In conversation with AJ PEARCE
The bestselling novelist talks to Zoe West about her vintage magazine collection and friendships
‘The problem pages really captured my imagination’
Emmy Lake, the budding wartime journalist, charmed her way into our hearts in AJ Pearce’s debut novel, Dear Mrs Bird. An instant hit, it became a Sunday Times bestseller, a Richard & Judy Book Club pick, and was shortlisted for The British Book Awards Debut of the Year. In Mrs Porter Calling – the third book in the series – we are reunited with Emmy and her pals at Woman’s Friend magazine, along with a glamorous, overbearing new owner, who is about to change everything. AJ Pearce lives in Hampshire with her two golden retrievers.
I have always loved magazines, going back to the days when comics were delivered to our door. Twinkle was my first. You would quite often receive free gifts with it. There’s nothing like owning your own ‘diamond’ ring. I later progressed to Jackie, and then monthly magazines like 19 and Honey.
My first book, Dear Mrs Bird, was inspired by a 1939 copy of Woman
I found on ebay. I discovered everything we still have in magazines today – fashion, beauty and current affairs – but it was like opening a window into another era. I started collecting them and now have around 600 magazines. It was the problem pages that really captured my imagination. During the war, women went into war work, while keeping their families going, despite huge challenges, and advice in the columns became more broad-minded. I started thinking about what it would be like for a narrow-minded Edwardian agony aunt to be working with a young, positive woman whose mother was part of the suffragette movement.
In Mrs Porter Calling, Emmy explores what is important to her – and what might threaten that. And so we have Mrs Porter – the new publisher and owner of the magazine. She is privileged and entitled, and thinks owning a magazine is just another one of her jolly escapades, when it means so much more to the people who work there, and its readers.
Like many women during the war, Emmy had to grow up fast and I knew how that would take shape. I’m never far away from the characters – I carry them around in my head. If I see something on Twitter, I think, ‘Oh, Bunty would like that.’ That’s when I know I need to step away for a bit.
I’d like to be more like Emmy. She has that ability to not give up under immense pressure. When I think of the toughest parts of my life, I realise I got through them thanks to other people; it helps to know that someone is listening, whether it’s a best friend or a complete stranger. In one of the agony aunt columns, I read about a woman who had lost her husband and child. She’d just about given up, but the writer could see how close to the edge the reader was and reached out to her.
Friendships are very important to me. One of the best things to have come out of my writing books is my friendships with other authors. I went on a retreat recently with some of them, including Katie Fforde. I met her and Judy Astley on a course they ran 12 years ago and I was star-struck. Now they’re my friends and they are so supportive.
So much of the research for my books is taken from the magazines.
I look at the recipes, the brands that were being advertised and the clothes they wore. I also had to ask questions like, ‘How did The Savoy hotel operate during that time?’ An archivist there showed me a 1943 menu, which was such a privilege.
There will be more Emmy Lake books. I know that I’ve got at least one more in me – and maybe more.
Write what you want to, not what you think will sell. That would probably be my advice to anyone with aspirations to be an author. And it doesn’t matter what age you start. I didn’t have my first novel published until I was
52. It’s never too late.