Dear Rebecca,
My novel, Lisa Doyle is Absolutely Fine (Spring Street Books, 2026), is about a woman so busy insisting she’s fine that nobody, herself included, can see what this well meant white lie is costing her. I have been telling the same lie since I was eight, the year a gang of older boys cornered me at school to find out how hard they could squeeze before I screamed. More than fifty years on, the memory still has an address. It sits in my throat.
I’d like to write a first-person feature for the magazine about what bullying leaves behind in the adult who assumes he got away with it, and the odd route from there to writing happy ever after stories. My armour was being top of the class, which meant dropping any subject I might come second in, so nobody could line me up against someone better and find me wanting. It held for decades. Then a manager told me she planned to mark my performance review ‘not achieving’, and at 61, in a steady job and on a decent wage, I thought I might throw up in my lap. For one awful raw minute, I wasn’t 61. I was eight, in blue nylon shorts, with the nasty boys closing in.
It would run to around 1,400 words and end somewhere warmer than it starts. I write the rescues that never came for the boy in the shorts… and I have a fair idea why.
My journalism and essays have appeared in QX Magazine, The Bookseller, Bookbrunch, writing.ie and FemaleFirst. I’ve drafted the piece and can send it in full, or shape the angle with you first.
Thank you for reading.
Best wishes,
Mo Fanning
mofanning.co.uk | 07881925376