Madeira!

Ahowayiz! Now you may or may not know that I made a rash promise on the Twitters that I’d do a diary of my holiers in Madeira, the way I did when I was on my holiers in Antarctica. However! I had not factored in that it was a walking holiday I was on in Madeira and at the end of every day I was absolutely SHATTERED and in no fit condition to be writing my name, never mind a diary. So I must apologise profusely for letting you down.

However. All is not entirely lost because I’d written the below, while I was on the 2 planes flying to Madeira (From Dublin to Lisbon. From Lisbon to Funchal.) and it seemed a shame to decommission it entirely. So it’s not about anything much, except the Friday Night Dinner over at Mam’s, but nevertheless you may find it amusing.

Once again my apologies. Also, I hope you are keeping well. Thank you to all of you decent, kind-hearted people who’ve been buying The Woman Who Stole My Life and keeping it so high in the bestseller lists all summer. Also to all of you who’ve been buying the Kindle version – huge numbers. Penguin who are my publishers say the figures are ‘unprecedented’ – which is nice!

And thank you to everyone who has come to the readings and yokes I’ve been doing – there are a few more coming. I’ll be at The Feile in Belfast on August 6th, at The Cheltenham Festival on (I think) October 7th. Also, there are thrilling plans afoot to do a reading/Q&A/enthusiastic chinwag at – get this! – the Gudrun Sjoden shop in Monmouth Street, London on September 26th to celebrate the arrival of the Autumn clothes. Also I’ll be in the ACTUAL Swedens in October. And more appearances ‘to be announced.’

Thank you again and onwards we go!

So like I said, this was written on the planes, when I was still convinced that I wouldn’t be spannered with exhaustion every evening and well able to turn out a lengthy account of my day…

“Here is a diary of my holiers in Madeira! However, as I’m on the plane on the first leg on the flights, flying to Lisbon, I don’t have much but minuitae to report. So I will report said minuitae!

Well I rose at 8am, readying myself for a 9.30am departure from the house. I donned my Fitbit and this is only my second day of the fecker but it is already tyrannising me. I decided I needed to do a quick skite to Ronan the Chemist, because I suddenly became worried that the 3 crates of medicaments that I’d purchased earlier in the week wouldn’t be enough. And although Ronan isn’t far away, I usually go in the vehicle, but with one eye on my ‘step-count’ I decided I’d – yes! – WALK to Ronan! But then, after a discussion with Himself, I realised that actually I DID have enough medicaments and that I was just doing the panicky pre-holiday thing that I always do and I abandoned all plans to visit Ronan.

I ‘took’ my bricfeasta of porridge and enjoyed it tremenjussly but I was brimming over with pre-holiday giddiness that had no outlet, so I had to eat 15 cinnamon and apple ‘diet’ biscuits in order to calm myself. Then I hated myself. And that was grand, business as usual, you might say.

I will backtrack slightly to yesterday, where we had the Friday Night Dinner at the Mammy’s. Turnout was low because all 4 of the Praguers were ‘otherwise occupied’ as they prepared for their holiday in Madeira with myself and Himself. Present were: Me, Himself, Mam, Dad, AnneMarie (visiting from UK), Rita-Anne and The Redzers. It was a joyous occasion because The Redzers had just returned from wrecking New York and I’d missed the little blighters while they’d been away, things had been eerily quiet. I interrogated them on what they’d done, whilst ‘Stateside’ and Redzer the Elder said they’d gone swimming. And Redzer the Younger said, “The pool was in the outside.” So I assumed it was the local baths in the park opposite Caitriona and Sean’s apartming in Brooklyn.

But no! It transpired that The Redzers had gone swimming in the roof-top pool in Soho House! And I nearly got SICK from the laughing. I’m sure you know but The Soho House is a foncy members club – I’d been in the New York one a few years back and around the pool is profoundly intimidating – many, MANY slender beauties in elaborate bikinis and ginormous sunglasses lounging around, being aloof and soignee and icy and drinking foncy elegant cocktails in misty glasses with tiny white straws – the time I was there I was a cringing ball of fear and unworthiness. And the thoughts of The Redzers in their goggles and armbands, doing energetic waterbombs and wild shrieking and splashing had me in convulsions.

“Then we had pancakes,” RTE (Redzer The Elder) said.

“No, we didn’t!” RTY (Redzer The Younger) said. “We had BRUNCH!!!!”

“Yes,” RTE said, in a rare display of agreement with his brother, “We had brunch.”

And that started me off with the laughing again, and it made me think of the scene in The Blues Brothers when the 2 brothers go into the foncy restaurant and make shows of themselves, flinging food across the table into each other’s mouths. I had to check with Rita-Anne, but yes, The Redzers really DID have brunch in The Soho House. “We had HASH BROWNS!” RTE said and clearly the hash browns had made a big impression on him.

Next thing, Tadhg’s car drew up outside and we all rushed to the window because a) he’d been vague about whether or not he’d be coming over at all. And b) and far more importantly, he hadn’t given a definitive Yes when we’d asked him if he was bringing over Baby Teddy. And being quite honest with you, no-one has much interest in Tadhg these days, unless he’s accessorised by Baby Teddy. “He’s getting out,” someone says. “He’s out. He’s on his own. No, no! He’s getting something else out of the car!” Then, in disappointment, we saw that it was only a bag. “Awwwww, it’s only a bag,” RTE said.

“But why would he need a bag?!” Mam asked. “Tadhg isn’t a ‘man-bag’ type. He’d only need a bag if he was bringing -” “BABY TEDDY!!!” We all chorused, and then we saw Tadhg opening the back-door of the car. “He’s opening the back door! He’s opening the back door! There he is!!! THERE HE IS!!!!” And sure enough, there was Baby Teddy in his little chair, bring led up to the house.

Everyone thundered out into the hall, and as soon as the door opened, we were all pawing at Baby Teddy. Mam yelled, “Don’t be UP in the craythur’s face! Don’t be UP in his face!”

Out of the corner of my ear, I heard Rita-Anne say, “When did Mam start saying that saying?” “While you were away,” Mam replied, “And you can’t make fun of me because it’s a real saying, I checked. So don’t be UP in Baby Teddy’s face.”

But we couldn’t help ourselves. We were UP in Baby Teddy’s face, and it’s a good job the poor little divil is as easy-going as he is, because a lesser child would have been terrified.

Details on Baby Teddy: he was six months yesterday. He is GINORMOUSLY fat – he has the fattest thighs you’ve ever seen. He is SUPER-smiley. He loves dogs, and his best friend is Tadhg and Susie’s boxer Katie (named after Katie Taylor.)

I hadn’t a hope of getting near him so I went into ‘the room’ and had a little chat with Dad, who greeted me by saying, “You look very dirty.”

“That’s my fake tan,” I said.

“What’s that?” He asked. I attempted an explanation, but I’d have got more sense out of Baby Teddy.

“And why do you put them colours on your nails?” He asked.

“Because I like them,” sez I.

“So do I,” sez he. “Are you married?”

“I am,” sez I. “Well, I wish someone had told me!” He declared.

Then it was dinner time and this week it was mine and Himself’s turn to get the grub and I’d gone off-piste. Usually we get them big pasta yokes from Marks and Spencers but I’d been up in Stillorgan and airly, I’d said to Himself that I’d ‘pick up’ some dinner from Donnybrook Fair because I liked that picture of myself, of a woman who stands at a delicatessen counter, chatting with a white-attired chef/server person about the various different salads and things.

And I’d got – what I considered anyway to be – a FABALISS array of Summery things – potato skins, lemongrass chicken, coleslaw, something called ‘Summer salad’ and garlic bread, and ontra noo, I’d only fecked in the garlic bread at the last minute because I sensed there might be a mini-revolution if I didn’t.

And let me tell you that it was the mercy of god that I DID get the 2 garlic breads, because when I dished up the lovely off-piste dinner, there were wild cries of disappointment – where were the pasta yokes? Why were they being fobbed off with this shite? Nervously I strove for airiness – “I thought we’d try something new!”

“New?” They cried. “Why would we want ‘new’? We like the pasta yokes!”

“But it’s Summer. These are Summery things.” Then I played my trump card. “They’re from DonnyBrook Fair.”

“I don’t care if they’re from Fossett’s Circus,” Mam said. “I want the pasta yokes.”

“Are these hash browns?” RTE poked the little cubes of chicken in deep-fried batter.

Sensing I could potentially form an alliance that would serve me well, I said, stoutly, “Yes, YES, Redzer the Elder, they ARE hash browns!” So he shoved about 6 into his mouth, gave a little chew, then spat them out again – and I knew I was sunk.

They divvied up the garlic bread amongst themselves and, giving me baleful looks, placed their alloted tiny slice on their otherwide empty dinner plates and ate in resentful silence. Even Dad, who, under usual circumstances would eat the leg of the chair, refused to partake of my lovely Summery food. “Well feck yiz,” I said to them. “Feck the lot of yiz!”

“Feck you,” Dad said, “Feck you right back.”

But then it was Magnum time and the Mammy took everyone’s orders and while the rest of us went into the sitting room and flung themselves on the couches, Mam went into the kitchen and began burrowing around in the freezer and now and again she’d come back into the room, with bits of hoary frost eyebrows and say, “Where’s Oscar? Here’s your Mint Magnet. And Rita-Anne? Here’s your Pink one.” And someone would say, “Where’s mines?” And Mam would say, in shrill tones, “I’m going as fast as I can! There’s only the wan of me!” Then back into the kitchen she’d go and we’d hear the funny scraping noises that are made as a mother moves around bodily inside a freezer, burrowing her way into cardboard Magnum boxes and emerging with the correctly flavoured Magnum and bursting joyously to the surface with it held between her teeth.

“The tea might have been a wash-out,” Tadhg said, “But we’ll always have Magnums…”

So now it is Saturday and I am attempting a spending spree in the Duty-Free but I’m being THWARTED! Which is a great word. I tried to get the Bobbi Brown Moisturising Balm but they didn’t have the colour I wanted, then I tried to get the Estee Lauder EE cream but they didn’t have the colour I wanted there either. THEN! We had to walk twenty miles from terminal 2 to terminal 1 because even though we had to check in at Terminal 2, our gate was in terminal 1 and it wasn’t the worst thing in the world because I was thinking of my Fitbit and how pleased it would be with me and THEN! We passed through the Terminal WAN duty-free and I dived into the Bobbi Brown bit and as luck would have it, they HAD the colour I wanted and I was in good form – until the woman said, “And it’s 20% cheaper than on the high street.” And I said, “What high street?” Because in Ireland we don’t have ‘high streets’, we have ‘main street’ or ‘down the town’ or ‘in town’ or ‘In Arnotts or Humdrum or Brown Thomas.’

However, this ‘high street’ business must mean that in the Dublin Duty-Free they’ve been told they can knock off saying, “It’s cheaper than ‘Downtown’ prices” – which used to make the red mist descend on me, because Irish people would NEVER talk about ‘Downtown’ like we are from Detroit or San Diego and it used to feel terribly wrong. But anyway… I got my stuff and I was happy.

The flight was uneventful, which is probably the best kind and then we landed in Lisbon and despite my great love for Jose, I’ve only been to Portugal once and that was donkeys years ago but I remember being struck by how LOVELY the people were. On that previous visit, myself and Himself spent about 4 days in a place called Sintra, which is atmospheric and sort-of-spooky and had lots of fabliss houses that – if I’m remembering correctly and I mightn’t be – Byron and his A-quills used to be taking drugs and stuff in and there was a funny well and lots of overhanging trees and like I said… atmospheric.

Then there was a seaside town – would it be Cascai? Something like that – with old-fashioned restaurants set into the dunes and the marram grass and the waiter tempted us to have the ‘fish of the day’ which he said was done in ‘the Portuguese national sauce’ and when I enquired what was in this national sauce, he declared, like he was telling me, “Unicorn eyelashes!” But the words he said were, “Boiling water!”

However! Himself is disputing my memory of that conversation. But he has added this codicil, “That is not to say that the food we had on that holiday was not the blandest stuff we’ve ever had anywhere, ever. Wasn’t that the place we got cod-fish for every meal?” And it was.

At the time, I’d found something slightly sinister in the tautological word ‘fish’. Either the Cod is fish or it isn’t. If the food is fish, there is no need to add the qualifying word, ‘fish’, is there? So at every meal I suspected that the ‘Cod fish’ was not ‘fish’ at all but some other quare food like sea-vegetable.

After 4 days in Sintra eating so-called ‘cod fish’ cooked in boiling water, we went to stay in Lisbon and when I asked the ‘man’ in the hotel what tourist things he recommended in Lisbon, he said, “You must go to Sintra! Sintra is the best thing about Lisbon. We will organise for you a car and a driver-man for to take you there – Jose! Fetch the hotel car to take Missy Keyes to Sintra, for she will love it! Byron went there, Missy Keyes. Off his nut on laudunum the whole time he was!” And it was the mercy of god that I found my voice in time to tell the ‘man’ to stand down his vehicle, that wasn’t I only after arriving direct from Sintra and that delightful as it had been, I wanted to spend a bit of time in Lisbon.

But the man was glum and downcast and could hardly bring himself to unfurl the map of the local area onto the counter and stab at our current location with a blue biro, so Himself and myself elected to go exploring on our own and these are my abiding memories of Lisbon: custard pies, a furniture shop run by a man called Senor Toucan, quare-flavoured Magnums, difficulty finding a public wees-facility, kindly people, custard pies…. Oh! And custard pies!

And now we are on the quare little plane, flying to Madeira-land and they have come around and gevv us FREE hang sangwidges and ‘drinks’ and they are SO nice and smiley and warm and friendly and I’m quite – still! – giddy! I mean, it’s nice, when people are nice, no? Why can’t we all just be nice?”

…and there I’m afraid, my Madeira Diary ends… I know! I know! I’m sorry! But you know what I was thinking – I like this sort of writing. I love it, in fact. It’s a lot easier than writing novels. Why don’t I just write travel books? Like, not real ones, obviously. Comedy ones. Travel books refracted through the prism of my peculiar personality. What do you think?

I’m actually serious. Are you on the Twitters? If you are, will you twitter me and let me know what you think and if you’re in agreement, where you’d like me to go.

I suppose I’d need a theme, these sort of books need themes… Well, one thing Himself and myself thought of a few years ago was doing a Sprite Zero hunt. Because you may not know this, but Sprite Zero in 33ml bottles is very hard to find. Yes!

Or another thing – and those of you with more refined sensibilities might wince at this notion – but I ‘suffer’ with my bladder and spend 89% of my life anxiously scanning my surroundings, looking for a wees ‘outlet’. I’m never comfortable in a situation until I’ve established where the nearest jacks is.

Himself suggested we do a project called, “Weeing Across America.’ He said this after we attempted to drive from LA to San Francisco and I made him stop approximately once every 15 miles for me to duck behind a hedge.

Obviously, this wouldn’t do. Who would want to read a book about a woman terrified of not being able to find a spot in which to dispense of any excess wees? But if anything occurs to you, be sure and let me know. Tanken yew in advance and now I will sign off as I have to go and make the tay.

Once again my apologies for the lack of Diary. Once again my thanks for all your kindness. Once again my best wishes to you and yours. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

PS I nearly forgot! I love this, so I do – on Friday at dinner time, I rang Mam’s from Madeira, just to see how they were all getting on and Rita-Anne came on the phone and over the shrieking and crashing noises in the background, managed to tell me that when she was driving the Redzers over, Oscar (Redzer the Younger, who is only 5) said, in sudden high alarm, “What if Auntie Marian is doing the dinner again this week?!” And it took a good bit of TLC AND effusive promises that I was faraway in another land before he calmed down.

Sali Hughes!  Pretty Honest!  Readings!

Hello amigos, hello, hello, hello. You are probably surprised to hear from me again so soon after my lengthy spell of unreliableness but so many interesting and lovely things have happened that I HAVE to tell you.

Firstly, may I tell you about last Wednesday, which turned out to be one of the happiest days of my entire life? I may? Tanken yew! Well! You know Sali Hughes, the make-up artist and beauty journalist who writes for The Guardian on a Saturday? And has her own website where she does great videos called In The Bathroom, where she visits the bathrooms of famous and/or interesting people and discusses their beauty products and skincare and whatnot? Well, I’ve been a fan of hers for a long time because while she really loves all things beauty, she’s entirely honest and reliable and informative. She knows everything.

We first came into contact when I twittered asking people what I should do about the little broken capillaries on my face and everyone told me to email Sali – and she emailed me back immediately, giving me a variety of options and telling me the upsides and downsides of each. And after that we stayed in touch and even though we hadn’t met in real life, I loved her already because she has great sweetness and gentleness coupled with razor-sharp intelligence. Also, she gives airtime to all kinds of brands, they don’t have to be big names and expensive, so she’s in nobody’s pocket, so I know that what she writes in her column is genuinely impartial. Also, she’s wonderful for giving exposure to new and emerging brands, which thrills me because I am a divil for ‘New and Exciting.’

And now she’s after writing a book, called Pretty Honest and it is the ABSOLUTE BEAUTY BIBLE – it covers everything from the very basics, such as identifying your skin type to how to manage your beauty when you’re going through something awful like cancer, and she de-mystifies the ‘anti-ageing’ industry, separating out cod science from things that do actually work. (As well as acknowledging that there’s nothing wrong with looking your age – basically she gives you every option.)

Every woman should have this book. Because beauty stuff is a passionate hobby of mine, I thought I knew a bit, but compared to Sali, I know nothing and I’ve already consulted the book many times.

So anyway, there I am, living in Dublin and you know, living a quiet life, seeing my mammy and the Redzers and the Praguers and going for walks with Himself and Posh Kate and Posh Malcolm – when Sali sends me this invitation to a lunch. A foncy lunch – being thrown for her by Bobbi Brown – yes! The make-up brand Bobbi Brown! And I was invited! There were only 20 people invited and I was one of them – and when I saw the list of the other invitees, didn’t I nearly get sick! They were all writers or journalists that I hold in HUGE regard – India Knight, JoJo Moyes, Sam Baker, Polly Samson, Miranda Sawyer, Hadley Freeman, Lucy Mangan, Maria McErlane, Georgia Garrett, Julia Raeside, Jo Elvin, Camilla Long, Sophie Heawood, Bryony Gordon and Sarah Morgan. Also invited were three amazing women from the Estee Lauder group – Jay Squier, Cheryl Joannides and Anna Bartle.

My immediate impulse was that I couldn’t possibly go, that I didn’t belong, that I wouldn’t fit in and then I thought, feck it! I want to go. I’m GOING!

And this was huge for me because I’ve been mad-in-the-head for so long that I’ve had to keep my life very small and safe because it was all that I could cope with. But I realised I was ready to go into a daunting, intimidating situation and try and hold my own.

And off I went. And I really hope you don’t think I’m being a boasty-boaster, I just wanted to let you know that if you’ve suffered from the MITH-ness yourself and you think you’ll always feel terrible, it may not be the case forever.

I ‘jetted’ in from Dublin – normally when I travel by air, I simply fly, but because this was so glamorous, I ‘jetted’ and the lunch was upstairs in the private room in Balthazaar and I had to scuttle past the welcoming committee to go to the ladies to do last minute checks on myself – only to discover that – horrors! – I’d somehow managed to leave Dublin without my comb!

For a brief but very real moment I contemplated leaving Balthazaar and getting a taxi back to the airport and flying home – yes ‘flying’ home, no ‘jetting’ this time, it would be an ignominious return – and never contacting any of the people here today ever again. Then I remembered a day long ago when my mammy couldn’t find any of her combs because all of her daughters had stolen them and she had to go to Mass (not a Sunday but a holy day of obligation) and she ended up having to comb her hair with a fork. Inspired by her ingenuity, I resolved that as soon as was polite, I’d secret a fork from the table into my handbag and race back to the ladies and sort my hair out that way.

So in I went to the room and I was appallingly nervous – the first person I saw was Camilla Long – Camilla Long! In real life! And then I met Sali and my hands were shaking so much, my fingers were all fumbly. But she was the kindness, nicest woman you could meet, and exquisite-looking, like a doll.

And as it transpired, everyone was INCREDIBLY nice. The only person I’d properly met before, apart from the amazing Jay Squier, was the wonderful novelist and Red editor-in-chief Sam Baker, who is very grounded and calm and kind and she passed on a little of her calmness to me. And she was with Jojo Moyes – Jojo Moyes! My love, my admiration, my downright jealousy of Jojo’s talent knows no bounds. But would you believe Jojo had also forgotten her comb! So I decided that if someone as amazing as Jojo Moyes had forgotten her comb that forgetting ones comb was actually admirable. Perhaps it could become ‘A Thing’. A bit like the ice-bucket challenge – where you go out for the evening without your comb…? No, maybe not. Sorry. Not all my ideas are runners…

Then I met Miranda Sawyer, the music journalist, who is so cooooollll! But she was extremely welcoming and warm and fun and that did a huge amount to put me at my ease.

So we were standing around having drinks and I went mad and had a diet coke, because of the day that was in it and before I knew it, I was in the thick of things. Initially I was acting, trying hard to chat and act normal and not keel over with intimidation, but after a while it became real – and then I discovered I was enjoying myself. Like really enjoying myself.

And when we sat down for the lunch I discovered several things:

A) a personalised name tag – while we’d been doing our chatting and mingling an illustrator had sat in the room and sketched each of us – here’s a picture of my one. I’ve never encountered a more charming, delightful gesture ever

B) I was seated on Sali’s right hand which was a massive honour.

C) On my other side was India Knight and oh my GOD! She’s incredible! Utterly hilarious – I nearly got sick laughing – and entertaining and warm and vital and alive and passionate and smart as a whip.

D) A Bobbi Brown goodie bag next to my sideplate. It took EVERYTHING IN MY POWER to stop myself from ripping it open and kissing the things inside

E) I was seated opposite Hadley Freeman, who is the nicest nicest person and was so complimentary about Ireland that I totally fell in love with her.

F) Maria McErlane was sort of diagonally across from me and she was another one that had me choking with laughter.

G) Diagonally across from me on the other side was the aforementioned lovely Miranda Sawyer

What was very interesting was the atmosphere in the room – there was nothing but love. I’m very attuned to undercurrents and unspoken tension and there was absolutely none. Everyone was so happy for Sali and everyone seemed genuinely thrilled to be in such a beautiful room, eating such delicious food, and being with such lovely people. And there was no oneupmanship or posturing or “Oh yeah? So when’s your book coming out? Because my book…” And believe me, I’ve been at my fair share of those sort of competitive yokes over the years and this was nothing like them.

I was having such a great time that the time rattled by and before I knew it, it was 4 o’clock and I had to leave to ketch my flight to ‘jet’ back to Dublin (definitely ‘jetting’) and as I was leaving I had a little chat with Lucy Mangan and to be honest, I was afeerd of Lucy Mangan because she’s such a passionate defender of the poorest and most deprived people in Britain, that I thought she’d dismiss me as a fluffy eejit airhead. But! Would you believe that we talked about shoes! Yes! We both have abnormally small feet and we bonded over what a pain in the arse it is to never to be able to find shoes to fit.

Then off I went and because everyone was so great and because it’s not that long since I was so mad-in-the-head that I couldn’t even get out of bed, it was one of the best days of my entire life.

Right then, in other lovely news, on November 5th, at 6.30, I’m doing a reading/question&answer session/chat about shoes, nails, BeachHouse Banjoing and anything else you like, at Waterstones, Piccadilly in London. [Sorry – appears to be sold out now – Himself]

There are tickets (available here) and they’re £5 and I’m sorry there’s a charge at all (it doesn’t go to me, I suppose it’s to cover admin and whatnot) but The Woman Who Stole My Life will be available at half-price and you’ll be getting it a day before official publication, so I hope it’s okay with you. The first batch of tickets sold out very quickly, but more have been made available, so please comes, we’ll have lots of fun.

Also, in Dublin, on November 8th, at Eason’s Dundrum, at 2pm, I’ll be doing a signing. No tickets needed for that, just come along.

So that’s all my news! What else? I’m looking forward to Hallowe’en when we go out with the Redzers. They live in an estate that’s ASWARM with nippers and everyone does their house up lovely and has skeletons swinging from the upstairs windows and spooky noises playing in their gardens and the quality of the sweets given out! By gor! Second to none! Dylan is going as Darth Vader and Oscar is going as Ben 10, but with a blue face… Riiiiight….

Thank you very much for reading this, I really hope I didn’t come across as a braggart or a boasty boaster, I just wanted to let you know that MITHness can go away. Mine could well come back again but it’s managable for today and shur, today is all we have.

Big kisses to you all and lots of love

Marian

PS I forgot to say that Sali Hughes will be coming over to film me In The Bathroom, sometime in late Nov or early Dec. We’re also going to film in my shoe press…

Hello!  Apologies!  New book!

GLITTERIN’ RAFFLE!

Hello there, hello and sorry as always for the long delay since the last newsletter. The thing is, I’m in thrall to twitter and tend to post all my news on it as it’s quick and immediate and I’m a slave to the instant gratification. So please forgive me. And maybe come and join the twitters. Follow @MarianKeyes, as it’s great fun and a right laugh.

So what can I tell you? Well, I’ve been scribing hard on a new book, it’s called The Woman Who Stole my Life and it’s out on November 6 in English and the translations will be along as quickly as possible. It’s a love story and it’s about this very ordinary woman called Stella Sweeney who accidentally (and briefly) becomes the most influential woman in the world. It’s far less dark than The Mystery of Mercy Close, there’s a lightness to it which amazes me because I was feeling far from light myself while I was writing it. Also it’s more ‘grown-up’ – Stella is in her 40s. But don’t be alarmed, it’s still funny, please rest assured of that!

My pals who have read it say it’s a bit different to anything I’ve already written but from the writing style, you’d still know it was one of mine. Also it’s very sexy – Stella has been married for about 20 years and has 2 teenage childer but she undergoes a kind of sexual reawakening. You know how hard it is for me to say positive things about myself, but I – *whispers* – think it might be the book I’m most proud of writing.

And you can read the opening chapters: HERE!!!

So you know the way I do hold the occasional GLITTERIN’ raffles on the twitters? Yes? Okay. Well, I am holding a GLITTERIN’ raffle to give away a proof copy of The Woman Who Stole My Life (a proof copy means it’ll still have the spelling mistakes and whatnot in it, but it’ll give you the general idea.)

But there’s more – oh yes! MUCH more! The Kenmare Park Hotel, which is a TOP-NOTCH, 5 star hotel in Kenmare, Kerry, has offered us a 2 night stay – that’s 2 nights, a fabliss dinner and a 3 hour Sisley Spa ritual! We are in the big-league now, amigos! The idea is that the winner will read the book while luxuriating in the beautiful hotel. Details here, it is so lovely.

Also, it is run by Irish national treasure Francis Brennan and his brother – also a national treasure, but in a more low-key way – John Brennan. They’re on an Irish telly-box programme called At Your Service, which everyone loves.

However, I’m afeerd there’s a caveat – travel expenses are not included and the prize can’t be auctioned on Ebay or exchanged for cash. So if you live in say, Borneo or Easter Island, and you won, but couldn’t come to Kerry, would you consider regifting your – FRANKLY FABLISS! – prize to someone else? I’m terribly sorry to sound so ‘Full of Rules’ but this is an unprecedented situation for me. And I suppose I’ll have to say that no members of my family can enter the raffle (sorry Mammy).

But there is a second prize – another proof copy of The Woman Who Stole My Life and also some other lovely books given to us by some of my twittery pals – some from Summersdale Publishing and a lovely bakery book called Like Mam Used to Bake by Rosanne Hewitt-Cromwell.

To enter, simply twitter me @mariankeyes with the hashtag ‘Marians new book’ so that it looks like this – #MariansNewBook. See? Tweet #MariansNewBook. Ferry simple, yes? Yes! And would it be okay if we could have just one entry per person, so that everyone has the same chance? And this GLITTERIN’ raffle is open to everyone in the whole world, regardless of which land you hail from.

Those of you familiar with previous GLITTERIN’ raffles will know that the entries are cut up by hand into little paper strips and each strip is placed in the Salad Spinner of Happiness, which is spun by a niece or nephew of mine, who then select the winners. However, because I am SHOCKEN busy this week, both with the run-up to the publication of the book (I am scribing many, many articles and suchlike) and because I am having several small but necessary medical procedures and because Ema and Luka are back at school and I can’t come to them, cap-in-hand and plead for them to do the cutting-up for me, would you mind if we selected the winners another way? Just this once, on account of the appalling busyness. I promise you that the Salad Spinner of Happiness has not been pensioned off, simply put on hold. So what I’m proposing is that on this coming Friday evening (that’s Friday 19th of September), the Redzers will sit at Himself’s computer and hit random keys until they have highlit two entries who will then be declared the winners. Because the Redzers are very young and very innocent, I can promise you they will be completely impartial.

Meanwhile, I have a new hobby! Yes! I did a course in Annie Sloan chalk paints and basically I am painting everything in sight. It’s great because the whole point of them is that your furniture looks ‘shabby chic’ which means you can make mistakes and miss bits and it’s all part of the total look, which is PERFECT for me as I am made for the instant gratification and can’t be arsed doing things meticulously and carefully.

I went to Christy Birds in Portobello and bought a little press for 30 yoyos and painted it blue and ‘distressed’ it so it looked like it belonged to the ‘Banjoed Beachhouse’ (my invention) school of interior decoration and I am SO PROUD of that little blue press and I put a new knob on it and all and I was over at the mammy’s and showing her pictures of it and she made admiring noises but I could tell she was AGHAST that I would ‘ruin’ the ‘good’ press by covering the lovely brown wood with blue paint and then sandpapering it, so it looked like it had been sitting in the sun for a decade. She was going out so I said, “Mam, while you’re out, I’ll paint your mahogany hall table pink,” and she all but shrieked, “No! NO! Do not lay a finger on any of my furniture with your horrible paints.” So now I know the truth. (If you are interested in the chalk paints, as well as Annie Sloan, there’s a brand called Autentico which do AMAZING colours. Check out the Heliotrope)

However, we have struck a deal: she has a nest of tables that would take the night’s sleep offa you with their horribleness. So she says I can have them if I buy her a nice new set. So I will! The funny thing is that although the furniture is costing me nothing, I’ve spent approximately 9 million pounds on the chalk paints and the special brushes and the finishing waxes and lacquers. I’ve had THREE – 3 – trips to Woodies and I usually abhor hardware shops but there I am, buying dust sheets and white spirits and sandpaper and sundry other items. So all in all, I’ve spent close to ten million yoyos on my new hobby and yet I still feel thrifty and ‘make do and mend.’

It’s a very nice hobby because it’s a bit like when I was mad for making cakes and decorating them but at least with the furniture I can’t eat it.

Speaking of hobbies, my fondness for telly continues unabated. Current obsessions – Ray Donovan. Do you watch it? It’s the best ruddy show on telly! Except maybe for Nashville – Christ alive, that Deacon Claybourne! What a complete and utter ride! And Scandal is back, which is nice. And the Great British Bakeoff – hurray! And soon Strictly will begin for real and – oh God – I cannot wait. Even though loads of our beloved dancers have gone and been replaced by new ones and I always take agin the new ones at the beginning and it takes a while for them to ‘bed in’ in my affections.

So what else? Well, Himself, who prior to recently was the healthiest man in all of Ireland, has had a shocking run of ill-health. Firstly, he had to have an operation on his gums, which sounds harmless enough, right? Well! Sweet mother of the divine! It was 4 weeks before he could eat properly. THEN! Because he was planning to climb Mont Blanc (I know!) in July, he was up and down hills, running in all weathers, building up his endurance and didn’t he take a tumble on Lugnaquilla and break a bone in his finger and it turned out to be a bad break and he had to have an operation, involving a general anaesthetic, where they put a steel plate in his hand and his finger still isn’t bending properly. And then! He got the most ferocious throat infection. And now it transpires he has an eye problem. The thing is, that he’s been hanging around with the Keyesez for too long. As I have often told you, we are the sickest family in the Dun Laoghaire/Rathdown area. Possibly in the whole of Leinster.

However, last week, despite all these ailments, he successfully scaled Mont Blanc and I’m incredibly proud of him and have given him permission to post a photo of it.

 

I’m racking my brains for more stuff to tell you. Oh yes! I knew there was something lovely! I’m starting a monthly beauty column in Irish Tatler. The first column will be in the November issue and I’m so so excited. I ADORE writing about the cosmetics.

And I did a kettle bells class. Sweet baba jay! I went to the local gym in Bluepool, it mightn’t be called that any more but that’s what it was called when I was a teenager and these things tend to stick and I rang in advance and the lovely lady said the class lasted 40 minutes and wasn’t too hard, so along I went and the lightest kettle bell was 8kg, which scared the daylights out of me. Then! The instructor – a very nice young man with tattoos and fancy facial hair – said we’d be doing the class outside! Outdoors! Where my shame was visible to all the people sitting on the top deck of the number 4 bus. And we had to do a warm-up first and my experience of warm-ups is doing grapevines and other sappy easy things, but the nice man made us run around an all-weather pitch, doing sideways running. You know when you see football teams training on the telly and they’re doing the sideways running and then they do that strange running where they bring their knees up to their chests and then they bring their heels up to their bums? Yes? Well, that’s what we were doing. And it was AWFUL and I thought I was going to die from unfitness but I felt I couldn’t lose face, not with the people on the number 4 bus watching me with interest (the number 4 terminus directly overlooks the all-weather pitch) and then we had to start flinging the kettle bells around and I could hardly lift my 8kg one, never mind swing it and it was a mercy that I didn’t clatter myself in the head and knock myself out, although I DID actually consider doing that, just to get out of doing the rest of the class, in the same way that World War 1 soldiers would shoot themselves in the foot and say that the gun had accidentally fired while they were cleaning it, so that they wouldn’t be sent back to the front. But I kept going, even though the class went on for AN HOUR AND TWENTY MINUTES. But all the same, there was a great sense of camaraderie and I liked the teacher and the other people and it was only 6 yoyos and there was a kind of honesty about the whole thing I liked. And I fashioned great plans to return but I haven’t as yet, because with one thing and another. But I will! Yes! Almost certainly! Perhaps!

Look, I’ll try and make this newsletter a more regular thing. I’m awful sorry that I’m so remiss. But anyway, all is well this weather. Busy but well. Read the new Tana French novel, it’s out some time this month and it’s magnificent. Also read Liberty Silk by my beloved pal, Posh Kate, although I think she is published under the name Kate Beaufoy – it’s a 3 generational epic, very glamorous, set in the French Riviera and Hollywood and war zones, it’s this year’s Beautiful Ruins.

I hope things are well with you. I will be back soon. I promise.

Thank you for your patience and all your kindnesses

Big kisses to you all and lots of love

Marian xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx