Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Common-adjacent (with Mick Herron)

Episode Date: August 1, 2024

There's a funny smell in the studio today... is it the smell of the 1970s? Is it the smell of Homme?Also, keep an eye out for Parish notices, some recurring garden chat, and recommendations for mole repellent.Plus, Fi speaks to the author Mick Herron about the reissue of his book 'Down Cemetery Road', 21 years after it was first published.There's also a discussion about quite a serious news story, if you're affected by any of the issues raised then please email [e-mail] you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @janeandfiPodcast Producer: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's not from the 1970s, Jane, and it's for Om, and I would suggest to any Om, don't. No, don't. Welcome to Thursday's edition of Off Air with Jane and Fi. And today the rain is coming, Fi, thank God. Well, that is good news, actually, because I managed to get my bark mulch out. That was the big delivery the other day, wasn't it? Which regular listeners will actually have heard occurring live.

Yes. And, oh, actually, no, maybe I should have waited because that traps the moisture in. Does it? I always get gardening wrong. Always. You've got gardeners in your family, haven't you? Yes.

Very good. I don't know why you don't ask for their expertise, but you plough your own furrow. No, I do, and they're very helpful on the subject, but I just find it baffling because they are just light years ahead of me in terms of knowledge. They'll start using terms and I just, you know, what? Sorry, what? What do I do then? How?

How much? That often? Why? Can I ask, what kind of bark is it? Wood bark. But do you know what kind of a tree? No. Okay, now I just wonder whether some trees produce better, more garden-positive bark

than others. Well, it's kind of mulch so it's bark and bits so i wonder if it's a serious question now coming up would it help my garden which is the soil is just full of builder's rubble would an application of this mulch be a good thing no i think uh i think the only thing that can help with builder's rubble is to try and get as much of it out. And the mulch... You have to take a month off. ...is just to... I mean, I'm using it to try and dissuade the cats from using every flower bed as a constant litter tray.

I'm just trying to send them a bit further down the garden. Yeah. But it definitely does help keep moisture and nutrients in, but I don't think it would necessarily... You just need to put some fertiliser down. Take some of the rubble out, put fertiliser down. I don't think it would necessarily, you just need to, you need to put some fertilizer down. Take some of the rubble out, put fertilizer, I don't know why I'm doing that accent.

I think it was, it was sort of multi-purpose rural, I think. Okay, well, that's the gardening section of the podcast over with. You may know more, Jane and Fi at Times.Radio.

But don't, please don't bewilder me and please don't use latin names because that's that's why i just want you know my inner child comes out and i just want to cry because the rest of the family's doing something i don't like yeah fair enough i also wonder is it just common practice was it common practice i think my house is about 100 years old is that just what they did when they were building streets, that they just put all the bits and bobs and leftovers? I mean, I sometimes think,

have I unearthed a Roman pot? And I haven't. I honestly don't know because I'm not common. Well, yes, OK. I probably am common. I'm more common adjacent than fears, that's for sure.

I'm proud of it. So, yes, somebody will know. I just couldn't resist that. Would you like to do parish notices? Oh, I would absolutely. Or are you going to ask your assistant? Your common assistant. I would love to do parish notices.

Here we go. See, I think in another life, I think you'd have been the lady of the house and I'd have been, what would I have been? The parlour maid. But I'd have been really useless. Yeah, but the weird thing is, Jane Jane back to just two generations in my family we were parlour maids were you yeah so we

were you know serving in the big house so you've done it can I say you've done ever so well oh my god okay actually do you know what this is an interesting conversation this seriously I remember asking I think it was my grandmother, did you have servants when you were growing up? Because she was born in 1900. You're the posh one, that's what's so weird about this. No, I'm not. And she said, no, we didn't have servants, but we weren't servants either.

And that was a sort of, that was her assessment. But I, it is so interesting, isn't it, how families change and morph and i mean some go off in all sorts of directions not necessarily in an upward trajectory trajectory yes they don't do they so my grandmother left school at 14 and she put herself through a bookkeeping course uh in order to find work she then had to go back and care for her mum, who was incredibly ill and died, you know, when she was very young. And it was the local GP who noticed how good she was at caring

and suggested that she pursue a career as a nurse. So she went back and put herself through nursing school. I mean, you know, I find that story just phenomenal, absolutely phenomenal. It's really, really impressive. And it was education for both my grandparents that turned their lives around. So my grandfather's family ran the food shop in Montrose. And he, you know, he just, he was clever. He was just a really, really, really clever boy.

And, you know, powered his way all the way through to become a professor of gynecology and obstetrics so you know there's nothing kind of grand going on in their in their backstory at all but they both educated themselves through their own hard work and actually evidence of a meritocratic society in lots of ways just diligence i think they were just diligent people who wanted to didn't ask for anything. Yeah, you know, to do good things. I mean, you know, luckily I can remember them, so I can't remember my other grandparents on the other side. My family died when I was tiny.

I have no memories of them at all. But I remember both Chassa and Grace just being really lovely, quiet, calm, diligent people. And this isn't entirely unconnected. Did you finish Hillbilly Elegy? I threw Hillbilly Elegy across my bedroom. I got really fed up with it, actually. And I'd also been alerted on the socials to a passage

that I was about to encounter about his kind of teenage young man sexual awakenings, and I just didn't want to read it, actually. And it all came at the same time that the Catwoman stuff re-emerged. I would highly recommend, if you have access to X, just searching out the utterly brilliant Catwoman video that has been made of Catwomen on their way to the White House. Just type that in and you'll see it. It is so good. It's so good.

So no, I just thought, actually, I'm going to take on board all of the thoughts of our lovely listeners in this community who have said it's not a great depiction of Appalachia. So I just stopped. I'd read enough, I felt. I think I might have got halfway through it and I just can't remember where I put it. So perhaps that was simply meant.

But you don't have enough curiosity to search the house to find it to finish it. Well, I suppose I now know more about him and also I read the emails from the listeners who, as you said, disputed his account of Appalachian life. But I guess that's memoirs, isn't it? They're only ever one person's view of things.

And even members of their own family must dispute the content of so many memoirs. Now, look, I've got a gift for you. Oh, sorry, we've only done one of these. Oh, yeah, no. Yes, I mean, also we do. People will think, will they talk about Hugh Edwardswards yes we will so i was going to come up bear with abigail shepherd and her mom glennis this is people who've won totes it certainly is frances cushway and her friend alex julia russell on her holiday in south world uh very close to

dungeon and helen for her 69th birthday happy birthday birthday. Susan Jane and her friend Steph, Susan Jane known as Sue, and for the hospital team, Colette, Sarah, Deanne and Caroline. Well done, all of you. And yes, you look forward to your totes. There is an issue with envelopes. There is.

What is this? Me Too body spray hom. We were talking about fragrances from back in the day and this is what I found in my local pharmacy. It's a body spray which is called Me Too. It is really called Me Too. And when I saw it, I just thought that can't possibly have been made recently after the Me Too scandal, the Me Too movement, everything.

What is he wanting us to do? Do a little spritz. Do a little spritz, OK. Oh, I don't think you want to smell like that for the day. So this will go up on our Instagram, but it's a Me Too body spray. Still available? Yes. So I looked it up.

It's a current thing. It's not from the 1970s, Jane. And it's for Om. And I would suggest to any Om, don't. No. Don't. No, Oms just don't. Absolutely bizarre.

Well, let's just, should we just spray it around the room just to get, because there are some whiffier members of staff. Let's just give it a... Oh! Okay, and it's, who's this made by? It's horrible. Made inland by milton lloyd cosmetics oh that's really bad golly right okay um i gift that i can just leave it in here see if anybody takes it away i tell you what if anyone takes it home starts using it we will really know because

that scent is louise thank you for your email about hugh ed Edwards do you want to read this one I listened to every episode of your fortunately podcast that's the one that we did before we came here I only had one episode that I felt uncomfortable listening to you were both so thrilled to finally interview him fee responded several emails telling you that it was an uncomfortable conversation saying it was not how it sounded and all was said with a twinkle and you didn't feel the same about it as the listeners his eyes covered up what his voice couldn't i expect you can't read this out but maybe this is one of those situations where those listening were getting a better understanding of the man than the people in the room i was not a frequent or regular bbc news viewer but i never warmed to the man after that interview i love the bbc and

was reluctant to follow you but so glad I did you do a fabulous job at Times Radio and I love that you're my breakfast show here in California uh well that's fantastic by the way very good morning to you Louise and obviously um you know Jane and I have had quite a few off-air conversations, I mean literally off-air conversations, about Hugh Edwards, given what we now know about him. And for people who are listening outside of the country, you don't understand this conversation, Hugh Edwards has been one of our most famous and revered newsreaders at the BBC for over 20 years.

He's been the anchorman for the death of monarchs, for the arrival of royal babies, for general elections, for pretty much everything. He's also one of the highest paid newsreaders at the corporation. And he pleaded guilty to three charges of accessing indecent images of children at a magistrate's court yesterday in the UK and he'll be sentenced in September. That's it and but of course that's not it because so many people are upset and angry

and repulsed and we cannot say often enough that these crimes do have real-life, real-world victims and consequences. And I can't, there are no excuses for this man's behaviour. But I feel that a lot of people were, is coerced the right word? Were felt honour bound in the initial stages of this controversy to defend him. And they must be very angry and upset today and actually Louise mentions in that email the um podcast that we did do with him for the BBC and it's really interesting what you say Louise and I think I'm not going to speak for Fee but I know you probably will agree with me that we did feel that we had to apologize. We had to try and explain his peculiarities afterwards, didn't we?

So just to give this a bit of a... But I quite remember why we did. A run-up. It had become a meme on the podcast that we couldn't get Hugh Edwards to do an interview with us. And the whole point of our previous podcast was actually to interview and be revealing about people at the BBC as well as to interview other guests who had written books

or in movies or whatever it was. So we used to sit outside in the piazza, the kind of main public accessed place outside the BBC. And of course, lots of BBC people would stride past and we would call out to them and hoik them over. And an awful lot of people came over and had a chat to us and were lovely and funny. And David Dimbleby was, you know, magnanimous and hilarious.

And he had no idea who we were. Yes. So anyway, it was all a good laugh. And Hugh Edwards just wouldn't join in and so it became a bit of a meme that we were trying to get him on the podcast and you know listeners joined in with that and then you know we found that we had a producer who'd kind of known him and worked with him so she put in her well he became a little bit kind of um arch about some of the questions that we asked him and he was a little bit kind of um

humorously condescending towards us which in the moment i think you and I both did feel uncomfortable but also felt that we were being asked to kind of you know play his game and his game was to be a bit arch and a bit camp and so afterwards you and I felt I don't know what do we feel a bit a bit got at and I think we probably both felt a bit humiliated but what is making me angry today and is making me ask questions of myself is why i then felt that in the next time we did do the podcast we had because we had lots of emails about hugh edwards appearance and how people had expected to like him but found themselves really quite disliking him we felt we had to say oh well that's, that's just his sense of humour.

By the way, if you think I'd like to listen to that, you can't listen to it anymore. No, it's been taken down, as has much of his work in the BBC. Yeah, and that's what... So why did we? Why did we feel we had to apologise? Because we worked for that organisation, and you and I both know that he was a very, very important part of it, which makes his disgrace all the more terrible.

And again, I have to say, it is a tragedy for the BBC because we can't deny the fact this stuff keeps happening. Yeah. I felt that he was performing a version of himself. Yeah, it was all performative. For comedic effect. Yeah. And to a degree, everybody does that.

Yeah. And because there was a, you know, sometimes there was, he delivered some of his kind of more arch lines because he had a bit of a go, didn't he, at you about reading a script because you had asked him about reading an autocue. I'd had the temerity to suggest there wasn't a lot to news reading, by the way.

That's not to say there are some people who do it brilliantly. But actually now you're questioning whether i i don't quite know how the whole anchorman concept recovers from this um and whether people quite wrongly will now look unforgivingly on other people who do that role and play that part and start wondering what their quotes really like. And I think that's probably very unfortunate because there are so many hugely decent people who work doing that job across all broadcasting organisations

and actually just in the wider BBC. It's full of... I mean, you and I have both met people who absolutely work their watsits off for that organisation, which doesn't love them back, by the way. Totally, totally. But do you know what, that's my anger about it all, is the fact that the original investigation,

which was done by the Sun newspaper, a part of News UK who we work for, and it was done in the building, that investigation didn't lead to a criminal charge against Hugh Edwards. These criminal charges are separate to that investigation. A BBC internal investigation didn't reveal any substantial wrongdoings on his part. And to all intents and purposes his he was still living with his family we only learned recently that Hugh Edwards was no longer with his wife and and I would just like to say to her anyone who knows her or his children none of this is on them and I really really hope that they are

okay because what an awful awful thing yeah to happen to your family but because of all of those things jane i think i felt uh that he was a man who had done something really stupid and definitely definitely wrong uh and you know i just expected him to go away and for that to be that i think some people felt me too reassured by the fact that those investigations had not revealed something as horrendous as this we now know that it was there so my anger comes from being asked to believe something that he knew he knew was wrong and he didn't choose to allay people's fears, did he? And we know why, because there was all kinds of stuff there. So it's so mucky, it's so horrible.

It is, it's vile and genuinely upsetting. It is genuinely upsetting. And it's been an upsetting week, I think it's fair to say, and in any number of other ways. So, yes, anybody wants to email us about this, then please do because we are free to discuss it. It's not as if we can't talk about it, we can talk about it. And we can own our own confusion, I think, which we're happy to do. And also just to say that on the programme yesterday, we did make sure that

actually the substantial news item that we chose to do about this whole thing was about the children who are involved and exploited in those kind of cases because it is easy to talk about the perpetrator

and it is quite easy in this country to talk about where it leaves an institution like the BBC. We can all hold opinions about that. And in a sense, it stops us from devoting equal time to how you can stop children falling into that kind of trap of exploitation and having their lives ruined forever. So please don't feel that we've ignored that aspect of the story because we absolutely didn't No, anyway it is Jane and Fi at Times.Radio, I slightly feel we've run out

of time and that's a real shame but I was really keen, we were both really keen that we talked about this. Yes and you don't think that we're shying away from it because lots of people have asked about that interview Well I'll tell you what we'll do because that has all been incredibly hefty.

Why don't we just have a right old laugh for a couple of moments with some emails, and then we will play you our Mick Herron interview. And he was really delightful to talk to. So let's talk about smells. And... Do you want that? That is...

Yeah, I know, because it's still lingering. Me Too is very much still with us made in England though I noticed from the from the canister there Melanie says

what I wouldn't give for a whiff I hadn't heard of this of Yardley Sea Jade to transport me back to the heady days of 1972 when drenched in it

sporting hot pants and platform shoes I strutted my stuff at the winter gardens in Cleethorpes. Looking back, I'm not sure if the cloud of perfume or the fact that platforms made me well over six feet tall meant that I often failed to pull. Sea jade did, however, mask the aroma of frying as I spent my summer holidays frying fish and chips at the cafe on the boating lake. Happy days. Yours, reminiscing from Melanie Walker. Melanie, thank you so much for that. I am really interested in

Cleethorpes. Whenever I go to Lime Street station in Liverpool, I arrive and the train to Cleethorpes is waiting to depart. And I'm genuinely interested in how many people travel on the train between Liverpool and Cleethorpes but there's always a train waiting to take you.

Why don't you leap on? Have an adventure. Do you know what? I think I will. I think you should. Yeah, I definitely will. This one comes from Lots of Love Adam. As a teenager, my go-to aftershave was

Dracar Noir by Guy Laroche. Guy Laroche. Guy Laroche. You've put pronunciation in and I still can't get it right. Would you be Guy? I'm just going to say Guy. A tactile and sleek black design bottle, the fragrance was wonderful. In my early 30s, one Christmas, the presents from my mum included a bottle of Noir.

It was as far from Guy's creation as you could get. A clear bottle with a picture of a winking devil brandishing a trident. Despite best efforts, the look on my face gave it away. It's what you like, isn't it, she said, and whilst I had to explain it wasn't quite the one, I was, as ever, at pains to thank her. The bottle was alas consigned to the outside loo, and months later, exasperated with the destruction and carnage

the moles were wreaking on our pristine lawn, I chanced upon said bottle. Having read moles were sensitive to smell, and with every other trick exhausted, Right. I wondered the opportunity missed for the manufacturer to rebrand the product as mole repellent because I wasn't convinced that marketing it as aftershave noir was quite hitting the mark. It was years later during a drunken family celebration I came clean to my mother. She laughed but not quite as heartily as others. I love that.

So that was very much noir for the moles. Yes. Do moles, do they pop up in almost every garden? Sorry, back to gardening. I'm looking at you, but you do know more about this subject than I do. Are they... Well, I've never had moles in a London garden,

but I think they're put off by the rubble. Oh, yeah. Well, there must be. If you're a London mole and you're listening or you know someone who knows one. I think we might end with Nella who says how about Love's fresh lemon cologne made your mouth water far quicker

than opal fruits, ironic really as those fruits were made entirely with that purpose in mind according to the jingle I'm hoping you too can remember the tune yours warmly and not just due to the weather Nella thank you very much yes, opal fruitsed's Main to Main.

That was the jingle. And they've now, of course, been renamed. But we won't go there because it's simply too distressing. No, that's what Stuart McHoney's for. Yes, exactly. Did you ever wear Reeve Gauche? Yes, I did. I used to love that.

I think they still make that, don't they? I might get myself a little bottle. Yes, retro bottle. I used to love that. I think they still make that, don't they? I might get myself a little bottle. Yes, a retro bottle. Do they still make it? It's blue and black, isn't it? Yeah. Yves Saint Laurent just sounds sophisticated. I mean, there's just no getting away from that.

So growing up in the 70s, you had Woolworths, Yves Saint Laurent. I mean, that was just better, wasn't it? Yeah. And hats off to the French. Chapeaus chucked in the air because I'm hugely enjoying their Olympics. Well, thank God for the Olympics this week because it's a go-to place of joy, wonder and safety

in a pretty dark world. Let's bring in Mick Herron. He is a legend in the world of crime fiction, the author of the fiction, the author of the best-selling Slow Horses series, made even more popular by its Apple TV adaptation, featuring the very lank hair and sardonic charm of a greasy Gary Oldman. It seems surprising now, but Mick struggled to get his first book commissioned. It's called Down Cemetery Road. It's a thriller, but it doesn't feature Jackson Lamb, the slow horse's lead, but instead

features Sarah, a young housewife in Oxford who feels a connection with a young abducted child and sets off to find her, a search that takes her to unforgiving places where power and brutality collide. Now, the book is being republished to celebrate 21 years since it first appeared on our shelves. And Mick joined us from his home in Oxford. I asked him to take me all the way back to its first publication. Well, the book itself was published 21 years ago. The gap between it being accepted for publication and publication was two years. And I must have finished it at least four years before then because it had a long pre-publication history of going around publishers

and being rejected by publishers and eventually finding a home at Constable, which was one of the first places it had been offered to. It was turned down by the then editor, but everything went on for so long that a lot of people in charge of publishing houses got old and died. So the book went out again to their replacements. And yes, it found a home at one of the first places it was turned down by Constable and Robinson. When you first started writing, how does that process work? I mean how do you know how to stagger the plot? How do you know when to introduce a twist? Well I was very much learning all of that on the hoof when I was writing Down Cemetery Road. It wasn't the first book I'd written but it was the first one that I really

felt was worth anybody else reading. And as I say, it was a long process. I do remember that the very first draft of it had pretty much a different plot in it. I took the plot out and then rewrote it. Do you like the book? Do you like it? I do. I think, you know, as I said, it wasn't the first book I'd written, but it still feels like the firstborn because it was the first published. I would hate to be in the position where I detested the first novel that I published. You know, it has a special place in my heart. I think it's probably a bit long, but I wouldn't change it. You know, I want it kept as it is because that's what I was doing at the time.

Some writers do struggle with their earlier works, though, don't they? We were lucky enough to interview Anne Tyler a couple of years ago, and she said she really flinches at some of her earlier work because she said, you know, my voice now is just so much better. You know, I'm a better writer. I'm a wiser woman. much better you know I'm a better writer I'm a wiser woman so I'm interested that do you do you see that across your great body of work that you've changed as a person and there are bits and pieces that you're just not so fond of now I'm sure you could roll up sentences and probably whole paragraphs that would make me flinch now but I think you could do that with pretty much anything at any point in my in my career and certainly at at the time of writing, I was happy with it. I'm not sure that I'm much wiser now than I was then.

And a lot of things that I was then, like, you know, full of enthusiasm for life and so on, perhaps, you know, just a bit older now. But the characters remain close to my heart. I mean, there's a reason why the notion that a first novel is often a thinly disguised autobiography is partly true. It's because when you're that a first novel is often a thinly disguised autobiography is is um it's partly true is because when you're writing your first novel you have by definition a lot less experience in creating characters so you rely on yourself and your own responses and your

own thoughts and feelings more than you might later in your career saray is in many ways the most autobiographical character i've ever written not because our life circumstances are identical although i did borrow things but because throughout the book more than I've ever written. Not because her life circumstances are identical, although I did borrow things, but because throughout the book, more than I've ever done since, I think, I was thinking, what would I do if I was in this situation and allowing her to behave in that way? That's so interesting because obviously you've swapped agenda there. And I think one of the things that many people love about your books, and I'd include myself in this, is the fact that your female characters are very well-rounded. They're very believable. And in Sarah, her kind of frustration with the world, with the situation she finds herself in, it is very authentic, actually very authentic actually very authentic did you ask a woman to read her and her character or any

of the books actually before they were published or sent off somewhere not in the sense of checking for that kind of character check if you like no I mean I was perfectly happy with the way I'd created the character and did feel that I was being true to a fictional character, even if that fictional character wasn't necessarily true to womanhood as a whole. I don't write as a voice for, you know, a generation or a gender or anything else. I write to create character. And I felt that, you know, in writing Sarah, I'd done something as true as I was capable of. But I think it is a failing in other male crime writers, actually, that sometimes the female characters aren't as believable. And I wouldn't, you know, be rude enough to kind of name any names,

but also that women often appear as victims and in quite a salacious way as victims. And I wonder what your process was in in I think rather deliberately avoiding that well for a start I wouldn't narrow it down to the crime genre I think a lot of male authors will stop to do that um I I mean there have been female victims in in my books I mean I have become known to as somebody who kills characters off with, you know, it's not quite gay abandon, but I do it reasonably regularly. And some of those have been female characters. I try to be true to the story that I'm creating.

And then within that, try to be true to the characters that I've written. And I rely a lot on interiority, which most novelists do. So when I'm writing any given scene, I tend to be writing it from the point of view of the character. To all intents and purposes, while I'm doing that writing, I am being that character as much as I'm capable of. And so does your writing ever leave you quite perturbed for the rest of the day? I mean, if you are writing something that involves harm, and obviously you're writing about the dark side of life because it's a crime genre. Can you just shut the study door and it's all fine on the other side of it?

I wish I could say yes, and often I would answer yes to that question. I think I have done in the past. But the fact is I've had great difficulty with a scene that's been going on. I've been writing it for several weeks now. I finished writing it this morning, and I was very off my game yesterday evening. I was a person, not as a on. I've been writing it for several weeks now. I finished writing it this morning and I was very off my game yesterday evening as a person, not as a writer. I'd finished work then.

And I realised it is because that scene culminates in the death of a character and it was not something I was happy about. So no, it does affect me. Who is it? I can't. Who died? I know you can't.

I know you can't. We will talk about Sloughhouse and Slow Horses in just a moment. But just to make the broader point that one of the joys of reading your books is that there is a political backdrop. There is a current affairs backdrop throughout so many of them. And in Down Cemetery Road, there is this shadow of the war in Iraq. You also might like to make current jokes. Current at the time was this that you said about one of the characters, Howard. He looked as if he'd unexpectedly been made leader of the Conservative Party

and hadn't yet found a way of passing the buck. Yes, where were we then? It was in the early Blair years. I think that was right. I think that's right. It might have been Michael Howard. I can't actually remember. So you must enjoy

throwing those little darts at the dartboard. Oh yeah, yes. Feeding off whatever's in the news can be great fun. It's also a way of removing the sting from what's going on in the news as well. There's not much I can do but I can stick two fingers up and that's what it

amounts to really. What are you sticking two fingers up to at the moment? I'm taking possession. i'm writing a book that i've been writing for the past year and i knew when i started writing it but by the time it achieves publication we'd have a different government um so reality has just caught up with me i've been writing this book for a while and it's about the early days of a it's set in the early days of a new a government. I don't say Labour, but that's obviously what it is. And now, in fact, reality has completely overtaken me, because this

book won't appear for another year, and by then it will probably be quite a stable government. And does that make it harder to write when reality is unfolding in front of you? It would if it meant that much to me, but the political backdrop that I use is whatever's going on at the time.

And often when I'm, you know, doing second, third drafts, I will take out a lot of jokes that suddenly don't seem current anymore. Political jokes can become completely incomprehensible within a matter of weeks. And there are many jokes I've put in that I thought were funny at the time of writing. And by the time this book is ready to go to press, even I don't remember what I was talking about.

So it's only the real kind of headline jokes. Nobody's going to forget Liz Truss in a hurry, for instance. I mean, we'd all like to, but we're not going to. So jokes along those lines will remain current. She'll live on in fiction. How lovely. But by and large, it's secondary to whatever else I'm doing. It's there as a backdrop. It's not there as the main purpose. those fabulous characters, does it feel overwhelming? Is it a genuine pleasure that it is now such a big thing on the screen? It's a genuine pleasure, which is occasionally a little bit overwhelming. But I've always felt that there was a certain degree of separation

between me and the TV show. I mean, I am involved and I have the screen credit as well as being based on the book. I have a consultant's credit. But it's something that other people are doing. You know, it's certainly not something I'd be doing on my own. I do feel that my job is, you know, sitting, working with words on a page and everything else is kind of different. To be honest, I feel a bit overwhelmed when I see my books in bookshops.

kind of different from that. To be honest, I feel a bit overwhelmed when I see my books in bookshops. I mean, all of the public aspect of this job is something that I wasn't quite prepared for when I started writing. And it didn't matter then. It took years and years before I had to face any of it. But it all feels a bit like that's a big machine

and I'm not really in the big machine. I suppose I'm feeding the big machine, but that's all something different. It's all separate from me. I'm not making much sense here. I do feel that I, as a writer, I'm not really part of that. Yeah. The Gary Oldman thing is such a powerful part, isn't it, of the adaptation of Slow Horses?

I mean, his characterisation is just so brilliant. Is he actually filthier and kind of lancardier, I know that's not a word, on the screen than you would ever imagine that he would be in your books? The lancardier-ness of him is certainly more than I was expecting. I think he's done an absolutely extraordinary job of portraying that character on screen. I don't have a visual sense of Lamb particularly. I write to voices in my head and to words on a page rather than trying to convey pictures that I have. I don't really have a pictorial imagination.

So he pretty much had a carte blanche to do, you know, he and his costume is, free to do whatever they wanted. And what they've done is quite terrific, I think. He really does look like Lan Fields. And he's becoming more so all the time. I think he's getting bigger apart from anything else. And I have sat next to him when he's dressed up like that

and that coat stinks to high heaven, I'm telling you. Oh, I'm glad it's authentic, but I'm sorry for you. The hugely good news for all of your fans is that we will be seeing Down Cemetery Road on television. Do you know exactly when that's going to happen? Not exactly when, but it is filming this summer. I've been on set a couple of times. I imagine that the earliest you'd see it would be towards the end of next year,

but that is, your guess is as good as mine. And can you tell us about the casting? I can tell you the headline news, which is Emma Thompson is playing Zoe Bell and Ruth Wilson is playing Sarah Tucker, and I couldn't ask for two more extraordinary talents. That is phenomenal, isn't it? Really phenomenal. Do you ever want to go back in time to the point at which you started writing?

And if you were going to go back in time, would you do anything differently? I'd be, like the character in the Ray Bradbury story, desperate not to step on any butterflies I mean that everything that's happened all the mistakes and missteps have nevertheless left me where I am which is a grand place for a writer to be and I'm very happy to be here

so I wouldn't want to do anything differently I mean I'm not pretending that things didn't you know my decision weren't made one way or another but in the long run it's all worked out quite nicely. So the books, I would want them still all on the CV, even if one or two of them I might approach a little differently now. So some of our podcast has been a bit dark today,

and apologies for that. We will return to Norm. But that's annoying as well, isn't it? That a man who we entertained has then brought us all down with his darkness and horrible stuff and let's show up and go away. I can't think of anything.

I can't top it. She's right congratulations you've staggered somehow to the end of another Off Air with Jane and Fee. Thank you. If you'd like to hear us do this live, and we do do it live every day, Monday to Thursday, two till four, on Times Radio. The jeopardy is off the scale.

And if you listen to this, you'll understand exactly why that's the case. So you can get the radio online on DAB or on the free Times Radio app. Off Air is produced by Eve Salisbury and the executive producer is Rosie Cutler.