Tipping the family members out of their beds in order to attend Helen Lederer’s early session, was worth every grumble when she rewarded us with an entertaining hour of comic indulgence. The miseries hanging over from the late night before disappeared as this talented performer took to the stage, treating the audience to a ten minute display of her stand-up comic talent. By the end of her introduction, she had won the hearts of most of the audience.

Helen is at Hay to promote her first novel ‘Losing It’, a tale of a middle-aged woman’s participation in a paid trial to lose weight. As she loses weight, she hopes to save her house. The heroine has tried all kinds of faddy approaches to her weight-loss, some based on real-life experiences and Helen made us giggle as she read a passage about the All White Clinic for colonic irrigation. Helen states that she writes in a new genre of ‘mid-lit’. Her type of comedy is about recognition & making it feel as though she & her audience are ‘as one’.

The serious dilemma of working as a woman in comedy (a male dominated industry) has encouraged her to promote the new ‘Comedy Women in Print’ award (CWIP). Behind the funny exterior, lurks a clever, observant mind.

Intelligent comedy reading for the middle aged – I look forward to reading her novel.