Number one in Mammals

In a recent edition of the popular podcast The Rest Is Entertainment, hosts Marina Hyde and Richard Osman discussed the latter's latest book, We Solve Murders, and what publication week was like for the king of cosy crime. Osman, who is as genial inside a pair of Airpods as he is upon the page, talked enthusiastically about appearing on The One Show, and across a variety of other radio and television programmes. He mentioned how effective it could be for book sales also to pop up on local TV news stations, and shared just how much he was looking forward to touring the nation's bookshops, where he'd meet his unfailingly eager readers.

A few weeks before his book came out, and a full month before Sally Rooney's mighty Intermezzo, I had my own published, a memoir entitled People Who Like Dogs Like People Who Like Dogs. On the day of release, I was lucky enough to have been invited to a lovely independent bookshop in Sevenoaks, where I spoke before an almost packed house: of the 12 seats available, 10 were taken. When I got home that night - three trains and a bus; it took ages - I made my daughters' dinner while the television gurgled in the background. The One Show was on, but I wasn't one of its guests. Neither had I made it on to radio, nor any of my local TV news stations.