For a long time I'd been publishing short stories in 'literary' magazines, but in 2003 I had a novel, Zade, accepted for publication by Saqi Books (it came out in 2004). So this bit of my website says a few things about it. It isn't a book I could write now - and even at the time it changed from its inception as a black comedy to something more serious. This was because of a couple of 'life' events that came along at the time, including losing a much-loved relative in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Centre. The event is located within the time-frame of my novel and has reverberations within the story ... but is by no means the main focus. However, there is also a lot of joy and humour in the book ... which possibly serves, in the end, to increase the pathos of the tragic happening at the heart of the novel. I was very pleased that more than one reviewer refered to its 'wit'!
Zade was on the 2006 longlist of twelve for the Prince Maurice Prize, awarded in alternate years to French and English writers (www.princemaurice.com). The list included Zadie Smith, Joanna Briscoe, Rachel Cusk, Clare Sambrook, and Julian Fellowes. The prize is specifically for novels which 'examine love between people in any of its myriad forms'. The judges included Helen Dunmore (for whom Zade made the shortlist of three), Mark Lawson, Blake Morrison, and Jacqueline Wilson.
I had some nice cover endorsements ...
'Inventive and playful by turns, Heather Reyes writes with tremendous verve and wit.' Jill Dawson
'A wonderful first novel.' Martina Cole
'A tender, profound, playful novel. Refreshingly experimental and a delicious hymn to literature.' Moniza Alvi
... but my best review was in Paris Voice - a review I only discovered by chance while actually in Paris and visiting a bookshop.
'Every once in a while, a first novel comes along that seems as accomplished as if its writer had long been a member of literature's Pantheon. Here, with wit an imagination, comes alive the story of a young woman, Zade, who experiences a sort of compressed cataclysm of love and loss, but ultimately finds consolation via the artistic souls at Pere Lachaise Cemetery. Are they figments of here imagination, or are they real? Indeed, this communion with the ghosts of Paris past - Moliere, Wilde, Apollinaire, Proust, Piaf, Gertrude Stein - seems so "real" it's as though they were alive, rendering in flesh and bone the essence of what art has to offer ... to life. This is a Paris book which isn't about living in Paris, but focuses on what the spirit of Paris is, on its timeless wisdom, and ultimately its uplifting and fathomless sources of inspiration.' Marc Heberden, parisvoice, March 2004
Zade was also shortlisted (a little less glamorously!) for Bedfordshire Libraries' 'Book of the Year'.