The Literary Sofa
Life
A Solitary Writing Week
As you may recall, at the start of 2013 I set myself the challenge of re-writing my oft-rejected-but-apparently-not-that-bad novel after calling in the professionals. I spent weeks messing around with coloured pens, stickers and Post-It notes re-structuring the story and when (I thought) I had it right, I pinned them on a board so they couldn’t … Continue reading
Week in New York – A Disaster
As you may know, I was in New York last week. I got home yesterday feeling very disoriented; it’s not just down to jetlag, it’s as if I’ve come to land in a strange place I barely recognise. That place is normality. My son S and I thought we were going for a relaxing time seeing … Continue reading
A Place in my Heart – The Lubéron
Well, we got back from our two week trip to Provence on Sunday night and this week is proving every bit as frantic as I expected –endless laundry and unpacking, getting my sons back to school, preparing for my interview with Jane Rusbridge at the Ham & High Literary Festival next week (details below), polishing my … Continue reading
A Year Online
It’s a year since my friend Louise Millar persuaded me to start using Twitter. Her debut novel The Playdate, was still nine months away from publication and she was already tweeting; I hadn’t even finished my manuscript. I’m grateful to her now, but at the time I wasn’t that keen. I now know that my reaction is a … Continue reading
Not About Rejection
I’m writing this post on impulse, before I have a chance to change my mind. Please note the title, because I put some thought into that: it’s not a post about rejection, it’s about what it can do to you if you let it. Many other writers and bloggers have shared their experience, including Guest … Continue reading
Things I Love and Hate about the London Underground
Life’s a bit hectic with my new manuscript at the moment (up to chapter 6 already!) – no time for features, hence this week’s non-bookish offering. After my last writers’ workshop on 9 July, things will quieten down a bit – for me – just as everything starts to hot up for the London Olympics. It’s … Continue reading
A Summer’s Afternoon in Marylebone
It says something about this year’s so-called ‘summer’ in the UK that an afternoon out in my home city without getting soaked merits a blog post, but this, in pictures and words, is the tale of a lovely outing yesterday with my husband and 10 year old son. The London district of Marylebone is one of the … Continue reading
A Real Character – Or in this Case, Me
Spring is here and it’s almost time to make a start on my second novel – if nothing else it will take my mind off what’s going to become of the first one, which is currently ‘out there’ in search of its destiny. For me, writing a book starts with character: this time the main one came first … Continue reading
Luck: When one good thing comes of another
On one of the many three-day weekends we had this year (with the royal wedding and all) we went to visit my husband’s family in the place where he grew up and the rest of them still live. The Wye is a beautiful wooded river valley that snakes back and forth across the border between England and Wales. We … Continue reading
The Time We Had: 20 years later, I remember my Dad
My Dad died 20 years ago this week, on 14 October 1991, of a rare kidney cancer which can’t be diagnosed until it’s too late. He was 58. I was already considering writing something about him because of his anniversary, but it was the death last week of Steve Jobs, founder of Apple at the … Continue reading
My new novel SCENT – out in paperback on 19 May 2022
The Literary Sofa 