In Love Marriage, you send everyone up… is there absurdity in all of us and is it important to recognise that? I’d like to think it says nothing about me and a lot about the parent/child relationship. “Arrrgh… Mum’s starting a story again…” They’re not talking about my books, but if I’m telling a story at the dinner table, they immediately start rolling their eyes. It’s funny because my children say I’m the worst storyteller ever. When did you first realise you had a gift for storytelling? It had an impact I didn’t acknowledge because I thought I ought to be able to cope with everything, that it would be unbecoming to moan. It took me away from home more than I wanted and I struggled with that. When asked about writing with a baby, a toddler and with little childcare, I’d merrily say: “It was fine, I wrote when they were napping.” I wish I’d been able to enjoy the publication process more. I never found that, although, when the first thing I pitched was accepted by the BBC, I thought: “Easy!” and then… it never got made.ĭo you think Brick Lane ’s success was too much too soon? Everybody said it was a tough thing to get into and that I’d feel beaten up by the process. I sank my teeth into learning to write scripts. I found I was depressed when I wasn’t writing and the depression fed into not being able to write – it was a downward spiral.

A total loss of confidence is catastrophic. A healthy dose of self-doubt is good for any writer, but you also have to have self-belief. I went through a time of deciding I wasn’t going to write.

Why has it taken so long to get this novel written? She lives in London with her husband and their two grown-up children. At its centre is Yasmin, a doctor from an Indian family (Ali is of Bangladeshi and English heritage) and her fiance, Joe, a fellow doctor and son of a liberal, middle-class firebrand of a mother. Love Marriage is her first book for 10 years and a publishing event in its own right: a serious, subtle, hugely entertaining exploration of relationships. M onica Ali, 54, is the author of four novels but best known for her first, Brick Lane (2003), which catapulted her to fame even before it was published, earning her a place on Granta’s best young British novelists list.

Monica ali books