Jenny Smith

Jenny Smith was born in Glasgow. A freelance copywriter and grants and trusts fundraiser, Smith lives and works in a small village in south Oxfordshire with her husband, sons and her West Highland terrier, Angus.

Diary of a Parent Trainer and My Big Fat Teen Crisis are Smith’s first two comic teen novels, published in the United Kingdom by Scholastic.

Diary of a Parent Trainer is to be published in the States on June 12th. Smith is hoping that it will do well, so she has an excuse to visit the USA!

Recently I asked Smith what she was reading.  Her reply:

I’ve been the member of a local book group for the past ten years, and we’ve read our way through a wide variety of writers and genres.

We recently read Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson which was absolutely gripping. It’s about a woman who loses her memory each night and has to learn about her life all over again every morning. However as she begins to make notes in a diary, she wonders if she can really trust the man she is living with, her husband. Although I found the story slightly unlikely at times, I didn’t mind because it was such an entertaining page turner. An ideal holiday read.

I very much enjoyed The Help by Kathryn Stockett, we had a book group DVD night and followed up reading the book with watching the film, which I also loved. The book is beautifully, lyrically written and deeply moving.

I am in the middle of The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery. It is written from the point of view of a concierge in an apartment block in Paris. But she is no ordinary concierge. I am finding this book a challenging read, because the voice of the central character is so formal and intellectual. But it is proving to be funny and full of insights. I love a story, and a ‘voice’ which makes you look at the world differently, and this one certainly does.

I am currently working my way through a book of short stories called Missing Kissinger by Etgar Keret.

I enjoy reading short stories before I go to bed, as I can go to sleep thinking about the endings. These stories are black comedy, often very bleak and violent and tragic. They are transporting me, from my sleepy little village in Oxfordshire, to a completely different world. That is the magic of fiction.

Visit Jenny Smith's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

--Marshal Zeringue