Month: May 2020

The name’s Rain. John Rain.

Welcome back for another lockdown episode of WE’D LIKE A WORD. And, before we start, may we ask a favour? This podcast has been nominated in the ‘People’s Choice’ category of the British Podcast Awards. Yay! So, if you think we’re worthy of a vote, pop along to this webpage and sling our name in the ballot box. Thank you. You’re lovely.

Now, on with this week’s pod. And this episode we’re lucky to have James Bond aficionado and host of SMERSHPOD, Mister John Rain.

John loves films. And, in particular, he loves the James Bond films. So he started a podcast called SMERSHPOD where he discusses the films, one per episode, with such people as Mark Gatiss, Rufus Wright, Samira Ahmed, Joel Morris, Dan Tetsell. Al Murray and more. He also does ‘side projects’ with episodes looking at films starring Bond actors. Or just action films that he likes.

And last year, he put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and wrote a love paean to Bond in the form of THUNDERBOOK, a series of very funny essays in which he pulls each film apart in turn and fills the reader with fun trivia, fascinating facts and unexpected insights. It’s a great book.

We’re beginning to hate Zoom. Roll on the days when we can record properly again and not have to cope with Steve’s bad wifi, barking dogs and children asking what’s for dinner.

We also talk about the problems of translating books to film (and vice-versa), John’s second love (H G Wells’s War of the Worlds) and who might, or might not, be suitable to be the next Bond.

We’d Like A Word is available on iTunes, Spotify, Apple Music, Google Podcasts or wherever else good podcasts lurk. or you can click here and hear us on our host site at Anchor.

Oh, and VOTE FOR US!

Mentioned in this episode:

The Empire Strikes Door – a film by Jamie Stangroom (it’s great!)

Judith O’Reilly – A great thriller writer

A Question of Us – Mary Jayne Baker’ award-winning comedy novel

Loving the Laughter

In this new episode of We’d Like a Word Paul Waters and Stevyn Colgan talk to authors Lisa Firth (aka Lisa Swift and Mary Jayne Baker) and Sue Clark about romantic comedy and a much bigger question … where have all the comic novels gone?

Lisa Firth

Lisa is the author of eight novels (under her two pen names) including The Honey Trap, Meet me at the lighthouse, Runaway Bride and The School of Starting Over. Her book A Bicycle Made for Two was a finalist in the Romantic Novelists’ Association ‘Romantic Comedy of the Year 2019’ award and in 2020, she scooped the award with A Question of Us. Her new novel The Never Have I Ever Club is published in June.

Sue Clark

Sue is a comedy writer with many TV and radio credits to her name including The News Huddlines, Alas Smith and Jones, Three of a Kind, Weekending and many more. Her first novel Note to Boy is published in July 2020.

This episode tackles the vexing question … where have all the comedy novels gone? Wind the clock back just twenty years to the start of this century and the bookshops were full of works by people like Sue Townsend, Terry Pratchett, Stella Gibbons, Douglas Adams, Tom Sharpe, Helen Fielding, George McDonald Fraser, David Nobbs and so many more. and if you ask people what their favourite books are, there’s nearly always a comedy novel in the list. But where are all the funny novels now?

We discuss the dearth of comic novels and why things are so bad for comedy novelists right now. However, one area of fiction where comedy is still thriving is the ‘romcom’ and we discuss such topics as: Why are romcom books packaged so differently for male and female authors? Why is romcom often sniffily viewed as ‘fluff’ by reviewers and even TV presenters? And should you include pets as characters?

Books mentioned in this podcast

Also mentioned …

(Lisa’s favourite book)

You can find We’d Like A Word on iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, Google Pods, Podcast Radio and pretty much anywhere that good podcasts are found. Or you can listen buy visiting our hosts at Anchor.