Great stories, well told

The connection between ad people and novels is one that continues to fascinate me, not least because of my own rather feeble attempts to be the next J.K.Rowling, ha ha. And I've blogged about ad people that write, most recently here.

There's an interesting article about copywriters and novelists, by Lisa Friedman, here, which looks at 10 reasons that great copywriters (should) make great novelists. There's knowing your audience, there's the killer work ethic, the ability to tell a story, the economical use of language, and more besides. Summing up, it boils down to having an innate feeling for people and what makes them tick, combined with excellent skills of expression. In other words, the ability to tell a great story, well.

And talking of novels, and ad-land, I can most heartily recommend the new book above, Spin My Little World, by Abigail Cocks. Less about ad-land as set in ad-land. The main character, Bo Simpson, crashes and blunders her way through life armed with high fashion, low-life connections, a refreshingly un-PC attitude and lashings of foul-mouthed humour. I'm sure I worked with her once.

I also worry that I was her once.