“Hull generated in me a real sense of curiosity – about people and places. I hadn’t thought about journalism earlier, but after three years in Hull, I knew what I wanted to do.”

Wendy Sacks Jones (pen name of Wendy Jones), author and journalist, BA English Literature and Drama, 1971

She’s an ambitious working-class headteacher, he’s the public school-educated deputy editor of the local paper. When she decides to put herself forward as the Labour election candidate, the strains in their marriage start to show…

This is the central tension at the heart of The Candidate’s Husband, the debut novel of 1971 English Literature and Drama graduate Wendy Jones, who writes under the pen name Wendy Sacks Jones. The tagline ‘behind every successful woman stands a resentful man’ hints at the twists and turns contained within the dark story of marital ambition.

Wendy had plenty of time to learn about the people in politics as a journalist. When she graduated from Hull, her first job was at a local newspaper in Slough, and her career took her to the BBC where she enjoyed a long career in roles such as BBC Education Correspondent, Today programme reporter and current affairs presenter, and latterly Deputy Company Secretary and Head of Education Policy. She’s at pains to point out, though, that neither the characters, the fictional Humberside Citizen, nor the fictional constituency of North Humberside are based on any real encounters from her time covering local and national politics.

For Wendy it’s the characters and their dynamic that drives the story: ‘It’s essentially about a less than perfect marriage between two people who, although they love each other in their own idiosyncratic ways, should arguably never have got married.’

In our interview with Wendy you can find out how Hull inspired her interest in politics and people, and how it led to a career in journalism, despite not getting involved in any of the student activities that might have helped her in that career.

The Candidate’s Husband by Wendy Sacks Jones is published by SRL Publishing and as an audiobook (Bolinda Audio) narrated by Yorkshire actors Liam Gerrard and Sarah Durham.

Find out more here >>

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How did you come to study at the University of Hull? What attracted you to study here?

I was keen to do an English degree, but with Drama, and Hull was one of the very few universities to offer Drama in 1968. On top of that, Philip Larkin was the university librarian. Although only 100 miles from my home in the East Midlands, Hull had a remote, unknown quality. There was no Humber Bridge, and Hull wasn’t en route to anywhere else. That said, it took some getting used to at first. Hull felt very much a raw northern city, and it definitely wasn’t love at first sight.

What influence did the University of Hull have in your subsequent career in Media and Journalism?

Although I was doing English, Hull was where I first got interested in politics and where I got even more interested in people. I didn’t take any of what I can now see would have been the sensible routes, like writing for the student newspaper or volunteering at BBC Radio Humberside (which opened during my third year in Hull), but instead I spent probably too much time going on demos and protest marches (this was the late 60s/early 70s after all) and gathering a very mixed collection of friends. Above all, Hull generated in me a real sense of curiosity – about people and places. I hadn’t thought about journalism earlier, but after three years in Hull, I knew what I wanted to do.

Your novel, The Candidate’s Husband is set in Hull? Why did you feel Hull would be a good setting for the book?

It was a trip back to Hull in 2017 – during its year as UK City of Culture – that made me realise what a great place it would be for a novel, even before I knew what the novel was going to be about. I’d been living in London for several decades by then, but I wanted somewhere that felt real and distinctly unglamorous for a story that I imagined would be vaguely political. Although Hull had scrubbed up nicely for City of Culture Year, there was still something very gritty that felt perfect. Of course Hull has now been rated by National Geographic magazine as one of the best cities in the world to visit in 2026. I’ve mentioned this to so many friends, they must think I’m in the pay of Hull Tourist Board.

Who would love this book and why?

I hope it’ll appeal to anyone who enjoys contemporary fiction, driven by character but with a strong storyline and several twists along the way. It’s very much the sort of novel that book groups might go for – with lots to discuss around local politics, the sometimes toxic nature of the media, marriage and relationships, social class and even the north-south divide. And I think it’s got equal appeal for men and women, as it’s narrated alternately by the candidate and her husband. 

When did you have the idea, and when did you realise this was the idea you wanted to turn into your debut novel?

I knew the sort of book I wanted to write – a book about the political and personal and with a strong feminist theme. The idea then grew of exploring a slightly dysfunctional marriage where the partners have very different outlooks on life. I started and ditched two novels before turning to The Candidate’s Husband and finishing the first draft during lockdown. I am now working on another novel. It has another possibly ill-matched couple at its heart and although neither is a politician or journalist, they find themselves battered by political storms.

The book features a character who is a journalist – did your own career as a journalist influence the story?

Yes and no. After leaving Hull, I started working on a local newspaper in Slough, but I should say – important disclaimer – that the wildly imagined Humberside Citizen in my novel is unlike any paper I have ever known, in Slough, Hull, or anywhere else. I went on to work for the BBC, in local radio, then as a Today programme reporter, radio presenter and education correspondent, with spells also in management as deputy company secretary and head of education policy. The experience gained from over 30 years in the media certainly feeds into my novel, although, as I can’t stress enough, this is fiction!