Stories To Make You Smile

VERONICA HENRY has always been involved in storytelling, from her first job typing scripts for The Archers to being writer-in-residence on the Venice-Simplon Orient Express. She was a scriptwriter for many years, working on some of our best-loved dramas including Heartbeat and Holby City. She has written twenty-five novels, all published by Orion. She lives on the North Devon coast where she loves walking on the beach, swimming in the sea or watching the sun set with a killer negroni.

Find out more at www.veronicahenry.co.uk or follow her on social media @veronica_henry.

Richard Madeley worked on local newspapers before moving to the BBC. He met Judy Finnigan when they both presented a news programme on Granada TV. Their eponymous TV show ran for seven years and was an enormous success. Richard Madeley has four children and lives in London and Cornwall.

DOROTHY KOOMSON is an award-winning, internationally bestselling author and journalist whose books have been translated into more than 30 languages, with sales that exceed 2 million copies in the UK alone.

Her third novel, My Best Friend's Girl (2006) was selected for the Richard & Judy Summer Reads Book Club, while a TV adaptation based on The Ice Cream Girls was shown on ITV1 in 2013.

Dorothy was featured on the 2021 Powerlist as one of the most influential Black people in Britain and appeared in GQ Style as a Black British trailblazer.

She loves reading and writing, and is passionate about supporting other writers no matter what stage they are at in their career.

Helen is probably best known for her role as the dippy Catriona in Absolutely Fabulous, in which she appeared alongside Jennifer Saunders in all six series of the show, as well as for creating the 'girl at the bar' in Naked Video.
However, to many she is known for her unique brand of wit and observational humour. A comedy writer with an extensive portfolio that includes writing and performing her own material, Helen has starred in a great number of top TV comedy and radio shows.
Helen was part of a group of early 1980s comedians, including French and Saunders, the late Rik Mayall, and
Ben Elton, who made their names at London's famous Comedy Store. She was a guest on ITV's Saturday Night Live with her solo comedy act, as well as performing at the first Just for Laughs comedy festival in Montreal along with Lenny Henry. TV appearances span such shows as The Young Ones, French and Saunders, Happy Families, One Foot in the Grave, Bottom, Love Soup, Miss Marple, Casualty and Hollyoaks. She plays Miss Bowline-Hitch alongside Bernard Cribbins in the much loved children's TV series Old Jack's Boat. Helen also played Rich Aunt Ruby in Horrid Henry: The Movie. On BBC radio, she has been a regular panellist on shows including Just a Minute, Quote . . . Unquote, Open Book, A Good Read and Woman's Hour, as well as writing and performing in two of her own comedy series, All Change and Life with Lederer. Her columns include Woman & Home, the Independent, the Mail on Sunday and the Daily Telegraph, and she is currently the 'agony aunt' for Woman's Weekly. Helen's comedy books include Coping with Helen Lederer and Single Minding.
She's done a variety of theatre work, following hot on the heels of Julie Walters in Educating Rita, playing
Doreen in Alan Bleasdale's Having a Ball, as well as appearing in The Vagina Monologues, Calendar Girls and
The Killing of Sister George in London's West End, interspersed with many fringe theatre plays.

Rachel Hore is the bestselling author of seven novels. She worked in London publishing for many years before moving with her family to Norwich, UK, where she teaches publishing at the University of East Anglia. She is married to the writer D. J. Taylor, and they have three sons.