Roddy Doyle said: I’d like to have my bio say “He divides his time between Dublin and confusion”.
- SO’F pursued a successful career in banking, and became Ireland’s first woman Chief Dealer, before deciding to become a full-time writer. She also plays competitive badminton.
- ST is a high-flying attorney who has served on a number of public bodies (!), including an Illinois commission to study the death penalty.
- MH has worked in private security and for the police. He is a 4th Dan blackbelt and coach in ju-jitsu.
- KM and her family divide their time between their home in Chichester, West Sussex and their home in Carcassonne – in the southwest of France.
- PB lives in Washington State with her husband, children and a small herd of horses.
- SG started her working life as a television script writer before becoming a best-selling novelist.
- JB is a former lawyer who lived and practiced in Hong Kong for 12 years. He now divides his time between Vietnam and France.
Whereas I have never lived in France, Hong Kong or Washington State; never owned a herd of anything (except cats); never divided anything except chocolate cake at birthday parties; don’t have a competitive bone in my body …
I do have a black belt, but I’m not sure where it is (possibly one of the cats borrowed it). My career choices before librarianship have been limited by preschoolers, owning a B.A. (we all know what that stands for), and being paralysed by my inability to write the perfect opening line of my as yet unstarted unfinished masterwork.
Am I being unreasonable in my bitter mockery of those infuriating book cover bio summaries? Do you think they write their own? Do you think PB really owns a small herd of horses? Should I be more forgiving? Should I regard them as an encouragement to aim for greater things? Should I just lie?
And here’s your challenge for the week: pretend you are a bestselling novelist, and leave a comment below with your own bio – remember, you have to base it as much as possible on actual truth.
