Sara & Cariad's Weirdos Book Club - Fight Night by Miriam Toews

Episode Date: February 22, 2024

This week's book guest is Fight Night by Miriam Toews.In this episode Sara and Cariad discuss air travel, mental health, embarrassing parents and farts. Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you!Trigger warning: In this episode we mention suicide. Fight Night by Miriam Toews is available to buy here or on Apple Books here.Tickets for our live shows on the 3 March and 9 April are available to buy here.Sara’s debut novel Weirdo is published by Faber & Faber and is available to buy here.Cariad’s book You Are Not Alone is published by Bloomsbury and is available to buy here.Follow Sara & Cariad’s Weirdos Book Club on Instagram @saraandcariadsweirdosbookclub and Twitter @weirdosbookclub Recorded and edited by Naomi Parnell for Plosive.Artwork by Welcome Studio.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm Sarah Pasco. Hello, I'm Carriad Lloyd. And we're weird about books. We love to read. We read too much. We talk too much. About the too much that we've read. Which is why we've created the Weirdo's Book Club.

Join us. A space for the lonely outsider to feel accepted and appreciated. A place for the person who'd love to be in a real book club, but it doesn't like wine or nibbles. Or being around other people. Is that you? Join us. Check out our Instagram at Sarah and Carriads Weirdos Book Club for the upcoming books we're going to be discussing. You can read along and share your opinions.

Or just skulk around in your raincoat like the weirdo you are. Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you. This week's book guest is Fight Tonight by Miriam Taves. What's it about? Well, it's about a young girl, her falling apart grandma and her pregnant actress mother. What qualifies it for the weirdos book club? Well, everyone in it is delightfully crackers.

In this episode we discuss air travel. Mental health. Embarrassing parents. Giving pregnant women seats. and farts. Trigger warning, in this episode, we mentioned suicide. Welcome, Carriad. Welcome, Sarah.

We've got a book guest and no human guest. No human guests. It's just kicking back. Old school, you just relax. It's just Carriad and Sarah. The OGs. The OGs. So you chose this book and you had previously read this book.

So how did it come to you? What was the origin story if you found in this book? I think, embarrassingly, it was an Instagram thing. Why is it embarrassing? Well, because that's where I get a lot of my book recommendations. Oh, I feel a bit embarrassed. Like I should be getting them from the Times Literary Supplement. Oh, no.

If Instagram knows what the kind of thing you like, that's a positive thing. Yeah, I do follow lots of people who read. Yes. Which is great. Great for them. They're good at reading. Yeah. And it was one of those, it's got a nice bright cover and it was one of those ones that kept popping up.

Did it? Yeah, like for like three months, people kept sharing. Did they? and the film had come out and everyone was going on and on about that. And then I think this was the book there. And that was a novel about something true. Yes.

Yes. So then I went, you know, I was in the book shop and I was like, oh yeah, that lady, oh, that book. And that was literally all I know. Actually, tell a lie,

I got it on a Kindle, I think, when I was ill last year. So it was a Kindle buy and I was like, oh yeah, I knew nothing. I never read any of her stuff before. I just saw lots of people going,

this is good. Yeah. Didn't know anything about it, which is quite how I like to roll. I like sometimes in life, but especially with books where it feels like they find you. They came to you at the right time. Yeah, totally, totally.

And I started it. I didn't like it at first. So we should say it's about SWIF. Because the narrator is a child. Yeah, 12? Well, I'm glad you don't know because she's nine. Because it's unspecified. And then when it gets to her height,

it's like four foot, five inches. At times I thought she was 14 Because her grandmother and mother Talk about such adult things around her Yes I knew that she was younger than 16 But had no idea how young Does she sneakily never tell you how old she is

Is it one of those? Unless I've missed a detail But on the internet it says she's nine Okay Well I mean it's a bit of a cheeky novel thing Isn't it because she doesn't read Obviously she reads much more maturely And interestingly like a nine year old

But it's in the It's in the rhythm of a nine year old There's a tone at the beginning Where yes I balked Yeah, oh yeah, and she's like writing to her dad who's not there who disappeared and she doesn't know why her dad has disappeared. And it reads like that stream of consciousness of a child. Yeah.

And when I started it, I was like, oh, this is really annoying. It's like a nine-year-old constantly talking to you. The writing style, she's made the decision to not put, obviously, speech in quotation marks and also not to put it separate from the text. So it does, it has a really flowing sense that at the beginning might, you know, take a while to sort of judder into. But once you're into it means that it just flows so beautiful. and feels like you're just sitting there in the kitchen or on the aeroplane with them.

Yeah, yeah. And they live in Canada. And so she lives with her grandmother who is, you know, old and falling apart slightly and heavily medicated. She's caring for her grandmother. Yeah, she's caring for her grandmother. She doesn't go to school. She's dropped out of school. Her mum is pregnant and is an actor and is rehearsing for a play.

Yeah. And they live in a rough neighbourhood. There seems like someone's trying to make them move out of their house. There's... Jay Gatsby. There's police. She's definitely a troubled kid, I guess, would be, you know, a cliched way of describing her. Because of the fighting at school? She's been fighting at school. She's kicked out, yeah. And she, you know, her and her grandma watch basketball and murder she wrote and, and call the midwife. I love the call the midwife. Yeah, yeah. And yeah, I, I say, at the beginning, and I was like, oh, this is so annoying. She's such an annoying child. And then to just sluble. And then just sluble. And then just slu. slowly you just drop into her voice and I don't know you thought but I just think it's fucking brilliant I just love this book so much it does so much it does so much so and so just skilled

piece of writing yeah so skilled to be a nine-year-old's voice telling you these things that the grandma is saying and the mom is saying and reveal the thing she reveals about this very very fucked up family and we have one chapter in the grandma's voice where she records her yeah yes where she and it is literally like again stream of consciousness but the slowly slowly slowly revelations of what has happened to her dad or what has happened to her mom and her grandmother and and and other members of the family who have died and how they died and this house is it's full of grief and depression and mental health yeah but it's never done in a kind of mawkish way the thing that I felt really hugely about it and that is a testament to the author is that I felt so much love all the time.

So much love. The love for the grandma, the love for Swifert, the unborn baby. Yeah, they call gourd, because it's as big as a gourd. The love that goes between her and her mother, even though it is a dysfunctional relationship, her mum feels a lot of guilt, she feels like a failure, but she's always apologising. Her anger never feels to be, the mum's anger never feels to be oppressive or... Well, no, it's just, it's incredible, isn't it? And the mum's, and the grandmother's illnesses.

I mean, this, if you had to describe this book, it would sound so depressing, but it's never depressing. Yeah, that's why I think so, that's why I enjoy it so much. And, yeah, this is my second read. And, you know, I didn't intend to, like, read it super closely, because I read it quite recently. And I couldn't help myself. I was like, oh, I'm just going to read it.

It's so good. Like, I'm just going to sit and enjoy this book. It's so brilliant. So the grandma is originally, she sort of speaks German. Yes. But described as being Russian immigrants. So obviously somewhere, somewhere in Europe at some point her family came over. Yes.

And lots of these people from her town came over. There's a huge community of them living in Canada and a huge community of people from the same village living in Fresno in California. In the second half of the book, they go to visit some cousins, Ken and Lou in Fresno. And the grandma is drip feeding this insane history of what had happened to her. she's one of 15 kids, 14 kids. So when she was born, she was left at the hospital so her mom was too tired and sick and couldn't cope. And then they came back for her when she felt strong enough.

When she was like two or something. Yeah, and she slept in a hallway. She was so small and she stopped the house burning down. She was in charge of the coal. Yeah. And Swift always describes it's like, oh, she's talking her secret language. And I couldn't work out if it was if it was German or like she speaks some German in the book Or if it was Yiddish as well, I couldn't work out.

I was like, but there's obviously lots of, you know, yeah, immigrant families living in this area. And grandma goes to visit all these old ladies who are all falling apart. But have this incredible attitude to ageing and... Or humour. Yeah, so much humour. Ending it themselves or laughing on the telephone about someone who's decided to get cremated because he found out how much cheaper it was and stylish because everyone else was doing it. Even though he spent his life telling him they couldn't get cremated.

And a nine-year-old trying to work out, but he'll be dead. Why would he matter about the cost or being in fashion? And as an older lady, the grandma and her friends, that makes a complete sense to them. But the skin flints decided to get cremated because it's cheaper. And they're just constantly talking about death. Like they talk about death all the time. And Swive is, I guess the other thing is you're dealing with as well,

is like, Swive knows a lot of stuff and also doesn't know a lot of stuff. So you have that child perspective. like she understands that the grandma is sick and is dying, but she's also got this terrible anxiety because she's so worried about her mum and her mum had left them before and her dad has just disappeared. So she got no idea where her dad is

and sometimes you forget that in the fun of the novel and then she'll say, well, you'll know this already because you know where you are and you're going, oh, this isn't for me, it's for her dad. Yeah, she's writing these sort of writing as if she's writing a diary to her dad. Yeah. So that's this massive question mark and that is huge sadness, where is the dad?

And the men, there's a lot of suffer, isn't it? Because it's three women, really. And with her, even when I thought I was reading from a sort of 12 or 13 year old's perspective rather than nine, her awareness of the outside world, the mum having a problem with the director who, like, touched her all over, for instance. And then later on in more detail, sort of a director wanting her to do things she didn't want to do, like taking all of her clothes off. She's a child. Yeah.

And she has that awareness. Well, they're super honest with her, aren't they? Like they have, the mum and grandma have an amazing conversation about the mum's asking grandma when she last had sex. Yeah. And Swive is like dying. It's like, you're all so embarrassing. But the grandma, when her daughter, Swith's mother was losing her virginity, sort of gave for like a picnic basket and a congratulations card and packed snacks. It's so funny.

And poor Swive is listening to it and it's just the worst. And also the things they talk about just not filtering in public. Like there's a scene on the bus which I really felt because I've, so recently been heavily pregnant on London Transport where no one will give Swive's mum a seat. Yeah, they literally won't give her a seat. They tell her to fuck off. But she's doing that thing we all wish we had done where she's like making a scene about it.

And she's saying that she's pregnant and one of the men's just like, congratulations. I know and he doesn't move. I thought it was terrible. Yeah. Did people not give you a seat? No. And honestly when I was, when I was nine... Did you ask? Did you say give me that seat? I started demanding it. No. Because I'm too angry. Because I wouldn't have been able to ask in a civilised way. I would get

so furious. I used to tap them on the shoulder and say... They would look up from their phones and look at me and then go, I didn't see you. And they'd be sitting in the special seats. I just, I would not, I couldn't, I'm so officious. No, I admire about you. I honestly think it's the difference between a middle class and working class upbringing. Yeah, definitely, because I feel like, excuse me.

Exactly. And I would do the tap on the shoulder and be like, that's my seat. Whereas I just send bad vibes from my head. Well, I get to sit down. Yeah, I know. That's how class works. Whereas I'm still angry. I'm still angry.

It's just all aimed inwards. See, this is why we have a class problem in this country. Yeah, I find it outrageous not to tap people on the shoulder and just be like, get up. I do it for other people. I tap them and say there's an old lady down there. It's wonderful if people do it for other people. And I have to say once a teenage girl stood up for me, a teenage girl stood up. And she was like an example to all of these adults of.

Yeah, I've had that. Do you know what, the worst I had, another pregnant woman tried to stand up. Well, that's it. She said, you can sit down. I was like, no. And then I said to the man next to me said, you get up. She shouldn't get up. Look her.

How can you not come out my mouth before everybody. I'll tell you something else I've noticed though. So I've had it where if I'm holding Albi in a sling, a pregnant woman will offer me a seat because they're the other person who's empathetic. But I've seen this thing that if Steen, who's, you know, tall, handsome man, he gets up to help a woman, say with a buggy

or to offer a seat, all the other men start performatively acting like gentlemen. It's like, oh, you'll do it for each other because you feel each other's gays. Yeah, but not for me. Oh, I'm like him. I also. So then.

Sirrah, I could be on your arm. Yes, so Steen helped a woman on with a buggy on the Piccadilly line, and then the next stop, another woman, and like five men got up to, like, no, I'll help you. She's looking around like, what is this tube? Everyone ignores me everywhere I go. Anyway, there's a great scene on the bus. There's a really great scene.

Where, yeah, she demands seats. And that really annoyed me that they carried on and they called her crazy. In terms of your children, do you think you'll embarrass them? So, I know I do. My daughter tells me already. Oh, really? Oh, she's already told me. Oh, okay.

We're not told you to this? No. Came to see, went to see her in a show. And, um, I mean, this is, this is for the therapy session. Went to see her and do her little drama show. Wasn't doing anything. Wasn't, it wasn't, being embarrassing. You did you?

You didn't call it a little drama show, did you? Oh, how lovely you're all trying. Is it a workshop? Um, I know, I was very, I just went and sat down. And then after which she came up to me and said, you're so embarrassing. Stop looking at me. She's seven. and I am now torn because I was raised by very embarrassing man, very embarrassing.

He was nude on the stairs doing press-ups. He was nude on the stairs. I didn't see that, by the way, everyone. I have heard tell. But that was inside. But you had friends over and stuff. Yeah, yeah. But like he would say out loud, my dad, my job is to embarrass you.

Oh, yeah. Like he reveled in this. But this is almost like a quote. So how dare my daughter think me sitting quietly is embarrassing? hasn't got a fucking clue. But what you just said that your dad said, my job is to embarrass you, it's literally like a quote in a letter from Swive's mom to her.

Oh, Swive's, she quotes the good enough mother. Oh my God, D.W. Winnicott, yeah. D.W. Winnicot, yes. He's an amazing, amazing guy. So Swive gives editorial meetings. She makes her grandma. Some homework. Yeah, she gives them an assignment.

They need to write a. letter to Gord before the baby is born. And Grandma writes a very beautiful letter and her mum writes a letter of someone, I would say, having a breakdown. Yeah, I was going to ask what you thought about that. I thought it was really sad that letter because it just, it becomes clear how unstable her mum is. And that's when Swive starts really, really worrying that her mum is going to take her own life because she seems so mentally unstable.

Okay. I didn't think she seemed so mentally unstable. I think it's because I'm not, I'm not a child reading that. It felt, look, as someone who, like, you know, does pages. Once you start writing, when your child asks you to write a letter to the unborn baby, you don't give them the stream of consciousness. You go like, oh, you know, Swift just wanted a nice, reassuring letter. You feel the tension of Swive that she's, like you said, she's not only her grandma's carer,

she's her mother's carer as well. So that's why she is in that weird adult child position. If you don't know who Winnicott is, he's like a child psychotherapist or psychotherapist who very famously wrote, created this phrase, the good enough mother, and said, children don't need perfect mothers.

And the quote that she has. They need mothers who are good enough because otherwise you think perfection is what. Yes, I think the quote, and I'm paraphrasing it because I can't find it, but it's about how I'm a failure, but it's good that I'm a failure because the duty of a parent is to fail because otherwise the child has to make this leap

from sort of, you know, pleasant fiction to reality. Yeah, yeah. I don't know what the real world is. So if you fail, they meet the real world. Yeah, and that's what Winnicross says, which is so great. It's like if you're a perfect mother, they'll go out into the world

and they'll be so confused that other people aren't perfect. Yeah. Which is what... And struggle with their own emotions when they are imperfect. Exactly. Here you go. This is her mum's letter. It is important to fail at mothering or else your child will not pass from allusion to reality.

The mother teaches the child to handle frustration by being one. By being one, yeah. Then she drew a smiley face. and a heart and the words ha ha and she added a PS that said that's dW winnacott's concept of the good enough mother she wrote love mom yeah i ran downstairs to show the letter to grandma she's gonna kill herself i said and um i know we laugh because it's because swift lives in this like everything's so heightened and everything's so stressful yeah and she's got so much anxiety understandably living in this crazy crazy house one of the things that she says to her mom

which is like leave the drama on the stage. And her grandma sort of adds in, why don't you just realise your normal? Like, would it kill you to realise you're normal for once? And I guess that's a really good example of how this book deals with everything so humorously. Yeah, it reminded me, maybe that's why we like it as well because the way they speak to each other is quite Essex-y

in like it's constant humour to diffuse tension. So there is that constant, like, if anyone gets, any kind of like emotional or sincereness someone is making a joke really quickly and laughing at them and being like oh calm down to where like like I also think it's love as lubricant or like bounce yes yeah yeah because we have such a strong relationship between the grandmother and the mother even though that isn't what swive is concentrating on there's a moment where the mother talks about how she wishes she could be back inside her mom yeah and I thought god you must really love your mom as an adult to still think that not have this like bafflement or like oh my

God. You can tell they've been through a lot and then what I love, said the first half of the book is All Swive, it's all this child's perspective. And then they get on a plane to Fresno, which is crazy. Grandma is not well enough to get up this plane. Absolutely crazy.

And she has her nine-year-old care, a sort of in charge of suitcases. In charge of suitcases. It's got nitro spray that if she displays it three times, it doesn't work, they have to go to hospital. They regularly sprayed it three times. And then we get this, yeah,

this monologue from the grandma where she has such good writing because she reveals so much why the mum is like this, where the dad is, he's basically run off because of mental health and alcoholism, and why they are trying to survive the things that have happened to them and how much they love Swive. And Swive is such a beautiful chapter. And then at the end,

Swive says something like, I started to breathe. Because it's like once she knows actually what's going on, rather than having things like sex disgust in front of her, but no one is saying to it, your dad was an alcoholic and he could not handle and he just left. So I feel like that moment, it happens proper midpoint in the book

where you're like, oh, Swive now gets really quite what's going on. And then they go to see the cousins in Fresno who are actually quite old. And there's this sort of beautiful moment where Lou, this cousin who is an old hippie, Swift discovers. And the grandma looked after him when she was 13 years old. And they have this bond and they're just, you know,

this big grey-haired hippie man who's clearly having a breakdown as well. It's just got his head on his grandma's shoulder and just crying and she's just holding him, but everyone's still laughing and enjoying. And you sort of start realizing, yeah, how much shit has happened to this family, but how much they, like you said, there's so much love. Like they love each other. It's so... There isn't...

Sometimes people who are trying to cope or trying to process trauma could be so spiteful. Yeah, yeah. Push away people who care about them. They don't think they're, you know, worthy. I've loved all of those kind of things. And, yeah, the mum is battling, but she's battling to have a good life and be good enough for her daughter. And I even loved actually with the mum, even the way she talks about smoking. I know, I know.

So she has these sort of marlies, like a packet sort of waiting for when she's not pregnant anymore, she can have a cigarette. Like when Gordon is not ruining her life. When she moaned about being constipated and how she could just have a fag on a black coffee and it was sort of self-up, she can't because she's pregnant. And I just thought that's such a good example of. She's doing the right thing. She's struggling with it.

Yeah. Because it isn't easy. Yeah, it's not. It's hard. And it's not the life that she thought she was going to have. And there's clearly all this like mental health stuff going on genetically in the family. She has this on-coming relationship with a stage manager that we hear about. That's so funny that stage manager.

So she makes a comment, stage manager. And I thought this was so funny to read about it in a book as well. Yeah, yeah. Because, you know, it's a very off-stage character in the book. a stage manager from rehearsals that her mum goes to so she doesn't have time to read and her mum says but you watch Netflix for three hours a night and then the stage manager is really funny with her

and doesn't give her a cues to go on so then she texts her a card she doesn't text back so she's crying yeah so she writes her a card and you do start saying this woman is a bit intense but actresses are they are I know I think it's believable character but you do sort of saying oh god like you just want the mum

to just like leave it and then she's like is ringing her and trying to like make it better. And I just think the three characters with the mum and the grandma are just so believable, so well-rounded. Like I completely loved hanging out with them.

I completely, yeah, felt in this family. And it reminds me slightly of Catherine Hiney, all of her books, really, because it's one of those books where it's quite hard to say what it's about. Like, not much happens, not a great deal.

You know, it's not like, you go to the school and you find out she's what's happening. Or like, it's just a kid. and her grandma hanging out and then they go to Fresno. I kept comparing it to, and it's very different in tone, but a book that we both love, My Phantoms by Gwendoly and Riley. Oh yeah, yeah.

Which is a much more pathos, yeah, much more pathos-filled or bleaker version of this, which is still so well observed. Like when a parent talks, I go, yeah, that's a parent, or it's definitely that kind of parent. That's very English, isn't it? Yeah. And it has much more like English, like, sharpness to it, whereas this has definitely a much more like...

But it doesn't have the love... the love as the sort of the balloon. Yeah, protecting everybody. Yeah. And then, I mean, it's... It has the opposite. It has people who can't give their love to each other. And stuff happens at the end, which, like, we won't say, because I think it's enjoyable to read it. I was really worried the whole time that's what was going to happen.

Yeah. Sarah's revealed it. I haven't revealed anything. But I mean, like, something that does have them. I guess that's what it is. I kept worrying something bad's going to happen. Yeah. Yeah.

And actually, yeah, it's not, that's the thing. It's not that kind of book. It's one of those books that's just, I love those books where you just like hang out with some with the group of people for like a little moment of their life and you just, you know what I mean? You just feel like you're just peeking in for like 15 minutes

being like, oh, this is how they all interact, this is what all happens. And then you kind of leave them. And she's, I think you have to be a really good writer to do that because it's not like, oh, it's an epic adventure and then they do this and they do this. It's like, they're just living. But it's living, but it's surviving and it's thriving.

Surviving and thriving. Because this is why I like also like weirdos in books. Yes, she's definitely a weirdo. But they all are. And I had a non-traditional family. I had all women and that adults didn't filter in front of children. Yeah, yeah. So seeing people coping with it, celebrating it, the humor in it, all of those lovely things,

it is really nice as a balance to bleaker things. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, I think that's why I bought it for you for your birthday even before the podcast. Sounds like Sarah were like this book. Yeah. Because it is so, like you said, it's so full of love. And it's a very uplifting, weirdly uplifting book for what they're going through.

The grandma is an amazing character. Like you love, I loved her. I just loved her. And you can see, she's trying, like you said, she's trying so hard in a life that is such a hard life. And having so much fun. So much fun. Even though she's in chronic pain. She's in the worst pain that you can have.

The bit when they're on the plane and Swive actually falls asleep after this chat. I didn't know she was faking it or not. No, I think that's when she says, like, I can relax. I can relax. But when she wakes up and they have to get off the plane and they have to catch another flight, and she's like, Grandma has spoken to the whole plane. So everyone is helping and shopping emails.

And they're saying, like, have fun with Ken and Lou. And she was like, someone must have told Grandma that her whole family would die and she makes friends with every fucking person she meets. And I was just like, love that frustration of being in a family with someone who's over-friendly. When you're the one who is uptight and anxious. and you're like, I have to fucking get somewhere.

And then they weird put in the wheelchair, she wheels down the ramp into her body shop. It's like knocks over all the soaps and stuff. And again, because Swift's so young, she thinks they're going to get arrested for doing that. And grandma's like laughing her head off so badly that she can't breathe and she just have her nitro spray. And it's like there's actually a lot of like farcical moments in it

that are just so funny. But also, yeah, at the same time, you are dealing with this like, yeah, a person really, who's really, really old and really, really ill. I really glad you enjoyed it. I really enjoyed it. Did your dad, so did your dad make friends with people publicly?

Just, yeah. My grandpa was more embarrassing than him. So he, and my grandpa also said my job is to be embarrassing. So my dad had inherited this idea. So again, my dad's view was like, but it's not, what you're going through is not as bad as what I went through. And that's what I'm now doing to be my daughter, being like, well, it's not as bad.

Yeah, no, it's more just Yeah, because I think what I like about her She's like a friendly old lady, isn't she? She's charming, and she's talking about basketball And she's asking him stories. My dad would more just talk to people, not necessarily. My dad used to wink. My dad would wink.

So if we were on a bus, for instance, say we were going swimming, he was taking a swimming, he would wink at other children and he didn't understand. Oh, God. And once, this is the most embarrassing thing he did, months we went to stay in his flats. He lived near Waterloo, and some children were being horrible to me and Cheryl.

We went out to play and it was very rough. It wasn't our, it wasn't our manner. Yeah, it wasn't your ends. So these kids were like, you know, fuck off back to Romford. And my dad came out and my dad's not an aggressive person. So what he did was pretended he wanted to kiss all these girls. So because they'd made fun of my jacket I was wearing. So he was like, but your jacket is so gorgeous.

Give me a kiss. Oh, no. I'm so embarrassed already. And afterwards my dad said to me, if you don't want to be aggressive, then you have to be funny. So he was trying to say to me, you'd be funny, deflect it, and there's all these kids run away. But I was like, Dad, they'll think you're a pedo. You haven't solved this problem. Now they think I've got a bad jacket and a pedo, dad.

But also, we are understanding why you do comedy. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you? Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, and what's supposed to like, my friends thought my dad was funny. I don't know this. And I feel bad for him. him because me and my brother thought he was so embarrassing

I think that is just and the same within the book it's with other people's parents we don't have they're not our parents so we're able to sort of just take them accept them as they are and think what wonderful qualities they have like he'd like do stuff and they'd be like hey your dad's so funny and I'd be like just just what the like

no stop stop just very loud very very loud yeah I think I can deal with chatty it was just being so loud and unaware of other people and far very loudly in public places. Oh wow. Very loudly. Okay. We all fart. Yeah. No big deal. So, listen, tell me. So we recommend this. Five weirdos out of five. Have we started doing that, have we?

I think we recommend everything we're reading. I think we recommend reading in general. We do recommend reading in general. I just don't think of all the books to be upset. We've just gone out of all the books so far. We recommend this one. It made me want to read her other stuff as well. Bestselling author of Summer of My Amazing Luck, a boy of good breeding. a complicated kindness, the Flying Troutmans, Irma Voth, all my puny sorrows,

Fight Night and Women Talking, and one work of nonfiction and swing low, a life. But yeah, I think she's an writer that I'm very glad I've come across because I just, she's brilliant. Yeah, and I'm worried that we've featured too many books by Faber,

and it's going to look like I'm biased towards my publishers. Oh. Because when I noticed it's another Faber, I was like, I think we've found 70% Faber books. Have we? I think so. I think that's a sign that they're a great publisher.

suck up just good books yes and we didn't do that on purpose no I chose that one not even you yeah

although Faber made me they knocked on my house they give you a five pound book voucher every time we do it oh I'd definitely do it for a five pound book voucher I did get some swag I did get some swag

did you they sent me a big Swiss mug and a jumper because we talked about big Swiss on the podcast I didn't get a big Swiss jumper I know I know you can ask

and then maybe you'll get it oh do you hear that listeners she didn't say she'd give me her jumper no you can ask I've worn it in bed you don't want my jump. I don't want your jumper. Well, that's it nice of them. It's really nice. It's a very cool jumper and mug, actually.

Oh, all right. I'm going to ask for you to have them. No, I don't want, I don't want to get them because my friend asked. Why aren't they sending them to both of us? Because I did ask them. Oh, I was in a meeting and I'd seen them on Instagram. And I was like, what do you have to do to get that mug and jumper? And they were like, oh, we're sending them out to influencers who are mentioning the book. And I mean, I've done a podcast on it. Oh, good work. Okay. Yeah. All right. I just need to become an influencer. A book fluencer. Book fluencer. Would you want to be a book fluencer? No, it seems like quite a lot of, you have to do a lot of content.

I then just don't trust him as well. Yeah, if you're doing it because someone sent you a book and a jumper, for instance. I think, well, you're open to bribery. Well, Sarah Pascoe, you just outed yourself. Actually, no, I've seen it from the other side. When my book come out,

they sent them to lots of influencers and what influences do, if they take a picture of it and go, just been sent this book. Yeah. And that doesn't make me one. But that's what happens to me. That's what happens for me.

People just said, oh, I've seen this book and this is how it works you see the image of a book you keep seeing it and the next time you're in the shop you're like oh yeah fight night

I've seen that but you can't remember where you're just like oh yeah so you're saying it does work I totally why I buy books so I get the opposite I go like don't try and influence me

I'll never read it and yet it has worked no but I never saw this oh how weird never ever saw it oh okay well they know how to get to you it's through me

oh there are so many beautiful lines actually. I know, we haven't read out enough funny bits. I tell you what, let's just talk about this bit at the end because it's about applause and applause is how things end you know, it shows there. Did you find this meaningful to you as a performer? So the mother is an actress.

Oh yeah. She hates applause. Oh yeah, that was really funny. And so mum said applause seems sarcastic and bizarre. She hates applause even for herself and grandma asked her how the audience is supposed to express their gratitude for her performance and mum said just by sitting there quietly. I just loved it. Talk about how incredible the writing is.

In the pandemic, I missed applause so much. I made my husband applaud me when I used to come into the room. Yeah. I said come into the room and bow. So it's a simpler thing for you. And he'd applause just so I was like, thank you. I just needed to hear it. Yeah. I missed it. I don't want the audience to be in silence. I want the applause. When she hears clapping, mum gets really sad. I think there's so many performers who would understand that. Understand that. And what we're being told about a character. Yeah.

Oh, it's brilliant. It's very complex. Grandma said that's because it means the show is over. Mum talked about her hatred of applause in therapy. But when the therapist tried to understand what she meant, mum said, ah, yeah, you know what? Fuck it. Just fuck it.

It's so good. It's so good. I can't recommend it enough. I just love this book. It's such a delight of a book. And it's one of those, not that this matters, but it's an easy read. It won't take you forever. It's not going to hurt your wrists.

It does matter because there are a time. times when that's what you want is a book when you pick it up. Just a delightful read. Just going to jump in. You'll do it in probably a week, two weeks, and you can pop it in your bag, it won't annoy you.

Popping in your bag. Because it's nice size. It's not going to be like lugging it round. You're very sizest with literature. Yes, because sometimes then you get grumpy at your bag. You're like, oh, that bloody book. And it's like ruins the enjoyment of the book. She's like, oh, it's so heavy.

I saw on the day that Richard Osman's book came out, the most recent Thursday Murder Club, about 150 people raiding a massive hardback on the train to touch. Well, that's like Harry Potter though.

He's in a different world. Exactly. So I think sometimes people love the big chunky. Yeah, occasionally. But like if it's like this, you're just, yeah, pop it in your bag.

Don't think about it. So nice. Some people don't have carry bags. We don't have the time. We don't have the time for that kind of shocking revelation. Right. Any last sign to end on?

That was it. Oh, that's just checking. I thought you were going to get in. Because you end things with applause. So that's why it was on theme. Right, let's do it, ready? Will we clapping?

Yeah. But she would hate that. I hope you don't feel sad. Don't feel sad. We're saying, well done, Miriam. Thank you for listening to the Weirdo's Book Club. Next week's book guest is Julia by Sandra Newman. Sarah's novel Weirdo and my book,

You're Not Alone, are both available to buy in book shops now. Also, I've got a live Weirdo event at the South Bank Centre on May the 9th if you'd like to come. Oh, book your ticket. What you're doing? Go, go. Book your ticket now. Don't wait. Thanks, Grandma.

My wife. Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you.