The high point for me is always the book launch party.
Con Coughlin
Con Coughlin is a journalist and commentator specialising in the Middle East and international terrorism. He is defence and security editor of The Daily Telegraph and writes for the Spectator and other periodicals. His new book, Khomeini's Ghost, follows Saddam: The Secret Life, a biography of the fallen dictator.
A lot of the newspaper diarists will be at the party, and I need to think of some lines to give them so that they can justify a diary item in their columns.
Sunday
So after all the hard work, now the fun begins. Or that's the theory, at least. The book is hitting the bookstores tomorrow, and to alert the nation to its imminent arrival I'm off to White City to do the paper review for the Radio 4 morning programme Broadcasting House. It means getting up at the unearthly (for a Sunday) hour of 7am, but that's showbusiness. I love appearing on Radio 4 programmes because it's the station I listen to most, and I know most of the journalists there who I often run into when I'm travelling abroad. My problem this morning is to persuade the amiable presenter Paddy O'Connell to talk about my new book on Iran rather than Afghanistan, where I've just spent the week touring with Foreign Secretary David Miliband. We have a chat in the green room next to the broadcast studio and come to an arrangement where we will start the programme talking about Iran and Khomeini, and then have a chat about Afghanistan later on.
Monday
Who said publishing books was fun? There's a general misconception among authors that their main job is done once the book is written and the manuscript submitted. Far from it. Apart from all the painstaking work that needs to be done working through the proofs, writing up the bibliography and remembering to thank everyone who has helped with the project, you then have the book launch itself and all the attendant publicity that goes with it. The high point for me is always the book launch party, which I'm having - appropriately - in the Library of The Travellers Club in Pall Mall, a favourite haunt of travellers and writers. I'm looking forward to the party, but concerned that all the invites have been sent to the correct addresses, and what kind of speech I should give. My book is half biographical - a study of Khomeini's early life - while the second half is more political, looking at the impact the Iranian revolution has had on the world during the past thirty years. My contention that Iran lies at the heart of most of the global security challenges the world faces today is highly controversial, and I don't want to alienate those who do not agree with my argument. At the same time I can't ignore the fact that this is a controversial book, particularly in Iran where I'm very much persona non grata. I need to get the balance of my speech right so that I keep everyone happy.
Tuesday
Most of the morning is spent doing an interview with the Irish radio network RTE. I know the presenter Pat Kenny of old, having done a television interview with him in the early 1990s when my first book Hostage was published. We were both a lot younger then and after the show we went to a Dublin nightclub called Lily's Bordello, where the walls were festooned with exotic drapes and the dance floor is in the shape of a four poster bed. This time our demeanour is a lot more sober, and we have a lengthy discussion of the merits or otherwise of the Iranian revolution. What I like about doing interviews in Ireland is that the presenters have invariably taken the trouble to read the book first, so that it is possible to have an intelligent and informed discussion. This is not always the case with interviewers in Britain.
Wednesday
Today's the day of the book launch, and most of the day is spent making sure that everything is properly set up at the Travellers, from making sure there will be enough drinks to go round to checking that there will be room to sell copies of the book. A lot of the newspaper diarists will be at the party, and I need to think of some lines to give them so that they can justify a diary item in their columns. My colleagues at the Telegraph Mandrake column have been most supportive by flagging up the party, and pointing out that the negotiations to persuade Libya to give up its nuclear weapon programme were conducted by MI6 officers at the Travellers. Perhaps the same might happen with Iran? Like all hosts, my main concern is that people will actually turn up, but by 7.30 the room is full. The star of the show is undoubtedly my old friend General Sir Mike Jackson - Jacko - who've I known since I first came across him during the Bosnian civil war. When I make my speech he grunts approvingly when I compare modern-day Iran to Germany and Russia during periods of the twentieth century - a wonderful country full of wonderful people - it's just the regime that's the problem.
Thursday
The party is a great success, and even merits a column in the Evening Standard's London Life diary. They've picked up on a remark I made where I sarcastically thanked the Iranian government for doctoring my Wikipedia entry to make it look like I'm the world's worst writer. I've tried to remove the offending material, but it just keeps coming back. I suppose most people are aware now that they shouldn't take Wikipedia at face value, but it's irritating nonetheless because the more lurid claims - such I was the author of the 45-minute claim on Saddam Hussein's WMD - are so obviously nonsense. But I suppose we have to take the attitude that all publicity is good publicity.
Friday
My book is being published simultaneously in Britain and America, and so when I'm not doing interviews with British media I am touring the stations of the various American networks. The Americans have a far more in-your-face way of interviewing, and demand to know what the "headlines" are in your book. There's no point explaining that this is a book, not a newspaper article, but I've learnt over the years to go with the flow. Many of the programmes I do are phone-ins, and I notice that there is a noticeable change in the public mood in America from the last time I did a publicity tour. The election of President Barack Obama has raised expectations in the U.S. that many of its problems can be sorted out - including the controversy over Iran's nuclear programme. A lot of callers seem to suggest that Iran has every right to develop nuclear weapons if it wants to. You certainly wouldn't have heard sentiments like that expressed when George W. Bush was still resident at the White House.
Tuesday, 10 March, 2009
In My week
- Charlotte Grimshaw
- Susan Hill
- Ed Hollis
- Ali Sethi
- Wells Tower
- Con Coughlin
- Dirk Wittenborn
- Kathleen Kent
- Daniel Everett
- Mark Crick
- Glyn Maxwell
- Rabih Alameddine
- Nicholas Hogg
- Charles Boyle
- Mohammed Hanif
- Sarah Hall
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