I quit my job of 25 years to write a book – and now I'm the author some other authors hate

This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine.

Jennie Godfrey is the author other authors hate. “I think, being really honest, that some of them absolutely do,” she confirms. It’s not that she’s unpleasant or a bad writer (she’s very much neither); what’s put literary backs up is her success, and the apparent ease by which she came by it.

Her first novel, 2024’s The List of Suspicious Things topped The Sunday Times charts, was one of the UK’s all-time bestselling debuts, sold 10,000 copies in its first week – and (can you hear those teeth grinding?) was the first thing she’d ever written.

“I’ve had lots of people cast aspersions on my route to the bestsellers charts,” she sighs. “I wrote a SubStack post [about it], and I got accused of lying, of having connections in publishing, of secretly working for publishers, of being rich, of having a rich family…”

It would all be quite depressing if it weren’t for the fact that, on the other hand, “there are a lot of people who’ve taken great hope from my story. Because when you do start writing, all you hear is how difficult it is, how you’ll never get an agent, you’ll never get a book deal… And particularly women of a certain age [Godfrey is 55], you’re told you’ve missed your chance. And I’m the opposite of all that.”

Hers is certainly an inspiring backstory: after a 25-year career in corporate HR, she chucked in the job to pen a book – “before I’d started writing it or even had the idea for it. Which was like jumping off a cliff without a parachute.”

The day job that Godfrey says she was “insane” to quit was a good grounding, though, it seems: “As an HR person, people tell you stuff. You get to know their secrets and what lies behind everyone’s façades.”

Handy, because that’s very much the subject of her new novel, published earlier this month: “The Barbecue at No 9 is set in July 1985, and takes place over the 12 hours of the Live Aid concert. It’s the story of the residents of a new-build cul-de-sac, and how they all get together to celebrate the historic concert, and all their secrets come tumbling out.”

Why Live Aid? “It felt like this seismic event, and everyone who was around at the time remembers it. Even people who weren’t born then know about it, and they’ve seen clips of it on YouTube. My own memories of that day are vivid: I remember crying on the phone to my friend Sam about how amazing Freddie Mercury was…”

Given that – and given the eye-widening nature of some of the characters’ secrets revealed in the book – it’s impossible not to wonder if there’s a touch of autobiography to it. Godfrey’s first novel, The List of Suspicious Things, was partly inspired, alarmingly, by her dad’s real-life realisation that he had known Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper.

“When I was 11 or 12 we did move to a new-build estate ourselves [like The Barbecue at No 9’s central characters], transplanted from our Yorkshire mill town to Milton Keynes, which felt like a fate worse than death for us northerners. But it’s not such a direct personal experience as the Sutcliffe link was for the first book.”

In fact, adds Godfrey, the idea for this one came out of the blue: “After the success of List, I felt frozen with fear, and I was just working out how to tell my editor that I was never going to write another book, when I got on a train and the idea for Barbecue landed in my brain, almost the whole book in one go.”

The author now lives in Somerset, where she works occasional shifts at her local Waterstones, because “all novelists should have to work in a bookshop. It’s an absolutely invaluable experience as a writer to understand who your readers are.” Her own, she’s found, are much more disparate than she expected: “I’ve been really surprised by how many men are massive fans of my work, and also how many young people. They think, because its set in the 1970s or 80s, it’s historical fiction, though! That makes you feel pretty old.”

At least Godfrey has a few A-list fans for comfort. Among others, broadcaster-turned-author Graham Norton and author-turned-broadcaster Marian Keyes are devotees. “I’ve met them both and was completely star-struck,” she giggles, “and a little bit intense. They were lovely.” But aren’t authors supposed to hate her? “Well, maybe they were just nice to my face. Maybe they were the ones on SubStack being mean…”

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