• RLF News
• Article

My Writing Life: Manni Coe

Manni Coe is the second of four brothers. He grew up in Yorkshire and Berkshire. He studied Latin American History & Culture at Edinburgh University, which took him on adventures to South America before he finally settled in Spain. He now lives between Dorset and a tiny village in Andalusia called Archidona. He works as a private guide in Spain and around the world brother. do. you. love. me., his debut memoir, became a Sunday Times bestseller. Little Ruinsis his second book and is set on their Olive Farm in Andalusia.

1. What book should every writer read?

As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning by Laurie Lee.

Spain, just on the cusp of Civil War – a young man walks the length of the country, playing the fiddle for his board and lodging and he captures, probably better than any other writer at any other time, the soul of the country. They say Lee was “born with a nightingale inside him”, and his prose takes me beyond beauty.

2. What is your typical writing day like?

I get up at stupid o’clock – typically 4 am – make tea, then coffee, and tiptoe down to my writing space, which is in a ruined cottage at the back of our farm. It takes me a while to settle. Some days I sit and wait for quite a while until I feel the sense of the words coming, and then I write longhand until my hand hurts. By sunrise, my writing is done. I break into the chores of the day, and then mid-morning, I type up what becomes my first edit.

3. Who has been an influential figure in your writing career?

The writer and journalist Sophy Roberts. Sophy and I would take walks together in Dorset and unravel ideas. Walking the coastal paths and holloways of Dorset with Sophy helped me to believe I could write. There was something about that ancient landscape and those safe conversations that unlocked me. Sophy would always challenge me to write deeper, cast my net wider, and be a better writer.

4. What is the one thing you wish someone had told you before you started your career as a professional writer?

When making big life choices in your writing career, trust the still small voice of your own intuition.

5. What is the best advice you’ve ever received about your writing?

Andrew Wille once told me, “There are no rules. Just don’t be boring.”

6. What has been the proudest moment of your career so far?

When my first book brother. do. you. love. me. was chosen as Waterstones Book of the Month in March 2023 and Reuben and I were in London. Waterstones Piccadilly had made the most beautiful window display using Reuben’s illustrations on easels to decorate the scene. I will never forget his face when he realised that his artwork was on display in the window of Europe’s biggest bookshop. “Look bruvr!” he said, pointing to his artwork. That moment was the pinnacle of his recovery, and I melted into the pavement.

7. What are you reading right now?

The Correspondent by Virginia Evans.

In Little Ruins, I wrote about suicide, and it has opened up many conversations. I was recently walking the Camino de Santiago and during an important conversation, a lady told me I needed to read this book. I don’t know why she suggested it, but I took her at her word and ordered it. I love the mystery of reading and where books take us in our own writerly journey.

8. Bookmarker or page-folder?

Both – and I’m a scrawler. Books are sacred, but that doesn’t mean they need to remain pristine. I treat them as manuscripts to be studied, annotated and examined. It’s those notes in the margins that lead me home.

This article originally appeared on our Substack. 

You might also like: