meat: Nick Coveney
- Adrian (the meat guy)
- 5 days ago
- 3 min read
Friend of meat and one of my most photographed men, Nick Coveney has turned author and is about to publish his first novel. This has only been made possible through his own Kickstarter, which is shortly coming to an end. Find out more below and if you feel like supporting this handsome, talented and lovely man, there's a link at the end.
Adrian: Tell me a little about your journey to self-publishing.
Nick: So I’ve worked in the book industry for fifteen years, including several as a commissioning Editor, so initially I was hoping to have a traditional publishing journey for my debut novel EVERYTHING NOT SAVED – get a literary agent, they’d get me a deal with a publisher and the publisher makes the book happen! But after lots nibbles of interest from agents (I’ve had nine full manuscript requests) no-one was willing to represent me, usually making an excuse that the concept was risky and publishers right now are very risk averse so I took matters into my own hands with KickStarter… Which has been an amazing journey we’ve currently raised more than double my initial target and now we just need an extra £500 or so to reach the final stretch goal of £9,000 so I can afford to release the book as an unabridged audiobook which would be a real dream come true for me.
Can you give us a flavour of the book?
Think Stranger Things meets Sex Education by way of Buffy and Ready Player One. It’s about two teenage boys Mikey Redman and Kris Dwyer who become best friends over the course of three years bonding over their favourite computer game series. But strange and violent things keep happening in their village, unbeknown to them one of them happens to have the hellmouth underneath the village well in his back garden and its jaws are starting to open...
What inspired you to write it?
This will sound a little crazy but it’s largely based on my lived experience. We really did move to an ancient cottage in weird tiny village in the middle of the country side when I was a teenager, and village well with its accompanying ghost stories of poisonings and murder really was in the back garden. The big difference is that I was ten then and the new kid in the book is 15, which has enabled me to explore the sexual attraction I felt towards my best friend but never expressed before we moved away in a fun way.
What are your thoughts on the importance of queer voices, particularly in literature?
I think right now that representing marginalised communities culturally has never been more important. I wrote this book largely because I wish I’d had something like it when I was growing up and struggling with my sexuality. I know that in some ways things have improved massively since then (I went to school while Section 28 was in place) but given all the recent attacks on our Trans and Non-Binary siblings especially Trans youth I think it’s even more important that there’s more queer voices sharing their stories to combat the hate and ignorance that we see.
Your Kickstarter finishes soon, what are the next steps?
All the exciting and fun stuff of not only making the book but making all the merch too! Some of my tiers include cool things like t-shirts and tote bags, but also because the response has been so amazing every physical backer is now getting a hard enamel pin badge and a deck of playing cards as thank you. Hopefully getting to work with a talented studio and voice actor on the audiobook edition too!
Where can we find out more about you?
I’m pretty active on social media mainly instagram or bluesy under @nmjcoveney and I have a personal website nickcoveney.com (although I really need to update that, it’s on my to do list when I get a moment)!
Finally, you’ve always been such a supporter of meat and you’ve posed for more projects than anyone else (fact). What does that mean to you?
Wow. I really didn’t know that, what an honour! I have always loved being a part of the meat community and appreciated the body positivity of it, and the warmth you bring to all of the projects. I think what’s incredible is I’ve probably been involved for about seven years now and probably I’ve changed body shape, hair colour, address and all sorts in that time but I always feel very good about myself when I’m in anything Meat related and I’ve been loving the new manuals series. Thank you for having me and for letting me talk about my book baby with you.
If you would like to help Nick fund his book there are some great rewards on offer through his Kickstarter campaign which can be found here:
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