Eleanor's Letter: Solstice in the forest and Adele Park's fab new Queenager book

I am totally gripped by First Wife's Shadow which will be landing on your doorstep soon!

Dear Queenagers

Greetings on this beautiful solstice weekend. When you read this I will be camping in the middle of Savernake forest near Avebury in Wiltshire. It is one of my very favourite places, replete with 1000 year old oak trees, wild raspberries (bit early for them) and a forest so endless even after going there for nearly 30 years it is still easy to get lost. I go with about 40 friends, my husband’s old posse from university which began with about 10 of us and as we have all multiplied is now a mighty, multi-generational throng. What is lovely is that all the kids – many now in their twenties – come back for this annual pilgrimage to the forest and then to the standing stones at Avebury; it is like a midsummer gathering of the clan; we walk, we talk, we cook, we laugh, we drink large amounts of rum. It is like an annual snapshot of where we are; how far we have come… the children becoming adults delineating the passing of the decades.

I’ve also been sitting in my tent devouring our latest NOON Book Club book, First Wife’s Shadow by Adele Parks. Those of you who are paid subscribers to this newsletter and NOON and have filled in the form will be receiving your copy, hot of the press from our friends at HarperCollins in the next few days (so keep an eye out for it in your letter box). This is a big treat for you all not only does the book retail for £16.99 and is a beautiful hardback – but it hasn’t officially been published yet, so you are some of the first to read it, it won’t even be in the shops until July 4th.. (you’re welcome just part of the Queenager service).

And it is also entirely gripping – in a thoroughly satisfying Queenager way. The heroine is a 47 year old single CEO of a green energy company, who thinks her life is going fine and who then falls in love with Matthew, a handsome photographer 15 years her junior. She cannot believe her luck – she had given up on the idea of love and relationships; it feels like a fairy tale. But there is trouble afoot; Matthew is a recent widower and – with shades of Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier – our heroine becomes obsessed with how she can’t measure up to his deceased wife, her deadly rival.

Adele Parks MBE is a master of twists and suspense. She is the author of 23 bestselling novels including the Sunday Times bestsellers Both Of You and One Last Secret. 5 million UK editions of her work have been sold and her books have been translated into 31 different languages and made into films. But what I am really loving about this book is all the Queenager themes; friendship (our heroine has a tight trio of female mates who are a bit suspicious about Matthew’s motives) wage discrepancy (our heroine is the breadwinner, she has worked hard and built a beautiful house and life for herself which intimidates many suitors) menopause (is she going a bit hormonal because of the Change or is she losing her mind) and the battle to save the planet (the great thing about having a heroine who is the CEO of an energy company means there is a good drum beat of Green science and what we all need to do but it doesn’t feel shoe-horned in).

Like many of us, our Queenager hero is also grappling with emotional seeds planted in her unhappy childhood which are now festering. This is the work of midlife; to slough off what has lain dormant but has perhaps driven us more than we know, to shake off the conditioning and expectations of our birth families and finally take on our own shape: who do we really want to be? What can we become? This is a great time both of shedding and reinvention. All of that is here in this book (and in mine, regular readers will know this is what the Queenager is all about). I can’t wait for you all to read it and to interview Adele Parks and discuss all of this with all of you at our next NOON Book Club on Thursday July 25^th . If you’d like come do sign up here on Eventbrite. And do send me any questions you have while you are reading it to hello@inherspace.co.uk.

Books are a bit of a theme this week. I am delighted to announce that I will be doing a special reading of some of my book on our Warwickshire Walk on Sunday July 28^th. One of you lovely Queenagers has kindly offered her farm to host a walk, tea, me reading from my book Much More to Come: Lessons on the Magnificence and Mayhem of Midlife and a Noon Circle. There will be fun, friendship, laughter, beautiful countryside plus tea and cake – what could be nicer? All are welcome – can’t wait to see you there for a kind of pre-launch celebration. If you fancy coming - here are the details.

We want to do lots more of these NOON Walks as we know that a good stroll is such a great way to talk and make new friends and get together. If you know somewhere lovely we could go or have a place where you could host do get in touch with jackie@inherspace.co.uk

Also, I am going to having a swanky launch party at the Groucho Club on August 1^st the day of publication and we’re running a special competition so some of you lovely Queenagers can come. If you fancy a night on the town here is how to enter.

And last month we launched our first ever regional NOON Circles because we know not everyone is in London. On Monday July 1^st we are running them again – there will be in person circles in London, Bristol, Kent, Exmouth in Devon, Guildford and Cheltenham (these are free for Paid Subscribers which is only £6 a month, and when you sign up there is an email which gives you the code for booking on eventbrite). Unfortunately lovely Liz who usually runs one near Skipton is away this month.. but we’ll be returning with more in the north and Scotland in the autumn. If you haven’t been to a NOON circle it is where our Queenager community comes to life; we share our stories of midlife collision and reinvention – it is a safe, fun supportive space run by a trusted Queenager who has been with us from the get-go. I kick them off from London on the Zoom with a particular theme and it’s a chance to meet amazing women near you – remember loneliness is worse for our health than smoking 50 fags a day (hot off the press that fact from listening to Gabor Mate at the Belfast Trauma conference last week).

I am so grateful to all the hosts who do it out of the goodness of their hearts because they want to spread the NOON/Queenager message that we are not done, we are never too old and it is never too late to become the women we want to be.

Oh… yes I almost forgot, it is election time and here is a piece I have written about Lady Starmer and the perils of the political wife.. a version of it ran in the Independent last week. But this is the piece I originally wrote. I wonder what you ladies think… in fact it goes back to the dilemma outlined in Adele Parks book; are women still seen as an add on to a man or can they live fulfilled, independent lives? Particularly as we age: that is at the heart of this project, changing the narrative about what the later stages of women’s lives look like to something more positive and fit for purpose. I’ve love to know what you think, do put any thoughts in the comments.

– Lady Starmer and the modern first lady conundrum by Eleanor Mills

With only a fortnight to go before the election, the local candidates leaflets have been dropping through letterboxes all over the country. I live in Kentish Town and my local MP is none other than Sir Keir Starmer; I’ve bumped into him a few times when I go to vote and I can see his house from mine. It’s been quite lively round here recently what with a noisy week long protest against ‘the genocide in Gaza’ at the station and piles of children’s shoes placed outside the Labour leader’s house (to remind him of the kids killed in the conflict). I also spy his security cavalclade if I am up especially early, whisking Sir Keir off to kiss some babies or press the flesh on the campaign trail.

But what surprised me when I picked up his election leaflet was the picture of Sir Keir with Lady Starmer. Or Vic, as she is better known by the Kentish Town mum mafia (who reckon she is ‘cool’ ‘a laugh’ ‘down to earth’ and ‘one of us’). So far, Sir Keir’s missus has been MIA when it comes to the election. Newspaper profiles says she’s keeping her head down and helping her son get through his 21 GCSE exams, apparently making him fried eggs and toast, while dutifully trotting off to her job as an occupational therapist in the local NHS. I reckon Lady Starmer has done very well to maintain such a low profile so far. For that, she has probably got her husband’s stonking lead in the opinion polls to thank. I can’t help thinking that if the election looked tighter she would have been wheeled out to humanise and glamourise her man (I hear from Labour contacts that despite the lead, on the doorsteps even Labour sympathisers claim they ‘don’t know who he really is’). The obvious antidote to that would be to unveil his secret weapon – his incredible, glamorous, clever, down-to-earth, funny wife.  So far, though, requests for interviews or off-the-record briefings about Lady V from Starmer’s team have been stonewalled. “Mrs Starmer will not be giving any interviews” was the curt response when I tried. And when I wondered whether they might put up some trusted friends to speak for her (as is often the way when it comes to first ladies - I did such a piece about Samantha Cameron as a magazine cover story back in the day) I was told firmly that that was not going to happen either.

Hopefully that is a sign of progress. A realisation that a politician’s partner is not part of a two-for-one BOGOFF couples deal as was historically the case. We saw lots of that retro behaviour during the D-Day celebrations; Mrs Biden dutifully trailing in her doddery husband’s wake, or the oh-so-fragrant Brigitte Macron doing her best to prop up the fortunes of her terminally unpopular husband. Michelle Obama was the Queen of the pack; mobama even threatening with her huge charm and charisma, to overshadow the cold, lawyerly Barack.

But so far Lady Starmer has popped up in red at a few Labour Party Conferences to stand by her man during his big speech, but all the signs are she intends to be a thoroughly modern consort, letting Sir Keir get on with it while she gets on with her professional life and copes with their teenage kids. There are even rumours that she isn’t keen on the idea of moving to Downing Street at all and would rather stay  in Kentish Town where both Starmer children attend local schools (she became a governor at our local primary in 2015 when he became the local MP) . Labour insiders reveal that the teenage Starmers are extremely anti the idea of -being in the public eye. I say  - who can blame them?

I know a bit about this, you see, having grown up with a front row seat on the last Labour government as my stepmother was a fixture in all Tony Blair’s cabinets and our family home awash with politicians. I’ve seen David Blunkett in his speedos and Alastair Campbell playing the bagpipes. I’ve even had the paparazzi camped outside my house and my kids and husband plastered all over the tabloids when things got particularly politically hot around her and my dad. As the family, you don’t choose the political career but it still impacts everyone’s lives regardless…. Sure there are fun moments – the insider knowing, or getting invited to events, or meeting the people most of the public just know from the Today programme or Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg – but if you’d much rather not, there is nowhere to hide. Particularly if your dad is in number ten. Just ask poor Kathryn Blair. Or Cherie who has never lived down answering the door the day after the election in her nightie.

Over the last couple of decades I’ve met all the incumbents of number ten and their spouses (except for Mr Truss and Rishi Sunak and his wife). I had a particular soft spot for Samantha Cameron who behaved at all times with great charm, kindness and dignity, even during the death of her beloved son Ivan. In my view, many of the wives were absolutely first rate. Mrs Clegg was dazzling – I am not surprised she is now running for office in her native Spain; glamorous, clever, charming, the full package she chafed at being seen as Nick Clegg’s plus one. Similarly Sarah Brown was a considerable businesswoman in her own right, an excellent PR woman and did much to humanise Gordon Brown – the most touching picture to emerge of his entire reign as leader was the shot of him with Sarah and their two little sons as they left Downing Street. I’ve even dined with Mr May, he was Theresa’s soul mate and confidante, the two of them were thick as thieves and he was one of her key strategists.

Like Mr May, it is said that Lady Starmer is also an important political voice in Sir Keir’s ear – that it is to her that he turns when he has to make a really tough call. And that it is Vic who is begged by his aides to intervene if it really matters. Of course her insight into the true state of the NHS he turned to good advantage during the leadership debates when Rishi tried to argue that waiting lists for treatments were coming down… And it’s not just her nhs insider knowledge: Vic has a political pedigree of her own, winning a landslide victory to become student union president at Cardiff University in 1994 when she challenged left wingers in the NUS and won the day. The local paper proclaimed “Vic-tory” for the “windswept”, deeply glam then Victoria Alexander.

She is no shrinking violet. Tom Baldwin’s biography of Keir Starmer recounts how the two met when they were both lawyers. Keir asked to speak to the person who had created some documents he needed for a case; she turned out to be his future wife. The first phone call revealed Vic’s feisty nature. Before Keir hung up he heard her say to a colleague: ‘who the fuck does he think he is?” Indeed!  According to The Times, they met at a legal dinner a few weeks later “and she shared her vegetarian meal with him”. Kentish Town legend has it that they had their first date at my local, The Lord Stanley (an excellent gastro pub, good taste there) – and afterwards he walked her to the bus stop and waved her off. What a gent.

She is said to have been supportive of his legal career, pushing him on to become Director of Public Prosecutions’ and suggesting he pursue other legal jobs when it ended rather than a career in politics. But Sir Keir had his heart set on leading the Labour party back to electability. As one Labour grandee put it to me: “He is tough, strategic and proud. He doesn’t want to talk up his tough back story or use his family to humanise his rather robotic public image. He makes a rather lacklustre candidate but those qualities will make him a very good prime minister.”

But what of the rest of the family? The truth is that it is impossible for a prime minister to keep them entirely out of the public eye, however much they might want to. And as the mother of two Kentish Town girls I can well understand how north London teenage life is not a great fit with living in Downing Street. Adding to their woes is the current climate around the Israel/Hamas conflict. Victoria’s family are Jewish, they fled Poland before the Second World War. Sir Keir told the Jewish Chronicle. “My wife’s father is Jewish and my wife’s mother converted when they got married. We observe some of the practices such as Friday Night Prayers.” His wife attends the Liberal Jewish Synagogue in St John’s Wood. Another Labour insider told me that Vic had felt ‘intimidated and scared’ by the pro-Palestinian protesters outside their home and the children’s shoes they had left there. Certainly within the right wing press any articles about Lady Starmer are awash with anti-semitism; they attribute her absence from the campaign trail to her husband’s wish not to alienate muslim-origin voters. That to me seems entirely wrong. She was reluctant to be Keir’s plus one long before the war in Gaza. Quite rightly. Sir Keir has chosen a political career – she, and most importantly, her family – have not. I respect her for trying to tread a careful line between supporting her husband when necessary (she has attended state banquets and official duties when required) but also protecting the privacy of her children.

Around Kentish Town, Vic blends in – her jeans and silk shirts, leather jackets and funky style making her just one of the local, professional working mothers. It is a close-knit community, close to Hampstead Heath for green space, within walking distance of Camden, Regent’s park and soho, and awash with fantastic food shops (she and Sir Keir relax by cooking and going together to gigs). There are plenty of great music venues in our vicinity too; from the Forum to the Jazz Café. Middle class life in Kentish Town has much to recommend it; as does the anonymity of not standing out from the crowd. So far Lady Starmer, 51, has managed to even keep her 13-year-old daughter’s name out of the press; new privacy laws and a tighter limit on what the press report have helped. But in Downing Street there is no escaping the media spotlight. I fear the Starmer’s cosy Camden life is about to change irrevocably. With great power comes great responsibility. I wish them all the best of luck. Hold on to your hats!  

Lots of love and see you all soon!

Eleanor xxx