Biographies of the Hollywood greats. Don’t you see? That combination screams out the same message. Crystal Leighton was an intelligent professional actress who understood the importance of image and design. And that’s the message we should be aiming for. Professional excellence. What do you think?’
‘Think? I haven’t had time to think,’ Mark replied, and inhaled deeply, straightening his back so that Lexi felt as though he was towering over her. ‘My publisher may have arranged your contract, but I’m still struggling with the idea of sharing personal family papers and records with someone I don’t know. This is very personal to me.’
‘You’re a private person who doesn’t like being railroaded. I get that. And I can understand that you’re still not sure about my reason for being here in the first place.’ She glanced up at his startled face and gave a small snort. ‘It’s okay, Mark. I’m not a spy for the paps. Never have been. No plans to be one any time soon. And if I was stalking you I would have told you.’
Lexi turned sideways away from the table and ran her fingers across the spines of the wonderful books on the shelves. ‘Here’s an idea. You’re worried about sharing your family secrets with a stranger. Let’s change that. What do you want to know about me? Ask me anything. Anything at all. And I’ll tell you the truth.’
‘Anything? Okay, let’s start with the obvious. Why biographies? Why not write fiction or business books?’
She paused and licked her lips, but kept her eyes focused on the books in front of her. To explain properly she would have to reveal a great deal of herself and her history. That could be difficult. But she’d made a pact with herself. No lies, no deception. Just go with it. Even if her life seemed like a sad joke compared to Mark’s perfect little family.
‘Just after my tenth birthday I was diagnosed with a serious illness and spent several months in hospital.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ he whispered after a few seconds of total silence.
She sensed him move gently forward and lean against the doorframe so that he was looking at her.
‘That must have been awful for you and your parents.’
She nodded. ‘Pretty bad. My parents were going through a rough time as it was, and I knew my father had a pathological hatred of hospitals. Ironic, huh?’ She smiled at him briefly, still half-lost in the recollection. ‘Plus, he was working in America at the time. The problem was, he didn’t come home for a couple of months, and when he did he brought his new girlfriend with him.’
‘Oh, no.’ Mark’s eyebrows went north but his tense shoulders went south.
‘Oh, yes. I spent the first year recovering at my grandmother’s house on the outskirts of London, with a very miserable mother and even more miserable grandmother. It was not the happiest of times, but there was one consolation that kept me going. My grandmother was a wonderful storyteller, and she made sure that I was supplied with books of every shape and form. I loved the children’s stories, of course, but the books I looked for in the public library told of how other people had survived the most horrific of early lives and still came through smiling.’
‘Biographies. You liked reading other people’s life stories.’
‘Could not get enough.’ She nodded once. ‘Biographies were my favourite. It didn’t take long for me to realise that autobiographies are tricky things. How can you be objective about your own life and what you achieved at each stage? The biography, on the other hand, is something completely different: it’s someone else telling you about a mysterious and fabulous person. They can be incredibly personal, or indifferent and cold. Guess what kind I like?’
‘So you decided to become a writer?’ Mark asked. ‘That was a brave decision.’
‘Perhaps. I had the chance to go to university but I couldn’t afford it. So I went to work for a huge publishing house in London who released more personal life stories every year than all of the other publishers put together.’ She grinned up at Mark. ‘It was amazing. Two years later I was an assistant editor, and the rest, as they say, is history.’
She reached her right hand high into the air and gave him a proper, over-the-top, twirling bow. ‘Ta-da. And that’s it. That’s how I got into this crazy, outrageous business.’ Lexi looked up at him coquettishly through her eyelashes as she stood up. ‘Now. Anything else you’d like to know before we get started?’
‘Only one thing. Why are you wearing so much make-up at nine o’clock in the morning? On a small Greek island? In fact, make that any island?
Lexi chuckled, straightening up to her full height, her head tilted slightly to one side.
‘I take it as a compliment that you even noticed, Mark. This is my job, and this is my work uniform. Office, movie studio, pressroom or small Greek island. It doesn’t make any difference. Putting on the uniform takes me straight into my working head—which is what you’re paying me for. So, with that in mind, let’s make a start.’
Lexi pulled down several books from the shelves and stacked them in front of Mark.
‘There are as many different types of biography as there are authors. By their nature each one is unique and special, and should be matched to the personality of the person they are celebrating. Light or serious, respectful or challenging. It depends on what you want to say and how you want to say it. Which one of these do you like best?’
Mark exhaled loudly. ‘I had no idea this would be so difficult. Or so complex.’
Lexi picked up a large hardback book with a photograph of a distinguished theatre actor on the cover and passed it to Mark.
She sighed as Mark flicked through the pages of small, tightly written type with very little white space. ‘They can also be terribly dry, because the person writing is trying their hardest to be respectful while being as comprehensive as possible. There are only so many times an actor can play Hamlet and make each performance different. Lists of who did what, when and where are brilliant for an appendix to the book—but they don’t tell you about the person, about their soul.’
‘Do you know I actually met this actor a couple of times at my mother’s New Year parties?’ Mark waved the book at Lexi before dropping it back to the table with a loud thump. ‘For a man who had spent fifty years in the theatre he was actually very shy. He much preferred one-to-one conversations to holding centre stage like some of his fellow actors did.’
‘Exactly!’ Lexi leant forward, animated. ‘That’s what a biographer should be telling us about. How did this shy man become an international award-winning actor who got stage fright every single night in his dressing room but still went out there and gave the performance of his life for the audience? That’s what we want to know. That’s how you do justice to the memory of the remarkable person you are writing about. By sharing real and very personal memories that might have nothing to do with the public persona at all but can tell the reader everything about who that person truly was and what it meant to have them in your life. That’s the gold dust.’
Mark frowned. ‘So it all has to be private revelations?’
‘Not all revelations. But there has to be an intimacy, a connection between reader and subject—not just lists of dry facts and dates.’ Lexi shrugged. ‘It’s the only way to be true to the person you’re writing about. And that’s why you should be excited that you have this opportunity to make
