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Author Archives: Dorothy Koomson

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Terms & Conditions

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Dorothy Koomson Prize Draw Terms & Conditions

 

  1. This is a prize draw to win one copy of a Dorothy Koomson book.
  2. By entering this competition you are agreeing to sign up to the Dorothy Koomson newsletter and receive regular updates
  3. The winner will be selected at random at 11.59pm on the closing date stated from the entries received in accordance with these terms and conditions. The winners shall be selected by Dorothy Koomson or an authorised representative, whose decision will be final and no correspondence will be entered into.
  4. There is no purchase necessary to enter.
  5. The prize draw opens at 12:01 am GMT on the date stated and closes at 11:59 pm GMT on the date stated. Any entries received outside these specified times and dates will not be eligible for entry into the prize draw.
  6. The names of the winners may see their name posted on other websites and social media accounts.
  7. The prize draw is open to residents of the UK only, aged 18 or over except employees of the Company, their families, or anyone professionally connected to the prize draw either themselves or through their families.
  8. Only one entry per person per book prize draw is allowed. Second or subsequent entries will be disqualified. Entries will not be accepted via agents, third parties or in bulk.
  9. The Company is not responsible for contacting or forwarding prizes to entrants who provide unclear or incomplete information or for entries lost, misdirected, delayed or destroyed.
  10. The Company reserves the right to alter the prizes or cancel the prize draw without notice but will try to avoid creating any undue disappointment.  No cash alternatives to prizes will be provided.  If a winner is unable to accept their prize or cannot be contacted, the Company reserves the right to select another winner.
  11. The Company is the data controller of Personal Data that it collects in the course of running the prize draw and will use the Personal Data in accordance with the Company’s Privacy Notice It will use such Personal Data for the purposes of running the prize draw delivering any prize(s). “Personal Data” means names of entrants and other details provided by them (e.g. email addresses, telephone numbers) for the prize draw.  The Company will not share such Personal Data with any third parties except for the purpose of delivering the prize(s) or newsletter. The company will need to provide the winners’ addresses and other relevant information to its distributor Hachette UK Distribution Limited to enable the prizes to be sent.
  12. By entering the prize draw entrants agree to be bound by these terms and conditions.
  13. This prize draw is being organised by Dorothy Koomson (“Company”).
  14. These terms and conditions and any disputes or claims (including non-contractual disputes or claims) arising out of these terms and conditions shall be governed and construed in accordance with the laws of England, whose courts shall have exclusive jurisdiction.

 

It’s a cover up!

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It’s a cover up… All My Lies Are True is coming out in paperback THIS THURSDAY!

Did you notice we’d changed the hardback cover? Do you want to know why? Well, it goes back to that saying – don’t judge a book by its cover. We say that, but the whole of the publishing industry is based on people judging a book – then buying it – by its cover.

So why the change? Several reasons. One of them is that we – my editor and other peeps at my publishers – have been talking for a while about moving the covers on.

When you’ve written as many books as I have, you tend to update the covers every few books to keep things fresh, while hanging onto the familiarity of previous works that people like.

We talked and planned and, you know, we decided not to wait until book 17 to make the change – I’m kinda impatient so it happened now.

I loved the original cover. The model – Jocelyn, is beautiful and it was absolutely what we needed for the hardback – as proved by the book selling well and going onto the bestseller lists.

With all these accolades, why change? Because I never want to rest on my laurels, never want to get stuck doing the same thing over and over with what goes into the book or on the outside of it.

Changing the cover between hardback and paperback also gives you a chance to focus on a different aspect of the story.

Beach huts feature heavily in both #TheIceCreamGirls and #AllMyLiesAreTrue so I love that we’ve got the chance to explore this aspect of the story with this cover.

And the colours – pink and yellow – was a running theme through all the Ice Cream Girls covers and have been carried on to #AllMyLiesAreTrue.

Have we got it right with the paperback of #AllMyLiesAreTrue? I think so because I am in cover love. What do you think?

#TheHappyAuthor #AllMyLiesAreTrue #TheIceCreamGirls #paperback #hardback #bestseller #dorothykoomsonbooks #podcasts #bookstagram #authorsofinstagram

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Hello! I’m so excited to share with you my new adventure…The Happy Author! What is that exactly? Well, it’s a podcast and a series of posts that come together to form a writing guide for aspiring authors and anyone who loves books. ⁠
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Why? Because over many, many years I’ve been asked about the how tos of writing. A couple of years ago I had the idea of putting together a writing guide. ⁠
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When I sat down to actually write said guide, I realised the only way I could do it was to make it a personal. ⁠Relate things to how I do it and what works for me, in the hopes that it would help readers on their writing journey. ⁠
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Then I realised there was more I could do. I’ve had 16 books and several short stories published, I’ve won awards, my novels have topped bestseller lists across the world, and they’ve been optioned for film and television – one was actually adapted for the screen. ⁠
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Basically, I’ve been a part of book world for nearly 20 years, which meant I could lift the lid on the publishing industry for people who like to read books, those who want to write books and those who’ve got a publishing deal and/or agent but have no clue about what comes next. ⁠
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So here it is, the world of The Happy Author – my way of demystifying the publishing industry for you. ⁠
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In my podcast I interview people from all over the publishing industry as well as sharing some valuable advice such as how to deal with rejection & how to be a better author.⁠
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With my posts I will reveal secrets, hints and tips on getting writing and keeping writing. I’ll also be sharing with you all the usual stuff that goes on in a writer’s life. ⁠(There may be doggy pics.)⁠
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I hope you join me on this new adventure. I am SO EXCITED about it!
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Don’t forget to let me know what sort of things you’d like to see me cover in The Happy Author and I’ll do my best to work it in. ⁠X ⁠

Listen to the trailer below.

https://shows.acast.com/happy-author/episodes/season-1-trailer

New Edition, New Cover

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News klaxon!! All My Lies Are True has a brand new cover for paperback! I love the hardback cover (the model Jocelyn is as lovely as she is beautiful) but we’ve decided to change things up on the cover front.

Have you noticed that a lot of books that come out in hardback change when they come to paperback?

Sometimes with only a few changes like the Tell Me Your Secret hardback to paperback, or sometimes a lot, like All My Lies Are True. The cover copy also changes, so that a new element of the story can be focused on.

In All My Lies Are True and The Ice Cream Girls before it, there is big Brighton focus and beach huts feature heavily, too. There’s also the yellow (Serena’s dress on the original cover) and pink (Poppy’s dress on the original cover) thing that is important in both books.

So we took all that and more, fed it into the paperback cover discussions and . . . ta-dah!  The new cover copy will be winging its way to you soon and again, the focus is different from what we originally had.

Probably shouldn’t be telling you this, because it’s not something publishing bods talk about publicly much, but for me, this is the start of changing direction with the covers again.

I’m always thinking of new things to do and moving the covers on is one that’s been on my mind for a while.

But let’s mark that down as something to come back to chat about another time and please join me in indulging in the beauty that is this new cover.

PS You can’t get a physical version of the new cover until January, so you’ll have to get one of the equally gorgeous Hardback cover until then.

#HappyAuthor #AllMyLiesAreTrue #Brighton #InsiderInsights #NewCover

What Black Panther did for me

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I’d been waiting on the Black Panther film since I saw Captain America: Civil War in 2016. I’ve always been a comic book fan and have indulged my love with the movies over the years. So when it was released in February 2018, I walked into the cinema excited to see what the latest Marvel offering would bring . . . and walked out two-and-a-half hours later, a woman transformed. Black Panther went way beyond descriptions such as ‘good’ or ‘brilliant’; it wasn’t simply ‘fun’ or ‘exciting’, it gave me something new. It gave me understanding.

Understanding of what it’s like to sit and watch a female hero – well, four of them – who looked like me.

I think it’s very difficult for people who as a default see themselves reflected in society and culture to understand why it feels so incredible to view a film or read a book and discover that person looks like you. I also think it’s hard for those who are regularly portrayed as multi-dimensional beings – the hero, the love interest, the complicated villain, the wise advisor, the heartless siren, the kooky beauty, etc. – to understand what it’s like for us who don’t have that happen very often.

More often than not, Black women are the sassy sidekicks, the aggressive interloper, the hyper-sexualised antagonist, the need-to-be-rescued victim. On those rare occasions when we are at the centre of the story, it isn’t about us in all our complex glory, it is about how badly we’re treated by society, it is about the effect of other people’s racism on us and how the other person grows as a result of it. Don’t get me wrong, those things do effect us and are part of our lives, but it’s not all we’re about. And because society is rarely shown that about us, we’re seldom allowed to be the face of a story that is about the universal human experience; hardly ever given the opportunity to be every-woman. This is what Black Panther did. It had multi-dimensional women who had backstories, flaws, strengths, vulnerabilities; hopes and dreams, loves and losses.

I came out of the cinema beaming. For me, Black Panther is a true feminist movie because it gives the female characters their rightful respect as equals to the men in the story and truly celebrates the strength and brilliance of all women.

Over the years Black women and girls have told me that is what my books have done for them. I didn’t truly grasp how powerful and liberating that feeling was until I walked into that cinema and had my eyes opened. Thank you to Chadwick Boseman and the Black Panther family for making that happen for me.

If you do check out Black Panther and decide you want to read more fiction about Black women who are multi-faceted and real, then pick up books by Malorie Blackman, Lola Jaye, Irenosen Okojie, Sareeta Domingo, Anne John Ligali, Patrice Lawrence, Rasheda Malcolm, Frances Mensah Williams, Buchi Emechata, Bernardine Eviristo, Alexandra Sheppard, Yvonne Battle Fenton, Sharna Jackson, Yvvette Edwards, Kit De Waal, Sara Collins, Louise Hare, Tee Cee Johnson, Diana Evans, Bolu Bobalola and Sandra Agard, to name just a few authors who prove there is more to Black women than you’re often told.

THE ICE CREAM GIRLS: 8 BOOK & TV DIFFERENCES

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All My Lies Are True, the sequel to my bestselling novel The Ice Cream Girls, is just around the corner. If you haven’t read the book and only saw the TV mini-series loosely based on the book or decide to track down the series to watch instead of reading it, I need to let you know there are quite a few *ahem* differences. These changes won’t make sense when it comes to reading All My Lies Are True (AMLAT), so here are the most important differences to keep in mind.

THERE ARE QUITE A FEW NAME CHANGES Serena is raised a Gorringe and in the book her married name is Gillmare. The TV series changed her married name to Farley. Not sure why, but since AMLAT starts off with someone remembering Serena for having a surname that begins with a G, it’s kinda important to point this out. Most of Poppy’s family – her brother, sister and dad – are also renamed in the TV series. Since they form a HUGE part of the sequel, and for the avoidance of doubt: Poppy’s brother is called Logan and her sister is called Bella.

QUITE A FEW CHARACTERS DISAPPEAR/ARE REIMAGINED In the TV series Serena has a child, a sister and her father disappeared from her life. These original characters from my book are a huge part of the second book so here’s a reminder: Serena grew up in a two-parent family with a mother and father. She has older twin sisters called Medina and Faye who are a big part of both books.

The TV series also makes Poppy the product of a single-parent family (do you think there’s a stereotype they were trying to shoehorn in or something?) with an evil step-father. In the book, she actually has two parents and was closer to her father than her mother. The destruction of her relationship with her father due to going to prison is one of the core elements of Poppy’s story arc in the first book and carries on into the second book.

CHARACTERS MEET/HAVE CONVERSATIONS THAT DIDN’T HAPPEN In the book, Poppy stalks Serena and finds a spurious reason to meet Dr Evan (Serena’s husband) but doesn’t let on that she knows Serena. In the TV series, Poppy does tell Evan she knows Serena and she also tries to befriend Serena’s daughter, Verity, which doesn’t happen in the book. Serena also has a huge confrontation with Alain, Poppy’s lover, about him being a journalist, then tells Poppy about it. In the book, Poppy finds out Alain’s secret when he confesses to her at a crucial moment in their relationship. There are very good reasons why none of these things happened in The Ice Cream Girls book – mainly for plot and plausibility reasons. But, also, if any of these things had happened, there’d be no All My Lies Are True. So, disregard all of these changes from the TV series when you read the sequel.

SERENA SPENDS A LOT OF TIME ANGRY AND SHOUTY I’m not sure why the TV series made her that way. . . Actually, I’m being disingenuous – I do know why: they fell into the tired old trope of Black girls being shouty, aggressive and oversexed and then growing into cold, shouty, aggressive women. But, there we are. The Serena in my book is a quiet, shy, thoughtful girl who doesn’t flirt with and seduce her teacher but instead is manipulated, groomed and ultimately abused by a man who knew she would keep his secrets. She grows up into a quiet woman who avoids trouble and focuses on bringing up her children in a stable, happy environment. She loves her husband and she is quiet and unassuming. Very different from the Serena we’re shown on screen.

POPPY HAS VERY LITTLE DRIVE In my book, Poppy was decisive and clever enough to find and stalk Serena, but we see none of that in the TV series. She seems to spend a lot of time waiting for things to happen to her, and I think that was because the core of her story – the relationship with her family – has been removed. In The Ice Cream Girls book, Poppy has drive and ambition and is in charge of her own life, despite living with the constant threat of being sent back to prison. That is a part of her character that is essential for the sequel to work.

MARCUS IS THOROUGHLY UNLIKEABLE In the book, Marcus is charming and manipulative. He grooms and seduces Poppy and Serena before he starts to abuse them. You see very clearly how and why they fall him. In the TV series there is very little evidence of charm, he mainly uses shouting, violence and brute force to get what he wants. It’s hard to believe anyone would go near him, let alone two young women.

EVAN LEAVES WITH VERITY When Serena’s past is revealed in The Ice Cream Girls book, Eva is so incensed by her lies that he forces Serena to leave. In the TV series, he takes his daughter and walks out. Not a significant difference you might think, but it is for the sequel – there’s a pivotal All My Lies Are True scene based on where Serena ends up when she is thrown out. I often wonder if the TV series did this to give Serena another chance to shout at someone. Hmmm.

THE ENDING/KILLER IS DIFFERENT I’m not going to spoil the TV series for you. Only a monster would do that. But a sequel, this sequel, just would not be possible with the ending of the loosely based adaptation. I had many, many issues with the ending that I can’t discuss because I’m not a spoiler monster, but know this – the ending is not the same. It comes from left-field and I don’t think it works, even for the way the adaptation has altered my original story.

 

These are the main differences between my book The Ice Cream Girls and the TV series loosely based on it. There are many, many others, but these are the ones you need to know about in case you want to know in full the story of The Ice Cream Girls before you read the second book. (By the way: you don’t actually need to have read The Ice Cream Girls to enjoy All My Lies Are True, but I don’t want you to rely only the TV series either, to get the idea of the plot.)

I have to state that there were some outstanding elements to the loosely based TV adaptation: some of the cinematography was stunning; and the acting was excellent. I think the actors did a fine job with the material they were given.

But it was the material they were given that I had the real issue with. The Ice Cream Girls, like all my books, was a labour of love. I particularly sweated over this one trying to get the abuse storyline right by attempting to show that it could happen to anyone. Not those ‘others’ we’re stereotypically shown to be abused; I wanted to illustrate that any one of us could end up in a situation like Serena and Poppy. To watch something with my name on be used to perpetrate negative tropes and stereotypes was a bitter pill to swallow. . . and, yes, it still stings all these years later.

I should add, though, that if you enjoyed The Ice Cream Girls TV series, there is no shame in that. I’m genuinely pleased for you. It was a good, solid TV drama (stereotypes excluded) and I might have enjoyed it, too, if I hadn’t heard all those stories about people’s real, lived experiences.

Either way, I hope you feel all caught up now, and you’re All My Lies Are True, ready. If you want to know more of my thoughts on the Ice Cream Girls TV series, then click here and read: The Two Ice Cream Girls.

 

All My Lies Are True is on sale from 9 July.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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