Come read with me…  Interview with Margate author Daisy Buchanan — ‘cene Magazine

4. Your podcast, You’re Booked, interviews writers on their favourite books. Who has been your favourite guest and which book has been discussed the most?

I’d have to say Marian Keyes because she’s my very favourite writer ever – and she’s so warm, generous and gorgeous and enthusiastic and smart. She inspires me as a writer, and with her Big Fan Energy. Bookwise – the work of Marian Keyes?! Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood has been coming up a lot, I haven’t read it yet. One of my very favourite recommendations from a guest came from Bella Mackie, who had been reading Chopin in Kentucky by Elizabeth Heichelbech. Loved it. 

5. Read Yourself Happy is incredibly well researched from both a literary and mental-health perspective. What was your favourite stat or fact you discovered?

Favourite isn’t quite the right word, but this is the one that sticks in my brain: psychology professor Alison Holman studied a group of people who watched six hours or more of news every day for a week after the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013 and found that as a result they were more traumatised than the people who were actually there. What we allow into our brains has the most enormous impact on us and our mental well-being. A reading habit gives us back some control when it comes to making our minds a positive, safe place for us to live in. 

6. What books or authors are your inspirations?

MARIAN KEYES! But also Sophie Kinsella because her writing is energetic and hilarious. Anne Lamott, especially Bird by Bird, because she’s patient, wise and kind. Anita Brookner because she’s so sharp and unafraid when it comes to observing people – and she’s so funny. And she started writing novels quite late in life – I’m about to turn 40 and I’m very excited by people who do their best work after 50. And I love any book where nothing happens. It feels like permission to write quietly.

7. Your Substack Creative Confidence Clinic inspires both readers and writers. Now you’re doing writing mentorship retreats in Greece – tell us more.

The Greek Island Retreat is a Read Yourself Happy retreat with Aweventurer at the end of September, and there are still places left! I love a retreat and this is going to be a space for people who love the message of the book and want even more of a sense of the way that reading can make us calmer and more joyful and change our lives. Basically, every retreat I’ve ever been on has resulted in one of the all-time great WhatsApp groups. I think it’s going to be the trip of a lifetime and it’s a way for all of us introverts to make friends.

8. Finally, favourite Kent literary fact/activity/thing?

I was completely stuck in the middle of [writing] Insatiable and I didn’t know how to end it, and I worked it out as I walked past the TS Eliot shelter, in the pounding rain, soaked and sweaty from the gym and carrying two heavy Bags for Life from Morrisons. That, and interviewing Tessa Hadley for Margate Bookie. 

Read Yourself Happy is published by Penguin (£16.99)

FOR THE WEB https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/772156/read-yourself-happy-by-daisy-buchanan/

ABOUT ZAHRA BARRI