Thursday, September 03, 2009

William Walker's First Year of Marriage: A Horror Story by Matt Rudd

I'm not going to lie by pretending that author & Sunday Times journalist Matt Rudd is a complete stranger to me, my sister or several close friends. Nor am I going to pretend that I didn't costume design his wife's (excellent) short film. Or that we didn't once work together on a British magazine.

The reason I'm getting all that out of the way is because I'd like to suggest that you all rush off to buy Matt's new book: William Walker's First Year of Marriage: A Horror Story which is published in the UK today, but several of you lovely readers know full well that Matt & I have been friends since, oh Christ, maybe 1999, and may suspect that I am merely plugging his book as an act of friendship.

Matt Rudd William Walker's First Year of Marriage
Fortunately, my code of ethics remains intact in this case, as Matt is, and always has been one of the funniest writers I know. I still remember reading his first short stories about travelling in bizarre and, at the time, off the beaten track places and hooting with laughter. In fact, I believe I may even have got him to sign my copy of some obscure paperback publication that featured his first published stories. (Matt, I'm fully expecting to educate my future children off the proceeds of that in years to come.)

I read the first draft of William Walker's First Year of Marriage: A Horror Story quite some time ago, and loved it, although did feel duty bound to check with his wife H that the vignettes within were products of Matt's fertile imagination and not recounts of actual happenings after they got married.

Matt is on Twitter here (although he claims to Tweet only under duress from his publishers), and you can read his columns from The Sunday Times here. And, of course, buy William Walker's First Year of Marriage: A Horror Story it by clicking on the book title in this post.