Why I love chick-lit - Joanna Trollope explains.
People sneer at these books, but wittily told romantic fiction is as hard to write as it is fun to read.

I've been reading a lot of what the media calls chick-lit lately (I've got another name for it - tell you later - bear with me ... ) This is because I'm a judge for a newish prize which I've every faith is going to become a New Big Thing - not least because it's for the books we actually read because we want to, as opposed to the books we buy because ... well, I needn't finish that sentence.

It's called the Melissa Nathan prize and it's for what she called comedy romance. That's what she wrote - remember The Nanny and The Waitress? - before she died two years ago, at only 37, leaving a husband and a little boy and the idea/wish for this prize. Last year was its first year, and the judges - Jo Brand, Sophie Kinsella, Jessica Hines, Gaynor Allen (chief fiction buyer for Tesco) Alan Davies and I, had such a good time that we insisted on being allowed to do it all over again this year.

Read Joanna's full story at the Guardian online.