What it’s like being Legend’s Author of the Week
Missed out on a day blogging. I’ve been working. Working! Terribly hard. At my journalism. Which, I fear, is always destined to pay me far more than will ever come from Idle Tom the Publisher.
However … that’s not to say that there aren’t quite a few perks to be had from being a Legend Press author.
Apart from anything else, I’ve just been named their author of the week!
I’d somehow imagined that there would be some huge prize for winning this prestigious competition - but I now understand that it is reward enough just to be nominated and to get your (dog of a) picture up on the Legend Press.
Anyway, one of the perks of being Legend’s Author of the Week was that I got to do another author questionnaire. Terribly funny answers, I assure you:
How do you feel winning Author of the week?
Deeply, deeply honoured to be up there in the Legend Hall of Fame. Do I get some sort of medal or cup for the week to put up on the mantelpiece?
Describe your book in 10 words?
The book that will make Legend Press - or bankrupt it.
If your novel could have a theme tune what would it be?
Can I have two theme tunes? One for the start and one for the end? Maybe we’d kick off with "Under Pressure" by Queen and David Bowie - a song that will always put me in mind of my publisher; and to finish, well, just for old time’s sake let’s have Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, Prelude 17 …
Tell us one fact about yourself that we won’t believe?
I made an 8,000 mile day-trip from New York to Peru - solely to eat a guinea-pig on the Inca Trail. I hand-picked the creature myself, before he was par-boiled and plucked.
Then they slathered herbs and spices onto his skin; made the tiniest little sausages that you’ve ever seen from his innards - barely bigger than a twig; and finally spit-roasted him over an open fire. One of the most delicious rodents I’ve ever tasted.
If you weren’t asking you questions right now, what would you be doing?
Writing a feature on pop has-beens; one of them is the New Seekers’ Eve Graham, who ended up fitting bras in Debenhams.
Who would play you in a movie of your life?
Alan Ruck, the nerdy kid in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. For years and years, friends used to torment with the fact that - or so they claimed - I was the dead-spit of this guy Alan Ruck, or Cameron as he was called in the Ferris Bueller film.
I’d forgotten all about it. Then ten years ago, I was in St Patrick’s Cathedral in New York for a Christmas service. We were all shaking hands with our neighbours - and this absolutely stunning woman flutters her eye-lashes at me and says, "Excuse me, are you Alan Ruck?"
If only I’d had the wit to say, "Yes! Yes I am Alan Ruck!"
Alan was in Spin City for a while - lost his looks unfortunately, and is not nearly the handsome young dog that he used to be …