Hello and welcome to Shearlex Book Club podcast with me, Heather Steele and Jordina Basky.

We are going to do things a little bit differently this time and we haven't had the

Shirelux community with a thread for this one because the idea is that when this podcast goes out,

we're going to open up the community thread on the book there. So you can all join in with us. We'll be there, Georgina and I answering any questions or discussions about romantic comedy. So yeah, let's all have a chat together. So yeah, see you there in the comments. So yeah, today we're joined by a very special guest, author and journalist, Sapphire Money Coot. Welcome, Sophia. Hello, thank you very much for having me.

Thank you so much for coming. So we're as usual going to be reading through the book,

the three of us together. We thought you'd be an amazing guest to come on because you obviously

write lots of romantic comedies yourself. I'm just going to read out this quote because I've

seen it many times in press releases and think it's brilliant.

But yeah, the amazing Ginny Cooper said that in your books, the sex is amazing and it makes me feel like a nun, which I think is just like the best compliment surely that someone like Jimmy Cooper can give to a writer.

Yeah, my mom was really thrilled with that as well.

My family really enjoyed it. Yeah.

No, that was extremely kind of her. And I couldn't, yeah, I was sort of quite daunted by that. So, um. Now do you feel when you're writing the sex has really got to be cracking? Well, my new book actually, well, we'll come onto it. My new book, the right place, there's not a sex scene. Wow. Yeah, I decided for this one.

I kind of just wanted to, you know, more plot, more story, less sex.

So we can. sex scene. Wow. Yeah. I decided for this one, I kind of just wanted to, you know, more plot, more story, less sex.

So we can get on to that later if you want. But yeah, so no sex, but there's plenty of sex in my first five books.

If I know, that's it. Yeah, plus one. Brilliant. But yes, first up, we're going to be discussing today,

a romantic comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld.

The novel is undoubtedly one of the books of last year and it just recently came out in paperback.

So obviously, don't listen to this podcast until you finish reading the book because we're going to be discussing everything, including the ending.

So, yeah, let's go for it.

So I suppose first of all, it's almost like it does what it says on the tin in a way, like romantic comedy. When I saw that was the title of the book, I was a bit like, oh, okay, being quite literal. I was quite annoyed actually. When I first heard about it and I got sent a proof before it came out, like, almost two years ago, I think now I got a proof. I was annoyed annoyed because I was when I was sort of jealous annoyed so I was like hang on some of us have been doing these for a while and I love all Curtis said of Val's previous book I love prep I love the American wife um that's the one where we all fancy George Bush yes and then we're yeah oh and then um the one about Hillary Clinton I love them and then suddenly she says she's going to write a rom-com oh, it's toward. And then the one about Hillary Clinton. I love them.

And then suddenly she says she's going to write a rom-com and cause it romantic comedy.

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