My Turn to Make the Tea

INTRODUCED BY LISSA EVANS ‘Humorous, moving and fascinating‘ CLARE MACKINTOSH Deciding to try her hand at journalism, Poppy takes a job at a local newspaper. What she lacks in experience, she makes up for in ambition, notebook always at the ready in the hope of a good scoop. But there‘s hardly enough going on to fill all sixteen pages of the Downingham Post, and innovation, she comes to learn, isn‘t an asset valued by her editor. Neither is her writing, which is greeted with the chastisement that ‘journalism is not literature‘ and stripped of any individual style. As a junior reporter, and the only woman, Poppy is frustratingly relegated to covering weddings and school plays - and making endless cups of tea. Meanwhile, at her boarding-house, Poppy must contend with her tyrannical landlady and the comings and goings of the many tenants of 5 Bury Road. Drawn from Monica Dickens‘s own experiences, My Turn to Make the Tea is a witty, keenly observed account of the daily scramble of newspaper life, and a fascinating social history of the post-war years. ‘Monica‘s naked curiosity and general bolshiness are easy to identify with, and as a narrator, she always tells us what we‘re longing to know - it‘s like listening to a friend‘s anecdote, and egging them on‘ LISSA EVANS