"Staring down the Blank Page"

Jessica Fellows in conversation with Daisy Waugh.

I've been an agony aunt, a travel writer, a reviewer of restaurants and of luxury houses. I've written columns in The Independent on Sunday, the Sunday Times, the Sunday Express, The Indy, Standpoint Magazine and the Times. Along the way, I've interviewed many celebrities, among them Donald Trump, who told me in 1987 that he couldn't be bothered to open his own Christmas presents. While teaching in Northern Kenya, I wrote 'A Small Town in Africa', while living in Los Angeles I wrote a column in the Sunday Express and co-wrote a screenplay about a couple of celebrities who turned their married life into a reality TV show. That was twenty-odd years ago. Truth has overtaken our parody long since.

I wrote an anonymous column or the Sunday Times, "Diary of A Country Mole', which eventually turned into my sixth book, 'The Desperate Diary of a Country Housewife". Back in London, I wrote three more novels, all of them set on the early 20th Century USA; two columns per week for the Sunday Times, a monthly column for Standpoint magazine, and a furious book about modern motherhood: 'Don't Know Why She Bothers'. As E.V. Harte, I wrote a couple of light-hearted 'mysteries about a Tarot-reading sleuth named Dolly. As Guy Woake, I wrote "Guy Woake's Word Diary', an affectionate send-up of a Woke Young Thing battling through his first year at university, which will be published in March 2021. It made me cry with laughter as I wrote it. As Daisy Waugh, I wrote 'In the Crypt with the Candlestick', a comic murder-mystery about modem aristocrats living in a house they can't afford. It's sequel, 'Phone For Fish Knives,' will be published in June 2021.

Jessica Fellowes is an author, journalist and public speaker. Jessica is well known for her work as author of five official companion books to the globally successful television series and film Downtown Abbey, various of which hit the New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller lists. Former deputy editor of Country Life and columnist on the Mail on Sunday, as well as a regular contributor to The Daily Telegraph, she is now author of a bestselling 1920s crime series, The Mitford Murders, which has been nominated wards in England, Germany, Italy and France. Jessica has spoken at events across the UK and US, and has made numerous appearances on radio and television.

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