@ellemcnicoll
Autistic. Bestselling author and award winning screenwriter. Agent: Lauren Gardner. Winner of Blue Peter Award & Overall Waterstones Children's Book Prize, 21. Emmy nominated #AKindOfSpark streaming on BBC iPlayer!
I am. I don't think we should be apologetic over a condition so many wilfully try to misunderstand.
So I wrote a novel about that public dance we have to do.
But also about an autistic woman choosing herself. And the things she needs.
I hope I'm not alone when I go home.
"Can you have sex? Or is that too overstimulating"
"Do you feel heartbreak or would you say the lack of empathy makes ending a union much easier. You just close a door on it, so to speak."
"Do you want children? Is that something you think about?"
"You're quite unapologetic."
About being an autistic woman in the public eye. Answering questions from press, hoping that will be the end of it. Only to realise that answering their questions is like fighting the hydra. Each answered question spawns another head, & another othering question.
The things I've heard, good lord.
Childhood is a faraway memory. When I write about those years, there's a wall that keeps my current self out of it all. The wall keeps out cynicism and grownup pondering. It keeps things pure.
Unapologetic Love Story is a romance novel, yes, but it's also a novel about being an autistic woman.
As an autistic writer, you're always used to the fear. The fear that a bunch of allistic people will gather around your work and laugh and point and say, "Isn't it an odd creature". That was my autistic childhood, after all.
"Is the freak really trying to write a love story?"
Yeah. I am.
I know nobody sees these posts so it feels a bit like writing in a diary.
I've always had adults at my events. Not just parents, carers and teachers. But neurodivergent adults who feel seen by my work.
Presenting a book about autistic love is a lot. The inside of your heart in glorious hardback.
I'm going back to Portobello Bookshop (a brilliant indy bookshop in Edinburgh) to launch Unapologetic Love Story on the 31st of March.
As a Scottish author, I'm excited to bring my adult debut home.
I'm also very afraid. I've never done an event for an adult novel. This is all new and strange.
thanks, you guys! I got the news about KO a couple of hours before coming to your latest award show. being with so many great people made the blow a lot easier. thank you for all you've done and will continue to do! x
Raina Character art
Tom character art
22 days to go I feel sick!!
So Philip Glass just joined TikTok. He only has like 4 posts and theyβre simply him in what I assume is his living room playing the piano. First comment on one I saw was βyour piano is too close to the fireplace, youβll dry it outβ and if thatβs not the internet in a nutshell I donβt know what is.
I hate to do this, but it's 1 month until UNAPOLOGETIC LOVE STORY is published and so I'm contractually obligated to share some of the nice things reviewers have been saying.
If you'd like to read yourself before anyone else, I'm doing special personalised pre-orders via West End Lane Books!!
Amazing!! Thank you, Paddy!
Threads post from an entity that calls itself @sabbbrwna: what do y'all use instead of ChatGPT?
My brain.
π«Ά
ICYMI: Bestselling author Elle McNicoll has joined Pan Macmillan in an eight-book deal π #BookSky
Yep, should be. Also doing signed and personalised orders with West End Lane Books and Portobello Bookshop.
And yay! That's awesome! Hope they enjoy it, I'm always around if they have any questions xx
This is going on my MUST buy list! β¬οΈ #BookSky
Taking my anti-fascist love story on tour.
Events will include fun, laughter, slight naughtiness and defiant joy in the face of whatever each of us is going through.
I know no one sees this on here, and I have no idea how this app works, but links will be in the second part of the thread.
Cannot actually believe we're getting to do this!!
As one of so many bookshops who adore @ellemcnicoll.bsky.social βs body of work, this really warms the cockles.
#KidLitUK
To quote @goodlawproject.org we need to take personal responsibility in keeping the far right out of the Scottish parliament. Trumpβs little puppet Farage wants to do to us what MAGA is doing to the USA. It can be so simple. We just need a good turn out in May. Make sure youβre registered to vote
βPlease get the truth out about our son.β
Read and share the statement from the parents of Alex Pretti, the VA ICU nurse who was shot and killed by border patrol.
I'm getting married and releasing my first adult romance novel in the same year. This year. The book is out on the 2nd of April.
Wedding invites are still in the works, but if you'd like a signed, personalised special edition of Unapologetic Love Story, here:
www.welbooks.co.uk/shop/p/unapo...
I'm happy now. Isn't that strange? Aren't I odd for saying it?
It wasn't staring into the abyss that made me live.
It wasn't accepting cold hard "truths" from people who don't understand women like me.
It's because I believed the stories. And mine came true. And I love that.
And after a lifetime of being treated like a zoo animal, or a mermaid stumbling about on land, isn't that fucking radical?
I'm so pleased I get to do it
It feels meaningless to say it... but I wish I could throw it in a time machine. For the young woman who needed it.
Because
I'd much rather write a novel that will bring someone the joy that I needed as a young woman.
Humour. Pain. Some wit, I hope. Sex. London. Darkness. Light. The truth, wrapped in pink confetti and beautiful endpapers.
I chose the title. I was being honest. That's what it is.
A part of me knows that if I wrote a miserable book, capturing all of the worst parts of being neurodivergent, I would be applauded. It would be called important.
But that's so easy. Tragedy is so close to hand. Easy to grasp. Easy to reproduce. In some ways, it feels cheap.
When I was 14, I would escape into romance novels. They reignited my love of reading and of life.
They would take me away from being a shy autistic teen. Because no matter how dark things would get in them, the happy ending was promised.
Mine will be out on the 2nd of April.