… Clare Lydon
What’s the time of the day when you feel most like yourself?
Late afternoon & evening. I work best between 3-7pm, always have. Yet I still try to shoehorn myself into being a morning person. Sometimes it works. Most of the time, I drink coffee and have a vacant stare. Then, in the evening, I love having a meal, a glass of wine and good conversation with loved ones. I used to be a night owl, but not anymore.
2. What’s your coffee order?
Nuclear-strength Americano, splash of milk.
3. Describe yourself in three words?
Driven. Distracted. Dramatic.
4. What do you think of garden gnomes?
I think they come to life at night and control your life. I have a plastic one in my garden who wears a Spurs kit (my team). He’s called Ginola the Gnome after one of our team’s stars of yesteryear. In real life, David Ginola now runs vineyards in France. I think Ginola the plastic gnome probably flies there at night and has a bottle of red and some knock-your-socks-off brie.
5. If you could have one superpower, what would that be?
Time travel, so I could go back in time and see all the musicians I deeply regret not seeing at their peak. Queen. Bowie. Madonna. Whitney. Wham. Kirsty MacColl. I’d also love to go have a cuppa with my paternal grandparents and my maternal great-grandparents who I never met. My great-grandmother was a fishmonger in turn-of-the-century Ireland, which I think is ace.
6. What makes you smile?
Spurs winning, ice-cold beer on a hot summer day, a leisurely meal with loved ones, the sea.
7. Do you believe in soulmates?
Yes, but not just one. That would make the odds of finding your soulmate almost impossible. I’ve been lucky enough to meet a few in my life: mainly friends, but also my wife.
8. If you could commit a crime and not get caught, what crime would you commit?
I’d probably invoke my time-travel rule here, go back to the wild west and hold up a bank with one of those old-school pistols you see in westerns. I don’t want to hurt anyone, but I would like to leave with a fistful of dollars. Perhaps two.
9. What makes you cry?
I’m not much of a crier, but it always used to be ER. That show made me shed so many tears. As I get older, young or tragic death. There’s been a lot of it about of late.
10. What personality trait gets you most often in trouble?
My habit of leaning in when talking to someone, and saying. “So, tell me more.”
11. What is the one thing you wish you could learn to do?
Play a barre chord on my guitar without killing my fingers. I play guitar really badly, and have never been able to stretch my fingers across the fretboard. Luckily, the Indigo Girls have a lot of three-chord songs that require no barre. Gawd bless em!
12. What is the one thing most people believe in, but you don't?
Ant and Dec.
13. In a crowded room, what makes you notice a woman?
Eyes. Smile. Shoes.
14. Best thing that ever happened to you as a lesfic author?
Getting a whole new set of friends in the form of fellow writers and readers. Nobody warns you about that when you first start to write. I thought it was just going to be lil’ old me, typing away, vacant stare, strong coffee. But no! People read my books and write to tell me, and I’ve met readers and writers who are now my genuine friends online and IRL. That’s something pretty special.
15. What would be the title of your autobiography?
“So, tell me more.”
16. Three women you’d have over for dinner and what would you serve?
Lauren Graham, Alexis Bledel, Amy Sherman-Palladino. A Gilmore Girls triple threat! I’d want to know all the gossip from set and would ask Amy how it feels to have created the perfect series. I’d serve champagne, seafood, steak, red wine, and cheesecake. My wife’s a good cook, she can help. Although she’s a bigger GG fan than me, so she also might faint.
17. What is the one memory you’d give anything to relive?
Our wedding day. I was too nervous and worried to truly enjoy it! I am a natural Virgo, a born worrier, and quite often that’s really annoying.
18. What’s in your fridge right now?
Curly Wurlys, champagne, milk, tomato puree, lemons, limes, chillies, roasted chicken thighs, rocket, quorn scotch eggs, craft beer, Coke Zero, cornichons, mustard (English, Dijon, wholegrain), ketchup, jam, marmalade, mayonnaise (normal, garlic, lemon, burger), ham, eggs, chipotle, Thai curry paste, horseradish, olives, butter. And some out-of-date pesto that we might still use.
19. If you could choose one song to be played every time you enter a room, what song would that be and why?
You’re So Vain by Carly Simon, because it always makes me smile, and I do have a love affair with mirrors.
20. If you could have an evening-long conversation with one author, who would that be and what would you talk about?
It would have to be Judy Blume. She wrote such era-defining books when I was growing up and she’s still writing today. Plus, she runs a bookshop, too. I’d ask her about the challenges of getting noticed in the 80s, how she wrote those books like Forever, Super Fudge and Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret. Also, I’d love to delve into her writing process and see what I can take away from it.
Clare Lydon’s latest book, a wonderful romance featuring the beloved fake relationship trope, Change Of Heart can be found here: mybook.to/ClareLydonChange