Before the publication of Madison’s Song, author Kay Plowman had already established an impressive list of academic publications. But the co-author of several key text books for Religious Studies, including Advanced Religious Studies (Philip Allan Updates) and Revise Religion and Life GCSE Religious Studies (Heinemann), chose a pen name for the purpose of her work as a fiction writer. ‘I needed to keep a distance from my identity as an academic writer’, Kay explains. ‘Madison’s Song marks such a complete departure for me, but one which I’m excited to be making in the company of a new identity!’

Not entirely new, however, as Kay brings to her first novel a wealth of experience as a singer. ‘Like the heroine of Madison’s Song, I’m a lyric coloratura mezzo soprano, and have sung all the roles she sings during the course of the novel, and many more: Sesto, Carmen, Cenerentola, Orfeo, Donna Elvira, Rosina, Second and Third
Ladies, Dorabella, Idamantes, Maddalena, to name but a few.’

‘I had always wanted to be able to write fiction, but it was only when I followed the old adage ‘write about what you know’ that I found the right direction,’ Plowman adds. ‘Singing is the most important thing in my life, and I enjoy relating to the teenage students I work with at a London 6th form college. Once I put the two together, Madison’s Song took on a life of its own. Initially, I wrote a short story, Playing the Part, which won two Editor’s Awards for on-line fiction and was published in a small anthology by Forward Press. Inspired, I took the characters from the story, added several more, put flesh on the bones of the idea – a singer who had fallen in love with her pianist – and Madison was born. I’ve been excited by the responses I’ve had from early readers, singers and non-singers alike, and particularly by how readers seem find it impossible to remain neutral about any of the characters.’