The How to Hold a Grudge podcast returns to provide fresh grudge-related chat to help keep you entertained during the time of social distancing.

In this first episode Sophie and Grudge Poet Laureate Nic Aubury talk about cancellations - highly topical, but are they always a bad thing?

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Sophie's latest novel HAVEN'T THEY GROWN is out now in hardback, eBook and audiobook. the Daily Mail calls it 'fiendishly clever' and the Sunday Express dubbed Sophie 'a literary high-wire artist'.

Sophie is joined by psychotherapist and fellow Agatha Christie superfan Helen Acton to discuss grudges — valid/reasonable and invalid/unreasonable — in the novels of Agatha Christie, the Queen of Crime. Also in this episode: the beauty of three-layered puzzle solutions, the Insufficient Poirot Content grudge some fans have about novels like Cat Among the Pigeons and After the Funeral, and Sophie reveals her grudge-related theory about why Murder on the Orient Express and And Then There Were None are Agatha's two most popular and beloved books.

Sophie is joined by award-winning, bestselling novelist Naomi Alderman for this special bonus episode. They discuss the popular misconceptions that give rise to that widespread phenomemon, the Misunderstanding-of-Loyalty Grudge, and what loyalty truly means in a grudge-holding context. Also in this episode: when couples separate and friends pick a grudge side, why it's always grudgeworthy to write insulting blog posts about your best friends, and a grudgey dilemma involving a potentially devastating but brilliant cultural artefact.

Being judgemental is bad, we tend to think, but using our judgement is essential. So how do we distinguish between good judging and bad judging? Having a lower opinion of some people than others has to be okay, surely, even if one's aim and wish is to be all-forgiving and grudge-free. Sophie and Helen Acton discuss the ways in which our own ethics and opinions in relation to infidelity and meat-eating, among other things, can influence how lenient/empathetic we're able to be where those issues are involved.

There's always room for a newcomer — a new grudge type — in the Periodic Table of Grudge Categories. After a new TV crime drama attracts hundreds of comments that strike fear into Sophie's heart, she tries to find a name for this emerging grudge in order to classify it accurately. Also in this episode, Sophie plays a newly invented grudge game, Judge That Grudge, with poet Nic Aubury and psychotherapist Helen Acton. Grudge types receiving judgemental scrutiny include: people turning up on time instead of realising you'd love it if they were a bit late, and passive aggressive CC-ing of senior colleagues into work emails.

Sophie and Podcast Grudge-Poet Laureate Nic Aubury discuss those grudges that we might not need to hold if only we were better at creating and sticking to personal boundaries. If we're so busy people-pleasing that we allow ourselves to do things we hate in order to placate others, isn't that our fault rather than theirs? Also in this episode: what does American life coach Brooke Castillo have to say about boundaries and the 'manuals' we have in our minds for how other people should behave, and do Sophie and Nic agree with her?

https://thelifecoachschool.com/brookecastillo/

In a friendship, is it acceptable and necessary sometimes, or uncharitable and grudgeworthy, to say 'You did X and I didn't like it' or 'I'm angry with you because you said Y'? Sophie is joined by psychotherapist Helen Acton for much jolly disagreement on this subject. Why would Sophie never in a million years tell friends, family, acquaintances or anyone that they'd upset or annoyed her? And why does Helen adopt the opposite approach? Is it just down to personal preference or is there a better way to approach these things? Listen and decide for yourself!

Sophie is joined by this podcast's poet in residence Nic Aubury, who is also a Latin teacher at Oundle School. Together they discuss more shocking and frankly implausible (though entirely true) school-based grudge anecdotes, and whether all schools should be abolished for being too grudgeworthy. Also: when teachers lose their temper and yell and scream at pupils, or announce their intention to humiliate children deliberately, is this understandable and something that's just bound to happen now and then, or is it grudgeworthy? And what's the point of having 'best practice guidelines' when teachers who ignore them receive no punishment or sanction?

If you share a piece of life-changingly amazing good news with a close friend, lover, parent or sibling, and they respond simply with one yellow smiley face emoji and no words at all, is that innately grudgeworthy? Could and should they have done better? Is a diagnosis of envy any sort of mitigation? Or are you the one guilty of grudgeworthy behaviour in that scenario — for failing to take the happy emoji at smiley-face value? Sophie and psychotherapist Helen Acton discuss The Inadequate Congratulations Grudge and its sister type, The Withholding of Praise Grudge, and discuss the teachings of American life coach Brooke Castillo, who believes all circumstances are neutral and that we can always choose what we want to make them mean.

https://thelifecoachschool.com/brookecastillo/

Is it grudgeworthy if someone has a terrible spouse, even if they themselves are completely innocent? Why aren't more people alert to the grudgeworthiness of their romantic partners? Sophie is joined by this podcast's Grudge-Poet Laureate Nic Aubury to discuss what to do when you have a close friend whom you adore, yet you can't visit them at their house because it contains one of the grudgeworthiest husbands known to humanity (or at least to Sophie).