The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry - now the book club thread!

firenze

The book is a lovely mixture of poignant and funny, I think. Did you have to work hard to get that balance and were you worried about it tipping over into sentimentality? (I don't think it does, but it's deceptively simply and I was worried it might!)

Hello firenze

I can't get away from the fact that I'm somebody who feels things very deeply. It's something I've had to learn to live with. But I also find slapstick ridiculously funny. For me, drama lies at the point where humour and tragedy collide. It's a very interesting space.

doubletrouble

Hi Rachel,

I wanted to ask whether you think people can be taught to write or whether it is something you either have or you don't?

Hello doubletrouble

That's a good question too. I think there's always something to be said for learning but as far as writing goes I think the most important thing is to keep at it. Like Harold's walk even when you don't believe in what you're writing (and I have lots of bad days) you still keep going.

extremesport

Is it difficult to follow a book that has had such very great success?

Hello extreme sport

That's a really good question and a very generous one. I started writing my second book before Harold Fry had come out so to begin with I didn't really have a sense of expectation. Since the success of Harold Fry I just kept sitting in my shed writing this new story and letting Harold get on with his own thing.

j08

Excellent start! A verse of my favourite hymn on the front page!

#truevaloursee.

hello j08

It's one of my favourite hymns too! In the radio play Niamh Cusack sang it unaccompanied and it was moving.

Milly

Thank you Gransnet for my copy of Harold Fry.
I have just finished it, with many tears, as unfortunately I too have been
looking back on mistakes made over the last 78 years.
Babba you ask if such unhappiness exists in Marriage, I am glad you have
not experienced it yourself. I berate myself quite a lot these days over
past failings now I am widowed, and Maureen I expect is replicated quite a lot - I hope its not just me.
Enough of that, it was a lovely book, and when I started it I was reminded
of "Mr. Finchley discovers his England" by Victor Canning, and also "The
History of Mr. Polly" but as I got further into the book and especially
toward the end I realized that this was a much more thoughtful, and,
unfortunately, true to life book.
I hope the Radio Play is repeated as I would like to hear that.
The questions in the back are interesting, did Rachel Joyce have Book
Clubs in mind when writing this?
just me.

Hello Milly

When I wrote the book I was really only thinking of a story that moved me. I was thinking of my dad too, so it was a very personal thing to write, but since it's been published and I've been doing events and meeting people, book clubs have been discussed. I'm still really moved by the things that people say to me as a result of having read the book. It was unexpected that strangers would open up to me in this way.

Mads

Found the couple quite sad though in the beginning but it was a brilliant read, so compelling and I was willing him to finish his walk. Got cross with all the hangers on though. I will read it again in the future.

Hello Mads

Oh, I agree with you. I hate the hangers on. They get in the way and they don't understand Harold's journey. You're not supposed to like them but I had to include them because I felt that without them both Harold and the reader would stay in a bubble. The truth is, I think, that we come across people in life who don't always understand us and we have to work out how to deal with them.

batgran

Are you a great walker yourself (or is the dedication metaphorical)?

Hello batgran

I am a big walker myself. I live in the middle of countryside and this morning, for instance, I was out at 5.30 feeding ducks and hens and lambs and walking the dog. The light was extraordinary and I feel very lucky that I live like this. The dedication is to my husband who walks with me both metaphorically and literally.

j08

Loved this book. Best one I've read in a long time. I think it was interesting the way he had difficulty in facing difficult emotions, burying them under the carpet and only being able to face up to them when he finds the space and peace of the open road.

Do you think he would have gone on his journey if the garage girl had told him that her aunt had, actually, died?

Hello j08

Yes, I'm very interested in difficult emotion that we bury because it is just too hard or painful to deal with it. The garage girl definitely plays a significant part in Harold's journey. For me it takes a number of things to fall into place and make one thing happen.

mrsmopp

Delighted with this book, characters well drawn; the book is very easy to read and I am whizzing through it because I want to see what happens when Harold reaches the end of his journey.
It is sensitively written, amusing in parts and also very funny in parts too. It would make a good movie too I think.
Who could we get to play Harold? Any suggestions?

Hello mrsmopp

I'm really glad you enjoyed the book and that it made you laugh. The film rights have been bought and the script is being written. Have you heard Jim Broadbent reading the audio book? He breaks my heart. Who do you think?

closetgran

Hello Rachel, my question is: is it very different, writing for radio and writing a novel? Did you carry over anything you'd learnt from writing for radio?

Hello closetgran

I've learnt a lot from writing for radio, but one of the most important things for me is the significance of story. In radio no matter how beautiful a scene, you can only keep it if it advances the plotline. I think that's a very important thing to learn.

Treebee

I loved this book for many reasons, especially for its simplicity and healing ending.
2 questions from my book group discussions.
A couple of readers couldn't get past Harold's unsuitable footwear. They thought he couldn't possibly have done the walk wearing them so this made them dislike the whole book. Was there a reason for this? (I thought it meant he came as he was...)
Also , why make Queenie so disabled that she couldn't communicate with Harold? Would it have been too pat for her to put the past right with him?
Look forward to reading Rachel's answers.

Hello Treebee

Thank you for your comment. The reason I chose deck shoes was because my father always wore them and it made me laugh because he hated the sea. The point about not wearing walking boots is that Harold's journey is unplanned. He sets off in the clothes you would wear to post a letter. But one of the things his journey teaches him is that we don't need the 'stuff' to do things.

DavidH22

Found this a wonderful, engrossing read which must allude to every emotion known to man. Most people's lives are touched by cancer and having had some experience of hospice visiting I found the care described in the book very similar to what I saw.
Can I ask Ms Joyce whether the passages inside the hospice are from her research, personal experience or is it her fiction? And were you surprised at the success of the book, both critically and in sales terms?

Hello David

Thank you for your moving comment. In answer to your questions I wrote this book as a tribute to my father who died of cancer of the head and neck. He spent time in Intensive Care but died at home. By the end of his life his tumour was the size of a ball and growing out of his face. This is why I had to write Queenie's story the way that I have, so the descriptions of the hospice are a combination - as with most things in the book - of what I know and what I imagined.

The success of the book has completely floored me, I didn't see it coming at all.