00:00Hi, I'm Janet Christie from The Scotsman. We're here this morning with Elizabeth Day, author and podcaster.
00:06The podcast is How to Fail, and she's just published her tenth book, One of Us.
00:12So I wondered if you could tell us first about the new book.
00:15Yes, thank you so much. I wrote this book.
00:19It is a sequel to a book I wrote called The Party, which came out in 2017.
00:23But you don't need to have read The Party at all.
00:26We've all got busy lives. We don't have enough time to add to our to-be-read pile.
00:31So this is also a standalone. I tell you everything you need to know.
00:34And it's a multi-voice narration, and essentially what it's about is why we fall in love with the people who damage us,
00:41and why sometimes we elect them too.
00:44So there's a whole political backdrop to it, and it mainly concerns the story of two former best friends.
00:50So there's Martin Gilmore, who is the quintessential outsider and unreliable narrator.
00:57He won a scholarship to a boarding school after a difficult childhood,
01:00and there he became fixated on the aristocratic, wealthy, handsome Ben Fitzmaurice.
01:06The two of them became friends, but something happened at university that meant they fell out massively.
01:12And now it's several years later, and Martin Gilmore is hell-bent on revenge,
01:17at precisely the same time as Ben Fitzmaurice is on course to become the UK's Prime Minister.
01:22So it's about what unravels after that.
01:25Excellent. OK. And your podcast, How to Fail, hugely successful.
01:30In it, you ask people about three failures and what it taught them, what they learned from it.
01:36Can you tell us about three of yours?
01:38Great question. Yeah, I'm aware of the irony that a podcast called How to Fail
01:43has actually turned into one of the most successful things I've ever done.
01:46But I think it's because failure connects us all.
01:49We've all failed, even though we might fear it sometimes, or we might try very hard not to.
01:55We will all fail, myself included.
01:57So I suppose three failures that I would choose.
02:01I went through a divorce in my mid-30s, which did feel like a failure.
02:05I thought I had known myself, and actually it turned out I hadn't.
02:09I failed to have babies, which is my self-perceived failure.
02:14So I spent 12 years going through fertility treatment, having recurrent miscarriage,
02:20and yearning to be a mother in the conventional biological sense.
02:24And about two years ago, I came to terms with the fact that that wasn't going to happen,
02:28and I decided not to pursue any further treatment.
02:31And I'm really at peace with that, but it still brings me an element of sadness.
02:37And I can live alongside that sadness, and it informs my life, and it's really helped me grow.
02:42But there's still a part of it that does feel like a failure in terms of the life I thought I was going to have,
02:48and the life I actually have.
02:49And then the third failure, I'd probably choose something a bit more breezy and light-hearted,
02:54which is my failure at team sports.
02:57I'm just not a team...
03:00I wouldn't say I'm not a team player.
03:02I'm not a team sports player, because I have a fear of letting other people down.
03:08And because I'm not naturally gifted or coordinated at sports,
03:11whenever I have played a team sport, I've humiliated myself.
03:15So I think that's a failure.
03:17Okay, thanks very much.
03:19Pleasure.
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