Sara & Cariad's Weirdos Book Club - Swing Time by Zadie Smith with Sophie Ellis-Bextor

Episode Date: September 11, 2025

This week's book guest is Swing Time by Zadie Smith.Sara and Cariad are joined for the last episode of this series by the one and only Sophie Ellis-Bextor.In this episode they discuss motherhood, celebrity, white saviour complex and sexy dancing for your dad.Thank you for reading with us this series. We like reading with you! And we'll be back in October with more Weird and wonderful reads!Swing Time by Zadie Smith is available here.Follow Sara & Cariad’s Weirdos Book Club on Instagram @saraandcariadsweirdosbookclub and Twitter @weirdosbookclubTickets for Sara's tour show I Am A Strange Gloop are available to buy from sarapascoe.co.uk 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'll be a really interesting wide raging 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. It's the last episode of this series. Oh, it's a bit sad, isn't it, sir? I'm devastated. Yeah, thank you so much for listening along and reading with us and joining us on Patreon over this series. If you haven't, then please come over and join us. See what we're up to over there? Yeah, it's pretty good on the Patreon. I think it's unfiltered.

And you imagine us more unfiltered. It's a small club. But hey, prestigious. Yeah. Like most clubs, it's better to be in it than out. Yeah, exactly. I think that's what Groucho Marx said. We are going to take a short break, but don't worry, we will be back.

We just need to catch up on some reading, basically. Yes, and we're ending the series in style. This week's book guest is Swing Time by Zadie Smith. What's it about? Two friends growing up in a state in Willsdon and the very different paths they end up taking. What qualifies it for the weirdos book club? Well, sometimes music makes you want to dance, but it's very rare that a book makes you wiggle. In this episode we discuss

motherhood, celebrity, white saviour complex and sexy dancing for your dad. And joining us this week is Sophie Ellis Bexter. Sophie is a pop legend famous for her kitchen discos and her murderous dance floors and her new album Perry Menopopop is out in September. Welcome to the podcast, Sophie Ellis Bexter. Hello. As soon as that name, I feel like I can hear music. Do you have her? Yes.

Yeah, yes. I feel like this top of the pop sesk is like, for Ellis Vector did a little, like, I just waiting for like the tune to start. Unless those days. Yeah, I know. I'm glad I got to do

Top of the Pops. Oh, God. It's sad that people don't get to do that now. I haven't really thought about that. It really is. Yeah, a lot of those music things. I mean, CDUK,

all of that stuff. A CDU. I love CDUK. So much. The cooler brother of SM TV. It was on a bit later. What was the one on Channel 4 where they were a bit mean

that Simon Amstall was on? That's all the T4 stuff. Oh, and Pop World. Pop World with Nikita Oliver and Simoninso. I loved that one as well. It was actually really funny, was there? Yeah, they were really funny.

Yeah. Did you go on Pop World as well? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh my God, you did it all, so. You did it all. Is that a big moment for you? Was it Pop World? You know, I actually really got on with them,

so I used to find it quite fun, but it was, yeah, you had to be like a little bit on guard because it could go anywhere, but I quite enjoyed myself. That's good. I like a laugh. What's the world like now promoting an album or a single? Yeah, it's a good question.

I'm sort of, I mean, it changes all the time. And I guess, I guess, I guess you're on online stuff is really where it's at. It's really shifted. When I signed my first deal, when the whole social media starts to become a thing, it was down in the basement of the universal building, two rooms, windowless rooms. That was their whole online support. And now, of course, it is absolutely front and centre. And I suppose the thing is, because there isn't music programs guiding, it used to be, if you had something coming out, if you got on the specific radio stations,

and you've got on certain TVs, you're going to be kind of fine. Whereas now, everything's so diverse. So you've got all, it's a lot more spread. So I guess it's, I don't know, just trying to be everywhere all at once. Yeah, exhausting. It must be the same sort of thing with every field. Or any sense of actually being able to build something. It feels like you start all over again two years later.

That's true. Letting people know you've got new stuff is the thing that's hard. Yeah. Yeah, to be like, me or so. And then like, there's a million people being like, I've also got a new thing. Exactly. Yeah, it's hard, isn't it? Do you read a lot when you're on tour?

I have at all. I feel sad when I talk about reading because I used to read so much. I was such a little bookworm. And I'd gone holiday as a child with a book pile where I'd read one book a day and take great pride and racing through things. And trying to read above my age, I felt very, you know, worldly with my book reading. And now it's dwindled. I read a bit.

I carry books around very well. Very good at having a book with me. I love to carry one. It's nice to let the book see you the world. You know, the book's been all over the world with you. Exactly. It's never had to open its pages. In fact, this is my second copy of the book because I left one in a dressing room in the Netherlands very recently.

And I thought, well, I don't want to not have the book anymore. You've set it free. I have to be really, like, charmed by a book to read it. But I feel I've let myself have a rule where if I get to 50 pages in and I'm still, it's still a bit of a grind, like I'm allowed to stop. Oh, you do the 50 page rule. What do you do? I push through and I wish I didn't.

But why? I don't know. You wouldn't do it with anything else. I know. I agree with you. There's very few books I've given up on and I'll read with Fury. Like, this is so shit. And I think, just put it down.

But there'll be a part of me going, I just want to know what happens. And it feels like failure as well, doesn't it? Yeah. I definitely think since kids, I've got better at going, just put it down. Or I put the bookmark in. I leave it somewhere. And then if like six months eight, I'm like, I can't even remember what, do you know what the beginning was, then I will just...

Can you read more than one book at once? We have to. Yeah. At the moment, we have to. But I didn't used to. Did you used to be able to do that? No, I would have thought you mustn't. Yeah, I would have also thought that.

No, no. So we should say we're talking about Zadie Smith's swing time, which is a music, pop star book. Which is why... Sarah thought it might be good for you. Yeah. Have you... So you hadn't read it before.

I hadn't read it before. Had you read any Zadie Smith? Yes, I read white teeth. I wanted to say pretty soon after it came back, I remember it was in paperback, but it was still a very new thing. And it was a sort of publishing phenomenon, wasn't it as well? Absolutely. And so Zadis, I think she must only be a few years older than me. And I remember reading it in my 20s and thinking, how did she write this book?

I was really blown away by her intellect, her brain. Yeah, her brain is something else, isn't it? She sounds like a really obvious thing to say. but it's so enjoyable to read her sentences. Oh my God. Some of them I just kept, I just made loads of crates because the sentence she even managed

to put on her tight sarcastically. Yes. Yeah. I was like, give that woman an Oscar for that sentence or a book of prize, whatever one she wants. But it was like so good, wasn't it? Yeah, it's really wonderful spending time with her, particularly I found,

in the youth scenes. Yeah. Her and Tracy is young, want to be dancers, the odd friendship of people whose mothers don't get on who have sort of judgments on each other so we should say it's about two friends

it starts in Wildesden it says on the back two brown girls from Wilsden who dream of being dancers but only one Tracy has the talent and then it kind of follows Tracy's journey from the council estate to not quite becoming a dancer and then do we ever find out of name

we don't do it yeah sorry and so we yeah we never find out the other girl's name and her journey to becoming again I don't think this is a spoiler a PA for a very famous pop star who sort of sounds like Madonna-esque. Yeah, I think that's where you're at. Yeah, I was like, it kind of feels Madonna-esque, doesn't it?

Because she is globally famous and she's also like going to West Africa, choosing a village and saving it, essentially deciding to save it and build schools and just turning up and dropping her entourage. And our main character becomes her sort of executive PA and caught up in all that while Tracy is kind of lost to the wind slightly. So yeah, that's the basic premise of it, isn't it? There's a lot of description of dancing. Yes.

Right from the very beginning. Amazing description of dancing. So I know nothing about Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. Do either of you have any interest or? I used to watch, yeah, when I was a little girl, I'd watch the black of white movies of him dancing and her dancing and be pretty mesmerized. Yeah.

And I felt like I could really see those little girls watching those videos, copying it. And also there's a bit, isn't it, where they saw. dance a bit inappropriately. And I did something really similar as well. Funny enough, because I, after reading it, I went and listened to Zadie Smith on Desert Island Discs, and she picks Madonna as one of the tracks. Interesting.

And I was a big Madonna fam and I was little. And in the video for Open Your Heart, Madonna does a performance in a peep show with a chair. And I learned a little bit of that and showed my dad. On his own. I just got him sat on the sofa, got the chair, whips it round, leg up, arms move, whip the chair down, sit on it.

I mean, yeah. Oh my God, what did he do? How did he handle it? Well, I just remember thinking, why is he not more impressed? I've got quite a lot into this. He's thinking, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. He's thinking when does this finish?

I mean, especially knowing my dad, like, seeing it in a different perspective, he must have really been struggling with that. So uncomfortable because how do you say, well done that you've done that. you've tried really hard. It's not about your ability. It's so hard with kids to explain that line of, like, inappropriateness.

My daughter, like, dances a lot and has developed what she thinks. It has her signature move, which is a big bumwiggle, like, just really, like, it's really hard. You don't want to discourage, do you? But you also don't want to project shame when there is none. No, no, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think context is everything. And it's okay that I, at that age, didn't understand any of that stuff.

And so it went over my head. It was just dancing. I actually think my dad did the right thing and just moving on. Lovely. Lovely, great. Brianie Kimmings, the performance artist, did this amazing show in Edinburgh about female role models for young children about her niece. Her niece was on stage with her.

And at one point, she was just talking about as an adult how terrifying it is. So she got this sort of nine-year-old to say who her favourite singer was and then do her favourite bit of their song. And so to see a nine-year-old girl saying, stuff that is so sexual that she has absolutely no idea that that's the meaning of those words. That's true though, you don't know, do you? You don't, you don't. And those musicians have always appealed to little children.

Two friends have very different memories of the situation. Yes. And also, I sort of loved, and I want to talk to you about this, that Tracy lies about a lot of stuff. And there's an amazing line where she said, and so we got something like the truth, quite like it. but not exactly. Yes. And I was like because Sarah has talked about lying in childhood quite a lot. They both fudge things because the other character, the narrator,

she has this moment where she realizes, well, she finds out that her dad has other older children and that her daughter, her sister, her half sister is studying ballet. And she makes a building near them the Royal College of Ballet, even though it's sort of a function hall where people have their wedding parties and things. There is that blurring in terms of. of what things represent. And that moment, that line you've just quoted

is when she actually meets Tracy's dad and he's this incredible dancer and in some universe he could have been one of Michael Jackson's backing dancers. Tracy says that one, he's Michael Jackson's backing dancer that's why he's not around.

To explain why, because he's away in prison. And also then he's living and then like very nearby with another family of his own. But the doubling down of Tracy on that lie is, I just think that's such a good conceit of a character,

isn't it? It says a lot about Tracy very simply in that. Yeah, I used to tell lies at school, Sophie. And so I was very unpopular. So to the extent that I thought my lies were believed, because no one... We're all sharing today.

I didn't have sort of any friends to say, obviously that didn't happen. So they just got more and more excessive. So I told people Mariah Care was my babysitter and that she was giving me singing lessons while she was round. And then someone... She'd probably, she'd be nice, I think. They'd ask the question, like, why is she in Rompford?

But like, oh, she's just commuting from Miami. Extra cash in town babysitting money. Yeah, you've got to cover your bases. Yeah, yeah. I told everyone that take that had broken down their car and had to come into my house to have a bath. And I had to make up a bath that was big enough for take that. And I said it was a chakouzy bath that I think I'd once seen at one of my mom's boss's houses. I just imagined all of take that in there.

a 13 year old girl's house because they needed to wash before the concert. Because you find as well when you make up things like that that when people don't believe you, you're almost kind of annoyed because you can see it so well in your head. I believed myself. You're a bit like, why are you questioning this? This is real deal. Which is what Tracy does. It's like when the narrator tries to say, I think, a couple of like, oh, maybe he's not.

And it's like, why would I have said it? Yeah. Like, why would I even made that up? Obviously, he's with Michael Jackson. And it's that thing of like, you just, yeah, reality blurring so much. Like you said that it's real for the child, therefore it's real. Yeah. There isn't a distinction.

You can imagine it. So did you say that you'd lie sometimes as well? Yeah, I think I remember I was definitely at secondary school with one of them because I remember there's a picture I'd done in my homework that I said I hadn't traced and I had. Oh, yeah, classic. And I was very sure, indignant. And there were things like that. Lady Smith says she's fascinated with memory and what it means about us and what we remember and how we remember.

Yeah. Yeah. Because also there's a certain power in it. experimenting, aren't you, with what repercussions you can cause? My six-year-old, not that long ago, said to be bedtime, Daddy doesn't want to be with you and he wants to be with somebody else. Wow. He's actually a really sweet kid.

I don't put my brains in that way, but I was like, okay, because he does sometimes drop the odd. I'm sure he's lovely. It's just one of those things that kids do. You're like, really? This is what I have to deal with before bedtime. I was like interesting. So he's just seeing what happens if I say this.

What, you know, concentric circles? Was there a part of you that was like? So obviously Richard had to move out. I've said to him, this is your fault. Yeah, he's heard it from somewhere. We should talk about that as well because there's a lot about motherhood in this book. Yes. I really love the narrator's mother.

The narrator's mother is amazing. I'm obsessed with her mother. So she's very academic. She doesn't want to have, she's chosen only to have one child because she comes from this, you know, generation of women who had so many children and then weren't allowed to have their life. and she's educating herself. She's an autodidact and it's really, I just find it so aspirational. She's always got a book in her hand.

She measures time in how many pages she can read. When they come home on a Saturday, her and her dad from having spent the deal is that they spend the day out of the house, her mum's all curled up with a pad, learning, you know, making notes on a lecture she's watching and she sort of looks at them with disappointment because they're back. I know. There's, again, this amazing quote where she was talking,

Oh, it's very nice and rational and respectable to say that a woman has every right to her life, to her ambitions, to her needs and so on. It's what I've always demanded myself. But as a child, no, the truth is it's a war of attrition. Rationality doesn't always come into it. All you want from your mother is that she wants and for admit she is your mother and only your mother and that her battle with the rest of her life is over. And I was like, God, it's so interesting reading that as a mum, but remembering what it does feel like as a child, that you're like, why do you need any other life? Also, it's a war that I've absolutely lost. And before having children, I would have thought,

I would have thought I would be the kind of mum that could have boundaries and separate myself and do things for myself. Oh, I've lost at the moment. I can't even have a bath without them getting in it. You still have a career is what I mean. Like, you still do work stuff. Barely. Barely.

You're out of the house. The cost is so high. Going to work doesn't feel like autonomy or like space or anything like that. And especially if you're like snatching it, like this is my tiny bit. And I'll make up for it later, like triple and double. This is what shocked me about having from one to two, actually, is that a child is so greedy they want 100% of you. Yeah, every child is thinking that.

So when you have a second one, they also want 100%. And you've got four, right? Five, five, five. Oh my God. That's 500%. Do people often have that reaction, Sophie? It's funny as well because... And you're very successful and brilliant and creative and doing all this stuff.

Yeah, you never sleep. Sure, Sunny's got to give, Sophie. I've definitely struggled with it as a, as that spreading thin and worry and guilt and all of that stuff. And I think, I mean, I totally resonate with what you were saying. I think sometimes as well when I go to work, you're so top and tailing it with everything and keeping an eye on what else is going on. And I think when when they're little, you're so in the trenches with, you know, it's all about the physical touch and being there and all the very sort of binary stuff they need. temperature, food, all these things. And they get older and it gets even, I finally even

getting broader. And they're more aware of when I go away. And now my older ones are talking about how they got used to the fact of what I do and that kind of thing. And they're like, you know, the little knife turning. The first thing my three-year-old says in the mornings now to me is work tonight?

Work tonight? Because he just wants to be reassured that I could put him to bed. He's like, yeah. And it's like, no, mommy, no work? I know. This morning I said, I'm leaving early. And we went, again? That's why that sentence is incredible.

It's because, unfortunately, they feel a necessity as rejection. Yeah. Because, and that's, yeah. Like, that's why I loved what... And it's not a rejection. She's done with this book, that mother-daughter thing, of like, I remember that feeling of like, but why do you need to go and see your friends? That's what's interesting in this book, isn't it?

Because, you know, her mother is not the mother she sort of wants sometimes. She's not there for her in a way that's... She doesn't feel very fond of her mother. She's not on the... It's not very sort of... It's not loving. No. But then she then sort of has this incredible resilience, independence,

becomes this, you know, slightly mad, stars, PA. And has all this... You know, the mother is very involved in, like, cultural politics, and she has all this information and knowledge that she sort of picked up from her mum that she then finds herself saying to people thinking, my God, like, I've argued with my mum this old time.

I just thought Zadie really captured the nuance of that relationship, then it's not as simple as like, oh, I don't mind, we're not very close. It's like, oh, we are close and we're not close and it's difficult. She's classy. She wants her daughter to have a better life than the average person on their estate. She thinks there's ways of behaving. All of these things are how you protect your child. It's such a strong form of love that doesn't feel like love to the child.

Well, I thought it's also interesting that Zadie managed to capture the ego behind it, like the child can sometimes see, like the mother would often do things because she wanted a kind of army behind her and becoming a cancer and the power and enjoying that. And the child is able to sort of see the duality of what's happening. Do you know what I mean? That it's like, she's the amazing figure. People stop her in the street and say, God, your mom's amazing. She's doing all this stuff.

And the child is like, yeah, there's the other side to that. There's like, just, yeah, then what makes up a person is more than just the work in the community. Do you know what I mean? I think that's what I've struggled with. It wasn't very sort of warm and nurturing. No, it wasn't nurturing. And you felt like that all the characters,

I wasn't really sure whoever them I really liked that much, and that real 360 way. What did you think about the description of parents' evening when they were at primary school? Because I thought that was really an incredible insight when all of the mothers go to parents' evening ready to be told off. Oh, yeah. Because that was their relationship with school themselves.

Yeah, I thought that was really interesting. So the teachers have authority. And so whatever your child's done wrong, you just go there, it's your own sort of position at school. but her mum was such an opposite to that. In terms of criticising the teachers and saying, like, what hope is there for these children? They deserve more than this.

Didn't she say, like, loads of the parents don't turn up because they know they're going to get told off. They were told off there. You're just going to tell them off. And it's like, well, how, yeah, that subtle observation of, like, this working class community is, like, they're not benefiting from the school in the way that maybe they could do if it wasn't done with, like, you're doing wrong.

Which I've also felt quite 80s, didn't it? Like that kind of like that's what it was like then it's like either you'll behave well and you're good to tick or you don't and you're a bad person. Yeah and that is it was before they changed the language of how they would talk to people about their behaviour and it was you're a bad boy, you're a bad girl. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's no absolute no like, oh they have different needs. Yeah. Their brain processes differently. It was just like they're stupid. They're stupid and they're bad. And they disrupt the class.

I thought it was such a great scene because her mum was saying about these children deserve more. And then the narrator says and as we left neither me or my mother knew how I was getting. on at school. Yeah, yeah. Did you enjoy it? I did. I did. And actually, I was thinking

about what you said about the characters and sort of warming more. I mean, the protagonist I liked always, but I think I just struggled and initially with the

fact that none of the relationships felt like they were, I suppose, giving her what she needed. Yeah. And there's a lot of sort of seriousness or even if they're having fun and the peripheral

is sort of adult and, you know, from the get-go, there's things they're trying to work out things they don't understand surprises, family secrets and it just felt like quite a serious childhood for her. I really enjoyed it when she starts working as the PA. I loved all the descriptions of Amy, the pop star, and life she's living in this of MTV building and all of that.

And their relationship was quite good fun, isn't it? And how the pop star thinks she's really doing the right thing and is really worldly and then just keeps making these really lumpy gestures towards sort of being good. The pop star is always. almost like another version of her mother, this person that has these honorable intentions and is trying to use their money for good. But they like buys them all laptops, which then, like, get sold and then the boys, no one goes to the boys school because only the girls school

being given the laptops. Like, I love that she just kept showing the consequences of everything. It's like you do an action. There's just a hundred consequences you did not expect. Yeah. But yeah, the relationship with Amy and the MTV, did you do, did you? Did you do? Did you? I did you do. I did work experience there when I was 16. So I remember going there first then for a week or two. and then yeah I would go along to that yeah does it sort of feel real because I could picture it completely I was like completely I wondered if she had done work experience

yeah I wondered that there's several things in this book where it's awful to think is this part of the biography the thing I loved about Amy actually the character detail I loved the most was that she thought that her backstory was relatable to everyone else's story and I and I also thought there is something going on in terms of like obviously like a white saviour complex as well

that someone can't see their own privilege. So if something has worked out for them, they think it's applicable to everyone. Why didn't you just do what I did? Yeah, yeah, just work home. I'd be talented. When she says, like, Mother had never helped me back and then she's thinking about all the nanny. The nanny. The Jamaican nanny, which is an important detail. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was her character, she was, I thought, having never met Madonna, I really believed that pop, like that global pop star, because again, she wasn't horrible. She wasn't like a diva. She was quite likable.

She was really likable, really charming. And she had a reality about her, but you could just see this kind of steel within her. Yeah, aboard a boundary as well. Yeah. I think it was also quite important that she was quite a lot older than the protagonist. So she had that sort of big sister, mother thing. If we're going to do it this way, this is what's happening for you now. But there's a couple of stories that I are.

I mean, you say she's not horrible, but she was deeply manipulative. She was, but she's also very kind to her at the beginning. Well, the thing about her 30th birthday, so they're in Amsterdam, she keeps saying to her, we'll have a big, for two weeks, she keeps saying, we'll have this big night out for your birthday. Just the two of us are going to go out for your birthday. And then on her birthday, doesn't mention it, doesn't do it. The next day, the narrator gets up expecting something to be said. And it just isn't. It's like that there's these things about people who you get swept up in what they're enthusiastic about. And when they have lost enthusiasm, it's completely dead. That's not having, that's not having intimacy with someone. No, there's no intimacy with the pop star at all. Because also the narrator can't bring it up. Yeah, yeah. That's very true. It goes back to that dynamic that they have really the unspoken things and the control.

You're right. It's deeply in everything. Because when they go to Hampstead, so the Amy character says to her, where do you feel most relaxed, takes her to Hampstead Heath, gives her a joint that she doesn't partake in and just says this is how I fast track intimacy. Yeah, yeah. It saves us six months of getting to know each other. I was like, oh, it's a psychopath.

Yeah, I think she was. There can be an element of success that can make people behave in non-emphathetic ways because they have to cope and they have to depend on other people. She, about all of her boyfriends, after three months, would introduce them to Amy and Amy would call them customers, which means they were using her to get to her. So like all of that paranoia then inflicting so deeply on someone's personal life. If that was your friend telling you, you'd be like, oh, this job is not healthy. I constantly thought the job was not healthy.

I was like, you should leave this job. But I also thought it was so interesting that she was showing us like, I get a lot of stuff that's really nice. Like I get first class and there's all the things that happen in that situation where it's like, oh, I've got comfortable in this world. That's not my world. It's not mine. I'm visiting it.

And so it feels real. I guess what I mean is, you're right. She's been manipulative, but she's, Zadie's done that amazing thing where she does it very subtly, manipulatively. Like, Zadie, again, is written like a very nuanced. character that you kind of go, I see why you took the job. Yeah. I see why you stayed with her for that long. It's like love bombing as well, isn't it? Just constant like, oh, the heady highs. And then you realize, but they didn't ask me a single question about myself or, oh, but we're doing

an activity, not the way I wanted to do it. And I don't really want to be here right now. Have you ever found yourself in like, not like, obviously, like, a pop star situation where you have felt, oh, I'm at the center of this and other people are trying to get near me or like the way it's described there of like I think it's more that I've witnessed it really yeah yeah I've definitely seen people who don't behave well and then they've got people who work alongside them sometimes for a really long time yeah and it's this very dysfunctional relationship um and you think why did these people stick around I think it's because the person at the center of it is very good at giving just enough yeah just at the right times yeah it keeps people kind of on there at the

leash you know but that is classic narcissist yeah yeah yeah dysfunctional relationship, isn't it? And give us the name. The scene, which I thought, again, was, I mean, the trouble with it, actually, is when a character's really entertaining. Yeah, she's very entertaining, yeah. So the narrator is a brilliant singer, and there's a piano karaoke bar, and the narrator is drunk, and she closes her eyes and she's thinking about, and it's a beautiful jazz singer. And she's really in it, and, you know, there's some sense that she's so disconnected from what, you know, people are going wild and then Amy just leaves.

She's back in the car. She couldn't bear it. She couldn't bear it. And also because she's a pop star. She's not a great singer. Yeah. It's a different skill. It's like she's a global pop star, isn't she?

It's like, I don't need to have a good voice. I'm Madonna. But also I'm bored by you having a good voice and I'm going to go and wait in the car. There's so many bits where you're like, that reaction has told me everything. Like just that the way she makes her characters behave. What did you think about her going to build this score? I suppose like you are just thinking, oh, okay. as this Madonna, that's kind of thing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, the sort of speed of it, the way it's so, sort of, not cynical, that's the wrong word, but it's very, I suppose it's the white saviour thing. Yeah. It's just scooping and not really reading it properly, not taking the time to nuance, and then just thinking you can bypass and buy in

for the things that suit you to make it happen in the way you envisage it, including babies. I like that it's called the Illuminated School, isn't it, or something like that, which is the name of her album, but all the people think she's part of the Illuminati. And they're like, well, fine, because we need a school, but it is an Illuminati school.

And I just thought that's such a simple, like, miscommunication between her. And I love that scene before Amy arrives, when our narrator is, like, living as normal, and then has to, like, get the ferry and it's difficult and it's hard. And then as soon as Amy turns up, just everything is easy, and people will be there and you've got planning permission for this thing. And I just thought, God, she does constantly show you that how amazing this world is to live in, but how it's not real, is it?

It's not. Well, she, the really powerful sentence I thought was when she says that Amy has, she looks up the amount of money that I think. I wrote that down, the GDP. Yeah, is it the event to go? And just like that, the GDP of an entire country could fit inside onto a single person, like one Russian doll into another. Yeah. That's so gross. So she's building a school in a place where she has the same amount of money.

the whole country. Exactly. Well, that's why it works like that for her, because people will just bow down to the bits that are so sort of clumsily orchestrated just because the money is so beneficial. I listened to a podcast once, which was about effective altruism,

and it's all about how just a big lump of money often doesn't solve a problem. And that charity and ethical giving needs to be really, really well thought through. You should do these little pilot schemes, see how things are affected, and the example they were using was that some people wanted to build wells in Africa

and then they thought how do we make them more fun so they made them like roundabouts so that the children could go on the roundabout and it would bring water up from the ground which sounds like a great idea and a year later they went to see how effective they were and it was just mums pushing around about round because the kids had all got bored of them

because when the women need water so it's just women they had their work ten times harder than just having a well and you go you can absolutely see the glee they would have been punching the air i've got a great idea why don't we make them fun for the kids you know two birds one stone well like she says here like it's a god's

crue shrieuiting isn't it yeah it's a girl school she's funding and she's only letting the girls go there which mean all the teachers leave the boys school because they know they're better facilities and you're just like ah like you again you see the good intentions of this and you this problem with white saviors and it's like it's not coming from a malicious place but and who's the character who is constantly trying to tell them what to do i've forgotten his name Lamlin or Fern. Oh, Fernando or something like that, isn't it? Yeah, Fern, they call him, don't they?

Who's, like, the job of, like, has worked in these communities before, has worked in development, and there's constantly like, you shouldn't be doing that. You shouldn't be doing it. This book spans so much. It's other thing. It was epic, wasn't it? That's what I kept thinking as well of, like, how did she hold all this and all these trails, all these life stories and the chronology and the way it jumps around?

I really, I find with her writing, I just keep having been, like, so. I'm so impressed just that I think of how she considers it all. When I finish the book, because again, so, you know, the character then comes back to London and I went back to that beginning, the first bit where she's sort of in the hotel and people are stalking her, which we don't need to go into. But I remember reading that at the beginning and not with being like, oh, she's in her hotel, okay, okay, do you know what I mean? And then you forget it. Like, it's such the structure of the book, like you say, Sophie, is so, yeah, like, not simply chronological,

but, like, taking you from childhood to, you. Yeah, you know, I think she's sort of like 30s or something by the time it ends. And these two girls, what do we think of lovely Tracy? I really adore Tracy. She made perfect sense to me. She made sense to me as someone who is coping with her realities. There's a scene where her, when they're children, where her dad turns up or someone turns up, Louis, but that she doesn't, you know, our narrator doesn't know whether it's Tracy's dad,

but it's a man on the flats. Let me in, let me in, let me in. They have to go to her room. Tracy gets out a Pac-Man game and just starts playing it, ignoring the adult shouting in the other room. Fighting, shouting, throwing things at each other, yeah. And obviously the narrator, this is violence,

a possibility of aggression. It's scary and you just see a kid zoned out, which is a coping mechanism because it's happened previously a lot. Yeah. So Tracy is a master class in coping strategies. Yeah. The whole way through.

There's a scene where she shows our narrator the gun that he's holding so he can protect Michael Jackson So a child's world is having to absorb so much adulthood She's having to absorb far too much adulthood Yeah I loved the description of her as a little girl And her talent but also her confidence And this character she sort of created for herself

And the lies that supported this fantasy And I felt like you just could already imagine where she was really heading. Yeah. So the fact that it doesn't, doesn't turn out with her living out that life is no surprise, is it? Yeah. So it's sad. But I feel like the sadness is there from when she's small.

The sadness is really there from she small. And again, you get that about this book that our narrator's mother is already worried about Tracy in the way that narrator is confused about. She's like she's fine. She's the best dancer. Why worry about her? It doesn't feel snooty. No, but it's like she can see. Yeah, it feels like an awareness.

This girl needs some help. This girl needs some support and guidance. But again, that's the, so both of the characters have one parent who's white and one parent who's black, but they have reverse genders. So Tracy's single parent mother is a white woman, and that's really relevant, I think, because she thinks her daughter's really, you know, beautiful. She does all her plaques. She has a really good ballet shoes.

What we're told at the beginning is her mom will spend money on these certain things, but she isn't maybe protecting her in the way that the narrator's mother, would have tried to do. Yeah, because, and says like... Or instill certain values. Yeah. That the visual is not as important to her, is it? Like, she's not dressing up her daughter.

She doesn't, she doesn't have the right shoes and she's not, but to her, that's love. That's what I thought was interesting. The narrator says, well, you're so lucky. It really made me laugh when, I think it's after another instant, they play Barbies. Yeah. And she says, together we got that tiny white woman's life in order. Yeah. Yeah, they put away all of her clothes.

The kind of playing she wasn't allowed to do at home because her mom would have thought it was so, like, dumb. Yeah. Or like, she could do it. Traceous. Yeah. They're just putting like hanging up all of Barbie's clothes

putting her shoes away. Like if we can get Barbie sorted everything's going to be all right. That made me laugh out loud. Yeah,

that's a great line. I liked how bored the narrator's mum is at the dance classes. Oh yeah. Just sort of being on a chin of oh God, three hours.

Yeah. Three hours. Ballet tap and what is modern. Yeah. What is modern? Have you had to attend a lot of classes or?

No. I've been, I've basically only I try and only water the seeds that sprout So I haven't done lots of that sort of stuff If it's not sticking Yes But I don't know if that's good really

Because I haven't ever If my kids are doing classes And they start to lose interest I'm not one of those people Who will be saying No we're going to do it for another year In fact the only one I've done that Swimming

Swimming's on when they start But everything else I'll be like Well if you're not giving it If it's not working Then we'll finish this term And then we're done I think that's nice smothering. I think that's nice.

But you're supposed to do that, or are you supposed to be like, no, let's keep going, learn that instrument to that level, pass that test, be part of that team? I don't know. I think it's really hard, isn't it? Because I think also, as this book shows, there's no, like, right or wrong. Should I have pushed you and you could have become a global ballerina, but why would that be good? I'm more worried they'll come back to me and say, why did you not make us do more of those things? Did the descriptions of dance in this book make you want to dance? Yes.

Or listen to music? Also, the films she's talking about, I've watched, those films. Have you? Yeah, they... So is this true that with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, it was like a lesson that he was guiding her. He's a much better dancer than she is. Yeah, that's absolutely true. But a lot of the dance stuff, especially the Hollywood stuff, is true. So why have I absorbed such a, she did everything he did backwards and in heels? Well, that's the famous quote that he said about her.

Okay. I think, look, he's a dancer in those days. Dancers are harsh people. No offense, dancers. Oh, apparently still now, if you believe all the strictly rumors. Sophie cannot comment It made sense for him to say She's great She's doing everything

Do you know what I mean It's like it's like it's PR isn't it He knew the good PR is what I'm saying He's almost her manager But he danced with his sister And his sister was apparently as good as him When you get to Hollywood And it's like well we don't want a brother and sister dancing

It's weird If you're going to dance with Ginger Rogers I didn't know that I've used Yeah they were like I'm sure this is right It's in the book They were in a They were discovered in a musical

And he was dancing with his sister And he is genuinely an amazing dancer And he genuinely is like Phenomenal. Just what he can do with his body. And Ginger's just not as good as him. But it's like, it was the package. The film she's talking about those dances that they're watching as well.

I loved a kid discovering that. Like, I remember discovering that. Gene Kelly is another one who makes everything look like it's just not even breaking a sweater. Is it him who does the roller skating one? Have you seen the roller skating routine? Yes, another one you mean. And I think it is him.

God. They put a really special set for it, doesn't they? They put his massive set and it's like really up high and he just, he does like a like five minute dance routine on roller skates like going through the town and like passing people and like tap dancing. And it's it looks, it makes you think, I could do that. But that's like good stand up as well. Good, like good performing. You think part of you thinks, I could do that. Because that's how effortless they're making it look. I think as well, it's a certain type of performer that's got that generosity to them that makes you feel part of it. They're trying to pass it over. Yeah.

Because I think there are other people where you're supposed to sit there and go, amazing. And that's the joy is watching someone do something extraordinary. And other people do it in a way that makes it feel, I could just take you by the hand and bring you up here. It's a slightly different emphasis, I think. But what's so sweet is that the book, you know, the descriptions of the girls dancing,

kids still do that. Like that's part of, but you do have those bonding moments with your friends and watching the dance routines. And trying to do it. It's so part of what still happens. I would love to have gone to dance lessons. actually, but I never did any of that kind of thing.

So what was your journey into it then? Yeah, but you didn't have music lessons either. So just really into music. And then I started going clubbing and I was about 16. And through that I met someone that said they had a friend looking for a singer for a band. So I met that person in there was Billy and we started this band called The Audience, which was my first band. And signed a deal just before I sat my A-Levels. So it kind of came and found me a little bit.

But I absolutely loved it. As soon as I stood on stage and did my first gig, I was like, that's it. That's what I want to do. And then I got dropped when I was 20, so I was a bit high and dry. And luckily, I still had a publishing deal, which was a bit mad because I'd never written a song. But the band I was in, we'd signed this deal together. And they had the instrumental of Groovejet knocking around the office and someone there sent it to me. And I thought, yeah, maybe I'll go and do a dance song now, just for fun.

And it kind of whisked me off. And then I got offered a solo day after that. So I kind of became a solo singer because I was a singer without a band, really. How are not incredible Unexpected How did you find writing your book Because you wrote your book a few years ago I did thank you yeah

I actually really enjoyed it I was approached about writing a book By publishing house they said Oh after the podcast has started Which you have both been on And thank you They said what do you want to do a book called spinning plates And I'll have like wisdom

That you've learned through these conversations And at the time it was locked down So lots of time spent thinking about things wasn't it? And thinking back on lots of memories and I just started writing and I thought, oh, I actually think I'm writing more of an autobiography here. And I wrote all over the shop so I'd sit down and think, right, did I want to write about terrible haircuts I've had? And then another day, right, I'm going to write about, you know, boyfriends. And it'd just be every day, just go to where I had a bit of energy. And I really enjoyed it. Really enjoyed it. It's fun just sort of

spilling it all out into the book. Well, especially when you've lived a life, like experiences. And also to, like you said, that's kind, but I really don't want to read it, I think I'm in. I really, you know when you do it, and then after you come back, I just don't want to know what I've put down. I'm quite reassured by my memory loss. Writing and reading it is, they're different processes. Like the writing of something, and like you said,

that feeling of getting something from you and on the page, it doesn't, you're not doing that so you can sit down and read it. No. That's not what you're doing it for. Absolutely. Did you have to read the audio book? Yes. It's excruciating.

Yeah. With some sort of polite tech person. Yes. I think it's quite intimate. Yeah. It's like, bring my dad in, I'll give him a lockdown. That could be better than this. Yeah, 100%.

Yeah, it's excretchen, isn't it? Awful. I don't think I left much out. But that's what makes it good book. You don't want to read one though. You're like, oh, I know there's more than that that happens. But it feels like writing a diary, doesn't it? If you're writing about yourself, it feels like you're talking to yourself.

And then the fact that someone else, that's what's awful in a way about the three dimensions of it. Agreed. Suddenly being out of your control. Oh, gosh. Yeah. when it's just you tapping away. Yeah. And also you can start thinking, I'm not going to go into this.

And then like you said, you know, 50 pages in. You want to tell the truth? You want to tell you? And it feels good, doesn't you think? That's good writing. That's truthful. That's good. But then when you're sat with a, you know, middle-aged man go,

can you just say that bit again when you were crying? I would have these interactions with people in cues for book signings where they would bring up something from the book. And my reaction would be, why would you bring that up out of nowhere about from my life? And then their reaction would be like, why did you write it down if you didn't want people to know it? We would just both be looking at them. This is so rude.

It's so impolite. Yeah, because to them it's like, well, it's fair game then. If you write about it, it's fair game. You obviously are happy to talk about it. You're like, no, no, I was happy to write about it. Yeah, really different. People go, it's really brave. You've been really brave.

You're like, oh, stop it. Don't know. Was I brave? I don't remember feeling brave. What did I say that made you think that? Yeah, that's really brave. is such an odd word, isn't it? Unless you've actually been brave. Also, it feels like it's just a word they're using in place or something else.

Like, I don't know. Unnecessary. It feels like they're saying, I wouldn't have said that. I wouldn't have written that. Yeah, well done. You went much further than I would. Yeah, yeah. And Sophie, tell us about the new album. So, that new album is called Perimenop. Oh, I love this name so much. It's brilliant. It's so good. It's good fun, I think. And I feel like, um,

It sums up what the album's about in more ways than just the fact that I wanted to sort of talk about, as I know, being in my mid-40s, making pop music. But also, I think the very fact that I've named it is sort of testament to actually feeling a lot, talking bravery, a lot safer and a lot braver than I probably was when I started out. I was always quite introverted and I think this is a more extrovert side of me, which I think pop music does bring out of me, actually. I think that being in the studio is just something I adore. And so I was working with amazing. people. I already knew I wanted to make another disco pop record. And then thanks to what happened with murder on dance for last year, there was all this momentum and it meant I could just get in the studio with people who maybe wouldn't have had time for me otherwise. And I just totally exploited it, basically. It's like, where at Wish List ended up with these people and then just, yeah, had a lot of fun. And yeah, I made an album I'm really excited about. So, yeah, that's coming in September. It's my eighth record. So not so many, really. That's load. It's amazing. It's But it still feels, sometimes, I mean, I feel like it's been quite a long time.

I probably could have done more. But I like to take my time and put my course. I think that sounds plenty. I think that sounds like a lot. Fine. It sounds a lot. Eight albums is a lot. And like, yeah, if it was an author saying they had eight books, you're like, oh my God.

Yeah. That's a lifetime's work. Yeah, that's a lot. Okay, fair enough. Thank you guys. Yeah. Because also some people could say, oh, I'm on my 25th album. You'd be like, I don't know any of them. Do you know what I mean?

Like, it's like, we can all just, oh, we can all do an album. Yeah. Can you do a good album? Yeah. So, thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Thank you. What a nice way to spend the time. It was so lovely. Thank you for getting me to read another book. Yeah. That's good. Thank you for reading with us again this series. We appreciate it so much.

And thank you so much for your listener suggestions. And to all of you have joined us over on Patreon. I've written your names down on my heart. We will be back again soon with another series of incredible and crucially, extremely weird books and guests. Until then, stay in touch with us. Tell us what you're reading. reading recommendations for us.

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