Martyn Bradley’s memoir The Ralph Story – My Search for The Lady of Shalott is the true story of his lifelong quest to find his birth family. Published to great success in March 2022, I wanted to talk to Martyn about his early promotional appearances.

Martyn – congratulations on the success of your launch! I know you’ve had a busy weekend travelling to the BBC studios in London to talk about the book, and your story. Can you tell us a little about how this was set up?

My daughter Abi emailed BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Live and they very quickly came back to us – with an invite to be on the show the following week! This was much faster than I could have dreamed of, but of course we were delighted to travel to Broadcasting House. 

What preparation did you do for the interview?

Apart from a phone call from the Saturday Live producer, Corinna Jones, none whatsoever. The idea of the segment is for the conversations to be totally spontaneous, so even when us three guests met for coffee before the show, we were told not to talk about what we would cover in the show.

However, we were told there was going to be a question about a slapstick moment asked by Les Dennis and could we all have one up our sleeve for this.

Were you nervous about appearing on a live radio show with c.2.4 million listeners?

I’ve enjoyed a lifetime as a musician playing on big stages, so this didn’t faze me – although of course the emotion of my story came through in the recording. It’s my life story, so the easiest and most natural topic for me to talk about – though it does always stir the emotions.

I do have empathy with people who might find such a situation more daunting. After my stroke three years ago, I have actually given up live music performance as one of the legacies of the stroke was a sudden inability to hold a tune in my head. (The other has impacted my spelling – I know the answers to crosswords, but can no longer spell them!)

Anyway, performing music live – which once came so easily to me – has now become overwhelmingly stressful. The experience has changed my outlook on performing. Talking about the book is a different matter as that story is part of me and telling it feels as natural as breathing.

Have you been able to see the impact of the radio feature?

Yes, we were delighted to see the book go up to the top 300 of all books sold on Amazon, and for it to achieve number 1 best-seller on Amazon in the category of Adoption and top 5 in Memoir – which I’m told is a tough nut to crack. The BBC have highlighted it as a clip of the week and mentioned possibly using it as a World Service feature also. I have some more coverage in the press next week and look forward to seeing the impact over time. For all the people involved in the book, it’s just been wonderful and very emotional to see its success – and for what began as a project ten years ago to finally be a physical product. 

Thanks so much, Martyn. It’s been a pleasure working with you and your family on this, and I wish you and the book continued success.

I want to thank you for all your efforts in producing this, Claire. I wouldn’t have known where to start with the technical aspects and nitty gritty of publishing!  

Listen to Martyn’s interview here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0bxphfp