Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

1 . Paragraph begins with: Fen, meanwhile, did all the arrangements…

Alexis: Tell Alfie you love him without telling him you love him, Fen.

This is from South Pacific , “I’m in Love with a Wonderful Guy.”

2 . Paragraph begins with: “Ye knaa, the flimsy white nonsense…”

Alexis: Turns out Great Aunt Sheila was right all along. Our Maureen is a lesbeen.

3 . Paragraph begins with: “When you used to come in with your mum…”

Alexis: One of my weird quirks as a writer is that I always want what my characters are having—which can get weird, because there’s a moment Ellery, in the Billionaire books, takes coke and nobody should be sitting around being like, “Wow, I could murder some cocaine right now.”

I could, however, really murder a proper South Shields stottie, exactly as described.

4 . Paragraph begins with: “It’s not unsalvageable though.”

Alexis: Wow, past me was really interested in the full details of how to make a local flower shop profitable again. Good on you, past me.

The thing is, I’m always really into “saving the [x]” type plots, but I’m too much of a logistics pedant not to want to know something of the how. I guess this represents a compromise: it shows Alfie knows what he’s talking about, sets out a clear path of recovery for the shop, but doesn’t make the entire last third of the book about the intricacies of running a flower shop.

5 . Paragraph begins with: “Wow, you’re kind of demanding about your princes.”

Alexis: This is from Into the Woods , for anyone who isn’t a musicals person.

I think the exact line of Sondheim’s Prince Charming is “I was raised to be charming, not sincere,” but thankfully Alfie is both charming and sincere.

6 . Paragraph begins with: “It can be one of the most difficult things in the world, I think.”

Alexis: No, you’ve got something in your eye.

It’s so strange coming back to your own work after a long time. I forgotten I’d written this and then it got me.