We are delighted to welcome Ruth Jones to this very special Chepstow Books & Gifts event at "The Auditorium" at Rougemont School, Newport.  Tickets are open to all (the school is closed to pupils as it is a bank holiday) and are likely to sell out very quickly.

All tickets include a copy of Ruth's new hardback book "By Your Side" (rrp £22) which will be available to collect on arrival at the event.

About By Your Side – published 22nd May

Bursting with all the heart and humour that has made Ruth’s name as a screenwriter and author, By Your Side is about finding joy in the most unlikely connections, and the importance of holding onto friendship, love and community – especially when life gets messy.

Linda and Levi will never meet. But they’re going to change each other’s lives.

In her role at the council’s Unclaimed Heirs Unit, Linda Standish investigates the lives of those who’ve died alone and tracks down any living relatives. She’s been a friend to the friendless for the past thirty-three years. And now she’s looking forward to an early retirement.

But before she hangs up her lanyard, Linda must take on one last case – that of Levi Norman Jones – a Welshman who’d made his home on a remote Scottish island for the past five years.

What brought Levi here? And who did he leave behind? Obliged to travel (by hearse) with her arch nemesis Fergus Murray, and helped (and hindered) by the eccentric local residents, Linda searches for clues to a life now lost. And in the process unexpectedly makes new friends, and discovers things about herself she never knew.

About Ruth Jones
Ruth Jones MBE is well known for her television writing, most notably BBC One’s Gavin and Stacey, co-written with James Corden, in which she plays the incorrigible Nessa Jenkins. Ruth also created and co-wrote Sky One’s Stella, which ran for six series between 2012 and 2017, in which she played the eponymous role. She has starred in several other television comedies and dramas, including Hattie, Nighty Night and Saxondale. In 2024 Ruth returned to the stage, making her West End debut as Mother Superior in Sister Act the Musical. Her most recent role is that of private investigator Elena Ravenscroft in the adaptation of Harlan Coben’s Run Away for Netflix.

It is perhaps for Gavin and Stacey though that Ruth is known best. The 2019 Christmas Day special gained national critical acclaim, drawing an audience of over 18 million, winning a BAFTA for TV moment of the year and a National Television Award for Impact. The 2024 finale of Gavin and Stacey soared to the top of the Christmas ratings, with the well-loved comedy watched by nearly 21 million people.

Ruth’s novels have sold over a million copies. Her debut novel, Never Greener, was chosen as WHSmith Fiction Book of the Year 2018, nominated for Debut of the Year at the British Book Awards, was a Zoe Ball Book Club pick, and a Sunday Times bestseller for fifteen weeks, three weeks at number one. Her second novel, Us Three, and her third novel, Love Untold, were also instant Sunday Times bestsellers, and Love Untold was a Waterstones Paperback of the Year as well as a Richard & Judy Bookclub Pick. Ruth was awarded a Comedy Women in Print Prize in 2020.