Sara & Cariad's Weirdos Book Club - Slags by Emma Jane Unsworth with Emma Jane Unsworth

Episode Date: June 5, 2025

This week's book guest is Slags by Emma Jane Unsworth.Sara and Cariad are joined by the BAFTA-nominated and BIFA-winning screenwriter and bestselling, award-winning novelist Emma Jane Unsworth. In this episode they discuss teachers, diaries, nostalgia, otters and scaring Mark Owen.Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you!Slags by Emma Jane Unsworth is available to buy here.You can find her on Instagram @emjaneunsworthTickets for Sara's tour show I Am A Strange Gloop are available to buy from sarapascoe.co.ukCariad’s children's book Where Did She Go? is available to buy now.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.

Sarah Pasco. And I'm Carriead 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 created the Weirdo's Book Club. A space for the lonely outsider to feel accepted and appreciated. Each week we're joined by amazing comedian guests and writer guests to discuss some wonderfully and crucially weird books, writing, reading and just generally being a weirdo. You don't even need to have read the books to join in. It will be a really interesting, wide-ranging conversation and maybe you'll want to read the book afterwards. We will share all the upcoming. books we're going to be discussing on our Instagram, Sarah and Carriads, Weirdo's Book Club. Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you. This week's book guest is Slags by Emma Jane Unsworth. What's it about? Two sisters with a murky history go on a motorhome holiday. What qualifies it for the Weirdos Book Club? Well, what could be weirder than a teenage obsession. So in this episode we discuss teachers, diaries, nostalgia, otters and scaring Mark Owen. And joining us this week is Emma Jane Unsworth, an award-winning writer. Her first book, Animals, was made into a major film. She's

also written the Sunday Times best-selling adults, and she has her non-fiction book after the storm about postpartum depression. Her new novel, Slags, is out now. Welcome to the podcast, Emma Jane Unsworth. Welcome. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for having me. You're our first return guest. Oh, yeah. You did a live episode with us. I did. So you've got a new book. It's called Slags. It's just out. So, To give a loose pressie. Yes, loose plot. It's got two sisters in the modern day.

They've decided to go on holiday. Sarah and Juliet. Sarah has hired a camper van. A camper van. We're not campers. You're going to discover that as we church. I believe it's a camper van. Don't worry.

I am here for all your camping. Well, I guess she must be really experienced because you knew so much about the toilets and grey water. And they drive, they're in Manchester. They drive up from Manchester to Scotland. And you give some exquisite detail. of Scottish camping signs. I was like, oh, Emma Jay's and shout out for the 10B services,

the best services in the world. It really is. I like to think of it, not just as a novel, but as a bit of a guide to motorhoming, you know, in Scotland. It was giving good guys. Everyone wants to do that walk across Britain.

Now with slags, everyone's got to want to go to toilet in a car. Cartridge toilet, though, in a motorhome is quite something. The smell after a few days, yeah, yeah, really. I've never done any motor. Have you done any motor? No, no, no, no, of course not.

I barely get in cars. I've been in one. Like at latitude, yeah. I went in one. Right, okay. But I have never, like, done a holiday one. Everyone else is watching bands. Carrie, I was like, do you mind if I just poke my head in here?

I've tried to experience new things at latitude. Because Marcus, Briggsock, oh, yeah. owns one, and that's how they get to Latitude. And I know his wife, Rachel Paris. And so I went there for a cup of tea to the motorhome. And they're, like, drive off. That's the way to do it.

Like the Winni Bego's at Glastow backstage. That's the way to do it. Because it's a solid roof. You've got a shell. You've got everything really pop a table. I've been inside. I've never had one there, but I've been inside them. Are you been saying?

But you've been motorhoming. Like you've done this trip. Yeah, yeah. But just to bring it back to stories, we've talked about toilets too much now. So we also have flashback scenes between Juliet and Sarah and what's going on when Sarah is still at school approaching her exams. Yeah.

So she's 15, I think. So every chapter kind of alternates between, they said, present day, slightly present day, contemporary with Sarah as a 15-year-old, taking her gCC's sort of imploding. Having all of the feelings in the entire world, which unfortunately, 15-year-old girls, I want to do. So obsessive.

So obsessive. So powerful. That obsession, I think, when you're a teenager, because I really wanted to write about that and about female fantasy and where it starts. I think it starts in your teenage years. Quite often it did for me. And just being able to flex that amazing muscle in your head

that can take you to places that kind of like heal a bad experience in the day. or just give you something exciting to do when life's being boring otherwise. And I wanted to start going, you know, explore how I started going into that. But at the same time show that she's really vulnerable because of that paradox of being a teenager, I think, where you are really powerful and really vulnerable at the same time. And having no idea of feeling so robust, you know, being such a lightweight, saying yes to everything. Yeah.

Because the world is so exciting all of a sudden. And you're almost being treated like what you think is an adult, a grown-up. and then all the time actually, oh, just everywhere, I just had so much fear for her. I mean, because she's quite wild as well. She's making big bold choices. She's not a teenager that's like, no, I'm just going to stay at home and watch Reddorf. I don't know who that is. So that's it.

So the friends that I had at the time, I just had a couple of friends who I definitely did things that were very dangerous. Like I had a friend, I'm not going to name. I should always insist we spent all our money in Hollywoods. What's Hollywood? Tell us what Hollywood is. Yeah, that's actual Hollywood. You have the search for teenagers. It's a nightclub in Rompford where they just didn't care about age.

As long as you had your, you kept your mouth shut to cover your braces. They knew that the 17-year-old men were there for 14 and 15-year-old girls, so they let everyone in. But she would always, we would always spend all of our money so that we could hitchhike. I mean, that was part of it. They were forced to hitchhike up because that was another way to meet guys. Oh, my God. I feel sick.

And I feel sick about that every day. So you spend as much, that's a deal. Probably only had like three pounds anyway. I know. But it was a pound a drink. See, I had a fake ID. Did you? And getting the fake ID.

So I would have thought you were like in the wire. Who did you a fake ID? Well, it was quite a process getting one. I think you had to go. There was like a place in Manchester that everyone knew you could get them and you had to go. You had to pay it at money and get it done. It's all very kind of like, yeah, secret undercover, exciting. I think teenagers are much more sensible these days actually, though.

I think it was all about getting a drink. Yeah. That's what it was when I was a teenager. and that was so problematic and I put a lot of that in the book but I think these days teenagers seem much more sensible they just want to have a coffee don't they? And chat a lot of the time

and go on the internet If I see them in clumps of more than two I do get terrified. I'm still terrified of a teenager. There's so much nostalgia in your book for this period. The 90s. Should we call it the 90s?

And we should say so Sarah our main character. Not me, the main character of this podcast. Sarah with me. My character of the book. Well, there's an interesting we should talk about because Sarah, with an H in the book, Slags, is her friend is very obsessed with a band

who got called four princes, but I felt that Sarah without an age would relate to the boy band obsession. I didn't think they were based on Take That, though. No, no, but a boy band obsession. No. No one, because there's five princes and take that, and there was all be in my heart. Hang on, though, were you to take that fan?

Yes. Obsessed, she was obsessed. Do you not know this? Well, actually, there's something, so I was, I was. It was a really huge part of my life. Who did you like? Because if you say them, all of them. Okay, because if it was Mark and I'd have to leave now,

because I still have that rivalry with him. Well, so you wanted Mark Holmes, the safest one. I mean, he was so funny, and he was just seen like such a lovely person, and I still believe he is a lovely person. I see a nice guy. And he had his lovely Peta-Guana. You've met him. Okay, you dropped it in Sotovoche there.

You've met him? Many times. How did you cope? Many times? And his mum and his brother. What? Did you sit outside their house? Yes, I had a piece of his wall, and this tells you how old I was.

This is you. This is you. In my purse. You know, my dad's in a band. My mum's 14 set outside his house. So me and my sister's thought that's how you met your husband. So did I, but I got it wrong, but your woman was right. She's one of the few.

You wonder you'll leave your actual husband. Well, do you know what? Did actually marry a ginger woman called Emma. So do you know what? The universe, you almost got it right. You got right into his brain. So you were hanging out. Life is long.

You were hanging outside his house? Because she was hanging outside the big breakfast. I was. I used to get the bus to Oldham where he lived. I mean, this is dreadful. You know, kind of like modern-day store. And it was only a small house, but you could see it on the videos. I don't know, guys, but thanks for telling me

how where Marco and lived as a teenage boy. Because on the videos, they would film stuff in their houses. So you saw Mark Owen in his childhood single-bed bedroom with his iguana. And also, it was... This is gone deep. Also, he couldn't go online. Yes, which we all got a kind of... That's a tattoo of.

The smashes would just give you... Yes, exactly. We'll put it on. We all put it on. Also, you said you liked all of them. At different times. But there is one that's... No.

There was one for every mood, though. There was a total. There was a little. And also, I kept thinking I was being realistic. So I kept downgrading until I was Jason and Howard. And it's ridiculous now because I look at them, think these guys were incredibly beautiful. What was happening in your Gary phase? My Gary phase.

That's what I thought we'd be dweeps together. He would play piano and I'd read some. This is the thing, though. It's not just like you fancy. When you fancy someone in a boy band, you don't just, and you're a teenage girl, you don't just think like, oh, I quite fancy them. You think you are in a relationship with them. And you think you're going to marry them. You think this is a thing?

It's such a real thing. I didn't have this, but I know that you did. And obviously, this is a very common teenage girl thing. But like, so you were sitting outside his house, as Sarah does in a book, thinking if he comes out, he'll see me and he'll marry. Yeah, yeah. And that would just all make sense to me. So what my mum did, just so you know, is my dad left his band. They broke up.

She waited until she was the only person still sitting outside of his house. That's how you get them. Wow. That's kind of Nessa, the character of Nessa in the book, isn't it? She's sitting outside so much, she goes there when he's not even there. But also, as teenage girls, we didn't have any empathy for how weird it might be for them. No, totally. And you're right, because when at that age, you are not, you're not thinking about them at all.

Do you know what, you have no concept of what they might think. No, because they're famous. You're actually just having this mad fantasy with a version of yourself. You're projecting onto this person who's famous. I think it's a couple of things. I think it's partly that you're so desperate for power, and you're so. desperate, as in you're so desperate. Yes, agency, to be powerful just to kind of like be in control of some things in the world

when you're a teenager. You kind of pick the most powerful person around, I suppose, and that's often a man in a position of authority, whether that's a boy band or a teacher. And because no boys at your age are giving you anything. They're not giving you like, hey, I think you're funny. And your family definitely don't treat you like that. And that's what you're trying to separate yourself from. Jess Foster Kew has got some really, really funny stand-up about going to her first concert,

which is the band Blue. and she really liked Duncan so she trims her pubs for the first time and it's so perfect about the psychology in a massive stadium the ego

you know the main character energy you do think they're going to see you from a stage and it's you no one else has ever told you you're pretty but me my first concert was

East 17 yeah so it was mine actually as well when I was 14 yeah because my same concert in Wemble no it was at the Ulford Island before they were famous

and my friend's sister was obsessed and as happens in your book that she was so hyper, they got her up on stage. And that was, again, a big moment for me because she was obsessed with Brian Harvey. They chose her, he sang like, whatever their love song was, too, House of Love.

No, whatever slow one. Maybe it was steam. Which is about poor Tony's dead brother. And she couldn't speak or do anything. And I remember sitting there thinking, this is wasted because she met the hero and she just was like, she couldn't speak, move, do anything.

She was frozen. In her defense, they don't use deodorant. So she might have been like, wow, this is a bit too real for me. No, she was so overwhelmed. But I remember thinking then, it's a 14 year old like, oh man, even if you meet them, like, you can't even, you don't, you don't go, hey. In a way, you don't want the reality, do you? It's all about the fantasy.

And it shouldn't cross over. The reality should never cross over. It's terrifying. It was bad that it crossed. I saw it from, I was in the fucking Remley Arena watching going, oh, she's not happy. But that's why the problem, really, really problematic thing with any famous, men is the sort of the parties afterwards, the comeback stage, the green room, which obviously you do talk about in your book as well, because the men think that all the women are there

because they love them so much, that their consent has already been given. And they don't understand that it's power dynamic, it's expectation, it's that, oh, this is exciting, it will never happen to me again. It's experimental as well, isn't it? You're not really, you're not really thinking it's going, you're not thinking I will have sex with Duncan. So my fantasy, we take that, so I two, or not that fantasies, but it's just that visualization One was their limo broke down on my road in Rompford,

and I had to make them more beans on toast. And because it was the first time I had real food, and someone was like down to earth with them. And they were like, and it was just friendship. It was just all being best friends. And we've just all getting the bath. The bath one, we've talked about the bath one. But the other one, I did, I kept testing myself.

Absolutely fine, guys. In my two-bedroom terrace house in Romford. But then the other one, I would test myself. I have a bit in my book, Animal. Dolly Auditor is obsessed with because it encapsulation. how you feel then where I kept testing myself, what would I let them do to me? And it was nothing about my own pleasure.

And I was like, I would let take that shit on me. If that was what they wanted, I will be carpet for them. Carpet, is that what they normally do? No, no, but just like, I'm a bath mat. I'm nothing. But why do we feel like this is teenage girls? Because that's devotion. Some people have that for like, you know, Christ.

Or Manchester United. Yeah, I reckon my husband would let most out. said, yeah, I reckon my husband would let Mo Salah pull on him. I don't even know who that is. Liverpool. Okay. But when did you, I need to go back, when did you meet Mark Ome? Was it outside the house?

It was. And it's that thing of like reality should never crash into these fancies because he was horrified. He actually wasn't, he wasn't even horror. It was terror in his eyes. And it really did make me think, even back then when I was wild with obsession, I did actually think, oh, maybe there's a line being crossed here. Because we were so, there were loads of us, loads of teenage girls outside his house,

all was waiting, waiting, waiting. And then he did, I think his brother, his brother turned up and told us where he was. His brother kind of dopped him in. He said, oh, he's just ran at the cricket clubs around the corner. So we all kind of like, brother. Someone was jealous.

Gaggle. Went around there. And then we got there. And he came walking towards us and he had a, Heinz baked beans. Beanie hat on. I'll never forget.

Hyde baked beans? Hang on a minute. He wouldn't like my beans on toasting. God, that would have been powerful. Psychic connection. You knew. He must have said it in a smash-its interview. He must have connected.

I was projecting. I was just projecting that they had lost touch with their normal lives. Anyway, so he comes towards you. And we were all just like, we're so excited to meet. Come up, me, you know. And he just looked at us and he said, how did you find me? How did you find me? And the way you said it just made me think, oh, this man is really frightened.

just really hates the fact that we found him. Also. But then we were, and then that passed, that moment passed. And I was just like, can you sign this and can I have a picture with you on a disposable camera? Because that's what we had back then. And it just instantly kind of back to what it was all about, which was me at that point. Also, I wonder, if girls are traveling across the country, you must feel this personal

responsibility as in, that's so dangerous. How are they getting home? Where are they staying? What else are they going to do? But you can't get involved. It was the 90s though. No one really cared about. Yeah.

Where did your mum think you were when you were standing outside Mark Corkarines's house? I think. I told her I was out with friends, which is true. I never went on my own, I always went with a couple of friends. Right. And so... And you lived in Manchester, right? I did.

It was just like it was something to do as well on at the weekends. Visit Mark Owens. Let's go to visit Mark Owens. It's like, yeah. That was, you know, set and fire to paper bags and car parks, which is the other thing we used to do for fun. You know, and that was thrilling back there. It was.

But it's probably better for mental health than Instagram maybe. I know. Well, this is it. I guess the thing about take that were... Because I liked new kids on the block. And then when take that came along, I was like, well, this is a copy of fake. I won't accept it. But I think for some girls, it became like you said, they were so accessible.

That's it. The fact that you lived in Manchester, a man who's on top of the pops is on a bus ride from you. Yeah, exactly. That's like, that's too tempting, isn't it? Will you like that about the Northern Line? I fell in love on another line. So they were, Northern Line were boy band, made up of models. And yes, someone I knew.

Someone I knew who was a model from just 17. and a girl in my year had snogged him at the like close show live. Or Just 17 used to have like a slap and tickle event which those bands performed her. So Northern Line, there was a big thing for us. Yeah, when that came out and then they only had the song. I fell in love on another night. In Rompford it was the Bourne Slippy, had a lyric in it going,

going back to Rompford and we thought we were famous. All of us individually. You've got to grab what you can. Oh yeah. You've got to grab what you can as a teenager. I wanted to ask you about the nostalgia actually because there were so many things that I fucking just love like Ginny record just like just little things

Oh the jokes when they were teasing Sarah and they said ding-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-jinn-dha. And I was like, that is so specific that only a few of us of a certain age know that is what happened to Redheads at that time. It's so true.

And then the cranberry song as well, did you have to be a ginga? Did you have to? Did you have to? When you said that, I was like, gosh, that very specific teenage boy humor of a time that like they're just taking very specific niche references. Fisie flaps. No one's ever called me it since 1997. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. So I wanted to ask about the nostalgia. When you were writing, was it all, have you already

been living in that world? Have you still got like imprints from the 90s or as you started writing, did it start coming out? Or did you start thinking what else did we do? What would have been in the shops? What would have been the snacks? So I did a bit of a mixture. So I found the thing that initially triggered all that character, the teenage character, was I found an old teenage diary at my mum and dad's house. Oh, oh. I know.

But I was, and at first I was like, oh, so cringe. But then I was just so surprised with how confident I sounded at like 14, 15. I was like, what? And I think it's because I was in my mid-30s, that time, very much for me. I'm sure it's true for a lot of women. I was just in absolute flux. Didn't know what the hell I was doing with my life was. doubting everything was so kind of unconfident in so many ways. And then I was listening to myself

kind of when I thought I would, you know, I should have been a lot more frail and fragile and wondering what was doing. I was actually sounded like I was a boss. And I was like, wow, okay, this is really interesting because I knew, I knew, you know, the reality of what she was about to go through this person. And I just thought, okay, this is the beginning of a story, maybe that difference between what I'm feeling now and who, and who this, this girl was who's kind of shouting at me in this God be confident way about how she knows about love and I can't tell her anything about anything. And she's just so sure about so many things.

And it was, yeah, she was really terrifying. So I want to sort of capture her. And some of the language, I really sort of used her as a bit of a channel for those teenage sections and tried to get into that voice and use that as a kind of jumping off point for it. And some of it is verbatim what I just lifted

from my diaries to just stick right in there because it just felt so right. Vertigo of like, oh, I'm back. And that like, oh, my God. And that like, That, like, intensity of teenage girldom, I was like, oh, fuck, this is real. The mistake that some writers make when they imagine a teenage girl is that they think it's a child, rather than an adult who doesn't quite have the tools for adulthood yet.

And so you're writing adult, yeah, you haven't had anything knocked off them. So, of course you're confident you haven't had your heartbroken yet. No one's rejected you from a job. Like, you've actually got no responsibilities. Nothing has actually properly hit you around the face in a way, even though boys not liking you. you're saying it's devastating, you're not being popular, it's devastating. But like proper life shit where you go, I can't actually, I don't know if I can. It's also just not questioning if you're whiter or not, not having any doubt.

It's a really pure time, isn't it in that way? And you fixate on one thing and it becomes your everything. And I think that allows you to not worry too much about too many things, but also it leaves you really vulnerable to that if that thing doesn't happen, which doesn't for her, then it's like, then your whole world shattered. Whereas the thing as we get older, we're like, well, that thing didn't have. But it's okay. I've still got these other 50 things to worry about every day. So it's like it's okay. Yeah. It's a pretty interesting you say that about fixation because with adolescents, they study male adolescents and they, you know, across all species it's a time for risk taking. You know, all animals sort of like travel further away. They have to get separate from their family. They're much more likely to do things. And in human beings, you know, of course, much more likely to sort of like joy ride or that kind of thing with boys. And they have all this evolutionary explanations for why. But it's so interesting that with there might be a.

female thing with fixation. It's like that's how you get what you want. Yeah. Get a partner. Like a partner. Yeah. It's mating. Yeah. It's like, yeah. I have to have Mark Cohen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I need to have his babies. And in the past, you'd have in a village where it just was you and Mark yeah. Exactly. A tribe would have been fine. Yeah. Yeah. And it was partly, like I said before, I think it's two things that make teenage girls obsessed with boy bands to that level. I think it's partly that seeking agency and seeking to have control. But I think it's also the way that the boy bands are really sold to us and they really sold very specifically to us. They're marketing and branded really carefully. So I'm just saying the thing about like having his baby. It's like, do you remember the

babe video? Of course you do. It was like literally they have like it's about him coming home after being away and there's a little baby there. And that was every girl's fancy about that in this book. It was like, I suddenly thought to myself, oh, is that take that video? And I was like, God, I have blanked that there's a child in that video. The one that got me worse was the day, I'll tell her the day after tomorrow. It's another Mark Owen singing ballad but it was on the next album. Oh, okay. And it's about Harry's going to leave his girlfriend for you but he can't hurt

her right now. So I'll tell her the day after tomorrow, maybe today. How does that song go? To hang in there? The day after tomorrow is that too... I mean, Mark Owen's songs were always just such a confusing I want to cry. Do you know what the message of that though?

I want to orgasm. I don't know what is happening. I used to listen. I had a Walkman that I listened to fall asleep. I mean, it was my entire emotional soundtrack. It's why I can't listen to music because they broke up and now I can't trust music anymore. But that song is totally like a PR

fixed because there was, for something that came out probably about him having a girlfriend or taking too long for him, you're actually dating, like, hang in there, keep buying the records. So they were still this viable. Because it's different now with celebrities. They do have, like, Justin Beeble will have a wife. They aren't telling teenage girls, you have a chance.

Well, he didn't when he was younger though, when he was full, yeah, like he's, if you think about it, he's at the stage that you had to go through with all of them. Like, he's grown up. Yeah. Like, I don't know who. I mean, at the moment, what's also interesting is you have this absolute abundance. But one direction were allowed to have girlfriends.

Yeah, they were, but they were, look at what happened. Like, when Caroline Flat, like, they were pulled apart. I think the same thing was happening. And what's happening now is you have a lot of incredibly strong female. So you've got Billy Eilish and Chaparone. And, like, young girls are obsessed with them. Yeah. So that's what's happened is you have, like, or Taylor Swift.

Like, there's a lot more women. being like, I am the big sister that you've always needed, follow me. Which I don't, we didn't really have. Although, yeah, I was in Cheryl Crow. And it was people who were still managed and dressing up as school girls. And it was a, yeah, like, I think Chaparone. Now, I would have been obsessed with Chaparone as a teen, and obsessed. And I let my kids listen to her.

And I think she's, I just think she's amazing. She's such an amazing, like, icon to have. But I, it was quite, we didn't have that time. It was, that's where I found music. Annie Lennox. We had done. Yes. They were too, like they're too out of touching out.

Oh, Spice Girls, I guess. Madonna. Yeah. Wouldn't that happen. But I was slightly too old then. I'm too old for Spice Girls. Yeah. Like by the time it came, I was like, oh, I can't.

Yeah. It was like, sure. This is the female take that. We should talk about the, obviously, nostalgia is lovely, but. Sisters? Yeah, sisters. Yeah. Families?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Because this character of Sarah, when we meet her, she is older and we flick back to kind of teenage life to find out what happened. But she's sort of, yeah, she said she's sort of, she's over 40, isn't she? Because her sister is 40, having a 40th birthday. Do you know what? I'm ashamed to say, I changed the age a few times in the writing, in the redress. And I think she went from 39 to 41 to 42 to back to 40.

And she's somewhere around that, I want to say. So she could be 41 mark. Yeah, because her sister's turning 40. That's what the birthday is. That's right. Yeah. She's the older sister. Yeah, she's a few years older.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And she's facing a situation where her sister is married, has kids, still lives near the parents. Yeah. Seems to have done everything sort of correctly. The Golden Girl. Sarah has a great career, but she's still having... She's got issues.

She's got issues with relationships. Yeah, yeah. She's never been able to quite find the right thing. Are you an older sibling? I am. I know. Yeah, I am a younger sibling. Are you?

And I was picking up some younger sibling that I was. It was like, yeah, it was just interesting because you were an older sibling. I am an older sibling. I'm unfortunately. Now that I've got two children and I've seen an older sibling with the under sibling, I feel so bad. Yeah. You sort of have to watch it playing out to go, oh God. Yeah.

It does a special thing to you, I think, but the order that you come in the family really governs how you are in a lot of your relationships. Oh, yeah. And I think my relationship with my sister, I only have one sister. She's three years younger than I am. And my relationship with her, I think, shaped me more than. any other thing in my childhood really, even more than take that. I'm saying my sister shaped me more. Was she in to take that?

No, she wasn't, no. And I'd have killed her if she had anything. It would have been a problem. Maybe that's why she decided not to. As a younger sibling, I can tell you, you kind of go, oh, okay, they've made it clear that's not okay, right. I'll find something else. Like, it's not worth it.

I think she chose another boy band. I think she did. I don't think it was East 17 because I think we were just a bit too northern for that. But she did choose another boy band. and it did become another sort of rivalry for us. Like, my boy band's better than your boy band won an award. So it did be...

She didn't go for like a wasis to like really like make it like indie versus pop in your house. She did go quite indie. She did for a while. Oh, that's totally what that was about. Yeah, that was about. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. So yeah, you obviously wanted to explore that sibling relationship and it's said so beautifully done in this book that they say to each other like, you know, yeah, they have shaped each other in that way that you don't want, to admit maybe that with a sibling yeah and is that was that something you just wanted to get to grips with has your sister read it was the other question she hasn't read it yet she's

going to read it soon I wanted her to read the final final final version where it was all lovely with with you know and all kind of polished up and with the proper cover and stuff so so she hasn't yet but I think I really hope that she likes it and I hope she sees the little bits that I've kind of taken lovingly from life and reshaped as you do well I write semi-autobiographical fiction Anyway, so I always take things and then twist them a bit and put them through a filter. And so, yeah, so I hope she can see aspects of it. She did have an otter table. How did she?

The younger sister in the book has a shrine to otters in her bedroom, a table laid out with all kinds of otter pottering things. That collecting is another little girl. That was like young teenage year thing. Isn't just me obsessed with a thing? I feel like it's quite 90s thing to choose an animal. Yeah, frogs. Frogs, pigs, pigs. I think they still might.

Do they know? Or is everything on the internet now? My dogs has like a unicorn collection, but some of them do go, I'd say unicorns are like, are the boy bands of the preteen world. Oh, YouTubers, they're the boy bands as well, aren't they? Yeah, yeah, they get obsessed with YouTubers.

But yeah, it is a... Well, little boys don't go, Oh, I'm really into kittens. No, but they're really into trains. Yeah, that's true. My train jumper, my train trousers and have you seen a train? Yeah. But then I'm also thinking maybe that's...

just neurodiverse children It might also be involved in that but yeah Otter collection is a very 90s vibe so 90s and she did she had it

all lovingly laid out I can still see in my mind the little table so I wanted to put that in as is I just thought I can't write better

than that so it's just got to go in and I think she'll like that there was a joke with the grandparents and an air raid siren and her again I've not got my teeth

and he said the Iranian bombs not sandwiches that felt real is that from something it is but it's someone else's story about their grandparents

so I did little magpie like thing with that one. Of course you did. Because you were just saw that away if someone's told you. It's just so good. Yeah, to, a granny and granddad running away from air raid siren and the granny says, we got to go but, Fred, Fred, we got to go back. I've forgot my teeth. He says, shut up, Irene, keep running. It's raining down bombs, not sandwiches. That sounds like my granddad. It's just too good. So I just thought I've just got to, I've just got to nick that on. So do you find that in life,

your brain is sort of filling up shelves, like you say, like a magpie, collecting things. And then when you're writing, out they drop. This is your auto section. The table in your head. I think that's right. I think when you're working at, as you guys both know, when you're working on something, you'll live in a kind of weird, you've got like a kind of filter on your brain where you're just looking for things that fit with what you're writing.

And you sort of see, you see things that fit. You have conversations that feel more meaningful. because of what you're working on and you just end up collecting and filling the shelves and filling the bells and you can't turn a lot of conversations around to the topic

that you're writing on. Really abuse your friends in that way. I find, fine, fine. I barely have a sincere conversation these days to be honest. It's all material. How long have the slags been in your brain? So the teenage girls

stuff started in my mid-30s which was a little while ago now. And so I started writing all that teenage section And I had that really clear, like the arc of that story, what happens to that character. That was all really mapped out. I had it all written. And I couldn't for the life of me think of what the older version of her was.

I knew I wanted the book to do that, to be that contrast of the older woman as well because of what had happened to her. I wanted to show how what happens to you in those formative years can often govern the rest of your life and how you can read something wrong and remember something wrong, which is what she does. And the tragedy of that, she's remembered something wrong. She's carried all those years this idea that she does. did something wrong one night when actually she didn't really. She was there was it wasn't entirely her fault and and she did something very human rather than like a mistake. Yeah. Yeah. She did something that she was in a situation that was overwhelming and anyone would have done. Yeah. And also they were children. Yeah. Like this is the problem with the adult world is like you blame yourself but it wasn't

it wasn't them. Yeah. Yeah. But she's carried it all these. I guess it's like an extreme version of you know after a night out sometimes you think you think oh did I something? Sometimes. I know, I was like, every single social interaction I have. What did I just say? The worst thing of being up with a baby at two or three in the morning is that apparently all of the memories live there. And all of the things you've got on, the hot shame. I can't, 20 years later, still be full body cringing.

But something I said drunk to someone who I don't know anymore. I know. We're so mean to ourselves, aren't we in those, in those. hours. And so it's like an extreme version of that. She's carried this memory for decades of something that she thinks she did that was wrong to her sister. And so it's about, I knew I wanted to write about that, but I just couldn't get that present day right. And then, and so I wrote two other books in the meantime, really. And then, and I still was like, this one was just there. And then eventually, like I got the idea for the present day and I was like, okay, I think it needs to be that.

And so, and I got it wrong the first time as quite a different, but then I, but then I sort of did a version of it that was slightly different and that was right. And so, so yeah, so it took a long time. He needed the space from it, which makes a lot of sense because you're trying, you're coming to the same character and she's aged many years in between it. So it doesn't surprise me at all that actually you also needed some years and some space to really understand how much she will have moved on or how holding on to that might have affected her after so much time. I think that's really true. I think sometimes you just need to really clear that emotional distance, don't you, from something that you've written and then think, right, what does this need to do now technically to me, to work as a story? Well, you said as well, when you read that teenage diary, you were feeling unconfident and lost. And it's like you can't write from that place. You have to like get past that place, like Sarah said. So then go, oh, that's what was happening there. That's so true. I was actually thinking about that on the way here. Like, what are the perfect conditions for writing? Like, what do we actually need? And I'm sure it's different for everyone. But for me, it's very much. much because I got up at 4 a.m. today.

Yeah. Out of choice. Well, because that's when my brain is the best for writing. Oh, God, is it? Because my kids don't get up until like six. And so if I get up at like four half four, I get like an hour and a half where I can just write. And isn't the day lovely after you've already done it? Yeah.

And I get more done in those. And then my brain gets sogier and sogier as the day goes on. But when you go to bed, am I? Well, half nine usually. Okay, but that's pretty good. Yeah. But I just think those, in those early hours before anyone else's, up, I feel confident, I feel positive, I feel clear-headed, I feel able to tackle anything and

I feel very private and solitary. And for me, all of those things are what enable me to write well and then the world screams in after that. I was going to say there's two things to add to it. It's not just that you have this like fresh, lovely, I mean, something is happening. Your brain is normally dreaming then, so it's in an imaginative, you know, hypnagogia state. Yeah. Well, it's probably much, you're less filtering. But yeah, you're not getting emails. No one's texting you. You haven't already scrolled your Instagram. It's four in the morning. Why would you get up and scroll Instagram?

Oh, I don't know. I don't know why you'd do that. I mean, obviously not if you've got children and you've got school run and stuff, but you can do it by just not letting the world in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so interesting. Like, I am 11 o'clock at night. You night. Night time. But after like the full day and all of those experiences of the day, do you need like some kind of mental sorbet to sort of cleanse to get them into your, what do you do? That 11 o'clock is like, everything's

actually done. Okay. So that sense of ticking all the boxes. Everybody's done. Everybody's fine. And then I can head there, but that I love my sleep so much. Like that morning, if I'm morning, you morning writing? Or you're just any writing at the moment.

Unfortunately, I'm in a really, not to sort of play a tiny violin. But it is, it's just a whenever you can have 20 minutes. You're in the trenches. And my brain screams, I've got nothing. I'm too flabby. Don't make me do it. It's like, this is the only chance you've got you. We'll type it out and it will be shit.

And then you will close your computer. I know that. I know that time. Yeah, because you are right, like, then when they're not at school, when they're at school, it's completely different. Yeah. There's such a structure. Yeah. Emma Forrest was saying the other day because her daughter's just gone to secondary school.

She said, and now it's, you know, she gets ready herself. She can get herself to school at the top of the hill. She went, so it's not even, she says, the morning is all mine. She said that was a game changer. Another writer friend yesterday saying, just started secondary school, they just come home when they feel like, like they just walk, home with their friends. So you don't have to be there at 3.30. It's like you're almost not a mom anymore. I can't wait. You spend the whole day. You say it out. Wow. It sounds bad, Sarah.

It's like I didn't even have kids. I've got my life back. No, but you have some flexibility. Rather than like every single day at three o'clock, you have to stop work. That's what I hate. Because I'm also like, I also love an afternoon, right? Two o'clock in the afternoon. I'm like, oh, you know what? I feel like I could do two to or four. And no, I can't. I'm interrupted by a school and I have to go, I have to stop what I'm doing. And so I think what you're doing is amazing. Like if you can, you can know yourself, that's the only key. It's like it doesn't matter what the time is, 20 minutes, 4 o'clock, 11 o'clock. You just have to go, come on, you know your time. So does that mean you're working on a new novel at the moment?

I am. Yes. I'm writing on a new novel. I'm working in a new novel that is about two women who are great friends in their 20s and then they break up acrimoniously. and then they encounter each other again in their 40s. Because for me, like my biggest ex in my life is an ex-friend. And I'm so terrified of ever seeing her again. I actually don't know what I do if I saw it at a party. I've got lots of romantic exes. And obviously that's kind of bit awkward,

but everyone knows what to do. And I've kind of dealt with it and stuff. And it's all very amiable. But with her, honestly, I think I would have vomit and run out the room. I don't know what I'd do. It's really hard. Have you read Claire Lombardo's book on this topic? It's very different to yours.

that's why I feel confident about saying it. Oh, okay, yeah, because you know you have to avoid things when you're going to be. Of course. Yeah, so. I can watch girls for years. So the story is a woman who becomes a mother and is befriended by an older woman whose kids are already grown up. And so she goes around and she drinks wine in her garden. And then she sleeps with her son when she's away on holiday.

So like the person she sort of loves most in the world, obviously. Same as it ever was. And she's in her whole foods. And she's doing something like squashing artichokes. And then she sees her. And obviously they've both aged. Yeah. having this conversation where you don't know, does this mean that we're going to make up and become

friends again? And through the book, you don't really know what's happened until you've realized anyway, it's so interesting the friend breakup because with a romantic breakup, one, we have social sort of contracts cues to go through it, even if that is like, okay, we say some nice stuff, we never see each other again. If we just cut each other out, it's that bad. But you could talk to other people about it a lot, whereas I think there isn't a resolution for that friendship. It just stays there like this. Which songs do you listen to? Which songs do you listen to?

Left there. There's someone that I really need to. Oh, there's a couple of people. I'm a terrible friend. But there's someone I really need to apologize to from sort of. I'm here. I'm ready. Carrie had taught me to be a better friend.

So I have hopefully made some of my apologies to you. But there's someone who I was just such a shit friend to through six from college in our first jobs. And I sometimes think she won't even want to get a Facebook message from me. But I probably should at least put it in. in writing. Like, I do know now how terrible I was as a friend. I think with stuff like that, you know, it's never, I always think, because this comes up a lot in like grief conversations, people always say to me, oh, my friend, so-and-so died

and I was a bit rubbish, but it was like 20 years ago. I'm like, you never too late to send that message. Like, you whenever, because my dad died as a teenager and I've had people from school 20 years later say, oh, God, sorry I was so, like, I didn't really understand. And even if you're like, obviously it's fine, but it's still nice to be like, oh, I'm, I'm glad that your brain got there. I'm glad that your brain got there. Like even you can say you write back,

don't worry, it's not a big deal, but just to have that. It's a bit like the bit with the sisters, the fact that Julia doesn't remember being left with the kitten. I don't want to bring it up with this person. I've forgotten you did that. I know. And he's like, can I get away with it? Oh yeah, that's true. You write the heartfelt message.

She's like, I have no memory of this. I cannot believe it. Now you've reminded me. I'm outraged. Are we going to court? Yes. Is this a travel card forged? Yes. I'm sorry that you had to break up like that with a friend.

Yeah. I mean, I've kind of, it's so interesting with, I think you spend a lifetime learning how to be a good friend, don't you? In the same way that you spend a lifetime learning about your brain and how it works best and what times and stuff. And I think the friends that I'm really grateful for and it sounds like you guys have got the same relationship, are the ones who've really taught me how to, and haven't run off and have kind of said, hey you, don't do that. That's shit. For this reason, be better. I love you. So be better. I know what this is now, Emma. It's because people are supposed to learn from their families.

And it's really hard if you're learning it afterwards. Yeah. I was thinking that, as you said that, like learning as be a friend. And also I think it's very... It's also fair to say that certain people, as with, you know, sexual relationships or loving relationships are not your people.

So you can be friends with someone and I like, you are very kind, so I tweet your friend. But there's definitely people who have beef with me who I've been a shit friend to. Like, it's that thing. And I beat them up. It's her to watch their mouths. Yeah.

I do come to you regularly. Someone's being me, Sarah. She should be a drop pin for the playground. I'm coming over. Oh my God, please. We're going to pretty woman them, okay? You've got a really nice dress. You don't want to go to their party.

That is a younger sibling thing. I sort of expect someone to come and sort this out. Yeah, that's interesting. Why have someone come and sort it out? Yeah. Because I'm, it's hard. Where is everybody? And that is something older siblings definitely don't have.

It's so true. Like, as a big sister, I still, I'm still looking over my shoulder. Yeah. For my little sister in whatever form that is. At the same time, I imagine my little sister is still kind of looking ahead for that person. Well, you're still, there's still someone who always has done everything before you. Yeah. Yeah.

Always. I mean, always. So, because I've got less than me. So, with my second sister. So I've got two, Cheryl, who's 18 months younger than me. The thing with us is, and I've really got this from Sarah and Julia, it's this shared history. It's the fact that even if you've never talked about it, you were both there for stuff. You were in the same house.

You were in the same playground. Yeah. It's just that. Well, I've told you that quite before. That's holding it all in them. Emily Dean, brilliant writer, Emily Dean, who his sister died and she wrote a beautiful book about her sister and her parents who also passed away. But she used the phrase that I use the time, which is that's your witness.

So your witness to your childhood. The person you can say, did that happen? Because otherwise, like you said, memory is foggy and you doubt yourself and you think, maybe they weren't that mad that day. Or, you know, but to have somebody who's like, yeah, yeah. I had it in real life because I did a Christmas, Would I Lie to You? And I told a story about how my mum had once taken the Christmas tree down on Christmas morning because we were too messy opening our presents and she put it back in the loft.

And then my mum claims, has no memory of it. I said, why did you tell a lie and say it was true on would I lie to you? Like, that's not the format. And I said, because it happened. And then it's lucky that I had two sisters to both go, yes, it was incredibly traumatic. We all remember it. And my mum being like, oh, okay. See, it's good to have witnesses sometimes.

Corroboration is what it's about. Yeah, that's why, because we did IVF to have Theodore, it was such a big thing to at least try to have a second so that they would have a witness to you. That's why I had a second. They had someone to kind of like be with when they could say, aren't they being mad to say? Are they being mad?

Someone else to say they're mad and then in the outside world. Yeah, solidarity. They don't even have to get on later, but there is someone who can go, like, yep. I like you were very prepared. They are going to need someone to deal. They're going to need someone to slag me off to who's seen all the same shit.

So let's give them a sibling. It's such an important part. And I guess people have cousins or other close people and they don't have siblings. Yeah, and obviously if you are an only child, there's no... Like, you have different... We haven't said all of the terrible stuff

about having a feral animal in your house stealing your stuff. Yeah, exactly, exactly. It doesn't matter. But I think you've written, you've captured this relationship so beautifully of the two sisters. I was apprehensive because I've got a real... I've been really struggling recently

with books about sisters because even though they're probably very true about a different kind of sister, I really struggled with Coca-Mella's, blue sisters, which everyone else really loves. And then I read Hello Beautiful and I really struggled with that one as well. But I didn't struggle with yours

because it felt so much closer to my experience. Apparently with that relationship, I can't bear anyone else's truth. Old sister. Let's talk about that next week. Ebertane, thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you.

It's available to by now. It's an amazing. amazing book. Everything you write is always, I think, very, very honest about the female experience, but also your gag rate. I don't know anyone who writes as many jokes on a page as you. It's really funny. Well, coming from you guys, that is the highest compliment possible, so thank you.

And when you're casting the movie, Caradry Goinger. Obviously, just for the teenage part. Who will play her as the older lady? Is Nicole Kidman available? Oh, what's that? No, Demi Moore. Dimimor. Demi Moore is fit. Yes. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Such a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you for listening to The Weirdo's Book Club. Sarah is currently on tour. Tickets for her show, I'm a Strange Gloop, are on sail now from sarah pascoe.com. Carriads' new children's book, where did she go? He's out now, too. You can find out all about the upcoming books we're going to be discussing this series on our

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