Annie Sanders is actually two people and not in the way that means you need medication. Or at least not often. Though it sounds clever for two people to write a novel, we’re slightly worried that each of us is only half an author. Good thing then that we ran into each other. Though to confuse you, at the time of meeting we were actually four people—both vastly pregnant and launching immediately into the nitty gritty of hemorrhoids and stretch marks. Five children later and communication is still as frank. You sure have to know someone well to be able to say that at times their prose sucks and their plotting is slack.
Goodbye, Jimmy Choo was the result of a hissy fit. After four years spent churning out consumer titles—we’d tackled everything from property guides to sex manuals—we longed to give rein to our creative urges. Plus there were too many “boy meets ditzy girl” and “does my bum look big in this?” novels out there. We searched in vain for novels that were relevant to women like us (very much the wrong side of thirty), books that made us laugh, were grown up without being too serious, and that tackled life after children when you think, “Is that it?” Answer? Have a go at writing one ourselves.
We both have arts degrees and backgrounds in publishing, and Goodbye, Jimmy Choo contains bits of our own experience—enforced moves to the country, an unhealthy fascination with sexy footwear, and the challenge of working with small children around—but it is emphatically not autobiographical. Oh, if only.