Humans of Hitchin: Edition 8... Kathleen Whyman
Hello! I’m Kathleen, an author of humorous women’s fiction. My novels are for all the multi-tasking, mentally-overloaded women out there, who put themselves on the subs bench for the sake of their family. My inspiration is my own struggle to juggle a family, career, running a household, life-admin and never-ending laundry. I’m still struggling… the laundry’s definitely winning!
I moved to Hitchin when I was seven-years-old. I’m a bit embarrassed to admit that I’ve never left, but I’ve never had a reason to! It’s such a great town with so much character. I love walking down Windmill Hill and gazing out at the gorgeous view of the town. Walking back up the hill isn’t quite so relaxing! Everyone in Hitchin’s so friendly. It always takes me longer to pop into town than I think it will, as I bump into people and have a chat!
It’s amazing when people tell me they’ve read my books and that they made them laugh. Many women who are also juggling the challenges of everyday life say they can relate to them and it’s great for them to know that they’re not alone. I love that – my work is done! My biggest challenge as an author is getting people to know my books actually exist. Unless you’re a celebrity or a really established author, publishers don’t have the budgets to promote you, so it’s down to us. It’s tough, especially as most authors would rather be writing than running a publicity campaign!
I’m currently promoting my latest book ‘Has Anyone Seen My Husband?’. It’s about being a second wife and the challenges of dealing with blended families, ex-partners, stepchildren, and a husband who’s torn between two sets of children, leaving Marie (the main character) solo parenting a lot of the time. It’s a funny story, but some serious stuff happens because that’s real life. I’ve started working on my next book, which I hope will come out next summer. No pressure!
The proudest moment of my career was when my book was shortlisted for the Comedy Women in Print Prize in 2020. The prize was set up by the actress, writer and comedian Helen Lederer to support witty women writers, as they’ve been underrepresented for so long. I received an email telling me that I’d been longlisted and had to submit the full manuscript 10 days later. At the time, I’d only written two-thirds of it! We were in lockdown and my children needed home schooling. To meet the deadline, I basically had to apologise to my family that I was about to practically neglect them for the next week-and-a-half and write non-stop. I finished at 4.10am on the day it had to be submitted. I thought it’d be a complete mess, as I didn’t even have time to read through it, so to go on to be shortlisted was phenomenal.
I’ve always written. At primary school, I wrote a book called ‘The Ghost of Cripple Creek.’ I remember it took up two exercise books, complete with illustrations. I sent it off to a publisher and still have the letter they sent back saying: ‘It’s not quite right for us, but do keep writing!’ Unfortunately, they didn’t return the manuscript because I wouldn’t have known to include a stamped address envelope, which I’m still sad about! I also have rejection letters from Jackie magazine for the short stories I sent them in my teens. They did return these and I can see why they weren’t published!
I eventually became a journalist, which I loved, but I missed the creativity of writing fiction. I started writing a book, but with work and a young family, I didn’t have much time to write. So, in 2018, after working on the same book for several years and getting nowhere fast, I made the decision to leave work and write full-time. I knew I was taking a chance, but that I’d regret it forever if I didn’t try. I was extremely lucky to have the support of my family to do this. I gave myself a year to finish the book and try to get it published. If nothing happened during that time, I’d go back to work. It took longer than a year, but eventually, after many rewrites and knockbacks, I got the interest of a publisher. In the summer of 2020, my debut novel ‘Wife Support System’ came out. I now have three published books and am so grateful that I was able to go for it.
My dream is to continue writing full-time, as it’s what I love to do, but to be able to afford to pay someone to do my PR and social media! I also love doing talks, teaching writing workshops and interviewing other authors. I’ve done evenings with Freya North, Susannah Constantine and, most recently, Shirley Ballas of Strictly Come Dancing fame at David’s Bookshop in Letchworth. Actually, that’s my dream – to become established enough as an author to get onto Strictly!
Small business shout outs: Rubarb for clothes; Pooja always knows what I’ll like and dresses me for all my events. The Hermitage Coffee Shop has a great space at the back, which we use as a writer’s room. Next Page Books is primarily a children’s bookshop, but also supports local authors, which is great. Fellow author Zoë Folbigg and I regularly meet at The Groundworks for a coffee and a chinwag about writing (well, there’s some talk about writing!), then go to Hitchin library to work. The library’s a fantastic resource and if we don’t use it, we’ll lose it!