Author Sophie Kinsella was diagnosed with brain cancer, then wrote a rom-com about it

Sophie Kinsella, the author of Confessions of a Shopaholic , packs love, laughter and a harrowing real-life health ordeal into a 133-page novella. Sitting beneath a skylight on a brilliant Sunday morning, Sophie Kinsella called to mind a posh, slightly weary matriarch who might appear in one of her novels. Flowing leopard skirt, check.

Devoted husband who looks like Harrison Ford, check. Town house near the Thames with chocolate bars on a silver platter in the living room, check and check plus. Then Kinsella lifted her chestnut hair to show a bald patch left by treatment for a brain tumour.

It was a glioblastoma, the most aggressive kind. “I couldn’t say the word ‘cancer’ for a long time,” she said “There’s still a residual cringing, fearful disbelief.” Kinsella, 54, is the author of 33 novels, many of them No 1 bestsellers, including Confessions of a Shopaholic , which led to eight spinoffs and a movie.

Her novels have been translated into 40 languages in more than 60 countries. They’ve sold approximately 48 million copies worldwide, including seven books that Kinsella wrote under her given name, Madeleine Wickham..