Angelina Melwani’s novel has been shortlisted for the Avon x Mushens Entertainment Prize. Find out more about Angelina below.
Meet Angelina:
I marketed posh skin care, got married, had a baby, launched my own business teaching Sing and Sign, started writing a book and was on Richard and Judy. I got divorced, abandoned my book and single-handedly raised my daughter while writing a magazine column – Mummy on the Edge. I re-married, sold my business, and presented a radio show. I currently sew badly, attend Collage Writing Room and volunteer with Food Bank Aid and Sex Matters.
Can you give us a one-line pitch of your novel?
What happens when your psychopathic ex is out to stop publication of your tell-all novel and your neurotic dead mother thinks she’s helping by haunting you through the hoover.
What inspired you to start writing your novel?
My mid-life crisis, which led to the realisation that life is like a toilet roll: The further you get, the less you’ve got left and the faster it goes.
Where is your favourite place to write?
Close to Blanche, my tailor’s dummy. She’s great company. And very quiet.
What are three essentials you need when writing?
- Headphones streaming random spa music because it drowns out the inner critic – and she can’t sing along and distract me either.
- Endless supply of quality Real Housewives episodes to reward a productive day or soothe writerly angst (mostly the latter).
- My demons.
If you were stuck on a desert island what three books would you take with you?
- All of Helen Lewis’s “The Bluestocking” newsletters with the articles she links to, printed out and attached – that counts as a book, right?
- Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China because it’s my mum’s copy and I started it but got sidetracked and want to finish it.
- Desert Islands for Dummies (for its chapter on how to build a functioning laptop from seaweed and coconuts.)
Find out more about each Avon x Mushens Entertainment shortlisted author for the next five days.
