When I ask writer Emma Unsworth to sum up her debut novel, Hungry, The Stars and Everything, she smiles as she admits: “I suppose the word is quirky, but I guess it sounds crazy!”

She explains: “It’s about all my passions really, so I’d say it’s about food, about romance, about physics and about the devil, but ultimately, I’d say, it’s a romance.

“I’m a hopeless romantic, which is why it might sound weird that there’s such a strong scientific thread through the book. But I find science hugely inspiring. When you fall in love with someone it’s like starting a whole new universe with them, it’s as significant as the big bang in your life.”

For Emma, that own significant other happens to be another very creative Mancunian, in the form of Guy Garvey, frontman of award-winning band Elbow. But having two creative minds in one household, at the home they share in Prestwich, has worked remarkably well, Emma says.

She laughs: “We definitely use each other as sounding boards for our ideas, it works really well. It works well in terms of understanding each other – and that we’re both really weird at home! We both need lots of time alone – we have rooms at opposite ends of the house and Guy has a sound-proofed room in the loft.

“So when we’re working, we’re not aware of the other person’s existence and that’s really necessary, we need to be in our own little worlds.

“We meet up for a cup of tea every now and again!”

Songwriter Guy has readily admitted in past interviews that some of Elbow’s most magical love songs have been inspired by Emma, which makes the 32-year-old laugh when I mention it.  

She says: “He only did it to woo me back! I’m sure I’ll listen to those songs in my dotage and shed a tear for past romance. Although I can’t deny when he first played me some of those songs when we were getting back together I was well chuffed. It was definitely a wooing process, he was a modern day minstrel.”

The couple have now been together for five years, after originally dating when Emma was 21 for a year when things hadn’t worked out.

She says: “It was long enough to fall in love, we stayed friends after we split and I think we both knew we’d get back together – we’ve been solid ever since.

“Guy is absolutely the great romance of my life, I think I always knew that in the back of my mind.”

Emma’s novel, however, follows the life and romances of Helen Burns, a 29-year-old food critic, and plays out through the dishes of an 11-course meal at a fancy restaurant.

Ever one for attention to detail, Emma tells me she consulted with award-winning chef Mary Ellen McTague of Prestwich’s Aumbry restaurant to make sure the meal Emma had created for the novel made foodie sense.

Emma recalls: “I wanted to make sure the menu was technically feasible, and something that she could imagine on a menu. She made a few amendments – like changing mutton with pickled cauliflower to hoggit with quince, and yes, that does sound like a much better dish!”

Meanwhile the science aspects of the book accounts for the location for our catch up, over at Manchester’s Museum of Science and Industry.

Science might sound a strange passion for a writer, but that in itself is a topic that really gets former Bury Grammar School pupil Emma going.

She says: “It was always one of my bugbears that at school you are forced into either being scientific or artistic, they’re made to appear poles apart, and that science is not considered part of culture in the way books are.  You are pushed to go one way or the other, but science has always been a massive inspiration for me.”

After studying English at university, Emma went on to study for an MA at Manchester University in novel writing.

From there she went straight into journalism, working firstly for City Life magazine, before moving over to the features department at the Manchester Evening News in 2005. Like many writers, Emma had always felt there was a novel within her, but it was only when she took the decision to go freelance in 2008 that she found she really had the time to dedicate to her book.

After two years, the book was finished, and with the support of independent publishers Hidden Gem it was published last month. Hidden Gem is run by Sherry Ashworth, Emma’s former English teacher back at Bury Grammar School.

Emma says: “Sherry was willing to take a risk on the book, and she’s been a lifelong friend.

“She taught me English from the age of 13 at Bury Grammar, and she’s been 100 per cent behind my writing ever since. And going with a brand new independent publisher made the project feel very home-grown.”

The book has already gone on sale on Amazon and at selected Waterstone’s, and Emma is planning a series of book launch events around the region.

And she’s already busy finishing a second book with plans for her third!

As for Guy’s verdict on the novel? Well, Emma admits he’s not quite finished it yet.

She laughs: “He’s only halfway through. He’s not a big reader of books, so I don’t mind if he doesn’t read it all. He’s been a great sounding board along the way.”

» Emma will be reading from her debut novel at Manchester City Library, Elliot House, Deansgate tomorrow at 6.30pm, and will be doing a book signing at Waterstone’s in Stockport on July 16 from 11am to 3pm.

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