The Last Word by Amy Price with Sharon Hendry
JOHN LENNON once said: ‘Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans.’ I gained lived experience of his wise words on a cold, rainy January weekend last year when I received a text from Katie Price’s mum asking me if I would help her to write a book.
We had met a few times when I was assisting her daughter to pen a column for The Sun newspaper and hit it off as two straight-forward, working class women who understood the tabloid market.
Kate’s world was often chaotic and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t immediately jump at the chance of re-entering it. Besides, after two decades at the cutting edge of journalism, I’d decided - not so much to leave the profession behind – but thoughtfully park it while I pursued a long-held dream to enter NHS doctoral training in child & adolescent psychotherapy. I had academic assignments coming out of my ears and the last thing I needed was an 80,000 word manuscript piled on top.
But then Amy delivered the deal-breaking line: ‘Sharon, I’m dying you see. The book will be my way of setting the record straight and I will be able to leave this world much happier if I get the chance to do that.’
Amy, a former championship swimmer, had randomly contracted the killer lung condition Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF), and had just months to live. I couldn’t walk away.
We found a publisher – Charlie Brotherstone - with the help of the brilliant ghost-writer Mark Eglinton and quickly brokered a deal with Harper Collins. The contract was signed in July 2022 and Lisa Milton and her team at the Harlequin imprint wanted to publish in December.
While steam flew off my keyboard throughout the long hot summer months, my friendship with Amy flourished as her health condition deteriorated. I was astounded by her courage each time her image flickered into view on Zoom. With the help of an oxygen tank, she would keep squeezing the words out onto the pages through me with fierce determination. We laughed a lot and cried even more. Every day we stayed tight, navigating the complexities of her health condition and the mammoth publishing task set before us.
By November last year, Amy had just a few weeks to live and I began to contemplate the sadness and emptiness of life without her. But then my Whatsapp buzzed and the extraordinary story of her survival began to unfold. She had been given a chance of a lung transplant and was on her way to Harefield for a complex operation which could save her life. I was on tenterhooks for days until I heard she had made it through the worst.
Thankfully she has lived to tell the tale and The Last Word is her legacy. It was published last week and….just like that…..it has reached Number 2 in the Sunday Times Bestseller list.
Life is definitely what happens when you’re busy making other plans.
“I found Sharon extremely honest, principled, and to the point. She is very intuitive at picking up things that others do not notice. She did not suffer fools gladly but was compassionate and had so much life experience that I felt comfortable in her presence. I am conscious that ours is a working-class background, and I was put at ease because Sharon was never condescending in any way. I knew I could say what I wanted to say, and she would understand my thoughts.”
Radhika’s Story by Sharon Hendry
I first saw Radhika walking towards me on a lush green lawn at a refuge for trafficked women in Kathmandu. She struck me as someone beautiful and vulnerable in equal measures. Holding her young son Rohan tightly, she sat crossed-legged opposite me and began to tell a story so powerful, I knew I could and should never forget it. It was the beginning of a special relationship that exists to this day.