Get Booked – Michael Steward, Harvest & Reviews 110422

Hello, you're listening to Get Booked, the women's and men's radio station. I'm Hazel Butterfield and a huge book fan, so I love doing this show. Get Booked is all about talking to authors, chatting about anything and everything books related, and all the joy, enlightenment, and escape that good books can provide. Sit back and let us entertain you with a different guest each week, sharing who they are, what they do, and what inspires them. Opening discussions and offering support via the incredible writing community out there. Come and join us, get involved. And if you want to catch up on previous shows, you can at womensradiostation.com/shows/getbooked and on our SoundCloud. Today we have such an incredible show for you. We are going to be interviewing Michael Stewart, the author of his recently released debut Harvest, and we're going to be looking at some books I've recently read and loved, some fantastic reviews to keep you entertained. My first set of book reviews are entitled "That's the Thing About Books: They Let You Travel Without Moving Your Feet." I love some of these fantastic book quotes. You can find out more about my book reviews on hazelbutterfield.com. .com. Now first up, we have 30 Things I Love About Myself by Radhika Sanghani. This is a great story about Nina embracing turning 30 with all the expectations from society, exacerbated by her overly critical mother, that manages to be simultaneously self-deprecating and life-affirming at the same time. We should all do this and own who we are, embrace what we are, and everything that makes us different, positively attributing anything that others like to put a negative spin on that doesn't serve us. We need to be kinder to ourselves and worry less about what people want to put on us, and we all need to find our own way. 30 Things I Love About Myself is just a fantastic story. Absolutely loved it. Next up, we have Dangerous Women: 50 Reflections on Women, Power, and Identity. We did recently have one of the editors of this book, Jo Shaw, who featured on Get Booked a couple of weeks ago. Now, mm-hmm, giving women agency, that makes them dangerous. Giving them knowledge and the ability to defend themselves makes them dangerous. Destabilizing what has been accepted and expected for too long, it is dangerous. Whatever next? Women who don't fall into line are dangerous. They affect the status status quo. They incite jealousy and fear of the unknown. What? Should I be rethinking my or the traditional path? This challenges a concept of what is expected, a path easily laid out for us. Very dangerous. I will continue on with my sarcasm, um, although who is more dangerous, those forging a new alternative way or those who react with fearful outrage and persecution at what they are comfortable with Being threatened. If women can think for themselves, that threatens thousands of years of historical traditions. We know where we are with traditions. Negative stereotypes are used to label women to be derogatory and warn others not to follow suit. Do you want to be labeled this way? The ultimate didactic narrative of Adam and Eve and how she was punished for just not doing as she was told. Constantly overwhelmed with conscious and unconscious patriarchal rhetoric spun for years. We are conscious and unconscious of victims of patriarchy. This book is a great selection of tales of dangerous women and turns the concept on its head. We should strive to be dangerous women, and we should be celebrating them. You can find out more about Dangerous Women: 50 Reflections on Women, Power, and Identity at dangerouswomenproject.com. Now next up, a fantastic story, The Former Boy Wonder by Robert Graham. This book follows the tale of freelance music writer Peter Duffy as he descends into a full-blown midlife crisis. No work for freelance writers, teenage son won't speak to him, marriage in tatters, and chasing his first love, or at least the idea of what it possibly was. A very funny and a frank fictional story of the time-old ideal that the grass could be greener elsewhere, especially when nostalgia and mundanity hits us, often coincidentally for many at our midway point in life. Imagining the what-ifs are a great way to pass the time when you feel that excitement is harder to come by. What could possibly be the harm, eh? That was The Former Boy Wonder by Robert Graham. A great little escape. Now another review for you is A Hundred Voices by Miranda Raskowski, again another recent guest on Get Booked here at Women's and Men's radio station. A hundred years after getting the vote, a hundred female writers share their story. A fantastic selection of voices talking about their own achievements relevant to them. We're all different, different goals, different backgrounds, history, challenges, and priorities. It doesn't have to be big, it just needs to matter to us. The variety of such stories in this book gives a great scope of ideas for us to identify with and appreciate of others, to help us recognize our own achievements, as too often we get caught up in the comparative nature of the achievement of other people that is regularly irrelevant We need to recognize what we like about ourselves, sing our own praises, focus on what we have achieved, and use that to spur us on. We've come so far in 100 years, and yet still there is further to go, which will be a constant challenge as the world changes around us. But women are strong, and books like this remind us of this when media panic and the less appealing side of society tries to tell us otherwise. Mental health is such a prevalent topic right now, and a lot of it can be attributed in some way to feelings of failure and loneliness. And 100 Voices shares and promotes our successes. It's about women, but it is for absolutely everyone. You can find out more about this at 100voicesfor100years.com, and you can listen into previous shows. As a quick reminder, on the Women's Radio Station SoundCloud. Now, if you come across a book that you've read and you think, oh, I want to share the love, you can actually get onto hazelbutterfield.com and you can either send me a review or you can record it and we'll get it played out on Get Books. So sharing is caring, as I like to say. Right now it is time for our chat with a crime journalist, author, and Ipswich Town FC supporter Michael Stewart talking to us about his debut novel Harvest, an incredibly dark thriller set in Beijing about a British teacher Laura Clayton who goes missing, and former Met detective turned private investigator Ed Vaughan is hired to search for her. But within hours of arriving in the Chinese capital to start their investigation, Vaughan and partner Andy McEwan are brutally attacked. The injuries are superficial, but the message is clear: stop looking for the girl or else. But with the help of a confident young translator and a consular officer, the pair begin to unravel clues into Laura's disappearance. With their own lives at stake, the case leads the two private eyes to a place darker and more depraved than they could ever imagine. Not one to read if your own children are embarking on their own overseas adventure, or maybe it is, maybe it is. This book got me hooked booked and kind of semi-reminded me of my own adventures traveling abroad when I was a bit younger. Who we can trust and crossing that line of adventure and danger and the murky underworld. Thank you for joining us today on Get Booked. Why don't we start with you telling our listeners a bit about yourself? Hi there, yeah, um, so basically I, I work as a crime journalist, crime reporter for a regional newspaper, the East Anglian Daily Times in Suffolk. So I spend a lot of time in the Crown Court, Ipswich Crown Court, and Suffolk Magistrates' Court, but also kind of working on other stories, crime statistic type stories, anything along those lines really. So I'm, I guess I'm already immersed in, in that sort of world in a way. I do have— I'm married, I have two young children, and I live in Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk. So yeah, that's a little bit about me. So I can imagine when your kids suddenly turn around to you and say, hey, Mum, Dad, thinking about going travelling, how are you going to feel about that? Because it's everybody's nightmare, isn't it? Yeah, that's right. I think I'm quite keen for them to travel, really. I mean, this whole story came about when I was traveling with my wife. We went on an around-the-world honeymoon trip, and we spent 6 weeks in China. So that was where the first kind of light bulb moment for this novel came about. But no, I think, I think I'll be keen. I mean, they're very young at the moment, and 6 and 4, so they're not quite at that age just yet, but I think I'll be keen for him to go out. I mean, I still— I'm sure I'll be extremely worried about it all, but I would be keen for him to see, um, you know, different, different cultures and different— meet different people, for sure. Well, that's the thing, isn't it? That's why I said in the intro, it's that kind of that line of adventure. And I know that I've been ex— I've extensively traveled in the Middle East, in Southeast Australia, America, everywhere, and And now being a parent myself, I see how it must have been so incredibly worrying for my mum. And you do come across situations where you think, wow, what an adventure, yeah, let's go and all hire a campervan together and go off into the sticks or just really immerse yourself with the local culture. And sometimes it's just not that simple, is it? No, that's right. Yeah, it's a difficult one because you, you know, you obviously want your kids to see that life, don't you, and see that different side of the world and all these wonderful places there is. But of course, as we all know, it's kind of fraught with a bit of danger. But I guess it's all about that letting go, isn't it? But you're absolutely right. I, you know, I know I think back to things I've done now, I think, oh God, that could have worked out so much worse than it did. I'm sure you're the same, you know, it could have worked out really badly, that situation. Fortunately, it didn't. But as you say, I'm sure my mum and dad at the time were probably— well, they didn't know half of what was going on, probably. I most definitely did not tell my mum about some of the things I got up to, and there was definitely some close shaves where it was a case of, 'This is an adventure. Oh no, it's not. Run.' Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But I guess I wanted to explore that a little bit in the book, not so much from a parent's perspective, although obviously the parents— the parent is in the book, but more from a factor of missing persons investigations abroad and how difficult that can be for people who have lost people abroad. And perhaps, you know, the police in that country are not particularly interested in what's going on and the sort of support that's available to them. So that was partly, you know, I want to explore that in the book. And I think what is explored in the book is also how there are people trained to notice people who are abroad that possibly aren't in their comfort zone, or maybe don't have the confidence to stand up for themselves, or be a little bit more naive as to what goes on in certain cultures. And it's terrifying, isn't it? I mean, I must say, I, as I said before, I did travel quite extensively myself, but I did I did actually go around Southeast Asia for a good month or two and took my 76-year-old grandma who was— Oh wow. Yeah, she was such an adventurous lady and at 76 she had more energy than myself when I was, you know, 19. And some of the things that even we got up to, you know, you kind of walk down the road in Thailand, Khao San Road, and you got chatting to people and there were people who couldn't get a room and so you ended up sharing with random people and I just kind of think we did just share a random room with a lady. It could have been so different, but it was also— it was a fantastic experience where, you know, my grandma talked about it for 20 years later, just going, yeah, it was random, it was brilliant, but it could have turned out so differently. So if you'd like to tell our listeners a little bit about, without giving it away too much, the storyline, what actually happened to Laura. Yes, so Laura is, as you said, she's quite a vulnerable sort of early 20s girl. She's lost her father a few years before, and she's a little bit vulnerable, and she's sort of seeking this new life abroad. So she takes a position teaching English at a school in Beijing. And then the book kind of cuts back and forth to sort of her point of view with regard to what has been going on with her. And unfortunately, there are people who are kind of taking advantage of her, you know, sort of gained her trust and taken her to a place where— not very nice place where, where you know, other, other girls are being held, and it's from that that kind of— she has to— the investigators have to find out where she is. So I'm trying not to give too much away. It's quite hard. I know, I know. It was, it was interesting. I was actually telling some of my friends about this storyline and how I was looking forward to speaking to you to find out where the inspiration came from in terms of whatever you might have come across on your travels Um, yeah, but there's, there's such a fine line in terms of who you trust, especially when you fall in love. And if, if we went through life not trusting people, oh, where would you, where would you ever end up? And it's— this is what happens. She does essentially get groomed, doesn't she? That's right. And she thinks she's in love, and you know people are very good at making people feel like they are genuine, and this is what we come across, and you don't necessarily need to go to Beijing to come across this situation. So I think it's got so many different levels to it. It's brutal, it's incredibly brutal. I mean, did you get the idea for the elements of brutality in Harvest from your crime reporting? I suppose there are aspects to it, which helped certainly. I mean, I don't— I fortunately in Suffolk I've not come across anything quite as brutal as that, but certainly aspects of, you know, policing, aspects of the criminal justice system, stuff like that certainly helped me to write it, definitely. I think initially I kind of wanted to be a book about a cult. I think that's where I started off. I, I, um, I was in Hong Kong and I got a leaflet for, um, Falun Gong, which is— I've kind of based one of the organizations on in the book. Um, and I started doing a bit of research into cults, and that, and that's kind of where, where the book began. It didn't turn out to be exactly like that, as you, as you probably know, but, um, I, I started to do quite a lot of research on, on cults and how people can as you say, kind of indoctrinate people. It was really interesting to see, you know, cults throughout the ages really, in terms of how they've evolved and how there's still some out there now, people just taking advantage of people. And that, and that's where the idea, the base of the idea probably came from. So while you were on your travels, in no way were you inspired by something that you particularly heard, or was it that particular cult that you'd heard has such a similar murky underworld as to what Harvest is based on. Yeah, I don't think there's any one particular incident that happened when I was away that kind of, kind of sparked the background, but, um, definitely when I started researching Falun Gong, that, that set off a few bells. And, um, and I guess in a way I did meet a lot of young people when I, when I was um, abroad traveling. My wife and I were a little bit older, we were sort of in our early 30s, but a lot of the kind of, um, travelers were a lot sort of 10 years younger than that, weren't they? Sort of in their teens or early 20s. So I kind of guess my wife and I sort of saw the naivety of some of them, you know. We, we weren't so much, um, we were a little bit older and kind of, I guess, we weren't susceptible to some of this stuff. But I, I, I guess the naivety that I saw on that trip from some of the young people doing some crazy pretty crazy things, perhaps that played into my mind a bit. Well, yeah, definitely. And I must say, I had— when I read this book, um, it was actually just a little bit before you published it, so thank you very much for letting me read. No problem. It was, it was one of those ones that it was quite self-reflective where I was, although it was incredibly gripping, I was sitting there just going, oh, what I used to get up to. And it's just that fine line, and in a way we want to shield our children from the dangerous elements of society, but also let them know just what to watch out for. I mean, do you think it's more dangerous now than it was? Um, it's a very good question. I think the dangers are still out there. I would say that due to kind of mobile phones and the technology we have nowadays, it's probably harder for people to, to go missing. Although people still do every day, don't they, as we know. But I would say because of the mobile phones and the laptops and everyone, you know, people can be tracked a lot easier, can't they? Um, so in that respect, in terms of missing people, I would say that probably it's a little bit safer now. But I, you know, But as we know, there are still dangers all over the world, really, aren't there? Unfortunately, there are indeed. And I must say that I've just turned 40. I started my traveling when I was like 17, 18, all the way up to 24. And I realized the other day, especially when I went on this kind of trip down memory lane from reading Harvest, I was like, oh, okay, when I was traveling in Southeast Asia, that's when I set up my first ever Hotmail account. And although I had a mobile mobile phone, I wouldn't dare use it abroad because it would— I'd probably have to get a huge loan to be able to even use it. So there was no way for my mum to actually really get in touch with me unless I chose to email her. And it's, yeah, definitely very interesting. Do you think— I mean, you've just— you've released this on the 24th of February. Are you getting quite a bit of feedback from people? Yeah, so Yeah, I think the reviews have been pretty favorable so far. I've been quite pleased. I think a lot of people said it's a, you know, a good page-turner and a quite unique plot. And, you know, they like the characters as well— Ed Vaughan and Andy McEwan— they like the characters in the book. And so, yes, it's a nice feedback. I mean, obviously I'm self-published, so the marketing side of it for me has been a little bit harder probably than than I found the writing, to tell you the truth. But I'm starting to get my head around that a little bit now. And yeah, it's going okay, it's going okay. I'm actually just going through the process at the moment of getting my own book published, and I see that you've self-published through Amazon, which is quite an economical route for starting. Yeah, yeah, I mean, absolutely. I mean, I've had to pay a little bit in terms of proofing and decent cover, but it's free to upload it onto Amazon and you can just get the royalties that way. There's kind of a— I've enrolled it into Kindle Unlimited as well, which is kind of like your Netflix where they pay a subscription and then they can read your book for free within that subscription. You still get paid per page read, but also So people can get it as an ebook, people can get it as a paperback if they want, and it's kind of print on demand with the paperback, so there's no massive runs that you have to worry about, you know, thousands of books being printed and not sold. So I think it's a really good way of doing it. I mean, I'm completely new to it myself, obviously this is my debut novel, so it's all been a bit of a learning, steep learning curve for me, but for me it seems like a really good way to do it. I think it's It's so hard to get published these days because most publishers don't want to hear from you, they want to hear from an agent, and it's very hard to get an agent when you're just starting off, even somebody who's actually in your industry as well, and I'm sure you've got particular contacts, but it seems to be that all the publishing houses want to go with people who are famous or with a ridiculous amount of followers regardless of the actual quality of the writing. And this is what I love about this show because it gives people the opportunity— people seem to go for all these books that have thousands and thousands of reviews, or they're from somebody famous because they get to get the information of their book out there. And I really must urge some people to go for these indie authors because there's some incredible writing out there. And until you've released your first one, it's been a huge success, it's it's harder to kind of get the momentum, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. I mean, as you say, it is so hard. I mean, not only are you up against some really established authors, but you're also up against everyone else who's self-publishing, so, which is thousands of people, isn't it? So it's a really tough market, and as you say, unless you're a celebrity or you've already got millions of followers, it's it's very difficult to get that foot in the door when you're a debut novelist. But, you know, I've always felt that hopefully the writing will shine through eventually. And as you say, I'm sure there's loads of hidden gems out there waiting to be unearthed, but I just hope mine's one of them. Well, I'm very, very lucky working for GetBooked because I do come across all these of incredible debut and self-published authors. And with the pandemic, so many people who just never had the time to write a book suddenly got to do it. And I very rarely actually read the mainstream books these days because I get inundated with the indies. And it's just— I feel so incredibly lucky to have the opportunity and to be able to go down that route I'm more incentivized to read these books. I must urge all of our listeners to search out these indie authors. And if you check out hazelbutterfield.com, I tend to generally only read the— those that have been self— who have self-published or are just emerging into the market. And the writing is incredible. There's some of the emerging work, I just think it's absolutely fantastic. And to anybody anybody that's listening at the moment, if you do read some of these books, get a review on Amazon. It is so invaluable, isn't it, to you authors? Absolutely, yes. I didn't realize actually how important the reviews were until I started getting a few, and then it sort of bumped up the charts straight away, you know. And it is so, it's so valuable for authors to get those reviews, and they're quite hard to get now because obviously Amazon stamped down on, clamped down on, on these websites where you pay and get certain reviews. They've kind of protected the integrity, which is good, but of course it makes it a bit more difficult to get them now, doesn't it? So, um, yeah, if— yeah, I'll just urge anyone, if you do read it and you like it, then please, you know, leave a review for me. And have you, as you've now released this one and you, you've kind of put it to bed, you've got— have you got other ideas kind of rolling around as to what the next book is going to be? Yeah, I've started the next one actually. I'm about 10,000 words into the next one already. So, um, yeah, the next one is going to be a little bit closer to home, um, in, in London. Um, but, uh, yeah, new case for, for Vaughan and, and Andy. And so, yeah, it's going well. Can you give us a little bit of an idea? Well, this time, um, an elderly woman comes to Ed Vaughan and, um says her son has been missing for 25 years, um, and she wants help to find him. She's, she's won a little bit of money on a lottery scratch card, and she's been into— she's able to pay for Vaughn's services. And so that's the case, um, Ed and Andy trying to, um— it's almost a cold case really in many ways, but, um, yeah, searching for this, uh, the mystery of what happened to this guy 25 years previously. Oh, I love that though. And also it's the hidden kind of routes and paths that you can pick up in your line of work as well. I do think it's an absolutely fantastic book. Thank you. You're very welcome. Have you been reading anything yourself lately? I have. Well, I have a kind of confession. I only read sort of crime fiction really. I know some of your listeners will think that's a little bit one— a bit of a one-track pony, but I just stick to crime fiction. There's so much great crime fiction out there, and that's kind of what I love, so I kind of stick to that. But I've kind of got into my Australian crime fiction of late, Aussie noir stuff. So it kind of started with The Dry by Jane Harper. I don't know if you've read that, it was a really good book. And I've just finished a book called Scrublands by Mike Michael Hammer, which is kind of set in this sort of desolate Australian community where a vicar has shot 6 people dead the previous year. And he's a journalist, the main character is a journalist, and he goes back to the town to try and write a piece on the year on, and things start to unravel from there. So that was a really good book, really enjoyed that one. See, it's nice to have a kind of escape. I do like to alternate the kind of books that I read. I do like my memoirs and things that have a bit of a mental health slant, but I think, to be honest, all books have a mental health slant, because whether it's escape or understanding something else that's gone on, or just entertainment, sometimes we just need to be able to just sit there and be in our own space, and books, especially in the pandemic, have really— reading has has really taken hold of people a little bit more and getting us off social media and getting us off tech as well, which is why it's great. Although it's fantastic to have the option to have Kindle, I think you can't beat a paperback. No, I have got a Kindle and it is useful, particularly when you're going on holiday or something like that. I find it very useful, but at the same time I still buy the regular books. I haven't moved on from that yet. It's nice to have the variety, I think, because I get offered a lot of books to read and I always ask for the paperback because it's something that you can hold. You can— it's too easy when you're on your Kindle to just suddenly go, "Oh, I'll just quickly check Twitter," or this, that, and whatever, and you kind of end up in a little bit of a wormhole as well, especially with books like yours. Where something happens and you suddenly decide that you want to actually search out this particular temple that you talk about. I don't know if you do that as well, but it's very adventure-based and you suddenly go, "Oh, that sounds great!" And, you know, apart from the fact that it, you know, it feels like it's possibly going to go somewhere really dangerous, I still think this area sounds fantastic and let's go and check it out. And that's what I tend to do, but I think it's nice that you can have the option, especially if you're going on holiday, just download 6 or 7 books, but there's nothing better than sitting in a café with a book and not being like everybody else constantly on tech. And I'm one of these people that reads, I read a lot, and it's— I'm quite often that person walking around the street reading a book, and if you're on, if you've got a phone or an iPad in front of you, you're just automatically somebody it's quite annoying, but if you've got a book, people are just like, "Oh yeah, it's fine, they're not looking where they're going, but they're reading, it's fine, it's literature." Yeah, I agree, I agree. But yeah, it is nice to have the variety. Now, a couple of things that I like to ask the guests on Get Booked are for 3 top tips on just trying to achieve good mental health and mental well-being, what would they be from you? I think for me, exercise really helps. I get myself out sort of 2 or 3 times a week for, for a jog. I do it in the early mornings. I'm kind of— I can't sort of stick exercise after a long day at work. I struggle to do it, but when I get up straight away and do it around the local park for a few miles, I just think that helps so much and it kind of sets me up for the day. I always feel a lot more relaxed and a lot more focused on the day ahead after I've been for a run. So it kind of clears the air. So, I mean, exercise of any description is good, isn't it? But for me, it's jogging, which works for me quite well. So that's one. Yeah. Secondly, I would say reading, as you said. I think, you know, that ability to kind of escape into and get away from, as you said, technology and just escape into a completely different world. Like I said, I've been in the Australian outback, a small town in Australian outback, for the last week or so. So it just gives you that opportunity to escape real life and shut it down a little bit, doesn't it? And the third thing would probably be spending, you know, some good time with family and friends. I appreciate that, you know, everyone's circumstances are different, but for me, I love I love spending time with my two little girls, that's really important to me, getting out in the garden with them, taking them to the park, doing all that kind of thing, that really helps me to focus on the day ahead. And just really make sure that you're connecting with them, and I must say, with them being 4 and 6, do it as much as you can because as soon as they get to the ages of my children, which is 12 and 15, it's just it's a kind of cacophony of grunts and complaints and— I don't want to go there, I don't want to go there. I know I will get there eventually, they'll get there eventually for sure. And I used to love reading to my children, I'd do it for absolutely hours, it was like an on and off switch at bedtime as well. My kids could go to bed at 8 o'clock and until they've had their book, they're just— that switch hasn't been turned. And as soon as you've read a book, that's it, they are out for the count. And I used to absolutely love that. And now they won't let me read anything to them. I'm far too boring, and my voice is— that I try to convey across to them while reading anything, it's just, yeah, I mean, I'm incredibly embarrassed. Embarrassing. So do enjoy it, do enjoy spending time with your family until they suddenly change. It would appear that my son's girlfriend likes spending more time with me at the moment. Oh, okay, well that's something. Yeah, much to his absolute disgust. But yeah, I think that's probably why I'm even— I started this show when I started being able to read a little bit more because I didn't have the children children's books to read because they wouldn't let me anymore. Oh right. Anyway, I digress, I digress. Yes, yes. Although, although, to be fair, do you have a favourite children's book at the moment that they insist? It's the one that basically you've read 100 times in the last 100 days. Yeah, it's Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson. Have you, have you come across that one? Yes, I have. We used to actually have that. Do you know when you have the books where they've got the sounds with the sounds down the side? Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, we used to have Room on the Broom with the sounds down the side. That was great for the first week, and then I absolutely despised it. Well, I must say, credit to Julia Donaldson, because I think all of her stories are fantastic children's stories, but yeah, Room on the Broom is certainly flavour of the month at the moment, for sure. Yeah, brilliant, absolutely. Now, something else that I also like to add else, because we've been talking about social media and how it can be a little bit of a wormhole, sometimes positive, sometimes negative. We need to try and— I think it's good for our mental health to be able to find something else that distracts us or find something that's a bit more of a positive influence. And is there somebody in the public eye that you think is smashing it out the park or a good person to just kind of absorb? Well, for me at the moment, it's— it has to be President Zelensky, doesn't it, from Ukraine? I mean, wow. What an inspiration. What, you know, the courage and, you know, the determination that he's shown in the face of such adversity has been, well, it's been phenomenal. I don't, you know, I think that's shown many leaders across the world, um, you know, how to lead almost. I mean, that's how you lead a country, isn't it? Um, so yeah, for me, he's been right up there in recent weeks as we see this terrible thing unfolding in Ukraine. I think in regards to him and just how much he's coming across on social media, it is— well, just in the news, he's fantastic. But do you think it's got something to do with the fact that he doesn't have a political background? I think politics kind of ruins politicians, doesn't it? Almost, yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, I think he was— wasn't he a comedian or an actor or something before? He was an actor who basically played the part of of a random— I think it was like a random teacher that just ended up becoming the same position as what he has now. And it was one of those situations where, because he was supposedly a nobody and he just had the good of the people at heart and he hadn't been ruined by politics, and the program just kind of blew up. And then someone said, "I love this, you should actually become the prime minister of the Ukraine." And he went, "Yeah, cool, I'll do it." got 70% of the votes. Wow, I didn't know that. Yeah, it's incredible. I mean, come on, this is going to be— in the next year or two, this is going to be a Netflix special where— I mean, God knows who's going to play him because he was actually the original actor of the story. And you just think it's going to be unbelievable. It's obviously got quite a horrific slant to the story now, but also you know, what an incredible influence he's had on the situation. And, you know, fingers crossed that, you know, he carries on the way he is and he gets a resolution of some sort sooner rather than later. Well, thank you so much for chatting to us today, and I must urge our listeners to go and check out Harvest by Michael Stewart. And just to point out, it's Stewart with a D, so it's easier for people to find. And it was released on the 24th of February. Fantastic book, and please, when you read it— and you will love it— do write a review because it is so invaluable. And thank you so much for joining us here on women's radio station and men's radio station. No problem, thanks very much for having me. You're very, very welcome. I do love a good old chinwag. That was Michael Stewart talking about his debut Harvest, which you can get hold of on Amazon. Now time for a few more book reviews. I have been storming through the books of late and there are some fantastic releases either just released or just about to come out. And one that I thoroughly loved, it was so incredibly brutal but fantastic all the same, was One One for Sorrow by Helen Fields. I just completely and utterly love this regardless of how utterly brutal it was. One of those books that really gets you thinking about right and wrong and how the lines are never really that clear. A cacophony of emotions regarding injustice and loss, how humanity can be scary, wonderful, and earth-shattering, often simultaneously. Our first responders are incredible, but they are only human, and humans make mistakes with devastating consequences. It's just such a fantastic book, couldn't recommend it enough. Now another one I want to tell you about is a children's book. It's called Crab It Chops by J.M. McClatchy and Jade Lorley. A children's book nailing the repercussions of the vicious circle of anxiety, helping children to identify with what appears on the surface and how it rarely is the full story. Understanding, kindness, and communication is key. And it's all about, uh, a rather grumpy crab. Hmm. Um, next up we have Five Days Missing by Caroline Corcoran. What would make a new mother want to leave her newborn daughter and disappear for 5 days? Sometimes we have to fight what we think is ultimately important for our future safety and our sanity, no matter how crazy that makes us look. But what if you're consumed with Uncontrollable Psychosis. When do we know how much to trust ourselves? This is a fantastic psychological thriller and really kind of challenges perceptions of who we think we are, what we think we're capable of. And sometimes when, when there's mental health elements at play, how much can we actually trust in what is actually genuine and what isn't. That's Five Days Missing by Caroline Corcoran. So good. Um, next up I want to tell you about Wet Paint by Chloe Ashby. There is only so long that we can proceed aimlessly in our lives after experiencing trauma and being let down and not addressing how life is sending us wayward in an effort to deny reality. The British trope of 'keep calm and carry on' being upgraded to 'if I keep you at arm's length, you can't hurt me.' Hmm. Wet Paint follows a journey of 26-year-old Eve stumbling her way through life, unconsciously self-sabotaging everything available to her. Because, well, we accept a love we think we deserve, right? A fantastically written and enthralling debut from Chloe Ashby. Next up we have Angry Mother, Assertive Mother by Crystal Hayes, again another guest on a past show on Get Booked. Now I devoured this book and I have been waxing lyrical about it to my friends. It's so important for mums to have this as motherhood and the emotions it can ignite can be isolating enough. We're all different, and you just use this incredibly well-written book to help decipher what is making you angry, frustrated, sad. Do what you can and just adapt the advice where necessary. Knowledge and understanding is key, but important— most importantly, you're not alone. And I think a lot of women do feel shame, and so they hide when they're not necessarily, uh, feeling in control or comfortable with a particular situation. And that's when, like, anger comes out, just when you least expect it. So the more that we understand each other and the more that we actually share our journey with other people and not just hide away when in fact we can all support each other so much more. There's a lot of pressures on men and women in modern society, and we just need to be a bit more honest and not be so obsessed with what we see on social media about how, you know, hashtag life goals and killing it and storming through our to-do lists, when let's be honest, it is very unlikely very real. Please do go and check out Angry Mother, Assertive Mother by Christal Hayes. Now I have a few more reviews for you, but a little bit of a reminder to send in your 1-2 minute recordings of reviews of what you've read. Maybe you've written a book yourself and you want to get in touch and have a bit of a chat chat with me on GetBooked. You can either get in touch with me via hazelbutterfield.com or you can email me at hazel@womensradiostation.com. Now, another book that I really want to tell you about is called Alcohol Reconsidered: Education for Moderation by Leslie Miller and Katherine Kell Clarke, available from Amazon ebook £8.99, paperback £9.99. This book, Alcohol Reconsidered: Education for Moderation, enables you to reevaluate your relationship with alcohol, enabling you to make positive, realistic, and sustainable changes without asserting a notion of abstinence or being preachy. It's about being informed, improving well-being and productivity by making positive changes, addressing what is possibly going on, and making a decision to alter our relationship with alcohol to better our attitude toward life and ourselves. Guilt, shame, tiredness, mood swings, etc. are is so prevalent in our daily lives, and overconsumption really does its part in contributing to this. I will happily and openly state that I know I drink more than I should, as I'm sure many of you listening now could say the same. I love drinking and the social aspects of it and have no intention of giving up, but I am keen to make tweaks to help maintain a better state of mental well-being, which is what our main goal is here at Women's and Men's Radio Station. Now, a little bit more of a tongue-in-cheek book, My Child and Other Mistakes by Ellie Taylor, the comedian you've probably regularly seen on TV. It is poignant, funny, important, and very real, made even more better by I consumed it via Audible and read by Ellie herself in her unmistakable, addictively witty tone. Ellie talks about motherhood in all its glory, realism, trials, and subjectivity. What needs to change in society, and until it does, what we need to know and appreciate about the intricacies, ridiculousness, the joys, and how it's okay to be confused as hell. It's just a fantastic book, especially if you're just going into motherhood, or you've been a parent for some time, you're just sitting there thinking, "What? Is this normal?" And yes, it is normal. I must say, when I come across books like this by relatively famous people, and they're of a kind of memoir tone. I love consuming it via Audible because it just has that additional depth to it when it's read out by the actual author, somebody whose voice you've kind of got used to as well. There's always that kind of hidden edge that you just— you don't always get when consuming it visually. By, by reading a paperback. So I do think there really is a place for all the different kinds of ebook, paperback, hardbook, and Audible. And yeah, choose wisely. But I would say my favourite kind of Audible is definitely along the lines of memoirs and things that are kind of read by relatively famous people. I don't know, it just feels like like they're talking to you while you're, uh, while you're out on your walk, your runs, at the gym. Now, um, another book that I read recently, which I'm sure many of you have read, it was a debut by Sarah Pearce called The Sanatorium that just absolutely blew up beyond anyone's imagination. Um, everything that a good thriller is supposed to be Suspense, lies, misguided truths, plot twists, and family politics. Going to the latest unique architecturally phenomenal retreat enriched with history and controversy is always going to be an incredible experience, so long as you can leave when you want to, preferably not in a body bag. Although when faced with adverse and harrowing experiences, human nature tends to help us dig deep and surprise even ourselves. Absolutely fantastic book. If you haven't read The Sanatorium yet, please do. I think it's now been translated into a good 20, 30 other languages, and she has released her latest book which is in my TBR Now another one that I read which I think is again quite prevalent at the moment is The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri. It's such a beautifully written story of a harrowing fictional journey yet based on experience of the author's time working in refugee holding camps. Everyone should read this to help appreciate what refugees go through in search of safety, to encourage compassion, understanding of cultural differences and nuance. Such beautiful prose coupled with simplicity, even while tackling the subject of seeking asylum and escaping unspeakable, mindless of violence. That is, quick reminder, The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri. A lot of the books that I read, I do review and put them up on hazelbutterfield.com, and if you click onto any of the book blogs, you can click on the picture and they will often take you to somewhere where you can get hold of that book. Books are a uniquely portable magic. One of my favorite Stephen King quotes. Now this next bunch of reviews on hazelbutterfield.com kicks off with Her New Best Friend by Penny Batchelor. I loved her first novel, The Perfect Sister, as did so many others, and I stormed my way through Her New Best Friend, which did not disappoint, giving me many secrets Secrets, lies, and lots and lots of twists. Her New Best Friend is a chilling tale of a woman's worst nightmare: having an outsider infiltrate your life in a bid to take what someone deems to be theirs, all masked by friendship. We can't be suspicious of everyone, although should we? It's incredibly tiring, but unfortunately in life we do need We trust people, but who should we trust? You can check out Penny Batchelor's collaboration with author E.C. Scullion on Thriller Women at thrillerwomen.co.uk. A great selection of interviews up there. Now next up we have How to Kill Your Family by Bella Mackie. This is another one where I devoured it through audible. It was, it was quite nice just to have that kind of personable edge to it. A very dry, poignant, quick-witted, and a hilarious takedown of what so many deem to be necessary to prove we are important, what we need to feed our hashtag life goals, how our lives are so documented and connected that we are so open to being infiltrated. When someone has wronged you and they're going around causing constant misery to so many people, how far do you go to rectify the situation? Revenge is so all-consuming. It tastes sweet, but how far is too far? Killing your whole family is definitely a level. Um, how to kill your family by Bella Mackie. Next up we have Finding My Right Mind by Vanessa Potter. Author Vanessa Potter woke up one day to find herself blind and paralyzed. As she recovered, she was stunned to discover that it was meditating, not drugs, that saved her mind. Finding My Right Mind is a story detailing the process The experiment undertaken using, um, EEG, a diary of the process, the pitfalls, the highs, lows, and realizations, described as a consciousness roadmap from mindfulness to psychedelics. The theory is great, but how did it actually work out? Such a great documented journey that just kind of offers up an alternative way And I think it's good that we explore alternatives. There's not one particular way that suits absolutely everybody. We are all different, and this is a joy of reading books like this that just help us to understand different ways and possibly figuring out if that is something that's going to work for us. Hmm. And we did actually have Vanessa Potter on Get Booked last year. If you want to have a look at that one, you can go and check it out on the SoundCloud. There is also a link on my website at hazelbutterfield.com to make it a little bit easier for you. That's what we do, we try and make life a little bit more easier for you and helping you keep informed. Now, the final book review that I want to tell you about is Harriet Tyser's Blood Orange. This has been incredibly popular, especially in the writing community. I've been dying to read this for ages after seeing how bloggers online were waxing lyrical about it, and I finally saw it on a little bit of a special offer via Kindle at the same time as getting my TBRs under control, if that ever really does happen. And do you know what, just Wow, it was completely unpredictable, scarily poignant, and very eye-opening to the constant reminder that you don't always know what is going on in somebody else's world, what makes them behave a certain way, how sometimes our lives are scarily similar to others, but it's not always that easy to see. A damaged marriage, a toxic affair, or a dark obsession, Blood Orange is absolutely fantastic. The kind of, hmm, thriller that just reins you in and sends you off on a little bit of a journey. Now what we do here at Women's and Men's Radio Station is we try and offer ways to help you improve your mental well-being. And the reason why I do this show is I think that books and writing can be so incredibly cathartic, whether it's because you want to find out about somebody else's life so you can help understand it, maybe you want a little bit of distraction or entertainment, whether it's a comedy or a thriller. My own personal favourite, you know, the domestic noir, very similar to Blood Orange that I've just been telling you about and her new best friend Penny Batchelor really does hone in on the fantastic genre. And I'm— it's just something where we can find something else to do that, that's a bit of a distraction from life when we need it. And even when a book is fictional, it's got so many fantastic well-being qualities in that even if it's just entertainment, we can understand a little bit more about somebody else's world, and it might encourage us to reminisce and think about some of the incredible things that we have done, or maybe it will spur you on to write as well. And I do find that all writing does not have to necessarily be for other people's consumption. Writing is a fantastic way to kind of order your thoughts or just ignite a creative element. I know a lot of friends who write stories all the time, even short stories, whimsical stories, and it's just a way of escape or maybe talking about something that's going on in their world. Maybe you've written some short stories and you'd like to have them read out here on the show at Get Booked, please do get in touch with me. I do appreciate everybody for your feedback and how you do get involved with the show. And please do go and check out more of the shows at womensradiostation.com. This— we live in an even more complex world. Women increasingly need need a place to discuss serious matters that go to the heart of who they are and what it is to be a woman in today's society, or a man, a man, sorry, in today's society. And you can go and have a look more on mensradiostation.com. And we need to understand what the pressures are and how we can make life a little bit easier on ourselves. Then there are times we all require emotional support. And at Women's Radio Station and Men's Radio Station, we are going to do our utmost to provide precisely that. And we're very lucky that we've received some fantastic awards. So do get on board, go and check out the websites and find out a little bit more about all the shows and all the support that we do offer here at Women's Radio Station and Men's Radio Station. My name is Hazel Butterfield. You've been listening to to get booked. Thank you for your time, and hopefully you'll join me again for the next show.