From my reading of the literature on life in the Victorian asylums, combined with what I learnt as a clinical psychologist in a long-stay psychiatric hospital, I explore the facts behind the fiction, and ask whether women were more disadvantaged than the men. Women’s history and asylum literature
Although around one in four of us will have mental health problems in any given year, only around one in a hundred would receive a schizophrenia diagnosis in their lifetime. Meeting Matty on the page might be the closest many of my readers would knowingly get to someone diagnosed with a serious psychiatric disorder. Given the stigma surrounding mental health difficulties, that’s quite a responsibility. Can Fiction Fight Stigma?
Mental health is a popular theme in fiction but negative stereotypes abound ... As a former clinical psychologist turned fiction author and book blogger, I’m always on the lookout for realistic portrayals of mental health difficulties in fiction. Let me introduce you to five novels that tell an entertaining and credible story about a character whose emotional struggles would earn them a psychiatric diagnosis. Five novels with authentic mental health depictions
How could she lose her baby, her home, her family, her future and remain upbeat? When our circumstances are unbearable, we can all close our minds to the truth. As TS Eliot said, humankind cannot bear too much reality. Sweet delusions: how I entered the mind-set of a character with a diagnosis of chronic schizophrenia
You might meet someone famous. You’ll find dungeons and glittery ballrooms. You’ll encounter a little kindness and a lot of cruelty. You’ll meet staff as messed-up as the patients. You could be admitted for having an ‘illegitimate’ child. Five fascinating facts about fictional asylums
He was a distinguished professor. I was presenting a poster on my extremely undistinguished research: an observational study of a group of long-stay psychiatric patients as they made the transition from hospital to community care. This work was to inspire Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home, but I didn’t know that then. Mark and me
Although around one in four of us will have mental health problems in any given year, only around one in a hundred would receive a schizophrenia diagnosis in their lifetime. Meeting Matty on the page might be the closest many of my readers would knowingly get to someone diagnosed with a serious psychiatric disorder. Given the stigma surrounding mental health difficulties, that’s quite a responsibility. Can Fiction Fight Stigma?
Mental health is a popular theme in fiction but negative stereotypes abound ... As a former clinical psychologist turned fiction author and book blogger, I’m always on the lookout for realistic portrayals of mental health difficulties in fiction. Let me introduce you to five novels that tell an entertaining and credible story about a character whose emotional struggles would earn them a psychiatric diagnosis. Five novels with authentic mental health depictions
How could she lose her baby, her home, her family, her future and remain upbeat? When our circumstances are unbearable, we can all close our minds to the truth. As TS Eliot said, humankind cannot bear too much reality. Sweet delusions: how I entered the mind-set of a character with a diagnosis of chronic schizophrenia
You might meet someone famous. You’ll find dungeons and glittery ballrooms. You’ll encounter a little kindness and a lot of cruelty. You’ll meet staff as messed-up as the patients. You could be admitted for having an ‘illegitimate’ child. Five fascinating facts about fictional asylums
He was a distinguished professor. I was presenting a poster on my extremely undistinguished research: an observational study of a group of long-stay psychiatric patients as they made the transition from hospital to community care. This work was to inspire Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home, but I didn’t know that then. Mark and me
Click on the image for a range of video interviews recorded between late May and early November 2021
In this two-hour podcast with Hannah Kate, first broadcast on North Manchester FM, I discuss twentieth-century psychiatric institutions, my character Matty, how I switched from psychology to fiction and the three books I’d save in the Apocalypse:
I was fascinated by the different ways people responded to being given a mental patient identity in the form of a psychiatric diagnosis. Some people found it liberating … Others became hopeless and demoralised and many rejected it all together. Given the stigma associated with mental illness, who can blame them? Where did you get the idea from?
I hoped to debunk the myth that those who receive a psychiatric diagnosis have little in common with those who don’t. One way of doing so … was to illustrate the ‘sanity’ of a character labelled schizophrenic; another was to show the derangement in characters considered ‘sane’. Creating an ambassador for mental health, in fiction
Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home is rooted in my work, gives a voice to the voiceless, lets the reader know more than the characters, it depends what you mean by home ... 6 things I’d like readers to know about my novel
About the man who doesn’t read for pleasure and why I’d rather scrub the toilet with a toothbrush than produce something as insubstantial as aerosol whipped cream. Q&A with Annalisa Crawford
When I gave my main character, Matty, a rich interior life, I hoped she’d be fascinating. I never dreamt she’d be funny. The Unstoppable Author
I learned a valuable lesson on that trip about my job in a long-stay psychiatric hospital seven thousand miles away. Until then, I hadn’t understood how people who’d lived alongside each other for decades failed to connect. Writers on Location: the long-stay psychiatric hospital
I challenged myself to make her both sympathetic and extremely disturbed. I find her heroic in how she’s adapted to adversity. Shock, horror: paranoid schizophrenic steps outside
I hadn’t given much thought to the pencil’s origins until a couple of years ago, on a research trip to my native Cumbria for my latest book. The black marketeers who gave us the pencil
When I switched from clinical psychologist to author, I couldn’t help taking some of my professional life with me. But I didn’t draw directly on my experience of the mental health system until my third novel. Resettlement revisited in my novel Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home
Almost everyone drank tea in the long-stay psychiatric hospitals. But, while staff could make a cuppa how and when they wanted, patients were served tea at set times with milk and sugar already added to the pot. How do you take your tea?
I hoped to debunk the myth that those who receive a psychiatric diagnosis have little in common with those who don’t. One way of doing so … was to illustrate the ‘sanity’ of a character labelled schizophrenic; another was to show the derangement in characters considered ‘sane’. Creating an ambassador for mental health, in fiction
Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home is rooted in my work, gives a voice to the voiceless, lets the reader know more than the characters, it depends what you mean by home ... 6 things I’d like readers to know about my novel
About the man who doesn’t read for pleasure and why I’d rather scrub the toilet with a toothbrush than produce something as insubstantial as aerosol whipped cream. Q&A with Annalisa Crawford
When I gave my main character, Matty, a rich interior life, I hoped she’d be fascinating. I never dreamt she’d be funny. The Unstoppable Author
I learned a valuable lesson on that trip about my job in a long-stay psychiatric hospital seven thousand miles away. Until then, I hadn’t understood how people who’d lived alongside each other for decades failed to connect. Writers on Location: the long-stay psychiatric hospital
I challenged myself to make her both sympathetic and extremely disturbed. I find her heroic in how she’s adapted to adversity. Shock, horror: paranoid schizophrenic steps outside
I hadn’t given much thought to the pencil’s origins until a couple of years ago, on a research trip to my native Cumbria for my latest book. The black marketeers who gave us the pencil
When I switched from clinical psychologist to author, I couldn’t help taking some of my professional life with me. But I didn’t draw directly on my experience of the mental health system until my third novel. Resettlement revisited in my novel Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home
Almost everyone drank tea in the long-stay psychiatric hospitals. But, while staff could make a cuppa how and when they wanted, patients were served tea at set times with milk and sugar already added to the pot. How do you take your tea?
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In this one-hour podcast with Stuart Wakefield from Write-hearted, I discuss the long process of becoming an author, the pleasure of editing, the inspiration for Sugar and Snails, how my professional background impacts on my writing, my creepy character Steve from Underneath, fictional therapists, meeting readers in book clubs, writers' block as well as my latest novel, Matilda Windsor is Coming Home:
In this half-hour podcast with Charli Mills I discuss writing about mental health issues and why I chose to tell the story from three points of view:
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BIG ISSUE NORTH 11 - 17 OCTOBER 2021
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Fictionalising the workplace: Never mind pleasing our mothers, will our colleagues disapprove? Bringing the workplace alive in fiction
Snakes sometimes slither into the Garden of Eden. One can encounter unpleasantness even here. Despite my character and status, both staff and guests have described me in the foulest terms. Accused me of moral turpitude and delusions of grandeur. Labelled me schizophrenic and unreliable narrator. I follow my mother’s advice and let the words wash over me. 10 (fun) things about Matilda Windsor
Are older characters side-lined in fiction? Are they accurately portrayed? We need older characters in fiction
I had to adjust the geography to fit the story, so I included real local landmarks to produce a stronger sense of place. Workington, rum butter and Egremont Crab Fair inspire new novel
If you didn’t think mental ill-health could be both funny and serious in fiction, think again. Lockdown literature: humour and mental ill-health
Instead of diagnosis, psychologists and psychological practitioners use a process known as formulation to make sense of their clients’ difficulties. Although they vary in how they do so depending on their theoretical stance, they have one thing in common. The good news is that it’s not a world away from what writers do. Fictionalising mental health and psychosis
From March to May, 2020, editing Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home proved the perfect lockdown project. It required the ideal amount of mental energy, being demanding enough to distract me from anxiety without overtaxing my locked-down creativity. Echoes of coronavirus in a novel set in the 1930s and 1990s
What favourite foods are you bringing to our summer picnic? I’d like dainty canapés and fresh fruit salad. However, as I’ve got a fridge full of gloopy porridge, soggy pasta and burnt cake – delicacies I needed for my new novel –– I might need to bring that instead. Summer Picnic with Jaffareadstoo
What is the real-life story behind your latest book, Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home? What was the best, worst and most surprising thing you encountered during the process of completing your latest book? What are your plans for future books? Q&A for NFReads
Snakes sometimes slither into the Garden of Eden. One can encounter unpleasantness even here. Despite my character and status, both staff and guests have described me in the foulest terms. Accused me of moral turpitude and delusions of grandeur. Labelled me schizophrenic and unreliable narrator. I follow my mother’s advice and let the words wash over me. 10 (fun) things about Matilda Windsor
Are older characters side-lined in fiction? Are they accurately portrayed? We need older characters in fiction
I had to adjust the geography to fit the story, so I included real local landmarks to produce a stronger sense of place. Workington, rum butter and Egremont Crab Fair inspire new novel
If you didn’t think mental ill-health could be both funny and serious in fiction, think again. Lockdown literature: humour and mental ill-health
Instead of diagnosis, psychologists and psychological practitioners use a process known as formulation to make sense of their clients’ difficulties. Although they vary in how they do so depending on their theoretical stance, they have one thing in common. The good news is that it’s not a world away from what writers do. Fictionalising mental health and psychosis
From March to May, 2020, editing Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home proved the perfect lockdown project. It required the ideal amount of mental energy, being demanding enough to distract me from anxiety without overtaxing my locked-down creativity. Echoes of coronavirus in a novel set in the 1930s and 1990s
What favourite foods are you bringing to our summer picnic? I’d like dainty canapés and fresh fruit salad. However, as I’ve got a fridge full of gloopy porridge, soggy pasta and burnt cake – delicacies I needed for my new novel –– I might need to bring that instead. Summer Picnic with Jaffareadstoo
What is the real-life story behind your latest book, Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home? What was the best, worst and most surprising thing you encountered during the process of completing your latest book? What are your plans for future books? Q&A for NFReads
World Mental Health Day
Browse the articles on the mental health facts behind the fiction
Browse the articles on the mental health facts behind the fiction
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