Patrick Gale

First of all, today is St George's Day, Shakespeare's birthday and, most important of all, my mum's 80th birthday.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM!!!

And now for all Patrick Gale fans, the following piece is in the May edition of Cornwall Today.

GARDENING, MUSIC AND OSTEOPOROSIS -
THE INSPIRATIONS FOR PATRICK GALE'S NEW NOVEL

Patrick Gale's novels cover topics that most writers steer clear of – Alzheimer's, bipolar disorder, Quakerism and gay love affairs, to name but a few. In his latest novel, The Whole Day Through, he writes about naturism, venereology and how to handle an ageing parent.

“I don't know why I include science or medicine in my books because I'm completely unscientific,” he says. “Perhaps it's an inferiority complex as my brother and sister are doctors!” In this novel, the mother is a naturist. “I needed a plot device that made it impossible to put the mother in a home,” he explains. “It also tallied with the emerging theme of honesty and vulnerability - when you take your clothes off you can't hide anything.”

Patrick lives near Land's End on a farm with his partner, Aidan, who drew beautiful illustrations for Patrick's novel, Friendly Fire. “He's horribly gifted!” Patrick says proudly. “I'd love to collaborate with him on future books, but publishers are unwilling to pay for anything extra which is such a pity. I think illustrations add to your pleasure of the book.”

Last year Richard & Judy's Book Club selected Notes from an Exhibition, gaining Patrick 100,000 new readers. “In a way it was like my first novel,” he says. But this has meant high expectations for his next novel. “I'm very worried about second album syndrome,” he says wryly.

Patrick describes The Whole Day Through as “a bittersweet love story. Several people said I couldn't do a Brief Encounter style story because of the therapy culture now that believes we have the right to be happy. I don't quite believe that, but my challenge was to come up with a story of two modern people who think they should do the right thing.”

What will strike a chord with many older readers is Laura, who looks after her 78 year old mother, riddled with osteoporosis. Patrick drew on his own experiences tending his mother after his father died. “What fascinates me is how our social behaviour is going to have to adapt. More and more single people are looking after elderly parents and also wanting a love life – how do they cope?”

The mother in this novel is a keen gardener; an interest that was passed on to Patrick from his own parents. “It's a visceral pleasure – weeding gives me an intense sense of calm and pleasure.” And of course, it's a good antidote to the solitary, sedentary and slow nature of writing. “With a pair of secateurs and a trowel you can make a difference in a few hours, whereas with a novel it takes much longer.”

Patrick is also a talented musician and chairman of the St Endellion Summer Festival, held annually in Port Isaac. He performs in amateur orchestras as a singer, pianist and cellist, and sings with the choir at the St Endellion festival, all of which takes up a lot of time, but is another necessity. “Music is like my life blood,” he says slowly. “I have a permanent soundtrack running through my head. It evokes expressions that are beyond words; it draws things out of you.”

Another vital part of Patrick's life is his adoptive Cornwall, but living on a farm, he is well aware of the real Cornwall. “It's been so mythologised and romanticised that it's fun to play with the gap between the romantic idea of it and the reality of it,” he explains. “On a practical level it's a very useful device – you can bring a Londoner to Cornwall and expose their follies.”

Patrick is clearly contented with his life, combining a mixture of writing, farming, music and gardening. “I come from a family of pessimists, but I've often thought that I'm a depressive with an optimist's habit,” he says with a smile. “If you're aware of the different sides to your personality you can see when one is getting the upper habit. Novelists get to know themselves very well – you don't need therapy!”

www.galewarning.org

Patrick will appear at the Du Maurier Festival on May 14th 2009
The Whole Day Through is published by Fourth Estate, May 2009
Gentleman's Relish will be published in December 2009

Interviews and Insecurities

Trust me to tempt fate. Just when I thought I could get stuck into the novel, along comes an interview that will need a lot of preparation. I'm interviewing Patrick Gale, prior to the publication of his latest novel, The Whole Day Through.

As with any interview, I am concerned that I prepare well, which means trawling through old interviews, learning about his background, thinking up new questions, and reading his new novel. I'm currently cross eyed from staring at the computer screen and my brain's reached saturation point.

Before any interview, I am always nervous. Rather like stage fright. Another journalist friend thinks this is a good thing. “It keeps you focused and means you don't get complacent,” she said. “It means you end up doing a good interview.” (I can only hope.) In fact, preparation is the key to a good interview. Compiling the right questions.

But my nerves usually filter into a bad case of sudden insecurity - can I do this person justice? Will he/she – and I – be pleased with the end result? Will my editor be pleased?

There's also the matter of the recession which has hit the main magazine I work for. Redundancies have been made, cuts implemented and many rumours flying around. Obviously as a freelancer I can't be made redundant, but the threat of No Work is always there.

Having said all that, would I swap jobs? Go back to working in an office, or juggling bureaucracy? Would I hell....

Patrick Gale

Yesterday I went to a Wonderful Words day (run by Cornish libraries) with several poets and authors including Patrick Gale, famous for his most recent novel, Notes From An Exhibition, which was picked up by the Richard & Judy book club earlier this year. His website is here . It’s a fascinating novel about a Cornish artist in Penzance and how she and her family are affected by her manic depression, or bipolar disorder as it’s called now. She is ‘saved’ by her husband who is a staunch Quaker, another fascinating topic. If you haven’t read it – do.

I have to say my concentration was somewhat shattered by a) appalling signeage at Tremough Campus (Falmouth university) which directed us the wrong way to start off with. Having wandered round, lost, for twenty minutes, we finally found the right building and the right room, only to discover that they’d run out of hot water and tea. On the basis that if you want something done, do it yourself, I volunteered to go and get some hot water. I was sent on a wild goose chase but finally found the staff room, boiled up two kettles and tipped them into the thermos and returned only to find that no water would come out of it. It turned out the necessary siphon part was missing so we had to nick it out of another thermos.

So you can see that wasted another twenty minutes and I wasn’t my most suave and sophisticated by this time – just gasping for a cuppa. And then I looked round the room and – well. His photographs don’t do him justice. He is stunning. Tall and slim, wearing a cream linen jacket, mauve and white striped shirt (believe me, it suited him wonderfully) and navy blue trousers. But it was his dark eyes that drew me, and dark eyelashes, plus when he smiled, which was often, his eyes crinkled up and he revealed white, even teeth.

In case any of you are getting the wrong idea, I would like to say that I know he lives with his ‘hubby’, Aidan, on a farm near Land’s End. I know, but I can look – and drool – and I did. When not reminding myself that I was a journalist and therefore sort of on duty.

So I sat and listened and watched (nice hands too) and he talks very well – funny, bursting with intelligence, fascinating about Quakers and their way of life. And all the questions he was asked about how he writes, his thought processes, what he does when he’s stuck – I sat there thinking, ‘I do that. Oh, and I do that too.’ Which was kind of heartening and not. The not bit being that while I am delighted at his success (and it’s taken him 10 novels to start actually making money at it), the other part of me is thinking, ‘I want to be there. I want to be published. Now!’ (And no I havent heard back from that agent yet.)

Anyway it was a fascinating morning and he signed one of this books and – the best bit - he’s agreed to give me an interview next year when his next novel comes out. I can’t wait….