A Bitter Sweet running experience

Hattie Williams has written a stunning novel that explores ideas of running through its troubled protagonist

Writing about running with Hattie Williams

This week sees the release of Bitter Sweet, the debut novel from Hattie Williams, an old friend of mine from London. It’s not a book about running, per se, (it’s a torrid rite of passage tale of a young publishing assistant getting caught up in a compellingly uneven relationship) but it is a book by a runner that features plenty of running within it. And it’s fantastic. I’m not just saying that because she’s my friend — it’s got 4.1 on Goodreads (underrated imho), and people like Jodi Picoult have been extolling the book’s virtues.

How does running help you write?

“Being a full-time writer, I am on my own all day, making people up in my head. It often means that I don’t have any reason to leave the house. I love working from home, and I’m a very homebody type of person, so running is a really essential part of my week. I treat myself to a run in the afternoon. I get up early, I work all day, get my w…