in the same answer, but really, what kind of 'helpful' advice is that for most of the people who follow her on socials?
 
Can I add Clover Stroud? Writes nonfiction and a lot about being a mother/her kids but also massively overshares them online, including storying her daughter's dance classes with loads of other kids - wouldn't be happy if I was another parent. Also quite posh and privileged but doesn't acknowledge it. She (rightly) criticises the government but then has always written and continues to write lifestyle features for the Daily Mail. It's so jarring. She promotes her work in a very 'I'm doing this for you' kind of way iykwim.
 
notthefullshilling said:
Can I add Clover Stroud? Writes nonfiction and a lot about being a mother/her kids but also massively overshares them online, including storying her daughter's dance classes with loads of other kids - wouldn't be happy if I was another parent. Also quite posh and privileged but doesn't acknowledge it. She (rightly) criticises the government but then has always written and continues to write lifestyle features for the Daily Mail. It's so jarring. She promotes her work in a very 'I'm doing this for you' kind of way iykwim.
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Cannot stand her. Sophie Heawood is a classic example too. Quite nasty and defensive to people on Twitter and aspires to be a member of the bohemian set (wafting around the Port Eliot festival etc). Basically wrote a mummy memoir although she'd be furious to have it classed as one. A lot of her writing is very sneery.

Who was the writer who wrote about her inexpensive boho wedding recently? She's another one. Wild swimming, tick. Over-sharing of parenthood, tick.
 
Would someone be able to summarise the dawn o porter bullying thing? Never heard a thing about it.

I like Curtis sittenfeld. Sisterland is the most recent but I enjoyed rodham, American wide and prep is great (more YA but still loved it and it didnt feel YA). Loved the paper palace. Quite like Reece’s book club but there have been a few duds.
The four winds by Kristin Hannah was really good I thought and got me from the start.

I’m in a reading desert at the moment and resorting to comedian biographies. Katherine Ryan’s surprised me. Thought it was good and showed a different side to her.
 
Love_hate_small_town said:
Would someone be able to summarise the dawn o porter bullying thing? Never heard a thing about it.

I like Curtis sittenfeld. Sisterland is the most recent but I enjoyed rodham, American wide and prep is great (more YA but still loved it and it didnt feel YA). Loved the paper palace. Quite like Reece’s book club but there have been a few duds.
The four winds by Kristin Hannah was really good I thought and got me from the start.

I’m in a reading desert at the moment and resorting to comedian biographies. Katherine Ryan’s surprised me. Thought it was good and showed a different side to her.
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i love curtis sittenfeld - american wife is truly one of my favourite books, i really liked the paper palace until the last ten pages.

i wasn’t a huge fan of the four winds though; kristin hannah is very readable but i find her character building a little lacking sometimes. they’re always enjoyable enough reads though.

i would add kate atkinson to this list too - imo she’s one of the best living british authors (or certainly the best living female one). her characters, her world building, is all excellent.
 
Love_hate_small_town said:
Would someone be able to summarise the dawn o porter bullying thing? Never heard a thing about it.

I like Curtis sittenfeld. Sisterland is the most recent but I enjoyed rodham, American wide and prep is great (more YA but still loved it and it didnt feel YA). Loved the paper palace. Quite like Reece’s book club but there have been a few duds.
The four winds by Kristin Hannah was really good I thought and got me from the start.

I’m in a reading desert at the moment and resorting to comedian biographies. Katherine Ryan’s surprised me. Thought it was good and showed a different side to her.
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Back when Dawn was the known for her documentaries, the kind that Stacey Dooley and a Cherry Healy make now, a bunch of writers/media women took a dislike to her, these included Sali Hughes. Everytime Dawn appeared on tv, sali and her band of friends would make snarky remarks about her on Twitter and they would all have a chuckle over it on their public Twitter accounts calling her Prawn and just sneering at and looking down at her. Sali mostly scrubbed them but they resurfaced when she started her “tattle should be shut down” schtick because she found a thread taking the piss out of her ridiculous posturing and k no it disclosing ads/spon properly.
 
Spilttea said:
Back when Dawn was the known for her documentaries, the kind that Stacey Dooley and a Cherry Healy make now, a bunch of writers/media women took a dislike to her, these included Sali Hughes. Everytime Dawn appeared on tv, sali and her band of friends would make snarky remarks about her on Twitter and they would all have a chuckle over it on their public Twitter accounts calling her Prawn and just sneering at and looking down at her. Sali mostly scrubbed them but they resurfaced when she started her “tattle should be shut down” schtick because she found a thread taking the piss out of her ridiculous posturing and k no it disclosing ads/spon properly.
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yikes i was referring to her BEING a bully after that infamous amazon review of one of her books where a school friend called her out, i didn’t know any of this.
 
Agree about Dawn O’P, find her books very bla, I always think I could write them. I agree with whoever said about the end of The Paper Palace, I really liked it but disappointing ending.

I read The Secret History when it came out 30 yrs ago and it’s been a favourite ever since. However, my favourite British writer is Maggie O’Farrell, just finished The Marriage Portrait and it’s stunning.

I feel a lot of the luvvies are just in it to play at writing, it’s an amusing past time for them
 
Breakdance Badass said:
Agree about Dawn O’P, find her books very bla, I always think I could write them. I agree with whoever said about the end of The Paper Palace, I really liked it but disappointing ending.

I read The Secret History when it came out 30 yrs ago and it’s been a favourite ever since. However, my favourite British writer is Maggie O’Farrell, just finished The Marriage Portrait and it’s stunning.

I feel a lot of the luvvies are just in it to play at writing, it’s an amusing past time for them
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maggie o’farrell is a genius! after you’d gone and the hand that first held mine especially are absolute works of art - i love her prose style so much.

i think your comment about them “playing at writing” is so accurate. i used to do that as a kid when i would write really overblown stories and staple the pages together into a “book”. the only difference is that theirs actually get published 🤣
 
Yes, I used to do it too, I feel that makes us qualified to comment. I don’t think they care if there is any integrity in what they do?

Agree on both those Maggie O’F books too, I just wish she would write quicker 😂
 
Rekyavikgirl said:
Cannot stand her. Sophie Heawood is a classic example too. Quite nasty and defensive to people on Twitter and aspires to be a member of the bohemian set (wafting around the Port Eliot festival etc). Basically wrote a mummy memoir although she'd be furious to have it classed as one. A lot of her writing is very sneery.

Who was the writer who wrote about her inexpensive boho wedding recently? She's another one. Wild swimming, tick. Over-sharing of parenthood, tick.
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Nell Frizzell? I think that’s her name. I saw Pandora gushing over her wedding outfit on Twitter 😂
 
Spilttea said:
Back when Dawn was the known for her documentaries, the kind that Stacey Dooley and a Cherry Healy make now, a bunch of writers/media women took a dislike to her, these included Sali Hughes. Everytime Dawn appeared on tv, sali and her band of friends would make snarky remarks about her on Twitter and they would all have a chuckle over it on their public Twitter accounts calling her Prawn and just sneering at and looking down at her. Sali mostly scrubbed them but they resurfaced when she started her “tattle should be shut down” schtick because she found a thread taking the piss out of her ridiculous posturing and k no it disclosing ads/spon properly.
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Thank you! Off for a deep dive …

LaBlonde said:
yikes i was referring to her BEING a bully after that infamous amazon review of one of her books where a school friend called her out, i didn’t know any of this.
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Didn’t know this either!
 
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