Tea & tears
A lot of things go awry in Sarah-Kate Lynch’s new book.

Review by author/editor Nicky Pellegrino, first published in the Herald on Sunday, 2 November, 2008

You have to hand it to Sarah-Kate Lynch, she’s not afraid of a challenge. In her sixth and latest novel, On Top of Everything (Random House, $29.99), the main character Florence is beset by all manner of disasters; she loses her job, her husband leaves her for a man, her house develops dry rot…and then things go really wrong. It’s not a plotline that sounds rich in comedic opportunity and yet Lynch, who’s known for her entertaining, often laugh-out-loud funny writing, somehow manages to find the humour in it.
“The family I come from uses humour as a way of coping when things go wrong,” she explains. “Hopefully that comes across in all my books, but most especially in this one.”
Lynch wanted to write a book that would resonate with anyone who’s ever had a bad day, month or year. The result is both funny and wise, a fast-paced read with nuggets of sound advice tucked within its pages.

Like all of us, Lynch has learned a few life lessons along the way. “I always used to think that there’s a certain balance sheet in the universe and somehow it’s worked out in the end and it’s all fair. Actually that isn’t true. Life can be incredibly unfair and some people have tragedy after tragedy. But one thing I’ve learned is even when life is unfair you can still make the most if it,” she says “Even when things are really, really crap it’s rare that everything is crap. That’s not being Pollyanna…it’s just that there are ways to get through it and laugh in the face of tragedy.”
Lynch’s first novel, Finding Tom Connor, was very much in the chick-lit mould. Since then she’s grown older (she describes herself as “clinging to my mid-forties”) and her subsequent books have tended to delve a little deeper.
“I’ve been through all the usual things,” she says. “Had challenges, illnesses in my family, been fired, made redundant, had money and then had none.”
Most recently she watched her sister-in-law Nicki Robins die of cancer at the age of 38. “She fought like hell and didn’t win,” says Lynch. “Seeing something like that so close at hand, a young mother of three dying in her prime, is an experience that makes you think about things you’ve never considered before. I’ve had other friends who’ve had cancer. As a writer and an observer it’s incredible and astonishing to see the different ways people cope with tragedy. And that’s probably what sparked the idea for this book.”

But, since Lynch didn’t want On Top Of Everything to be a dirge, she needed something to sweeten it up. And she found the perfect thing…afternoon tea. As she reels from life’s punches Florence decides to turn her London house into a teashop and finds consolation baking all manner of sweet treats. Tea and cakes come to represent comfort, security and nostalgia in the book just as they do for Lynch.
“My mother had five children and so she was a good baker but the big baking spreads I remember were from my grandmother in Alexandra. She used to produce all this amazing food and she didn’t even have a proper oven - perfect Neenish Tarts, Belgian Biscuits and Chocolate Afghans with a walnut on the top.”

Lynch’s research for the book involved tea tasting with Stephen Twining of the famous Twinings Tea as well stints over the cake stands in London’s Claridge’s, Hong Kong’s Peninsula Hotel and numerous other establishments. She also went into a frenzy of baking herself, even taking out the top prize in the 2008 Lake Hayes A & P Show for her chocolate and banana cake with fresh raspberries (she provides the recipe in the book).
“I never thought I’d enter a cake into a contest,” Lynch laughs, “but I have to say there’s a certain pride in getting a sign that says Supreme Winner. I kept mine propped up in my writing room. Some days it’s good to feel you’re a supreme winner at something!”

Lynch has had to calm down on the baking front because the tins were overflowing but she still does a mean blueberry muffin. Now living on Auckland’s West Coast with her film-maker husband Mark Robins (readers of her New Zealand Woman’s Weekly column know him simply as the Ginger) she’s currently brewing ideas for her seventh novel. Her books are sold around the world, from the US to Poland and Israel, and her writing career has gone from strength to strength. Her secret?
“The moment you try and do what you think people want you’re kind of screwed,” she says. “You can’t please everyone all the time. You’ve got to aim for what you think is right and what matters to you and hope there’s something in it that’s going to appeal to other people like you.”

Thanks to Nicky Pellegrino and the Herald on Sunday for permission to reproduce this review.

Footnote:

On Top of Everthing is being launched at a tea and cakes event in Auckland this Sunday.