Former nurse's bestselling bedside manner!

Sophie Gravia self-published her cheeky first novel for a bit of extra cash. Five years on, she's quit the NHS to write erotic fiction full-time after becoming a hit author. Now she even has a new BBC relationships podcast with Christine McGuinness

- By Claire Donnelly

SHE might be a bestselling author but Sophie Gravia still can’t believe her luck. This time five years ago the 33-year-old was a frazzled NHS renal nurse, juggling tough but rewarding 13-hour shifts with solo parenting her two young daughters and struggling to pay the bills. She started writing a funny, raunchy novel as a self-care project and a way of coping with the horrors of Covid, drawing on her own experience of dating in her home city, Glasgow.

When she self-published A Glasgow Kiss in December 2020 she was just happy to see it finished, and thought she might make a few hundred quid to cover the cost of Christmas.

But the tale — a hilarious, no-holds-barred tale of disastrous hook-ups and female solidarity — was an instant smash, leading to a four book deal and a completely new life for Sophie and her girls. Since then she has gone on to sell hundreds of thousands of copies of her cheeky novels.

A new title — The Dicktionary Club — is released this week and the BBC have snapped up her debut to make into a drama.

Sophie says of her overnight success: “If you'd told me in 2020 that I was going to get a new house, a publisher and a podcast because of my writing I definitely wouldn’t have believed it.”

This month marked the start of another new chapter as she said goodbye to her nursing job and announced the launch of her “ultimate girly chat” podcast — Situationships — alongside former model and TV personality Christine McGuinness.

“It’s been a lot,” she says. “I still can’t believe what's happened — it’s a little bit overwhelming to be honest. I finished work on Tuesday and that felt really weird. I keep thinking, ‘I’ll probably go back’

“So much has happened since I sat down to write, so much has changed. I was in the airport the other day and saw my new book on the shelves, I was standing there think-ing, ‘How did I do this?”