Bookshelfie: Women’s Prize Podcast - S8 Ep24: Bookshelfie: Rachel Parris

Episode Date: December 23, 2025

Comedian, actor and improviser Rachel Parris discusses why people can be so wrong about Jane Austen, the knotty complexities of female friendship and her love for crime fiction.  Rachel is officially a member of the British comedy elite – she has appeared on Live at the Apollo, Have I Got News For You, and Mock the Week, and was BAFTA-nominated for her satirical sketches on BBC's The Mash Report, which have garnered over 100 million views online. She’s a regular on BBC Radio 4 where she can be heard on Just A Minute, I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue and, formerly, The Now Show. Rachel hosts the comedy podcast How Was It For You?, with her husband, Marcus Brigstocke; and another podcast for the Children’s Book Project called The Power of a Book, where guests share the children’s stories that mean the most to them. On the stage, she is a co-founder of Austentatious – a Jane Austen themed improv comedy show in the West End.  Her debut novel, Introducing Mrs Collins, is a tale of love, loss, and second chances, for anyone who’s wondered if there’s more to the sensible character we met in Pride and Prejudice. Rachel’s book choices are:  **Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver **Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen **The Names by Florence Knapp **My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante **The Lost by Claire McGowan Vick Hope, multi-award winning TV and BBC Radio 1 presenter, author and journalist, is the host of season eight of the Women’s Prize’s Bookshelfie Podcast. Every week, Vick will be joined by another inspirational woman to discuss the work of incredible female authors. The Women’s Prize for Fiction is the biggest celebration of women's creativity in the world and has been running for over 30 years.  Don’t want to miss the rest of season eight? Listen and subscribe now! You can buy all books mentioned from our dedicated shelf on Bookshop.org – every purchase supports the work of the Women's Prize Trust and independent bookshops.  This podcast is sponsored by Baileys and produced by Bird Lime Media.

Yeah, I read it in a day. Well, my little boy was at school, one of those. It was getting, luckily he had a club that day, so I had it up 4.15, because I was not putting it down. This is the Women's Prize for Fiction, bookshelfy podcast, supported by Bayleys. Join us in celebrating women's writing from around the world in the 30th anniversary year of the Women's Prize for Fiction, sharing our creativity, our voices and our perspectives. I'm Vic Hope and I am your host for Season 8 of Bookshelfy, the podcast that asks inspiring and brilliant women to share the five books by women that have shaped them and their lives. Join me and my incredible guests as we talk about the books you should be adding to your reading list. Today I'm joined by Rachel Paris.

Rachel is a musical comedian, actor and improviser who's appeared on Live at the Apollo, Have I Got News for You and Mock the Week. She was BAFTA nominated for hysterical sketches on BBC's The MASH report, which has garnered over 100 million views online. She's a regular on BBC Radio 4, where she can be heard on just a minute. I'm sorry, I haven't a clue, and formerly The Now Show. Rachel hosts The Comedy Podcast, How Was It for You, with her husband, Marcus Brickstock, and another series for the children's book project called The Power of a Book, where guests share the children's stories that mean the most to them. On the stage, she's a co-founder of Ostentatious, a Jane Austen-themed,

improv comedy show in the West End. Rachel's written two books and her latest introducing Mrs. Collins is a tale of love, loss and second chances for anyone who's wondered if there's more to the sensible character we met in Pride and Prejudice. Rachel, welcome.

Thank you. It's such a pleasure to have you on the podcast. We met on Between the Covers. We did with Sarah Cops. Yes. Chatting books as well. What was your book? Swing Time by Zadie Smith.

Oh, yes. Yes. I can't remember I think Oh yeah I remember It was the name of the wind A fantasy

A fantasy book Yeah It's funny because so often I have guests On the podcast Who maybe I know from radio or TV Or something else

And we say Oh you know what We've only ever spoken about music We've never spoken about books And we will only ever speak about books Now I'm drawing a line This is it This is it

You have a great life I'm sure All sorts of things going on But nope I don't want to hear about it Books only That's it You mentioned fantasy there?

Yeah. Is that what you like to gravitate towards? I do love it. I do love it. I've loved it since I was little, starting with like, you know, the faraway tree. And then I read like The Hobbit. And I've always loved fantasy. And I loved the Game of Thrones books and the Wheel of Time.

And yeah, I do. I'm a big fan of fantasy. Weirdly, no fantasy has made it onto my list that we're going to talk to today, which is strange because I do really like it. but I like a lot of genres. But as I will say later, I do think I like going into other worlds. So I think that's what I like about fantasy, is learning new worlds. That sort of escape.

Yeah, exactly. When you were growing up as a child, did you love to read? Were you, you know, thrown in, you mentioned Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit there. Were they, you know, childhood books for you? That came, yeah, in my, I think it was in my teens when I read Lord of the Rings. But I did. My mum and dad would do like bedtime stories with me and we had those old-fashioned compendiums of nursery rhymes.

And yeah, I always loved fairy stories and ones that were, took you out of it a bit. And yeah, I was a big reader. Yeah, but I'm trying to remember. What did I read? Actually, my mum used to read me poetry a lot. We had a like children's, a lot of children's compendiums of poetry. that she would read me.

I really like that. You know, I've recently had a baby. And we were reading that it's important not to dumb things down for the child and use florid language was what our book said. So I've been reading poetry to my son pretty much every night. And he loves it. I don't know if he knows what I'm going on about at all. He's four months old. But there's something about the lilt of it.

The rhythm of it. The rhythm of it. And the engagement with it as well, I think. I love reading poetry to him. I think he loves listening to it. I think that's true. And I think some of the collections of poetry that were around a lot in the 90s were, they were brilliant. They were very funny.

They were like, you know, gargling with jelly and please Mrs. Butler. And they were hilarious. But I also think some of the poems that my mum would read me weren't these funny, light ones for kids. They were wordy, you know, they were for children because they were imaginative and interesting. but they weren't, yeah, like dumbing down. They were quite a wide vocabulary. They had a complicated rhythm to them. They weren't short.

And I like that. I think that gave me a good way of getting used to complicated language. Well, on the subject of books for kids, you host the Power of a Book podcast for the Children's Book Project. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? Yeah, I'd love to. So the Children's Book Project is a project which is doing amazing work, taking pre-loved books,

and making sure they get into the hands of children who do not own books of their own. And they do this through drives in schools. They go to businesses and ask them to donate. They go to football stadiums and ask the fans to bring in their books and they distribute them accordingly. And so on the podcast, which is fundraising for that, we spoke to people like, we spoke to Claire Boulding about her early books.

We spoke to the Bedele brothers, Suli Breaks. And, oh, so many fantastic people, Lauren Leverne. I love Lauren. That was brilliant. Lauren LeVern turns out is really good friends with one of my favourite children's authors, Nadia Shireen, which I've been reading to my son since he was born. He loves, there's a book called Barbara Throes a Wobbler. So we chatted about that.

Oh, it was just fascinating. So they would choose their favourite children's books that they grew up with. Sofa Claire Boulding, inevitably it was Blackbe. Yeah. We had Claire actually on the podcast just last week and one of her picks was Black Beauty. Right. Of course. Of course. There were a couple of horsey novels in there. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. So it was just amazing finding out what they loved as children and why. And then they'd also choose what they would read, what they choose to read children now, what they want children to hit now. And yeah, I mean, David Bedele's one was a lot about poo. Oh, I know. Oh, it was my first. favorite episode. Andy Oliver, I shouldn't say it's my favorite. No, no, no. Andy Oliver's my favorite person, full stop. Me too, now. She was amazing. So she came on and her choice for a children's book was To Kill a Mockingbird. And we had a brilliant, she talked about, she had such a rough,

like lots of racism, you know, affected her growing up. And she talked about how children, the books you read to children don't have to be children's books. And she said, like, she found To Kill a Mockingbird really galvanizing. and enlightening and gave her like power. You know, so yeah, there's lots of fantastic, inspiring stories on the podcast, and she was a real highlight. I've always said about Claire Mockingford.

It was what sparked my activism at the age of 10 because my mum gave me her copy and it still had all of her notes in it in the margins in pencil. I remember reading it and being so starkly aware that things weren't right. There's something in the world that's not right, and I'm going to change it.

Yes. It was, yeah, it was a galvanising, mobilising. mobilising book at a young age. Right, we're inviting Andy Oliver to our next book talk. Yeah, please, Andy, I love you so much. Yeah, it's a brilliant podcast. There's six episodes available so far, but we're going to be doing more. Yes.

Well, we're all about sharing recommendations. We actually had your very good friend Carrie Ed Lloyd on the podcast not that long ago. She's a judge on the 2026 Women's Price of Fiction panel. So we're all about passing those books around. pressing them into each other's palms I love when friends of friends give us recommendations me and Carrie do that a lot

you do yeah she's much she's much better on nonfiction than I am like she's a big nonfiction reader and she's always like read this by Amy Pola read this by this person and I'm I always take them I'm terrible for nonfiction I just want stories

but I feel you I trust her if I'm ever if I'm ever reading nonfiction it's because Carriads recommend it to me. Well, we'll dive into your list, and there aren't actually any nonfiction books today. What a surprise. We are diving into worlds. We are in full story mode now, and your first book-shelfy book is the brilliant Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. Winner of the 2023 Women's Prize for Fiction, and so deservedly so, Demon Copperhead is an epic tale of love, loss and everything in between. It's a fused with truth, anger, compassion. It's the story of a boy

born to a teenage mother in a single wide trailer in the southern Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, with no assets beyond his dead father's good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit and a fierce talent for survival. For a generation growing up in this world at the heart of the modern opioid crisis, addiction isn't an abstraction, its neighbours, its parents, its friends. Relayed in his own unsparing voice, demon braves the perils of foster care, child labour, derelict schools and athletic success, forever seeking affection and safety.

How did you meet Demon? Oh, just hearing you say all that. I'm remembering all the moments through the novel because it felt like such a journey. It's a big book, which is, I like a big book. It's a saga, isn't it? You feel like you're giving part of your life to the book and I definitely felt that with Demon Copperhead.

How did I come to it just at random? I don't think it was recommended. Oh, it will have been, it was talked about it. was so successful and I gave it a go. I'd never read any Barbara Kingselver before. So it was yeah, it was, the author was new to me and straight away, I was like, what is this? What is this wonderful writing? I didn't know anything about the David Copperfield connection. I found out after finishing it, months after finishing it, that it was sort of loosely based on an idea of David Copperfield, but I don't feel like that has very much bearing on it, to be honest.

It doesn't really take over it, does it? No. That's what, I mean, there's an idea that there's sort of a paying homage, but it's truly original. Totally, totally. Like the idea of a young boy going through various trials and foster homes, yeah, certainly, but for me, the place where it was set and the class and the circumstances in which it was set were so unique and, And I didn't know anything about it, about that part of America. And that's really such a big part of the novel is talking about the fact that no one knows about this community, about what's going on there, that it's quite a shut off part of the world and an abandoned part of America as well, part of the USA. That becomes almost a character, I feel like the Appalachians become a character in themselves. And he's an amazing character to follow

and he goes through so much just when you think he's had a success it's pulled away from him in a heartbreaking way and you can feel the traps that he's getting into you're like, oh don't, she's not going to be good for you and he's not going to take care of you and I just, I found my whole heart was with him all the way through

and I never wanted it to end and when it ended I was heartbroken. No, I feel you, I've finished it It's interesting that you say it takes a part of your life. It takes your heart. He stays with you long after. I mean, he's with us right now. But I saw my mum reading it after I'd finished it,

and I was so jealous of her. She was still in that world. We spoke to Barbara Kingsolver that year when it was released for the podcast, when she was nominated and then won. And she felt so vehemently and so passionately about giving a voice to this often kind of mocked community, There's a redneck. This white trash. Yeah.

Exactly. And it was so important to it. She says actually that Charles Dickens came to her while she was at his home and urged her to tell the real story of Appalachian. Do you even cough a head? That's what she says. What do you think contemporary writers can gain from reimagining older works? Although we kind of have established it's not really a reimagination because it's so original, but taking those strands or those ideas forward? I think it's often just a useful framework for talking about themes that are really universal.

So, of course, like the opioid crisis in America is a unique one and it's happened in a very deliberate, corrupt way. But there have always been corruptions from our leaders. There have always been medical crises that have far worse affected the point. than the wealthy, there have always been bits of poverty that have been horribly ignored and covered up. So I think that in a way you can use the idea of a framework from an earlier book just to tell a modern story, but you're still telling a story that is universal. It's sort of what I've talked about.

We'll talk about Jane Austen later, but there's not much about the apopioid crisis in Jane Austen, but I think a lot of the themes from those older books still stay true. Exactly. In Ostentatious, like Barbara Kingselver does, you bring this classic story to a new audience as well. Themes like you say that are universal. Why is that something that was important for you to do? What with my book? With your book and with Ostantatious. Yeah. I would say with Ostentatious, it's much more. We absolutely do aim to have the themes. It's usually a romantic story, obviously, but sometimes it's a sibling or a parental relationship that is focused on. And we do try to do that, but ostentatious tends to, it is a comedy and it's really knockabout. Whereas with my book, I think I was focused on making it more rooted, more grounded in the world of Jane Austen.

And the reason I wanted to do that to reimagine the world of Jane Austen was just purely for my pleasure, to be honest. I'm quite infatuated with the world of the books, not just pride and prejudice, but also like persuasion and Emma and sense and sensibility. not so much Mansfield Park and the idea of Charlotte Lucas was very a story and a woman who I wanted to know more about so I don't know that I'm trying to offer up new understandings necessarily of Jane Austen it's just I wanted to know more

I wanted to follow the stories myself Well let's talk about Jane Austen right now and your second bookshelfy book which is Pride and Prejudice Of course it's Jane Austen's most perennially popular novel the love story of Elizabeth Bennett and Fitzwilliam Darcy, who misjudge, then challenge and change each other is also a novel about the search for happiness and self-knowledge in a world of strict social rules

where a woman must marry well to survive. You have described this book as instrumental to your career, inspiring, like we say, both ostentatious and your new book, introducing Mrs Collins. When did you first read Pride and Prejudice? How has that impact on you evolved over time? It was GCSE, inevitably. Of course, yes.

Just that age, there's like a bracket. And I think they still do it now for GCSE in some boards. So I really liked it. I don't think I adored it at GCSE, but I liked it. I did love the 1995 adaptation, which came out when I was about 11, I think, or 12. And then it was when we started ostentatious. We started ostentatious really before we had all totally falling in love with Jane Austin. We chose Jane Austen because we liked the novels well enough and we thought

Jane Austen would be a good fit. But that was 15 years ago. And in those first few years, we really took it upon ourselves to read the novels more, learn more about the period. And it was the rereading of Pride and Prejudice in those early years in my 20s that I really started to fall in love with it. and I've had so many years to sit with those characters that it was a few years ago that I really got interested in Charlotte Lucas and the idea of her having a romance of her own and interested in Mr Collins as well so there's a lot spoken about Mr Collins isn't there about his behaviours

so yeah it was it was at school but I would say I fell in love with Pride and Prejudice more in my 20s you reimagine Charlotte Lucas so she becomes the heroine of her own story in introducing Mrs. Collins. Why is it so important that this character, this particular character, had an opportunity to be seen in a new light? Well, I think that she is given great potential by Jane Austen. I think Jane Austen shows her to be sensible, smart.

I think she's funny. Like, I think the things she says to Lizzie in a very dry way are funny. and she's someone who's got all these theories of courtship and marriage, even though she's not succeeded in that way at all. And then when she accepts Mr Collins, she has such a harsh judgment from her best friend from Lizzie, who just dismisses her and says nothing will ever be the same between them again, which is a mad way to respond as a friend.

And then, you know, she's kind of written out of the story, which is what would happen. you know, she left, so she's gone. And we see her in Kent a bit as a side character. She comes into the end of the novel. We hear from her through letters sort of quietly in the background. And I thought that that's what had to happen in Pride and Prejudice because we were telling Elizabeth Bennett's story.

But I wanted to know what was happening in those months between the stories because I think she deserves our attention. I think she's, the decision she made was a well-informed one. I say in the novel, I think that she went into it clear-eyed. Colonel Fitzwilliam in the novel asks her, how are you finding marriage? And she, instead of giving a platitude, she decides to answer him quite honestly. And she says, something like, you know, I'm learning, I'm learning to enjoy it in whatever way I can. I went into it with clear eyes and I congratulate myself at least on that.

You know, she's grounded, she's rooted, and she's smart, and she knew this was the right path for herself. And my goal in writing the novel was that that marriage shouldn't be the obstacle to her happiness. I wanted to make that. That was important to me. 2025 marks the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen's birth. What would you say to any of our listeners who are yet to pick up a Jane Austen novel? Oh, I would say that, well, first of all, I hope you don't mind me saying this. I'm not going to say Jane Austen is for absolutely everyone, because I don't think that's true.

I don't mind you saying that at all. Because there's some people are like, everyone will love Jane Austen if you just read it right. And I don't think that's true at all. It isn't for everyone necessarily, but I do think that people have misconceptions about the writing and that it's about balls and courtship and flirtation and blushes and swooning women. And of course it's not at all. She would really condemn a swooning woman. It's about strong women or interesting, unique women

and a huge range of women making choices in difficult circumstances. And they're difficult in different ways. So you've got Emma, who's very wealthy, but he's absolutely tied to her house by her dad and who sort of is completely disinterested in marriage which again goes against this misconception of what Jane Austen does and then you've got like Fanny Price who has got a really difficult life

you know sort of away from her parents really disregarded by the family looking after her treated very badly no prospects forced to and then she's strong she turns down these marriages from wealthy men. You've got Anne Elliott who gained persuasion, who gave up love, missed it eight years ago, and she's on the shelf, and she's going to be an old maid, and she regrets it.

She's harboring so much regret for having wrongly, for she feels it, giving up love. And everyone's, I would say, start with pride and prejudice, then read sensibility or persuasion. Persuasion's my favourite. And look out for the absolute smorgasbord. of interesting women that Jane Austen gives us because there is a version of woman and not all of them looking for marriage, not all of them are young.

Look, there's widows, there's dowagers, there's poor, there's wealthy, there's hateful, there's manipulative, there's innocent, there's every version of womanhood there. And she shows them all and offers them up as gifts. And I think it's not for everyone, but it's for more people than they think. That was a perfect sell.

for anyone who is turning on and thinking, okay, which should I go for? That was excellent. Bayleys is proudly supporting the Women's Prize for Fiction by helping showcase incredible writing by remarkable women, celebrating their accomplishments and getting more of their books into the hands of more people. Bayleys is the perfect adult treat,

whether shaken in a cocktail, over ice cream, or paired with your favourite book. Check out Baileys.com for our favourite. favourite Bailey's recipes. On the subject of women making difficult choices in difficult situations, we move on to your third book, Shelfy Book, which is The Names by Florence Knav. It is 1987, and in the aftermath of a great storm, Kora sets out with her nine-year-old daughter to register the birth of her son. Her husband intends for her to follow a long-standing family tradition and

called the baby after him. But when faced with the decision, Cora hesitates, going against his wishes is a risk that will have consequences, but is it right for her child to inherit his name from generations of domineering men? The choice she makes in this moment will shape the course of their lives. This is a book that you've relatively recently read in the past few weeks. He couldn't put it down, it says here. What made you choose this as one of your bookshelfy picks? How did you come across it. I came across it. It was one of the, I was in a bookshop looking for new, interesting books and I just picked it. Again, I'd heard people talking about it and I didn't know anything about it. I'd sort of deliberately avoided in a way, sort of people giving me

spoilers about it because I'd heard it was good. And then, yeah, I read it in a day. Well, my little boy was at school, one of those. It was getting, luckily he had a club that day, so I had to on 4.15 because I was not putting it down. Oh, it was just, it was such an experience and it's funny how you know we were saying you give a part of your life to a book. It was only a day, but man, I went through it

in that day. I think it's such a beautiful book and none of the things that it talks about are like new ideas and even the high concept thing that it's doing with it's no spoiler because this happens immediately.

like three timelines going on not three timelines but three alternative sort of what ifs what ifs yeah the stories she's not the first person

to do that but in lots of other ways I felt like it was so original and so moving I think the way she writes the characters and she's got a lot of characters to write

because every character has three versions of themselves so she's had to imagine these different paths for all of her characters so you can tell how well she knows

those characters and I felt like I recognised some of the different versions so well I think she paints them beautifully and the timeline have you read it? I haven't so I recommend it yeah I'm taking this down as a recommendation and I'm in wrap I'll give it two days I can do it in two days if I do it again

but yeah there's a timeline which is probably the most shocking immediately but yeah Julian in that just struck such a chord with me and it's interesting because you know exactly what you want to happen from the first page it set out to each character

certainly to her yeah yeah to each character like set out what her marriage is you know what you want what your hope is it's simple and it's you want her to get away from him that's it and to have that goal from page one

was so powerful and so really the rest of the novel is just pulling at that thing of like how do they get away from him or the legacy of him or the shadow of him the shadow of his father like the shadow that abuse has cast over generations and generations of that family

and you want them to get away from that shadow and really the novel is just showing the different ways that they do or don't get out from under that shadow the book uses this what-if alternate reality structure revisiting the character's lives every seven years, depending on the name chosen, whether it's Bear, Julian or Gordon.

And, you know, we're following them over decades. Such a long span of time, like you say, you read it in a day, but you cared so deeply, you knew them so well. And the what if moments are these tiny little things that can change everything. Did it make you sort of reflect on your own what if moments in life and how small, small changes have had that butterfly effect?

Yeah, it really does. I think that's probably what makes it so emotional, is it does make you think about, yeah, the butterfly effect, like the little choices that you make that will change the course of your life. And it's not only that initial choice. That is obviously the concept of the book. Those three sets you off on those three journeys. But then on each of those journeys, there are decisions that are made that tend them spinning off. And yeah, I think that's why it's very powerful. It's hard not to think of your own. decisions that you've made over your life. I can imagine as a performer as well as an actor and particularly an improv, really considering the impact of little decisions can help you flesh out a character so well. Yeah, that's really interesting. I think in improv you kind of have to clear your mind to a certain extent to be able to do it,

but you have to be in the moment enough and you are aware that like, you know, if someone comes on stage and holds your hand, that dictates the rest of the two hours. That tells you something about who this person is to you. And if someone comes on stage and folds their arms, when they're looking at you, that dictates another thing. And tiny little gestures, you know, how the angle of their body, the tone of their voice, even saying the same phrase, dictates how you're going to relate to each other for the next two hours. So, yeah, it's powerful. If anyone doesn't know the concept of ostentatious, can you just give us sort of brief overview?

Yes. Yes. So we... It's so brilliant. It's so good. We get a made-up book title from the audience and then we improvise, in full Jane Austen costume, we improvise a Jane Austen style story over the next sort of hour and a half to two hours just from that title. And we make it up as we go along. And the titles range, some of them like puns on existing novels, like, I don't know, frankincense and sensibility. What have we had the Empire line strikes back?

Gay pride and prejudice. And then some of them are just, and not like, some of them are just like, you know, the grey vase or Mrs. Pottsworth goes to bath. You know, they're just random sort of titles. And we try, it's funny, but my goal certainly, and Carriad's goal, is always to have the emotion in it as well. It's important.

If anyone hasn't seen it, you can. You can. We're on all next year. Yeah. Thank you for the names as a recommendation. You're welcome. It's noted down. I think Christmas reading sorted. Let's talk on the phone after you've read it and we can continue this rule that we only talk about books. Yeah. Excellent. We'll move on to your fourth book-shelphi book now, Rachel, which is my brilliant friend by Eleanor Ferrante.

Beginning in the 1950s in a poor but vibrant neighbourhoods on the outskirts of Naples. Eleanor Ferranti's four-volume Neapolitan novels series spans almost 60 years as its main characters, the fiery and unforgettable Lila and the bookish narrator, Eleanor, become women, wives, mothers and leaders, all the while maintaining a complex and at times conflicted friendship. This first novel in the series follows Lila and Eleanor from their fateful meeting as 10-year-olds through their school years and adolescence. Now, you said this is a book you would recommend to anyone.

What makes this so universally shareable with other readers? Well, I think I only recommend books to people that I do think are excellent books, if you know what I mean. So for me, the work of genius category and the recommend to a friend category are quite overlapping. So I don't really recommend very easy reads to people because I think you'll probably find those yourself. You'll read what you want to. But like things that stand out to me is really powerful and important. um this and like demon cobberhead like I forced my husband to read it I was like you you have to read this so if I feel strongly about it I'll recommend it so I think why I would recommend this to friends

is because I've never read a portrayal of female friendship and childhood female friendship and then of course it goes into the adult years but like that is so fantastically done it's so you unique and recognizable and made just makes you think of like the complicated knotty friendships that you might have had in the past and of course this is unusually naughty granted but there were moments of such recognition and I think it's in a way it's such a simple story really it's about their lives and their friendship and the things that happen to them it's it's not hugely complicated but I just think the writing is amazing it's a friendship that is complex it's full of love and rivalry loyalty reflecting on what friendship can be like in real life, what does it mean to you to be a brilliant friend? I think to work hard at the moment, I feel like the strains of friendship are with kids and work and distance between you,

going to the effort to maintain and feeling comfortable when you do see them and happy and everything's the same. It's like, oh, okay, we're still going. got each other and also forgiving each other when you're too tired and busy to do that and then also in those more complicated friendships which I think we all have that forgiveness that willingness to sweep away is so important I think to keep like not if it's a really ongoing toxic friendship oh no no not if you're doing bad things to each other yeah not if you're like in a really

really fucked up bullying relationship that's different that's not a brilliant friendship but if it's just if It's a friendship that goes through naughty periods and you have disagreements, but you ultimately love each other. Like, just that forgiveness and just coming back to each other is so important. But especially the reason I like this. So I've read the whole saga and I said, I like a big saga. You know, it goes on for their whole life, the four books. But this one, I really liked their childhood friendship because it really reminded me. I like how badly it paints little girls.

I don't know if I was an awful child but like the friendships I had when I was that age were really strange and there was a bit of like I don't know bullying is the word but like there was a girl I was friends with who like sort of did some horrible things to me but I loved her and she hasn't grown up to be a psychopath or anything but she could be so cruel kids can be cruel and they're just trying out

boundaries and everything and we would go from her like doing something mean like she like I remember had some new felt-tip pens and she sort of you know bashed them on the table to make them break but then at lunchtime we'd have like the most brilliantly hilarious conversation like in the corner all huddled up together and like at school 11 and 12 I used to keep a diary and it was like my best friend and it was my best friend at the time we both did music and when she would like have a success in music like be picked for a concert or something I'd hate it I'd be so angry the words I I used, the fury that I had, the jealousy. I was so bitter. And I found that fascinating,

like, what? And I think she felt the same vice versa sometimes. And those were the friendships that we had. I'm sure I did have some other healthier friendships, but like, that was the main one. That's it. That's the one I wanted to keep. So that's what I loved this book, because I think it's a totally different world. It's the world of, you know, 50s Naples, which again, I loved learning about, totally new. traditions, new schools, new history, but the naughtiness of childhood friendship was so recognisable. Are you still friends with that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you still have the diaries as well? No, I threw them awake. I was so ashamed. So you burnt them. I nearly, but I was like,

I actually, these are so mean. I don't want anyone to ever read them. And I regret it. I regret it. I wish I kept them. It's interesting that you can look back on that time and have regrets about being a child. I know, but they were like... But like you say, there are feelings that you probably needed to have as you work out your boundaries as you grow. Yes, yes, yeah. Both introducing Mrs Collins and my brilliant friend

explored these complex relationships between women, whether it is friendship, whether it's rivalry, whether it's societal roles. Can you see similarities in your portrayal of female connection and Ferrantes? Yeah, I think so. I wouldn't deign to, you know, pair myself with Ellen Farante, but I think there are things that, as a woman, going on and on

about women in this book, I suppose that's fine, it's the women's prize. That's what we do. That you recognise, like, a moment in introducing Mrs Collins is an aspect of Elizabeth Bennett that I think Jane Austen quietly gives us in Pride and Prejudice is that she's not always completely thoughtful. I think she's got quite a strong inner gaze. and I think that so in introducing Mrs Collins Charlotte you know has a tough time making this decision

she's then married to someone awful she's all alone without any friends and then she gets pregnant and then she has a miscarriage and these things like Elizabeth isn't in touch at times when she should be writing letters and then there's like a moment later in the novel where Elizabeth sort of casually makes mention of someone who's had 10 children and goes, can you imagine, Charlotte, 10 children? And hasn't the way of the world to think that, oh, that might be a really sensitive topic for my friend.

And we don't, we don't think Elizabeth's awful for that, you know, and we can forgive it. And she's got other qualities that make her such a wonderful friend. But I think that you can have two very flawed people and that friendship still be beautiful. and also there's a big fallout when she marries Collins. In introducing Mrs Collins, I sort of leaned into exploring the fallout, the time apart, and how they felt, how Charlotte felt really betrayed by Elizabeth's reaction after such a long friendship. But then they come back together again and they try again.

And I think that's the enduring quality of friendship, even when it's flawed, is I suppose what they have in common. two flawed people can still have a beautiful friendship. It's like what you said actually just before, that when everything changes, the friendship can actually stay the same. Yes, yes. And I think we all have friends like that.

Yes, yeah, indeed them. Rachel, it's time to talk about your fifth and final book today, which is The Lost by Claire McGowan. What was it from the list? Oh, yeah. When two teenage girls go missing along the Irish border, forensic psychologist Paula McGuire, has to return to the hometown she left years before.

Swirling with rumour and secrets, the town is gripped by fear of a serial killer. But the truth could be even darker. Surrounded by people and places she tried to forget, Paula digs into the cases as the truth twists further away. What is the link with two other disappearances from 1985? And why does everything lead back to the town's dark past, including the reason her own mother went missing years before?

as the shocking truth is revealed Paula learns that sometimes it's better not to find what you've lost now crime fiction as a comfort reads such an intriguing pick it's different to your other choices as well what makes this series

it's a series this series you'll go to escape okay first of a moment for crime fiction I just love crime fiction I love a series of crime fiction I've read like all of the Karen Slaughter Atlanta series. I loved all the Patricia Cornwells. I love Val McDermott's. Like, honestly, there's so many incredible female crime thriller writers and I'm here for all of them. Oh, so lovely

child, but let's not talk about that on the women's prize. This writer, what I love about this series is it's not just about the case. It's about the troubles in Ireland, which again was a something I knew very little about even though it was when I was growing up I didn't know that much about it and this was really informative about that but through such a brilliant story and I said I'm really crap at reading nonfiction

but I love fiction that informs me about things like this. And sometimes it sends you to Google and you think I want to know more give me the context actually. It did. This definitely does that. Yeah. I was like oh I need to know more about what she's looting to because she throws you right in there.

So the author, Claire McGowan, was born in a border town in Ireland, Northern Ireland. And so the main character also comes from a border town, which was absolutely at the height of just horrendous scenes of like violence and threats and tension during the troubles. And she very much, and her mother went missing, and she's never known where she is. And she very much made a choice to move away. And she went to London. She became a forensic pathologist. And so this series of novels begins when she, for various reasons, is forced to return.

She returns to her dad and her old house and sort of the ghosts that haught the ghost of her mother sort of haunting this village for her. So the cases are great. It's got all the mystery of a crime thriller. And there's things happening in the present, which are informed by these old cases as well. There's often like two timelines. And she's often trying to figure out something that happened in the 80s as well as something that's happening now. And her main character, Paula, is like, again, a very flawed, often unlikable.

She's brittle. She's brittle and cold and quite defensive. But you can see why with her upbringing. And yeah, I think the book gives you so much more than just the case. If you could sit down with Paula McGuire, for a cup of coffee, would you want to ask her more questions about the cases or her life? Oh, her life, partly because of the love interests. You know, I am a romantic as well and she's got complicated love interests going on.

I would have a gossip with her as well. As much as there's so much more to it and she's all political as well, I do love. There's also a really great love triangle which you don't know which direction. you want her to go in. She's got a very troubled, kind of messed up old boyfriend who still lives in the town, who's very attractive, but clearly trouble. And then there's her like inspector, British, not sort of tied up police officer who's much more responsible, who's a much better choice in lots of ways.

But yeah, I like that it gives you that as well. That's what I'd end up talking to her about. I'd be like, I'll make you a cup of tea. tell me who you've slept with and who you want to we'll talk about the troubles later but that's it for the troubles to sit alongside the romance in a novel in a series that is suspenseful crime fiction is brilliant a misdirection and plotting

but then you also have this romance you also have the setting which becomes a character in itself these Irish towns these landscapes that play this role that feels so immersive what do you enjoy about following a recurring series having all of these things that you can grow with, develop with, learn about

protagonists that you get to know so well which I feel like is a theme for all of your picks a day. I think particularly crime thriller series is such a winning concept because you do get to travel with the characters you see their decisions that you do or don't agree with

you see the trouble they're getting into you see them change as people and then also you get a fresh story every book so it's so winning because you get this lovely familiarity and comfort of oh I know who these people are

I know the town I know the history but then you also get a new mystery to solve alongside it I'm sorry we made you pick just one yeah in a way I'm picking the series yeah how come this one when we pushed you this one novel

I think because inevitably the first one is the one that fully introduces us to that town and to what's happened before. So it's the one that sets the scene is often the one that sticks with you. In fact

there is a really good connection here that brings all your book shows that really nicely together. Claire McGowan has also written a modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice. Oh! Yes. I don't know if I knew that. She's a fellow Austin fan. Oh! I must get in touch with her. I really think you should be friends.

Yeah, I think we should. Yeah. Final question. We asked this to everyone. And I'm sorry because we've already pushed you to choose one book from a series several times. Yeah. But if we asked you to go even film that, pick one book as a favourite from the five that you brought today. Oh.

Which would it be and why? It would be demon copperhead. It's the one that I think I felt I most gave myself over to. and it took ages as well to read which I enjoyed and I just think it's I think it's a story for the ages I think it paints a place and a time in our world

I'm going to be grand about it because I think it's a grand book It's a tone It's an absolute work of genius It's a tome and I think everything about it is important I think talking about kids in foster care talking about the opiate crisis talking about attitudes to the poor talking about the USA's troubles and just the hero's journey, you know, the young heroes' journey,

it is, I think it will go down as like, you know, a sort of Shakespeare-level book in years to come. So that's what I'm picking. When you said that you only recommend books that you think are genius, how much do you hope that that then reflects? Because I actually do the same. If they read this, they'll think I'm recommending it because this is just the kind of book I like. Yeah, yeah, that's true. Yeah. I'm like, I've actually got some books to recommend. They're all this big. No, but that is a recommendation. I think we can all get behind. It is incredible. As have you been. Thank you so much, Rachel.

Thank you. I've loved gabbing on to you about books. It's going to continue. Well, we've got this call lined up a little later. About the names, yeah. Speak to you then. Yeah. Thank you so much. And Merry Christmas to all of our listeners. Thank you so much for listening to Season 8 so far. Our final episode of the season is coming next week with self-esteem. You do not want to miss that. I'm Vic Hope and you've been listening to the Women's Prize for Fiction Bootschelphie podcast. Brought to you by Bayleys and produced by Birdline Media.

Thank you for joining me for this episode. You'll find all the books discussed in our show notes. If you've enjoyed it, please leave us a rating or review to help other readers discover even more brilliant books by women. See you next time. Thank you.