WATC dating blogger Marcello | First novel out now

I have written a novel. It’s a tale of love, life and corporate machinations in the city.
Marcello

That’s how I described it to prospective literary agents anyway. It is in fact a book based on my life- a far more amusing version, but my life nonetheless. One literary agent thought the story had legs and I now have ‘representation’.

I should say she’s been a tremendous support and helped with various drafts of the book, she even set me up with a top editor.

All good, however, this hasn’t (yet) led to any kind of book deal. I’m guessing the liberal, literary world of London isn’t amenable to a story about a right-leaning, working-class City Boy (albeit, a self-deprecating one). At the beginning of the novel, when advising readers to be cautious in the matters of love, I write:

‘Like voting conservative or checking up on the bin-men on your day off, it’s not something you want to shout about, but it makes sense’.

Indeed, enough to make any Guardian reading gatekeeper turn away.

When I think about it I suppose I have always stood against the ludicrous, London lefties; those aloof hipster wraiths who haunt our every gastropub. This might seem pointless (given they have long dominated the culture) but someone has to speak for the rest of us, the distinctly straightforward masses who simply get on with it free of the compulsion to show off and virtue signal at every turn. I say ‘us’ but I am actually part of the least trusted group in society: the City working male.

Not quite a banker as such, but I do work for a bank. Still, I have a heart. Many of us do. And someone has to represent us as something other than greedy, loathsome cheats.

What is my novel about? Well, as it’s based on my blog it is about online dating, and my devilish lack of success in this arena. That’s how it started anyway, but it’s now about the corporate world as well; a place of fear, dread and wonder. A place I both love and hate, where I dream incessantly of escape while simultaneously enjoying what I do.

My book is also about unrequited love (buckets of it), family (that infernal life glue) and London, the great snarling city that spawned me. But more than anything else it is a story about friendship. That may not sound as grandiose or poetic as saying ‘it’s about love’ (even though the novel is subtitled ‘love in the city’) but it’s true. Friendship is all that really matters in my life. And so there you go, us City boys aren’t all tin men – some of us are real. But I’m sure you know that already.

Marcello: the novel. Click here for my Amazon page.

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