Sarah was one of the tutors on the Arvon course I took back in January, and she was kind enough to invite me to visit her blog shortly afterwards to help publicise the competition I was running to promote my anthology*. Well, now Sarah has a new book out - and I'm very pleased to be able to return the favour.
The book in question is Sarah's first published collection of poetry, called "You Do Not Need Another Self-Help Book". You can listen to Sarah reading selected poems on her pop-up poetry tour, the itinerary of which you can find HERE. And I'd urge you to go and check them out; they're very good.
Sarah's gift with language is the ability to take the very ordinary and commonplace and approach it from a new angle, sometimes revealing surprising beauty, sometimes unmasking unsettling darkness. She's won considerable acclaim for her novels (I've read "Something Beginning With..."; "Tell Me Everything" is next on my list), and from the sounds of things her poetry is being equally well received.
Sarah has a feature on her blog called Five Sentences, in which she invites her guests to complete a set of statements. In honour of her visit, I have basically stolen the idea, but given it a twist in that I've asked her to provide the beginnings to a set of 'endings' I concocted. Over to you, Sarah...
- Until I realise how much time I've wasted, watching videos of dogs on YouTube always makes me smile.
- I collect photographs of benches, and their memorial plaques, on a blog - www.aquietsitdown.blogspot.com - although not many people know that.
- Watching live bands play, wandering round city streets with my camera and good installation art never fails to inspire me.
- I would love to be one of those people who say, 'Oh, I only drink Champagne, dahling' - but only if somebody else paid for it!
- My family, true friends, laughter, cocktails, good food, the sun and plenty of time to talk or to say nothing are the ingredients for my perfect day.
Thank you - and that does sound like a perfect day. To celebrate, why not treat yourself to some Champagne? It's virtual, so you can drink as much as you like and still be okay to drive home.