Alex is a disaster, juggling multiple writing jobs and living paycheque to paycheque in one of the world’s most expensive cities: London. Desperate, she applies to write an online advice column for a men’s magazine, landing the role against all odds.

After offering some ill-fated relationship advice to Ryan, she tries to fix her mistake while hiding her identity as his ‘agony uncle’. The two fall for each other, and Alex believes she has finally met the love of her life — but Ryan is in love with a lie.

At the same time, Alex is ghost-writing the biography of Sir John Fenton, a retired Member of Parliament with secrets of his own. As her world unravels, can she help put Sir John’s back together?

Miranda Seymour grew up in Dublin, before moving to Canada to study English Literature and Theatre & Film at McMaster University. A hopeless romantic at heart, her debut novel, Dear Alex, is fittingly a romantic comedy.

J-P Jones grew up in a small Welsh village, reading anything and everything. Now living in London, writing became a passion in lockdown. Dear Alex is one of J-P’s first completed works, along with four short plays.

They explain: “We have been friends for a long time and we share a passion for a good book you can curl up with. We also both love to swap tales of adventures or misadventures whenever we catch up. From these seeds grew the notion to work together on the kind of story we’d both like to read.”

Miranda says: “We did much of the editing and proofing during lockdown, and it was a great way to feel connected and ensure we occupied ourselves! The inspiration from my side was the difficulty of the London dating scene, so I can empathise with Alex when she’s so terrified of losing a decent candidate! Her life for so long has felt a massive mess and that it’s a series of romantic and professional failures, so for it to come together at last, both career and relationship wise, but to be based on a lie, is such a difficult place for her.”

J-P says: “For me, partnering with a friend was transformational. Instead of becoming unfinished project #532, I had support, accountability and most importantly, deadlines to spur me on. When you know your friend is waiting for chapter 10 because they’ve set days aside to start chapter 11, then you can’t drop the baton. It’s been a fun and enlightening process and one I’d really recommend for budding writers.

While sometimes we’ve been able to surprise each other, the characters themselves developed their own momentum and truth very quickly. Almost as if they had a life of their own, Alex, Ryan and the other characters were very definitely themselves, with all their quirks, regardless of who was behind the keyboard. We hope readers enjoy meeting them.”

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RELEASE DATE: 28/03/2025 ISBN: 9781835741818 Price: £9.99
Find out more at https://bookguild.co.uk/bookshop/romance/dear-alex/