'Writing a cookery best-seller is easy.' Maybe.

  

I  have remarked here several times that  the art of writing a novel or short story is close cousin  to

 the art and craft  of painting. Now, after a delightful week spent in the company of  the very creative @licked spoon  I would include the art and craft of gardening and cooking for their  relevance to the art of writing fiction.

And now I feel this even more so, having read Jane Middleton's visionary Guardian article    Want to write a best-selling cookery book? Don’t worry about making it any good.

Middleton is very good at irony. To quote her directly: ‘Above all, remember that anyone can write a cookbook. Writing a cookery best-seller is easy. Why else would there be so many of them? But writing a good and original one – well, that would just spoil the fun for everyone else.'

Much of the witty critique in Middleton’s article seems to me to apply directly to the sometimes bizarre situation today in the world  of modern fiction.

I think all fiction writers, whether they cook of not, would relish the implications of this article by a great cookery writer for their own writing.

What do you think?