Today I was a guest on the drivetime show at Bristol’s community radio station BCfm, (link here for website), being interviewed live by Station Manager Phil Gibbons about “Back To The Black”. Although I had been a presenter on the station for much of last year, it was a new and pleasant experience being a guest. For a start, I didn’t have to pay for my coffee this time. Seriously though, who doesn’t like being asked questions about a topic in which they are interested?

My interview was interspersed with two others: with Neil Innes and Michael Palin, no less! This was because the station was running a live outside broadcast from Bristol’s Colston Hall, where both were about to perform in the city’s Festival of Slapstick. Phil said I could now dine out on the fact that I’d appeared on a chat show with these two luminaries; and that they “kept cutting across my airtime!”

Phil asked a very good question about one of the tips from my book. I’d mentioned some of the basic stuff about communicating with creditors, making an offer, etc, and he pointed out that those tips could be obtained in other books, websites, etc. “People know that’s the thing to do” he said, “so why don’t they do it?” My answer was that people like to read stories rather than to be told what to do, so the fact that my book’s advice is interspersed with the story of my own debt problem and how I worked my way out of it, will hopefully make people more likely to act on the tips given.

Phil wrapped up the interview by wishing me well with the book: “Hope it makes you rich – no, sorry, that’s not the point. I guess your point is to stop other people becoming poor”. To which I readily agreed.

In fact the Free Edition of “Back To The Black: how to become debt-free and stay that way” is available as a free download, in .pdf format, at www.scribd.com/michael_macmahon