User:Meena/The Thunder Girls

The Thunder Girls is a novel written by English author and talent agent Melanie Blake. Blake's debut novel, it follows the lives of a fictional girl group whose label host a reunion for the group thirty years after their break-up. Blake made the decision to trim her talent clientele in order to focus on her writing career and based The Thunder Girls on her real-life experiences within the music industry. Despite its 2018 release, Blake wrote the novel almost 20 years prior. She was offered a publishing deal at the age of 21, but declined since they wanted her to make the characters young and posh. Blake was adamant that she wanted the core characters to be older than 40 and working class, so kept the novel to herself until she got it published with the characters' original ages and backgrounds intact.

The novel was well-received by critics and sold over 4000 copies in its first week of release, with it becoming the Kindle Store's number one bestseller for four consecutive weeks. Blake adapted the novel into a play which premiered at the Lowry Theatre in 2019, and it was later commissioned for a national tour in 2021, which was eventually cancelled due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on theatre. Blake has since announced plans to re-release a reworked version of the book as part of a trilogy, confirming that there would be a pending prequel and sequel.

Background and premise
In 2018, Melanie Blake, an English talent agent, made the decision to trim her client roster to focus on her writing career. She had previously worked in the music industry when she worked on the musical series Top of the Pops, later forming her own musical agency with clients including Claire Richards and the Nolans. In 2009, Blake reformed the 1980s group the Nolans for a tour which took £2 million at the box office; she used her experiences within the music industry to inspire certain events of The Thunder Girls. Blake wanted the characters of the novel to be realistic and to represent women from diverse backgrounds, so she had the lead women of the novel be older than 40 and working class. She wrote the rough draft of the novel in two weeks, almost 20 years prior to its release. At the age of 21, she was offered a publishing deal for the book on the condition that she amended the age of the characters to be younger and to make them posh. Blake declined the deal and the book went unpublished until 2018, with the characters' original ages and backgrounds intact.

The Thunder Girls "charts the rise and fall of an 80’s girl band who attempt to reunite after three decades". In their years away from the band, the members have suffered, having breakdowns, bankruptcy, addiction and divorce, with the novel exploring their journey back to stardom. In 2022, the book was removed from sale. Blake explained that she had chosen to remove it to due to deciding that it would form part of a trilogy. Via Twitter, she confirmed that a prequel would be released that would detail the characters' initial success and their reasons for splitting. As well as this, she announced her plans to release a reworked copy of The Thunder Girls, as well as a sequel on the band's future. She was unhappy with the lack of control that she had over the editing of the original since it was her first book, but after becoming a more established author, she confirmed that she had more control.

Reception
In the first week of its release, The Thunder Girls sold over 4000 copies and became a number one bestseller on the Kindle Store for four consecutive weeks. The book also charted within the top 40 of the Amazon book chart, going on to sell 10,000 copies within its first month of release. It was noted that despite it being Blake's debut novel, it had sold more copies than numerous high-profile authors' books released that same week, including Maeve Binchy, Nadine Dorries and Lauren Weisberger. Writing for On magazine, Emma Sharrock said that the most striking quality of The Thunder Girls was how current the content was, as well as showcasing how ruthless the music industry is. Sharrock was also a fan of the main characters' personalities and noted that each band member had their own characterisation. She was worried that the ending of the book would be predictable due to having the typical qualities of a book, but was surprised to get to "a dark turn in the storyline" which left her intrigued for the direction of the novel. Sharrock felt that the change in events evened out the tone in the book, since it added a dark element alongside the lighter-read celebrity element.

Writing for the Tiger Tales, Maria Tumolo described it as a spicy novel that "reveals the misogynistic underbelly of the pop world". Tumolo felt that Blake's insider knowledge of the industry aided her writing abilities and contributed to the enjoyability of the book, as she felt the book was very realistic. Tumolo also wrote: "The book is fast paced and relevant. The Thunder Girls is the book we have been waiting for but didn't know it. It offers a hint of nostalgia with a double helping of reality. There's friendship, betrayal, revenge and murder. All the ingredients for a page-turner and a good read. Congratulations to Melanie Blake for penning such an entertaining debut novel."

The success of the novel led to Blake adapting it into a live theatre production. The play debuted in 2019 at the Lowry Theatre and was later ordered for a national tour. The tour sold over a million tickets before being cancelled due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on theatre.