Hilary Boyd - live book club webchat Tues 17 Dec 1-2pm

Love the typo, Cari. Is it short for 'nookie' club?

Good afternoon Hilary, I was wondering if you were as exasperated with your heroine as I was. The book brought up many emotions but that was the main one.

A great read, could not put it down. Thank you for my copy.

Hello Hilary I read the original article (except now I can't remember where it was) about "gran lit" and wondered how you felt about being creditied with the creation of the genre?

I think it's great (and I am thinking about your last book rather than this one) to have someone a little older as the romantic hero. Given we are an ageing population do you start others may follow in your wake?

actually my question follows on from that. I just wondered about the commercial response from publishers when you write about characters who aren't 20 somethings. Did it make it harder for you to get Thursdays in the Park published? I imagine some may think (wrongly IMHO) that it's a "niche" market

Hi Hilary, thank you for coming on gransnet. My friend has been writing novels for a few years now and now insists that the only way she'll get anywhere is by publishing her book herself (on Amazon I think). Do you have any advice as to doing this or is it a bit of a lost cause not going through a publisher?

Kay

Hi Hilary - thanks for chatting to us!
Do you think your time as a marriage counsellor helps you to write about relationships? Do you ever miss it?

Thanks for my copy of 'when he walked back into my life'. I thoroughly enjoyed it, also Thursdays in the Park. I've now downloaded Tangled Lives and look forward to reading it. As a grandparent who at nearly 70 is having to 'move on' after over 40 years of marriage - his decision, although he tells all and sundry it was my decision, I was wondering whether this would be a good backdrop to a novel? To me, it's like a game of snakes and ladders (good title!!??) and at this moment in time I feel like I've slid down one enormous snake! Not something anyone would relish at this stage of life.

Hi Hilary
Pinenut suggests that you may have created the granslit genre inadvertently - or was it a deliberate move on your part?

Thank you so much for my copy, difficult to put down but very frustrating! I am certainly on Prue's side.

I'm enjoying the book but I have to keep putting it down. This is probably a reflection on me rather than the book. I've got to the bit where Prue is "summoned" to dinner upstairs with "the family". I guess interfering families annoy me. Bel comes across as a bit soppy too when there is talk of her aunt moving to Scotland – as if Inverness were in the Antarctic, or even on another planet. Good grief! There are trains and aeroplanes that go there from London.

Do fifteen year old girls really get upset when their aunts talk about moving to the other end of the country? Or do they think, oh what fun, I can go and visit and have some adventures?

Hi Hilary

I tried to google your website to find out a bit more about you but couldn't fine one? Do you have one? And if not, did you decide not to for a reason?

Are you planning on writing more with similar age heroines? Is it difficult being associated with being the (grand?)mother of granslit? Are you finding that restrictive?

oh lordy, I'm only about a third in but Flora is doing my head in! Still compelling though - I do love your writing. But honestly, I do hope she comes to her senses. How annoying that we can't all be a bit more objective about our own relationships to stop us having acted like idiots. What I like is that your characters haven't sorted it out a little later in life. Age brings experience and (I like to think) a bit of wisdom but would you say there's always something to learn about relationships?

What's the youngest protagonist you think you'd write about?

Any film deals imminent?

I have read the book and enjoyed it! But I wish you had made the slimy Dominic get more of a comeuppance than just his losing some of what he expected in Dorothea's will! He was a creep and I would have made him suffer a bit more! Were you tempted to do that?

LyndaW there is a website - found it through googling her publisher first
http://www.hilaryboyd.com/

Hi Hilary. I really enjoyed Thursdays, but haven't managed to read your other books yet (they're on my very large reading pile!). My question is, are you now a full time writer, and is it all it's cracked up to be?!

Hi Hilary, do people who you know/have based characters upon, recognise themselves in your books?

Hi Hilary, what advice would you give to someone writing their first novel? Do you think self-publishing is the easiest best route to take?

Hello! I've read Step-parent's Survival Guide and Working Woman's Pregnancy - would you go back to writing non-fiction, or are you into novels now?

Hello, Hilary. Thank you (and Gransnet) for the book - it's the first of yours I've read and I did enjoy it.

I'm afraid though that I found Flora exasperating too, though I appreciate there are many women out there just like that. Most of us I'm sure would have given Fin the bum's rush as soon as he strutted back into our lives. I couldn't see the attraction anyway - such a self-centred, arrogant character!

I'm also surprised by the way the family feud was so easily mended at the end of the book. In our family a little matter of a sister sleeping with your boyfriend would have caused a rift between here and Doomsday. Do you come from a more forgiving family background?

I wondered whether you are a grandmother? I guess so to have been tagged with the gran lit (or is it grans lit?) thing. If you are what sort of gran are you?

Oh dear I think I just asked three questions in one!