The Literary Sofa
Features
The Story behind Stories for Homes – an anthology in aid of Shelter
You could say this post is a promoblog, or a literad. Whatever it is, featuring a title with the express aim of encouraging people to buy it is not something I’ve done before on the Literary Sofa, but I hope you’ll soon see why I’m making an exception. This week saw the publication of the … Continue reading
The Joy and (mostly) Horror of Houseguests
Last week we had a family of French friends staying with us, which led me to reflect on the subject of houseguests. This time we were exchanging bisous by the hundred with my oldest friend, her husband and their three children, the youngest of whom is my gorgeous eight-year-old goddaughter. Although we usually meet in … Continue reading
How To Run a Successful Book Blog – Guest Post on For Books’ Sake
This week I am delighted to be appearing as a guest on the fabulous and dynamic webzine For Books’ Sake. The editors invited me to contribute some thoughts and tips on running a book blog, and for the benefit of my own blog followers who aren’t on Twitter, here’s a link to the post. If … Continue reading
What’s Your Kind of Book?
Once again thanks to Ben Blackman and Sanjida O’Connell for contributing such stimulating guest posts and for keeping the Literary Sofa in business whilst I was, I hope, career-advancingly occupied. Ben and Sanjida proved to be extremely popular guests sending the stats soaring and I’m hoping they’ll both make return visits to coincide with their new … Continue reading
Sex Scenes in Fiction
2021 UPDATE: Since writing this post many years ago I have had two novels published which include plenty of sex scenes, including same-sex in my new novel Scent. This is the 100th post on the Literary Sofa and the subject of sex hasn’t come up much beyond the occasional mention in a review. Last week’s piece on … Continue reading
XX or XY? Do readers care about gender of author?
This piece started out as a review of A M (Amy) Homes’ novel May We Be Forgiven, winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2013. I’m a fan of her writing and rushed to read the book back in the autumn when it was released in the UK. It’s tremendously enjoyable and memorable, but I soon realised … Continue reading
Book Launches & Black Vodka
‘You go to a lot of book launches,’ people say to me. It’s true. It’s one of the many wonderful things, all the more so for being totally unexpected, which have come about since I started the Literary Sofa blog. The timing was just right too because my sons were old enough to be left … Continue reading
Keeping Up with the Literary Joneses (or The Tyranny of the TBR)
Before I joined Twitter and started blogging (both less than two years ago) I had never even come across the term TBR (To Be Read). Once I’d finished reading the novel for my monthly book group, I’d take a casual look on my shelves (always well stocked because the book stall at the school jumble … Continue reading
Warning – You are about to enter The Cliché Zone
Enough of the serious stuff – it’s silly season. The Literary Sofa is usually all about good fiction and good writing – you’ve heard about my Best Books of 2012, you’ve seen my Fiction Hot Picks for 2013, but my final blogpost of the year is dedicated to a subject which doesn’t normally get a … Continue reading
What Makes a Sexy Fictional Hero?
This post is a bit of fun. Do not even think about taking it seriously. When I first had the idea of writing about sexy fictional heroes, I was concerned that it might appear frivolous. So I took one of my regular soundings on Twitter and got a response that was, well, enthusiastic to say … Continue reading
My new novel SCENT – out in paperback on 19 May 2022
The Literary Sofa 