Interview with a Novelist.

FX FICTIONAL RADIO PROGRAMME STING


Presenter
So, Amanda Walters you are a real working mother. You're a journalist, a columnist and mother of two beautiful children and now you've just written a best selling novel on the subject of women doing it all, entitled 'Isn't She Amazing. ' Tell us Amanda how do you do it?

Amanda
I don’t know, I guess...I'm just amazing.

Presenter
How many hours a day to you work?

Amanda
Oh roughly....22.

Presenter
So how often do you see your children?

Amanda
Mmm, well I get back from work after they've gone to bed and generally I've left the house in the morning before they've got up and on weekends they go to my parents, you know just to give me a break.

Presenter
So it would be fair to say you hardly see them at all?

Amanda
What, no. I've got photos of them on my desk right next to a signed picture of Jeremy Paxman.

Presenter
So would you say having children has changed your life?


Amanda
Oh yes definitely, before I had kids I was a size eight and now I'm a ten, still we all have to make sacrifices eh? That's why I've given up potatoes, an Aitkens diet a day keeps the unsightly child bearing flabby hips away.

Presenter
Your book, "isn't she Amazing' is based on your weekly Guardian column by the same title.

Amanda
Yes, I write about my family life you know just the little things, the school run, supermarket shop, dental appointments, sports days all those details that go into family life.

Presenter
Do you actually do all the things you write about?

Amanda
Well I am a working mother.

Presenter
Do you have any help at all?

Amanda
I have a nanny to look after the children, a housekeeper to run the home, a man who does the garden and a chap that comes in to do odd jobs, oh no hang on, he's my husband.

Presenter
So in effect, though you write about an ordinary woman struggling to earn a living and look after her family you don't actually do anything yourself?

Amanda
Yes I do, I write it all down.

Presenter
Yes but I think you'll have to agree, your books' a bit of a fraud isn't it?


Amanda
In what way?


Presenter
Well you set out to make other women feel guilty by detailing all the extraordinary things you manage to accomplish as a working mother when in fact; you don't do any of it at all.

Amanda
Well of course not, how the hell would I get the bloody thing written if I had to do everything myself, don't be stupid.

Presenter
But surely that's the whole premise of your novel, women having it all?

Amanda
Exactly, you said it, it's fiction honey, now be an angel and pop to the loo for me, and I’m dying for a wee.


The End