Meet the Author: CJ Wray

CJ Wray is the pseudonym of Christine Manby, a Sunday Times bestselling author with more than forty books to her name. Raised in the west of England, she studied psychology before embarking on an entertaining and wide-ranging career that has seen her selling kitchens, editing erotica, interviewing an armed robber, and impersonating a princess.

Christine's latest book (as CJ Wray) is The Excitements which was published by Orion on 18 January. You can find The Excitements on our catalogue.

Who were your influences as you were growing up and did you have books around you as a child or use a library?

Visits to the library on a Saturday morning were a big part of my childhood. We went to the main library in the centre of Gloucester, which seemed enormous. I thought it contained all the wisdom in the world. When I was around six or seven, my favourite books were the My Naughty Little Sister stories by Dorothy Edwards. Possibly because I had a naughty little sister of my own.

Later, I devoured Tove Jansson’s Moomin series. I loved the slightly eerie feel of Moominvalley. I still do. Moomintroll was the least-interesting character in Jansson’s stories, as far as I was concerned. I felt much more connection with Little My and Snuffkin, who were altogether more complicated creatures. I loved Little My’s anarchic streak and empathised with Snuffkin’s need for solitude and space. It felt unusual at the time to find such nuanced characters in children’s literature. I reread Moominvalley In November every year and I’m drinking tea from my favourite red Little My mug as I write this.

You had a lot of varied jobs before you became a writer. What was the most and least enjoyable?

I loved working as a Saturday girl at a kitchen showroom. My job was to greet customers as they arrived, fetch them a drink (there was always a bottle of Lambrusco Bianco on the go, to help people make rash decisions), then show them the exciting features in our kitchen displays, such as the smooth-opening drawers, which inevitably collapsed as I pulled them out. Our products were shoddy but the team was great and I couldn’t have asked for a nicer start to my working life.

My least enjoyable job was an office manager / sales rep for a small advertising company in Soho. I was hopeless in my role and I hated going into the office because I was the only member of the team who didn’t smoke. You could barely see your hand in front of your face for the fug. I stuck out a year of feeling like a failure and smelling like an ashtray before I was fired. That was the catalyst I needed to really make a go of my writing career.

When did your interest in writing really develop and what was your journey to publication?

I feel a bit of a fraud on this front because I didn’t always want to be a writer. I wanted to be a fashion designer. I loved art lessons and hoped to go to art school but I was discouraged by teachers who told me I should pursue a more academic subject and keep art as a hobby. After that, I gave up drawing but I suppose my creative side needed an outlet and that became writing fiction. Aged fourteen, I decided on a whim to send one of my stories to the fiction editor at the iconic teen magazine Just Seventeen. I was absolutely astonished when she bought it, for the princely sum of £117. That felt like enormous riches (it’s a better rate than most magazines pay today).

After that, I continued to write stories for Just Seventeen all through university, where I studied Experimental Psychology. I didn’t get a very good degree – I guess my heart wasn’t in it – so post-university I went up to London and embarked on a series of terrible temp jobs. It was at one of those temp jobs that I met David Garnett, a very well-respected science fiction author, who challenged me to write a novella for a new genre series that was just starting up. I wrote the book and he was a great mentor, suggesting changes then passing the manuscript on to his editor. I was over the moon when she agreed to take the book, called Inspiration, which I published under the name Stephanie Ash. I used that early success to help find an agent, and I was away.

You have written successfully under a variety of pseudonyms. You have used a pseudonym again for The Excitements. Was there a particular reason for that?

I started my career under a pseudonym. My very first short story was published under the name Carolyn Lane. The reason for that is because I didn’t want to get beaten up at school. Later, I used a pseudonym for my first novella because it contained a lot of sex and I didn’t want to embarrass my family. I started writing under my own name when I thought I had written something I could let my parents read!

Flatmates was the first book I published as Chris Manby (I always introduce myself as Chris). I had some top ten success under that name but then my publisher decided I should change my name to Chrissie because they thought Chris sounded too masculine. I’ve also written bonkbusters as Olivia Darling and Stella Knightley.

I used yet another pseudonym for The Excitements because I knew the book was going to be different from anything I’d written before. C stands for Chris. J stands for Jinx. And Wray is the town in Lancashire where my friend and inspiration for The Excitements, the late Jean Argles (nee Owtram) lived.

The Excitements is your latest novel. Can you tell us a little about it?

I like to think of The Excitements as three books in one: it’s a comedy, a historical novel and a mystery too. It follows World War Two veterans, Josephine and Penny Williamson. Now in their late-nineties, the sisters are in huge demand, popping up at commemorative events all over the country. Despite their age, they’re still in great form—perfectly put together, sprightly and sparky, and always in search of their next “excitement.”

The story flits between the sisters’ wartime adventures – Josephine was a Wren and Penny was in the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry – and a present-day trip to Paris, to receive the Légion d’honneur, accompanied by their devoted great-nephew, Archie. Keen historian Archie thinks his great-aunts had relatively minor roles in the war but he doesn’t know the half of it. As the Parisian jaunt descends into mayhem, a number of secrets, official and otherwise, are revealed.

I had a fantastic time working on The Excitements and I hope my readers will find it the perfect uplifting comfort read.

How did you meet the real life Second World War veterans you based Penny and Josephine on?

I met Patricia Davies and Jean Argles (both nee Owtram) when I was commissioned, as Chris Manby, to help write their memoir. Pat was a Wren during WW2. She was a ‘Special duties linguist’ with the Y Service, listening out for radio traffic from the German Kriegsmarine. Her younger sister Jean was a code and cipher officer with the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry, stationed in Egypt and Italy.

I knew from the moment I met Pat and Jean that I was in for an adventure. I interviewed the sisters at length about their wartime experiences but what really inspired me was the lives they’d led since VE Day. Pat became a journalist and then a television producer, while Jean worked all over the world for various NGOs before joining the team at what was then the brand-new Lancaster University to set up their careers department. They were both trailblazers in their fields.

I soon came to count Pat and Jean as friends. Jean in particular had a wicked sense of humour and we had a running joke that she was really a WW2 spy. Each time we met, I’d say to her, ‘You were going to tell me about your career as a spy, Jean.’ She would usually respond by pretending that the batteries in her hearing aids had suddenly gone flat. Our joke inspired me to create Penny Williamson, who had all the adventures I suspected Jean wasn’t telling me about! Sadly, Jean died last year so I wasn’t able to show her the book which contains her fictional alter ego.

Pat celebrated her hundredth birthday last year and is still carrying the torch for the servicewomen of her generation. She very kindly agreed to appear in a special addition to The Excitements’ audiobook, where I interview her about her war years and beyond.

The Owtram sisters’ remarkable life stories are published in two volumes: Codebreaking Sisters and Century Sisters (both Mirror Books).

Does the Peter Jones café know they feature in your book?

Ha! No. I do hope they won’t be upset. The top floor café there really is one of the best spots in London and well worth a visit.

The Excitements would make a great film. Has there been any interest yet?

It’s ‘doing the rounds’ so I’ve got my fingers crossed. I was lucky enough to sit next to Bill Nighy and Andrew Lincoln on a train a short while ago. I told them about the book and Bill Nighy commented that it sounded like a project for Dames Judi Dench and Maggie Smith. From his lips to God’s ears, as they say! While I was writing the book, I actually had Eddie Izzard in my head for the character of Sister Eugenia, the 99 year old former Wren, who is also being honoured in Paris.

What is next for you?

I’m in the process of finishing a book called Jinx, which will be published in 2025. It’s a sort of sequel to The Excitements, featuring some familiar characters, but it can also be read as a standalone. It’s another dual timeline story, featuring the childhood experiences of the heroine, Jennifer ‘Jinx’ Sullivan, who was an internee in a Japanese camp in Singapore during WW2.

Can you tell us one thing about yourself that your readers may not know?

I am a ‘queunliskanphobic’, which means I have a dread fear of saliva and spitting. I can make myself feel faint just thinking about it. It’s very annoying as I’d like to do 23andme but can’t bring myself to provide a spit sample. I would honestly rather give them three pints of blood.