Welcome to my stop on Fiona Perrin’s The Story After Us blog tour!

Interview with Fiona Perrin…..

For those who don’t know already, could you tell us about yourself and your book(s) please?

I’m Fiona Perrin and my debut novel, The Story After Us is out now from Aria Fiction. It was inspired by me very unconsciously uncoupling a long while ago – although it’s definitely not my story. I am however, happily married again and have been a mum and step-mum to four kids while having a really full on job. I wanted to write about modern families with all their madness, but also their happiness and hope.

Where did/do you get your ideas from?

Women have all the best stories, don’t they? I love chatting to my friends (or anyone really) and I think lots of inspiration come from the daily stuff that happens to us all. Although clearly it changes a lot on the way (I have to say that, or my friends won’t tell me anything ever again).

Are any of your characters based (however loosely) on anyone you know?

I think you pick up mannerisms or a quick piece of dialogue from all the people around you and they become mashed into whole new people (see above re keeping friends 😉

How do you pick your characters’ names?

They have to be easy to say and have to match the picture of the person I have in my head. Characters become very real when you are writing about them.

Can you share your writing process with us, in a nutshell?

The first one could probably be described as ‘write, doubt, learn, push on’. I’m currently writing my second book and this time I wrote the entire first draft without letting myself go back. Then I edited it several times, each time, honing and sharpening. Mostly, the more you lose in editing, the better it gets. That took me years to learn.

Who are your top 5 favourite authors?

Marian Keyes

Kazuo Ishiguro

Jilly Cooper

Hilary Mantel

William Boyd

If you could meet any author, who would it be and what would you ask them?

Jilly Cooper and I’d just ask her to tell me raucous, debauched stories.

Were you a big reader as a child?

Voracious. I read everything from the classics to my Mum’s family sagas. She had six delivered every week by the mobile library to our Cornish village and I read them after her.

When did you start to write?

I was given a typewriter when I was about eight and then I started to bash out stories without really stopping. They all featured a very lovely, prim girl called Clover.

If you could re-write the ending to any book what would it be and what would you change?

I would change the ending of Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. It would completely ruin the point of the book but I would no longer be so haunted.

Is there a book you wish you had written?

Wolf Hall. If I had, I’d be really clever, inspired and a great storyteller.

If you wrote an autobiography, what would your title be?

Life on the Edge. This is because, in Cornwall, we live on the top of a cliff by the way, not for more dubious reasons.

If you could invite any fictional character for coffee who would it be and where would you take them?

Rupert Campbell Black from Riders. I would go somewhere unbelievably glamorous with him obvs – and then convince him to become a feminist.

What are you working on right now?

A comedy drama about a mother who finds herself – pressured by teenagers and parents – becoming ‘invisible’ to the world, including men. It’s only in fighting to keep her family together that she finds out that she is seen, needed – and loved very much – by those who matter.

Tell us about your last release?

The Story After Us is a romantic comedy about what happens after happy ever after – when we find out it can have a sequel. It’s about love, and whether it is always enough – and whether sometimes the end is really the beginning.

Do you have a new release due?

Book 2 is out in spring 2019, again from Aria.

What do you generally do to celebrate on publication day?

I’ve only had one. I got really excited and was a pain in the arse to everyone around me all day. Then they fed me wine to calm me down.

How can readers keep in touch with you?

Please do, I love hearing from people!

Twitter: @fionaperrin

Facebook: fionajperrinauthor

Instagram: fionaperrin

web: fionaperrin.com

Is there anything else you would like us to know?

Thank you very much for having me and to everyone who has read my book!

Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions, Fiona 🙂

Blurb

Sometimes the end is just the beginning…

If she tries very hard, Ami can remember when she used to have a dynamic and exciting career and a husband who she loved more than life itself, and who was equally smitten with her…

Now she has two children, a terrifyingly large mortgage, and no idea who she has become – or why she and her husband can’t even be in the same room anymore.

With life as she knew it in tatters around her, Ami is heartbroken, and in no way pulling off ‘consciously uncoupling’ like a celeb. But she’s starting to wonder if she just might come out the other side and be… happier?

As funny as Helen Fielding, as poignantly touching as Marian Keyes, Fiona Perrin’s dazzling debut is a story that is as much about finding out who you really are again, as it is about the exhausting balancing act of motherhood. Unmissable for women everywhere.