It’s easy to get stuck when we’re preoccupied with what the finished thing will be. Bestselling author Cathy Rentzenbrink shares her advice to 'write around' the writing: head out with a notebook, a five pound note and a simple prompt, and let go of whether the words will make the final draft. Willing guinea pig Helen Meller puts it to the test on a project about a lost silent film of Wuthering Heights, and we hear advice to keep writing from renowned radio producer Ira Glass (Current TV, 2006) on the gap between our taste and our work. Thank you to Cathy and Helen.
About the guests
Cathy Rentzenbrink is the Sunday Times top ten bestselling author of The Last Act of Love, Dear Reader, How to Feel Better, Everyone Is Still Alive and Ordinary Time. Her new book is The Agatha Christie Cure. She is a renowned book reviewer and literary festival panellist and host. Prior to writing her own books, Cathy was a passionate bookseller at Waterstones, working in seven different branches before becoming Publisher Relations Manager for the group. After that she became Project Director at literacy charity Quick Reads, then Books Editor at the Bookseller. She runs the Curtis Brown memoir-writing course and the highly popular online ‘Sunday Sessions’.
Helen Meller is director of Arvon at Lumb Bank and vice chair of the Brontë Society. She has a background as a creative producer in festivals, TV, radio and publishing. She hosts The Brontë Lounge, a series of online interviews with Brontë-inspired creatives. For BBC Radio 4, she abridged The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum and script edited Picnic at Hanging Rock. She was also Mariella Frostrup’s producer for more than a decade, working on everything from talk shows to cult movie programmes. Helen has an MA in creative writing and is working on a Brontë-related non-fiction project.
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