Bucolic Frolics

I'm A Guilty Pleasure!

2011-10-05T08:05:00.008+01:00

Well, after weeks and weeks of non-blogging due to the crash and burn of my previous computer (very sad as we'd been together for 8 years and knew each other so well) I'm back online! My new pc is very swish and very fast and scares me witless. Hopefully one day we'll grow to love one another. At the moment we're edging round each other warily like children in a new school...

So, I've only one thing to say after my crash and burn experience - Back Up! I'm sure everyone else in the world religiously backs up their work on a daily/hourly basis - but I hadn't. I blame being the delirium of being a new Nanna. (Elle, Topaz and The Doctor are doing amazingly now - I'm still a bit shell-shocked). So, when the kiddies at PC World shook their heads over my old computer I knew I was in trouble... They've managed to retrieve a lot of stuff from the old hard drive but I'm still gnawing my knuckles in shame at things I've lost... So, please, please, please - don't think like I did - oh, it'll be okay - because it might just not be... I'm now backing up like a thing demented.

Anyhow, now I'm back online (thank you to everyone who enquired - and when I've worked out how the new email system works on this computer I WILL reply, promise) I'm going to kick off with a brag (sorry) - hence the post title and the picture...

In the brilliant Peter Robinson's brilliant new novel, Before The Poison, which I was reading in bed, I'm mentioned on page 315!!!! His heroine, Heather, has just settled into her new flat and has spent an evening eating pizza, watching trashy telly and reading a book for the first time in years - "a Christina Jones - a real guilty pleasure..."!!!!

Oh, well, wow! and thank you Peter - especially as you're mega-famous and currently have a series on telly and all. I was so over-excited at the mention that I dropped the book, yelled a lot, scared the cats and woke up The Toyboy Trucker who wasn't best pleased or even the teeniest bit impressed.

As for me - well, I'm preening and showing-off in my usual diva fashion and am telling anyone who'll listen that now I'm not just a New Nanna - I'm also A Guilty Pleasure!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's A Girl!

2011-08-15T21:03:00.003+01:00

On Tuesday 9th August 2011 at 3.56 a.m. I became a grandmother! Yes, very early - and not without its dramas - but it's all over now and Mum and Baby are doing fine. Nanna (as I've elected to be called - as in Peter Pan) is still in shock.

Poor Elle, after a lousy pregnancy and several weeks in hospital with pre-eclampsia, became too ill to carry on so they decided to induce the baby last Sunday. After a 36 hour labour (don't ask - none of us ate or slept and God alone knows how Elle coped without shouting or screaming once, bless her - brave wasn't in it!) our granddaughter made her appearance. She was popped straight into an incubator and rushed off to SCBU where she was first in intensive care, then high dependency, then rallied nicely and eventually rejoined her exhausted mum and happy dad two days later on the ward.

I won't go into all the gory details but I can assure you that this will be our only grandchild! Anyway, she and Elle were discharged from hospital and finally came home last night - which is why I haven't posted before. They've both been given the all clear and are now happily reunited with The Doctor, and of course, our granddaughter is the cutest, tiniest, most gorgeous and perfect thing in the whole world - even though she shouldn't be here for quite a while yet.

Her name? Well she has two and they're beautiful: one British and one Indian to mark her dual heritage - but to protect her anonymity, for blog purposes, I shall call her Topaz because that's what I've been calling the bump since Easter when I was convinced it was a girl.

So now The Toyboy Trucker is a besotted Grumpy (Elle's choice!) - and a whiz at nappy changing and bottle feeding - and I'm just besotted and elated and really, really thankful it's all over.

Welcome to the world, Topaz - I'm your Nanna!!!!!!!!!!!

The End Of An Era - Or New Beginnings?

2011-08-01T08:12:00.003+01:00

Last Friday The Toyboy Trucker left the company he's worked for for the last 12 years - his choice by the way, and one not taken lightly. From starting off sorting parcels in the warehouse, to delivering said parcels in a white van, to becoming a long-distance lorry driver, thundering up and down the country in a 42 ton artic - and then deciding to get himself an education while still working... And all those promotions and area moves to Operations Manager, then Depot Manager, and finally Southern Area Hub Manager...

So, this morning it was no more corporate suit-shirt-tie and briefcase-and-laptop and multiple mobiles! Hooray! This morning he started off on his new venture - working with his best mate on a cross-country delivery business of their very own. This morning he left here in jeans, polo shirt and boots.... He's a Toyboy Trucker again - and I'm more delighted than you'll ever know.

And this morning, after he'd left the house looking once again like the boy I fell in love with, I typed Chapter One of the new book of the new deal. It's still unoriginally called Book One because I'm still without a title, but I've written four pages already (it's 8.20 a.m.) and it's going okay... I will probably find it very hard to remember not to add a dollop of magic in this book - this is very much the end of an era for me too - but it's quite exciting to be starting something completely new.

So, Monday August 1st 2011 - the end of an era for both of us as we leave the safe and familiar behind and step into the unknown - but a date to remember for our new beginnings too. Risky? Yes, definitely. But we're both hoping they'll be lovely life-changing beginnings. Time, I'm sure, will tell...

My New Spiritual Home

2011-07-25T09:22:00.008+01:00

Well! Unless you unleashed me in a chocolate factory with a spoon I couldn't have asked for more! We (me, The Toyboy Trucker, Elle and The Doctor) went to Southall Broadway to shop for wedding clothes... And I was entranced, bedazzled, completely overcome with dizzy excitement. So many fabulous shops. All those rainbow colours... All that glitter and sparkle and twinkle... Total, absolute bliss.

The Doctor's brother is getting married next month, in a traditional Hindu/Jain ceremony - which involves several events (not just the wedding - and even the reception takes place the day AFTER the nuptials) so we needed suitable outfits - naturally. Well, The Toyboy Trucker and The Doctor are wearing suits, but Elle and I felt that as "family" we should be bedecked in as much Indian splendour as possible... It wasn't just an excuse for yet more clothes shopping, honest...

So, we went to Southall to buy something stunning and authentic - and I absolutely adored it!!!! It's vibrant, jam-packed, lively - and looks and smells and sounds as if you've just stepped into a Bollywood movie. There's no "death of the High Street" in Southall, I can tell you. And oh, what bliss to be served by people who actually cared. Who were interested in what we bought and why we were buying it. Who said - and proved - that nothing was too much trouble.

Elle, determined to look fabulous and girly and not at all like a marquee (even though she will be nine months pregnant on the wedding day) homed in on swathes of sari silk in lilac and silver, turquoise and gold - all of which floated and fell beautifully round her bump - set off by matching softly-gathered salwar trousers encrusted with sequins and embroidery - and the most fabulous matching dupatta stoles, and looked like a princess. Albeit quite a large princess....

I settled on a salwar suit in purple and gold... I'm now convinced that I shall live in salwar suits for the rest of my life. Why have I never discovered them before???? So comfortable, so elegant, so flattering, so pretty - they're light and drifty to wear, hide a multitude of sins, and made me feel like a - well, no not a princess (too old, too fat) - maybe a sort of Bhangra Queen Mother????

By the time Elle and I had ooohed and aaahed our way up and down the Broadway, and eventually made up our minds, and then dived in and out of a zillion jewellery shops for the necessary matching multiple bangles and ear-rings, The Toyboy Trucker and The Doctor had become a bit bored with all the glitz and glam and girlie shrieks of glee, and wandered off to Jalebi Junction, one of the most famous food stalls Southall has to offer.

Jalebis are sticky, glorious, made-on-the-spot sweets. Spirals of fresh dough are piped into boiling oil and fried while you wait and watch. The dough takes on the characteristic orange colour in the deep frying process and is then dunked into another container of sugar syrup. The jalebis are then cooled on a wire rack until they can be popped into a brown paper bag and handed to you with the warning that they're very, very hot. Yes they are, but I defy anyone not to eat them while they're very, very hot. Even though you can't speak and get covered in syrup and look pretty disgusting... They're the most delicious things I've ever tasted - well, apart from the Gulab Jamons of course (the nearest thing to Rum Babas - and heaven - I've ever found).

Eventually - after eating our body-weight in an Indian veggie buffet restaurant - we made our way home, tired, full-to-bursting, and deliriously happy. All I hope now is that the baby stays put and we can wear our finery at the wedding - otherwise at the next Romantic Novelists shindig I'll be the fat one in the Salwar Suit and far too many bangles....

Never Can Say Goodbye

2011-07-13T07:37:00.006+01:00

Yes, I know NCSG isn't out until February next year (hardback in Sept this year) but I absolutely LOVE the cover, so I'm making no apologies for using it as the illustration for this post. I think it's just so girlie and pretty... I've got a copy pinned on the wall in front of me and I just sigh wistfully over those gorgeous frocks and the fabulous trailing roses and the to-die-for handbags... Thank you so much to Louise Anglicas, the clever, talented artist, for producing something so totally beautiful.

And as Never Can Say Goodbye is about a retro frock shop run by Frankie, the heroine, and has a DDG florist, Dexter, as the hero - then the frocks'n'flowers combination works so well. Yep - it's official - I'm in love with this cover...

Of course, there's a lot more to NCSG than just frocks'n'flowers. It's winter in the quaintly old-fashioned Berkshire village of Kingston Dapple - a very, very cold winter - and Francesca's Fabulous Frocks in the market square is home not only to a mass of vintage dresses, but also to a collection of very odd people. There's Brian from the kebab van; Biddy the bitch; Lilly, Frankie's air-head flat-mate; Cherish, the worst colour-palette-advisor in the world; Maisie the useless medium - and of course Dexter, the philandering Beckhamesque florist and his many conquests. Several of my previous characters appear too: Slo and Essie, Phoebe, Amber, Clemmie, Sukie etc, and all the cooks from The Way To A Woman's Heart - oh, and of course there are also ghosts... ghosts with attitude... ghosts with issues... ghosts with frock-envy... funny ghosts... sad ghosts... and even ghosts who don't know they are ghosts.

I've always wanted to write a rom com ghost story and am so pleased that Never Can Say Goodbye rounds off my practical magic series nicely.

So, yes - the good news - I've just been offered a new deal by my lovely publishers Piatkus/Little,Brown (thank you!!!) - and the bad news (maybe?) - it's the end of the current series. After eight books, we've all decided that it's time to say goodbye to the magic and hello to a whole new world.

So, while I'm still going to be bucolic frolicking in rural Berkshire, it's goodbye to Hazy Hassocks, Bagley-cum-Russet, Fiddlesticks, Lovers Knot and Winterbrook and their inhabitants - and hello to Nook Green, Daisybank, Bluebell Common and Maizey St Michael along with a whole new set of characters having a whole new set of romantic and hopefully funny adventures.

I think it'll be hard for me to leave the Hubble Bubble world behind - but I'm very excited about getting to know my new villages and meeting the people who live there. And as the first one (currently imaginatively titled Book One) in the new series has to be written, finished and delivered by Feb I really ought be popping off to Nook Green right now...

Ghod Bharai - and My Bindi

2011-07-05T21:58:00.003+01:00

Elle had her Ghod Bharai on Sunday - and it was absolutely brilliant. I hadn't got a clue what it entailed - but the Ghod Bharai is a Hindu baby shower thrown by all the Indian female rellies when the 7th month of pregnancy passes into the 8th - yep, it's gone that quickly! It's a lovely colourful happy celebration (and held - fortunately - in the mum-to-be's own home) when they bring traditional gifts and money and jewellery and bless her and the baby and eat a lot! There were some prayers and some funny traditional stuff like passing a small child between Elle and The Doctor seven times for luck (fortunately one of the cousins-in-law had brought a small child so we didn't have to go out and find one - this might have involved having to answer a lot of awkward questions). The Toyboy Trucker and I loved every minute of it! I had to present her with a kilo of rice washed by the waters of the Ganges (so not Tescos!) and a coconut with a swastika on it - the swastika being a Hindu symbol of happiness, well-being and joy...

In the absence of the necessary sisters-in-law, Elle's female cousins-in-law plus her sis-in-law-to-be had to dress her in a ceremonial sari which had to be attached to a rope-thing tied round her bump and then pleated - it took ages and yards and yards of material and because it was heavy (emerald green silk covered in gold threads) she could hardly move. And she looked like a marquee. However she was very good and didn't scream or bite anyone so that was a blessing.

The full-on Hindu wedding of The Doctor's brother and the beautiful Nisha is imminent (two weeks before Elle's due date - eeek!) and all the cousins agreed there was no way Elle could wear a sari for that - so if she's okay (she's enormous and has SPD and some scary foot/leg/hand swelling - the Dr and midwife say her BP is normal and she's doing fine - so maybe it's just me that's worrying), we're going to Southall next week with the girlie-cousins-in-law to find something more comfy and suitable for her to wear at the wedding - probably a sari suit with a long flowing jacket over stretchy silk trousers with elasticated waist. I'm going Eastern as well and am hoping to find a sari in purple and gold.... I'm so looking forward to it as I love all things colourful and glittery and don't mind in the slightest looking like a marquee (par for the course for me).

The very best thing about Elle's Ghod Bharai for me, was the bindis. They're the face jewels for Hindu celebrations. Elle had to have seven in a rainbow across her forehead, but I had one as mother of the mother-to-be and it was a tiny tear-drop ruby surrounded by diamonds between my eyebrows. Fabulous! I'm still wearing it! And no, sadly, that isn't me in the picture - ooooh, I wish...

Oh, and the food was amazing too. Elle and The Doctor had provided the food - an entire veggie Indian banquet - and the rellies cooked it - the kitchen was just filled with women of all ages in multi-coloured saris all cooking away and chattering like magpies and we ate it in the sunshine in the garden and it was the most fabulous spread ever - and we didn't move for the rest of the day!

When the baby arrives they're all coming back on the 6th day to have a similar ceremony for the Naming of the Child. I do love the way they celebrate things, and all the colour and laughter and sparkle. And the food... Oh, and especially the bindis...

Ten Years Today

2011-06-30T21:26:00.017+01:00

This isn't a proper blog post - I'm planning on getting back to those really, really soon, promise - but just a little memorial for Pat, and for me, because I feel I have to mark the tenth anniversary of her death - and not just with my own ritual of sitting in the garden on our (now crumbling but still there - just) seat with all the usual accompaniments, and remembering and being sad and happy and lonely all at the same time, which I did early this morning in the sun and the birdsong.

It's ten years today without her in my life - still can't believe it... Still miss her so much. Still think about her every day. The things below are what we always had by way of celebrating absolutely anything, and what we said we'd have at our funerals when were at least 97...

So, Pat, love, if you're up there laughing your socks off because I'm now 10 years older than you and about to become a grandmother (you'd have been an ace Great Auntie Pat!) - this is for you with love, always...

Blue and yellow irises - our favourite flowers in our favourite racing colours on so many happy occasions. Nothing more to say on that score!

Cream slice - our favourite cake. Such a lot of fun to be had with them - and so much mess to be made - and so much licking of fingers etc (and not necessarily our own or each other's!) afterwards...

Cristal champagne - we always raised a glass at every opportunity - and then some!

And finally - Wrigleys spearmint chewing gum - for reasons far too rude and personal and private jokey to post here - and she'll know why!

Coming Out on Kindle and Other Stuff

2011-05-03T08:58:00.008+01:00

So - after months of procrastinating and faffing and declaring that I'm far too much of a techno-idiot to cope with anything electronic and that books are books with paper pages you can turn and feel and smell and not soulless words-on-a-screen, I've joined the 21st century!

I've gathered together two short-ish volumes of short-ish short stories and published them on Amazon Kindle with the help of lovely Aimee Fry from The Author Works who did the covers, and I'm chuffed to bits with them!

Bucolic Frolics - a collection of rural romps - is available on ASIN:B004UH7V5Q
and
Happy Ever After - a selection of short rom-coms - is on ASIN:B004UGPVH2

It took me ages and ages to work out how to do it (even though the Kindle instructions are wonderfully simple, but then so am I...) then I had a eureka moment when it all fell into place - and I was SO proud of myself when I did it! I wasn't sure about pricing, so just went for the cheapest option, and I'm now going to have a go at *Kindling* a couple of my earlier out of print books and some more short stories - so you have been warned!

The absence from the blog and the plunge into *Kindling* do have a common thread - I've been a bit ill - again. I had post-herpetic-neuralgia - the after-effects of the last lot of shingles when the skin from my neck to my waist felt like someone was constantly pouring acid over it, and the nerve endings in my spine and ribs became inflamed in sympathy and HURT non-stop - and believe me you DO NOT want it. Never, ever... As I spent most of April high as a kite on mega-death-strength prescription pain killers and was unable to sit or lay down or wear any clothes from the waist up (not an attractive sight - and no, I didn't go outside) and slept (ho-ho-ho!) fitfully by standing up and draping myself over a dining room chair, the only thing I could do to take my mind off the crappy stuff was to spend the enforced waking hours by messing around with Kindle. So I did...

It hasn't been all bad though. Last weekend, because I was feeling better, we all went to Jersey for Easter. We being me and The Toyboy Trucker and Elle and The Doctor. And a jolly bunch we were too. Well, TTT and The Doctor were fine, but I was still zonked on medication and hurt quite a bit, and Elle hasn't had the best of pregnancies so far - so the girlie half of the party waddled and limped and grizzled - but we also sat in the glorious scorching sun by the sea and people-watched and ate loads (sadly neither of us are allowed alcohol so it was slightly less lively than it might have been) AND we met up with Debs and her lovely husband and the fabulous Grumpy for lunch AND huge milkshakes - which was brilliant. Thanks Debs - we LOVED it!

And now post-Royal Wedding (I thought it was fabulous.... sigh...) and all those millions of bank holidays I'm going back to work... Which hopefully means that as well as *Kindling* I really will answer emails and catch up with FaceBook and maybe even crack on with Only Make Believe. Of course the garden looks like a jungle and the house is akin to a midden - but they can wait - can't they????

Endings and Beginnings

2011-03-22T23:45:00.005Z

Oh joy! Never Can Say Goodbye is done! And I mean REALLY done. Edits and all. I've written another book!!! It's always like a miracle to me when that happens because I'm never sure how it actually turns from mad stuff in my head to 400 pages of comparative sense on the computer. And of course it means I can now look at the blurb for NCSG on Amazon and not panic. I always panic when the blurb gets there before I've finished writing the book somehow. It seems sort of scary. Like tempting fate. Although sometimes when the blurb is there really early, I've actually changed the book to suit the blurb, but not this time. This time - phew - it's okay.

Never Can Say Goodbye was one of those books that (once I'd started it - and yes, I faffed around with starting it for ages because I wasn't sure that funny ghosts were exactly what anyone was looking for) just seemed to fall into place (oh, I so wish they were all like that) and didn't give me any real problems. Once I got going it just seemed to work. And for that reason I love it. Mwah!

Now all I have to do is start the next one - which is okay because I actually have an idea... Well, actually I've already started writing it. In fact I started writing it the day I finished NCSG. It's called (at the moment) Only Make Believe. Now it's all getting a bit weird because I'm starting to sound like one of those cocksure writers who knows what they're doing. And I don't. I'm just on a bit of a high. Usually when I've finished writing a book I just slink off somewhere and slump and know I'll never, ever be able to do it again. But this time it's all very different. Oh, the joy of books like NCSG and Hub Bub and Going the Distance and Moonshine that just - well - happen and give me a nice big whoomph of much-needed writerly confidence.

So that's the endings bit of this post's subject line - and a bit of the beginnings. The other bit of the beginnings (and much, much more exciting and amazing) is because I'm going to be a grandmother.

Elle and The Doctor are expecting their first baby on September 1st.

Of course, as The Toyboy Trucker said, we're far too young to be grandparents, which is sweet of him, but to be honest here on the estate, if you're not a Nan and Gramps in your 40s you're considered pretty weird.

To say we're ecstatic would be a major understatement. But I promise here and now that - unlike the wedding - I won't gush a lot and give boring (to everyone else) minute details of the pregnancy. Will just say that poor Elle is currently having a pretty rough time with morning sickness 24/7 but we're all hoping this will soon be at an end. Especially The Doctor who is having the full-on joyous experience. We've seen the scan, complete with little hands and feet - incredible - and although it looks more like a tabby kitten than a baby I'm sure it'll be fine when the whole process is complete. They are determined not to find out the sex, so I'm currently knitting a layette in a nice non-discriminatory mustard...

Now I can saunter off and answer emails (sorry!) and catch up with FaceBook (sorry!) and decide whether I want to be a glamorous granny, or a mad boho writing granny, or a nice cosy granny in aprons and slippers like I had... And shall I be Nan or Gran or Granny or Grandma????

Decisions, decisions...

Jill Mansell Won The Jelly-Wrestling!

2011-03-08T09:06:00.003Z

As Jill had promised publicly on Facebook that we would be bikini-clad and wrestle in jelly for the Rom Com Prize at yesterday's RNA Pure Passion Awards I'm delighted to say that she won it by a country mile and therefore there was no need for me to display my acres of wobbliness while rolling around in strawberry goo...

I was absolutely chuffed to bits that Jill won - because she's a great mate, a brilliant writer, and I love her. There was no flouncing or tantrums from me - I was just thrilled to ribbons to have been short-listed and to have been part of such a glitzy and auspicious occasion. I met so many friends, and made some new ones, and everyone looked fabulously glam. I loved every minute of it.

Congratulations to all the other award winners too, and while there was (in my opinion but then I'm a bit of a gannet) too little food (and that's pretty shocking considering my lovely publishers had generously taken me to lunch at Michel Roux's Brasserie - a mind-blowing gastronomical experience - BEFORE the Awards Ceremony), there was certainly more than enough champagne as can be seen from the - er - slight squiffiness in the pic (courtesy of Liz Fenwick)... This is me and Broo, my amazing and lovely agent, after our umpteenth glass...

A short blog post today because I'm still supposed to be working offline and trying to meet the Never Can Say Goodbye deadline (it WILL be done by next Monday!) - but I just wanted to say how thrilled and excited I was to have been shortlisted, and what a truly fabulous time I had. My heartfelt thanks to all concerned.

Ooooh,right - now back to reality. Big, big, big sigh....

TWTAWH Shortlisted for Pure Passion Rom Com Of The Year Award

2011-02-11T08:18:00.004Z

Okay, now I'm not even sure I believe that heading. Still pinching myself, actually. Being longlisted was a dream come true - this is off the scale. Am so thrilled and excited I'm in real danger of becoming a bit of a drama queen/diva. Have skipped and whooped and beamed irritatingly at everyone since I heard the news. Well, WOW is all I can say...

Had an amazing day yesterday at the glam and glitzy Champagne Breakfast press launch announcement thingy (see how good I am with words?) - bubbles at 10 a.m. - how decadent is that??? In a swish club in Piccadilly no less. Oh, I loved it! Once the short-lists were officially announced, all the short-listed authors were photographed and filmed - we had to do one-to-one sound bite filmy snippets while smiling and holding our book and saying who we were, what the book was called, how we felt on being shortlisted and what the book was about. Simple, yes? No! Amazing how a man with a video camera can make you forget even the smallest, most familiar fact. I'm sure I wasn't the only person who couldn't remember their name. Or maybe I was...?

My face ached from smiling, my stomach ached from all that holding-in, and my head ached from far too much champagne far too early in the day - but it was WONDERFUL!

The awards ceremony is on March 7th - and this is where all the giddy excitement will end because I'm a realist and to be longlisted was amazing, to be shortlisted is the greatest thing to happen to me in my Bucolic Frolic career - but also shortlisted for the Rom Com Award are Jill Mansell and Sophie Kinsella. Yep - Rom Com Royalty. I'm just dead chuffed to even be on the same list - but let's be honest - it's like pitting non-league Crawley against Man U in the FA Cup, a moment of reflected glory to be savoured for ever, an event to enjoy without any unrealistic expectations. But I'm a feisty lass, so bring it on is all I can say.

Keep reading through previous blog posts when I was battling my way through writing TWTAWH (all that snarling about the title being changed and everything) and wish that I'd known then what I know now. It would have made writing it a whole lot easier if someone had given me a crystal ball...

Anyway, today I'm still floating around, beaming and annoying everyone - tomorrow my inner-editor will take over and tell me to get a shift on with Never Can Say Goodbye - but not today. Today is a day for flaunting and preening and stamping my silken slippers and tossing back my ringlets and declaring to anyone who is unfortunate enough to hear me "don't you know who I am?". Yeah, okay - I've tried it with milkman and the paperboy so far and they just gave me a scared look and hurried away - but I live in hope.

Shortlisted? Me? Blimey!

Publication Day!

2011-02-03T11:06:00.002Z

I'm briefly breaking cover from my extended (thank you!) deadline to share a little bit of cyber champagne and a HUGE whoopee of joy - because today THE WAY TO A WOMAN'S HEART is published in paperback which means it's available in the shops!!!!

There were times (as always) when I thought TWTAWH would never be a real book - but it is - and I've just seen it, several of it actually - face out!!!! - in our local W H Smith. I do love the cover - perfect for Valentine's Day. Of course I was still too timid to tell them I wrote it, but I did lurk around the shelves and smile a lot...

So - another publication day has arrived. It's been very low-key, but it's the 19th since 1997. Crikey - did I really do all that WORK?????

Still, no time to celebrate at the moment - NEVER CAN SAY GOODBYE has to be delivered in two weeks. So - as I slink off back to Francesca's Fabulous Frocks - and Frankie and Dexter and Brian from the kebab van and Maisie the useless medium - here's to publication day number 20...

Not Quite How I'd Planned It...

2011-01-06T07:08:00.004Z

No, well, I'd intended to post this on New Year's Day (so that the date could be 1/1/11) and wish everyone in Blogland a Happy New Year and be full of festive cheer...

But, being me, things didn't go quite to plan, hence my new year greeting being almost a week late... New Year saw me and The Toyboy Trucker snuffling our way between various surgeries and pharmacies - him to get antibiotics for the chest infection left by The Christmas Cold; me to get antibiotics for the sinus infection left by The Christmas Cold; both of us to the vet's with Alexia who had chronic enteritis over Christmas and needed a daily antibiotic injection...

Oh, what a jolly little trio we were!

And, add to that, the fact that 1) I managed to break two teeth on a cashew nut and 2) I dislocated my knee by balancing on a stool on top of a cushion on top of the sofa (no, not a new party trick) to try to remove a loose garland dangling irritatingly from a corner of the ceiling and then tumbling off in a fat and flustered heap...

So, now we're coughing and sniffing and limping and lisping-and-dribbling and feeling damn miserable. Alexia, on the other hand, is fully recovered and can't understand what all the fuss was about.

Now I have a little over three weeks to finish Never Can Say Goodbye, so am disappearing into the deep, dark, hellish deadline cave for a while - but belatedly - Happy New Year!

Romantic Novel of The Year Award - ooh and Happy Christmas!

2010-12-23T09:57:00.005Z

I've just had the best early Christmas present ever - the news that The Way To A Woman's Heart has been long-listed for the prestigious Romantic Novel of The Year Award. Stunned? I'm speechless. The short-list will be announced in February and I'm pretty certain TWTAWH won't be on it (believe me, there are some really big-hitters on that long-list) BUT just to be nominated is absolutely amazing. I've just skimmed back over the blog posts I wrote while - um - crafting TWTAWH and have decided that, with hindsight and a completed book, all that - um - crafting was well worth it in the long run...

We've had a weird few weeks - it's all been a bit Hotel Babylon here with our usual influx of pre-festive visitors - and some lovely but disruptive winter weather. One lot of visitors, due to arrive at Southampton airport at 9 a.m. eventually, after several re-routes, ended up at Gatwick at midnight. The Toyboy Trucker who was collecting them spent a hairy day and night battling through snow, ice and freezing fog as he hopefully toured the UK's airports. The restaurant get-together was eventually cancelled at about 11 p.m and we all had weary fish and chips in the early hours and minus 10 degree temperatures.

And sadly, my lovely brave one-eyed Maddy cat died suddenly. We were devastated. She'd done so well and had such a happy and lively few months since her operation and had loved being a Diva Cat and spoiled rotten. Her death was as peaceful and gentle as her life - she hadn't shown any signs of being ill at all, and had curled up after her supper on her blanket under her favourite radiator and simply went to sleep. We found her the next morning looking as though she was still sleeping. A fantastic end for her - sheer, total, heartbreaking hell for us. RIP my Mad-Mad Maddy - I'll always love and miss you.

So - two days before Christmas, we're still up to our fetlocks in snow here, it looks gorgeously Winter Wonderland outside, The Toyboy Trucker will be home on Christmas Eve, I've packed all the Christmas stockings, and have stopped writing Never Can Say Goodbye until after the festivities. With the other residents of the terrace and Elle and The Doctor we're looking forward to a very happy Christmas and an awful lot of peace on earth.

So, Happy Christmas to all Bucolic Frolickers - thank you so much for all your support and brilliant friendship - and I hope you all have the Christmas you've dreamed of.

See you next year!

Rambling

2010-11-09T07:51:00.012Z

That's rambling as in dazed and confused mental meandering - not as in a hearty stride-out across the autumnal countryside - just in case you thought I'd suddenly turned into Ramblers' Champion, Janet "I'm a pensioner you know" Street-Porter.

Anyway I'm rambling for two reasons really: one, because I've had a touch of The Thing That's Going Around and still feel a bit muzzy and need to think about something other than my next dose of Lemsip, and two, because I've reached that stage in writing Never Can Say Goodbye where my finger keeps hovering over the "delete the whole damn lot and start again" button and need to be kept away from my 60,000 words plus until the moment has passed...

So - a few things that have amused me recently (and all in the name of research - just in case Broo is reading this)...

Last week, while shuffling across the estate to our local version of Big Sava via one of the rather pretty little lanes overhung with gloriously tinted trees I watched a very tiny and very elderly man tiptoeing beneath said trees, sprinkling something from a small bag. I smiled to myself at this vision of age-old rural tradition. Bless him, dressed in baggy brown cords and an even baggier beige jumper, he was one of those gentle pink and white marshmallowy old chaps, with pale blue eyes and the sort of stand-up fly-away wispy hair that babies have. He beamed as I approached and offered me the bag with a cheery "Do you like licorice, my dear? Would you like some?" Now, I do like licorice - come on, it's sweet, I like it - but I also remembered my mum's warning of not taking sweets from strangers, so I declined. "That'll mean even more for the squirrels then, my dear," he said, pale blue eyes twinkling kindly. "Oh," I said, even more touched at this demonstration of caring-for-nature, "do squirrels like licorice, then?" The rheumy blue eyes hardened as he cackled, "nah. They hates it. And I hates them. Gives 'em the squits big time -nasty little bastards."

And I've been to aqua aerobics. Once. I shan't be going back. Not to mince words here, we - the participants - were lumpen girls, clad in our uniform sturdy M&S black all-in-one-with-tummy-control-panel swimsuits. We stood self-consciously, chest deep, in neat rows in the aquamarine water, trying not to pass out from the heat and chlorine fumes, waiting for Sasha-Marie, the instructor. Beyonce boomed from the sound-system. Several of us cautiously limbered up a bit under water in an attempt to burn more calories or not fall over or both. Then Sasha-Marie, in pink leggings and a vermilion T-shirt, trundled in and stood on the pool edge in front of us. Yes, trundled. Sasha-Marie was h-u-g-e. Now, I don't know about you, but I'm kind of picky about my exercise regime (translate that as I don't have one but if I did I'd want some sort of proof that it worked), and I refuse to be pc here. Sasha-Marie wasn't pleasantly plump or cuddly - she was massive. We looked like collective Kate Mosses by comparison. With no apparent trace of irony, Sasha-Marie clapped her chubby hands and shouted "Right, girls, let's see if we can get rid of some of that porkiness in time for Christmas, shall we?". Five minutes into marching on the spot underwater and clapping our hands above our head at the same time (something I found a little bit tricky because I'm not particularly co-ordinated), we were getting into the swim (see what I did there?) quite nicely, but Sasha-Marie was still fully dressed and on dry land and puffing and panting and turning puce. Another ten minutes and were were slapping our hands together under our knees in time to Cheryl Cole. Sasha-Marie was sitting on a stool and gasping out her instructions in wheezy staccato bursts. By the time the half hour was up, we - looking like the hippo ballerinas in Fantasia - were twirling and kicking and splashing our hands happily on the surface of the pool along with Kylie. Sasha-Marie had been taken outside by the lifeguard. And when I got home I weighed 2lbs more than when I started. Aqua aerobics is not for me...

And note to self: when you're next having your hair coloured by someone who trained at A Big London Salon DO NOT say cheerfully "oh, just slap a few tabby stripes in as usual". Colourists from Big London Salons don't slap or do tabby or stripes. They do nuances and hints, and tones and tints, and shades and shimmers, and slivers and slices, and glints and glimmers, and hi-lights and lo-lights, and can have Very Bad Tempers.

We have an Old People's Day Centre on the other side of the green. The Toyboy Trucker thinks this is very handy as he reckons I'll be needing it before too long and being so close it won't be too tricky to find me if I wander off. For years we've been used to seeing bus-loads of Seniors (as our council insists we call them) being shunted off to watch the traffic congestion on the A34 or the fights in the entrance to Poundland. However, because the council (like councils everywhere) are having to make swingeing budget cuts, the bus has had to go. Now the Seniors are shepherded together in little groups with a minder to participate in activities on the green. The Teddy Bears' Picnic was a great success. Not so the litter-picking. Well, you give a lot of disgruntled pensioners-with-attitude pointy sticks and a plastic bag and you're asking for trouble, in my opinion. By the end they had more paramedics in attendance than there were at our wedding reception (another story for another blog post - maybe). This week they've borrowed someone from our FE college to teach them Tai Chi. On the green. In the wind and rain. I'm sorry, but I laughed. Thirty or so cold and wet Seniors, in a collection of puffa jackets, anoraks, hats, scarves and zip-up bootees striking poses (and each other) was like one of the more surreal episodes of Monty Python. Oh, and another thing - when I walked past the day centre yesterday they were having a sing-song. Merry melodies from their youth. Tunes from the War Years. Roll Out the Barrel and It's a Long Way to Tipperary et al. But surely, most of today's Seniors were yesterday's hippies and rock-children? Shouldn't they be boogieing along to the Stones and Led Zep?

Oh, goody - now it's time for my next Lempsip. And when I've had that, I might just have a look at the "delete the whole damn lot and start again" button...

Rebecca In The Scout Hut

2010-10-24T09:49:00.006+01:00

It was much as expected. A full house (we don't get much in the way of entertainment on the estate since Fiery Dave and his souped-up wheel-spinning Subaru moved, thanks to the petition and umpteen Asbos, to East Kilbride), uncomfortable chairs pinched from the Mixed Infants, intermittent lighting, and a biting wind through the window that never got mended after the Brownies had a bit of a fracas during last Easter's performance of Riverdance. Still, we were all there, in the scout hut, more in hope than expectation (as always) and we weren't disappointed.

The am-drammers had copped out (in my opinion) on the settings and used the backdrops from last year's panto (Jack and the Beanstalk). Therefore, Manderley (interior and exterior) was the giant's castle, the South of France was the market square minus The Village Children but sadly still plus the painted-on cow, and the Gothic atmosphere (such as it was) was provided by the lights being turned on and off very quickly backstage. Well, until the moment they all fused, then - until they were fixed - it was down to three people with torches aided by several rows of the audience who, remembering that ill-fated coach trip to see Barry Manilow at Blenheim Palace, held their lighters aloft.

Avis from the Co-op was The Second Mrs de Winter. As Avis is 53 and - given her build and incipient moustache - had been the giant in Jack and the Beanstalk, she wasn't that convincing as a frail and nervous child-bride, but her twin-set and tweed skirt were lovely. It was slightly disturbing that Maxim was played by Larry the postman. Now, there's nothing wrong with Larry and he can act his socks off when he puts his mind to it, but Avis is his mum - so you see the problem. We all tried to suspend disbelief and any squeamishness, but it tested even the most ardent theatre-goer at times.

The am-drammers are a small group, therefore there was the usual doubling-up of roles. Mrs Danvers (played with terrifying authenticity by the vicar's wife, leading us to discuss in the intermission - egg sandwiches with concrete crusts and polystyrene beakers of tepid tea - just exactly what home-life was like in the vicarage) was also Bee and, after lots of muttering and rustling and quick-changes of jacket/hat/beard in the wings, Sid Newman from the garden centre became Jack Favell,Frank Crawley, Frith and Giles. Any scenes that involved more than one of these characters were relegated to off-stage conversations aided and abetted by Gorgeous George (a nickname given with full rustic irony) from the garage who was the narrator. A narrator, we all felt, was essential, given the gaping gaps in the script.

Jasper (Avis's elderly Jack Russell was substituted for the springer spaniel of the original) made several impromptu appearances. Usually when he wasn't required. And eventually he went to sleep in the middle of the stage, snoring loudly, and no-one could shift him so everyone just stepped round him. Except Avis during one of her most wither-wringing scenes when she tripped over him and uttered a line of such eye-watering profanity that Dame Daphne must have groaned in her grave.

We were all, it must be said, really waiting for the burning of Manderley. It was well worth the wait. As we held our collective breath in a frenzy of anticipation, noises-off provided, by way of Gorgeous George rustling aluminium foil and blowing-across-the-tops-of-bottles (we could see this operation taking place so it did somewhat dilute the artistic tension), a lot of crackling and roaring, followed by the smoke machine, which was fairly impressive. I say only fairly as unfortunately the copious billows of thick grey vapour were caught in the draught from the Brownies broken window and rolled, like a Victorian pea-souper, away from Manderley/Giant's Castle and the stage generally and wafted across the audience. As the first four rows disappeared in the murk, everyone nostalgically agreed that it was just like being in the snug of the Weasel and Bucket before the smoking ban. Happy days!

Once the fog had cleared and someone had woken Jasper, and the vicar's wife (aka Mrs Danvers at that point) had stopped screaming, the am-drammers took their bows and got three curtain-calls (there weren't any curtains but you get the idea). Then we all tidied our chairs and beakers away, and as we filed outside into night the general consensus was that Rebecca in the Scout Hut had been a resounding success.

Their next production will be the Christmas panto of course (Goldilocks this year - we're all assuming Avis will be taking the title role and stretching the imagination even further and that possibly all three bears will be played by Larry) and then, frighteningly, they're going to be tackling Ben Hur.

I will be reviewing it here. Maybe...

Bugger - I Didn't Win The Booker...

2010-10-13T08:53:00.003+01:00

Well, not that I expected to of course, not being short-listed or even long-listed or even in contention at any stage or anything because I'm not even a smidgen literary. However, I was very chuffed when one of those intense and scary-looking telly arts' commentators said that this year's winner - Howard Jacobson's The Finkler Question - was a comic novel and indicated a move away from serious to humorous, from high-brow to middle-brow. Oooh, I thought - one more brow down and there's hope for me and the rest of the Rom-Commers yet. But, sadly, it seems not...

Now, I haven't read The Finkler Question (I've never read anything either long or short listed for the Booker because I'm a pleb), but the little bit I heard being read out last night didn't make me chortle. I actually didn't really understand it... which means, I suppose, that it must be really, really good. And Howard Jacobson showed a great sense of fun (I thought) when he said he'd spend the £50,000 (gulp) prize money on a handbag for his wife with a wry "have you seen the price of handbags?".

However, while I was having a little happy moment about The Man Booker sliding ever so slowly towards people of my limited brain-power, Andrew Motion (chair of judges) sodded it up by describing The Finkler Question as "laugh-out-loud funny but so nearly adjacent to tragedy" and "very sad, melancholic, laughter in the dark..." and then Mr Jacobson himself compounded my deepest fears by saying his novel wasn't "easy-peasy and middle-brow because it's comic. It's much cleverer and more complicated and about much more difficult things..."

Ah, well - many congrats to Howard Jacobson - but I have a feeling that Brian from the kebab van and Maisie the Useless Medium won't be troubling the Booker judges for a while yet...

And - while on the subject of literary fiction - I listened to the first ever Radio 2 Book Club reviews on Monday evening. This time the book chosen was Mr Chartwell - a first-time novel about depression and Winston Churchill and a widowed librarian set over 5 days in the summer of 1964. Mr Chartwell - who has a massive viewpoint role apparently (haven't read this one either because I'm a pleb) - is a giant black dog (black dog equalling depression which is the theme of the novel)... Ooooh, I thought, how many times have I been told that having an animal narrator is a huge no-no - things must be soooo different in Lit Fic Land. The author sounded very young and very happy and has been given a very pleasing advance - which is wonderful for her - but several reviewers said while they loved her descriptions they couldn't understand some of her complex sentences and had to re-read them several times to get the gist... Now, in Commercial Fiction Land that would earn you a sharp editorial rap on the knuckles and a severe editing session...

Oh, well - it's back to the keyboard and baby-easy sentences and Brian from the kebab van and words of one syllable for me...

Oh - and while out yesterday, I saw this notice in the window of The Eight 'til Late:
"Fitzharry's Am Dram Society proudly present Rebbecca by Daphne Du Maurier, unabridged, for three nights, in the Scout Hut".

The burning of Manderley???? The scenes in the south of France??? The costume ball??? Rebecca's boat on stormy seas???? In the Scout Hut?????

I've bought tickets.

Champagne at 38,000 Feet

2010-10-07T08:42:00.008+01:00

Last Sunday it was my birthday (I'm now VERY old) - and thank you so much to everyone who sent greetings and then obviously thought I was a mardy mare for not replying - but I was celebrating it with champagne and The Toyboy Trucker and 300+ other people somewhere dizzily high in the sky above the Alps en route to Cyprus. How decadent was that??? Actually, it was just wonderful. Perfect. I cried with happiness (I cry VERY easily) when I found out about it. Cyprus was my surprise birthday present from TTT, Elle and The Doctor and I LOVED it. Had never been before and will go back as soon as poss. We left the UK early on my birthday morning with temperatures in single figures and a cutting northerly wind howling across a bleak sky - and landed 4 hours later in 35+ degrees of non-stop sunshine. It was one of the most blissful weeks of my life...

But now I'm back, feet firmly on the ground, shivering and WORKING. Well, I'm trying. The new book (Never Can Say Goodbye) is still going okay. It seems to be like Going the Distance and Hubble Bubble in the way it's kind of unfolding itself easily as I go along. Strangely (because I still have absolutely no idea how my books ever come into being, or how I write them, or why it seems natural to me to have this entire cast of REAL people living inside my head) my books don't follow the same pattern. Some like this one (so far) sort of write themselves, others need a lot more concentration and - er - work.

My early Orion books seemed to gush out with no problems (but then I was still all starry-eyed about being published and everything was all lovely and shiny and new), then the HarperCollins ones were much bigger and more complex and layered and therefore took longer and I had to make sure that all the ends tied up and all the sub-plots reached a conclusion as well as the main story thread. And since then, the Piatkus/Little,Brown ones have been a mix of the two. Love Potions gave me all sorts of headaches (mainly because when the title was changed from Flower Power {considered too hippie} I realised I hadn't actually got any love potions in it and had to go back and slot them in); Heaven Sent was far too short but I'd told the story and anything else would have been padding; Happy Birthday was too long (in my opinion) and probably should have been two books...

And The Way To A Woman's Heart....??? Well, once I'd stopped being a diva-bitch-from-hell author and got over it no longer being called Midnight Feast, and accepted that Sunny (heroine) was now called Ella, and that it had to be a longer, meatier story (sorry, bit of a pun as it's about cookery) with a bigger cast of characters, less obvious practical magic and more grounded reality but still series-linked to the previous books - oh, and amusing, I finally knuckled down and just did it.

I suppose, as a writer, that's what it's all about really - just doing it. No-one else is going to. Sadly, it's taken me years to realise that! Much as there were many, many mornings when I'd switch on the computer and hope that the Tailor of Gloucester's mice had written several thousand words of The Way To A Woman's Heart overnight, eventually I accepted that if I didn't do it then it would never be finished. Weird though how the changing of the title and the heroine's name made it the most difficult book I've ever written. Still, it's done, I'm happy with it - and hopefully the slog/sweat/angst/difficult-author-tantrums won't show...

Never Can Say Goodbye (and that is going to be the title - they've had the discussion about maybe changing it to something else and happily decided to stick with my "let's get away from the cutesy magicky titles" title - so that's one hurdle - um - hurdled) is developing into a completely different book. The magic is slightly more - um - spooky. The characters are more eccentric (as in Brian from the kebab van and Maisie the Useless Medium). The situations more down-to-earth - well, in a sort of off-the-wall way. And much as I thought that after actually having to "work" on The Way To A Woman's Heart (I really hate work!) I'd never find my mo-jo or my writing joi-de-vivre again, so far I'm having fun with it. Which is just as well as it has to be finished by Christmas. Erk!

Blimey! This post is almost writerly. Still, the next one won't be as I've got to blog about total rubbish. Even more total rubbish than usual because our local council has just ventured into the multi-wheely-bin-refuse-disposal-system and you wouldn't believe the uproar this has caused in the terrace... FIVE wheely bins, all different colours, all for different things, all collected on different days... It's causing anarchy here, I can tell you. Anarchy.

Oh, and tonight I'm going to the theatre again with The Toyboy Trucker - but this time to see Frankie Boyle - so probably this is not going to be a repeat of the erudite cerebral Stephen Fry experience... Can't wait!

Why Can't I Be Stephen Fry???????

2010-09-21T08:59:00.010+01:00

We went to see Stephen Fry on Saturday. That is we went to see him at the theatre - we didn't pop round to his for tea or anything. I like Stephen Fry: I love him on QI, he's a great actor, a clever mimic, and I am in awe of his brain, his wealth of knowledge and his wonderful use of words. This theatre performance was to promo part two of his autobiography - so it was Stephen talking about the early and middle chunk of his life. Did I enjoy it? Yes, most of it - although being honest, some of it was way too elitist for me - but then I'm definitely a pleb. Stephen was warm and garrulous and rambling and told several lengthy and intricate tales about how he was a lost cause in his youth and sort of stumbled into stardom. Sadly, because I'm the aforementioned pleb, some of it was just a touch too luvvie for me. However, the man is without doubt a genius.

But the whole thing was ruined because I got the nutter sitting next to me...

You know how you always get them on a bus or a train? It isn't just me, is it? Oh, right... Well, anyway, on Saturday night I got the theatre equivalent. There was one empty seat next to me in a sell-out full house. And, just before curtain up, in he came. Bustling along the row, treading on toes, all multi-patterned jumper, cagoule, and haversack. As the lights dimmed, he dumped the haversack and rushed down to the front of the stalls, stood on tiptoe and peered on to the stage. Then he cantered back, threw himself down beside me and said excitedly "I can see him in the wings! He's ready to come on!"

I smiled weakly and edged further away - difficult in theatre seats. He leaned towards me. "I saw him in Cambridge last night and Norwich the night before and tomorrow I'll see him in London!"

Oh, great. I'd got a Stephen Fry groupie...

Fortunately, Stephen made his entrance then, and Mr Groupie was on his feet whooping and hollering. I shrank down in my seat as everyone turned to stare at us. The Toyboy Trucker, safely out of the spotlight on the other side of me, laughed. A lot. Anyway, once Stephen got going, Mr Groupie, who clearly hadn't wasted his time on the tour, loudly spoke every line along with him, albeit slightly out of sync. It was like having a slightly bizarre echo. Mercifully this came to an end when Mr Groupie burrowed into his haversack and brought out his sandwiches and flask of coffee. Generously he offered me a sardine and tomato. I declined. And by this time The Toyboy Trucker was, naturally, doubled up...

Maybe it was the stench of the sardine sandwiches, but I was getting pretty tetchy. So, when Stephen said that as a writer he was arrogant because all writers are arrogant I wanted to yell WRONG! I was absolutely itching to leap up and say WRONG, WRONG, WRONG - but, given that thanks to Mr Groupie our row was already the centre of attention and The Toyboy Trucker was giving me One Of Those Looks, I didn't. I just sat and simmered and tried to ignore the pungency of the sardines.

Then, just to add to my irritation, Stephen announced that the entire tour had been organised by his publishers (Penguin) to promote his latest book - and that after his hour and a half on stage he'd be doing a book selling-and-signing session in the theatre.

Well! Fancy that! Stephen Fry gets a publisher-paid tour of theatres - a sell-out nationwide tour of theatres seating thousands - and I get the local book shop if I'm lucky. Stephen Fry has queues and queues of hundreds of people winding for miles round our major cities, I get a few friends and people sheltering from the rain or waiting for the next bus to Kingston Dapple. Now I wonder why that is? And why, oh why, can't I be Stephen Fry?

Sadly, my book-signings always remind me of the days when I travelled with my Dad, the fairground organ and traction engine to do shows in remote rural locations. I've lost count of the times that Dad used to peer out on a bleak field with the rain falling horizontally in a force ten gale and say (in pre-PC days) - "good crowd tonight - three paraplegics and a daft bloke with a dog"... because it seemed that at every country fayre we attended, all the minders used to dump their charges in front of the organ with a cheerful "Never mind a bit of rain...let's park you here! Oooh, look at the pretty lights! Listen to the pretty music!" before sodding off to the beer tent...

And then I'd trundle on and dance the can-can in a monsoon to a less-than-impressed audience. Actually, it's funny with hindsight, just how much of my early life could have been lifted straight out of Cher's Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves...

Anyway, those less-than-packed performance days are EXACTLY like my book signings - except of course that I don't dance the can-can any more - maybe I should....

So - the picture at the top of the post is Stephen's very crowded book-signing and this one is mine.... Spot the difference???????????????

Sweet Dreams

2010-09-15T09:02:00.006+01:00

This is my dream bedroom. Sadly, it isn't how my real bedroom looks. It isn't how my real bedroom has ever (or will ever) look because The Toyboy Trucker would leave me. It is, however, exactly how my new heroine's bedroom looks and I'm dead jealous. New heroine (Francesca, known as Frankie) in Never Can Say Goodbye, is a girl after my own heart who loves colour and clutter and all things retro - which is why she's running a vintage frock shop and dresses like a bag-lady and has a tart's boudoir bedroom... I can only claim one of these...

Anyway, because I've been obsessed by bedrooms lately, I thought I'd mention Frankie's and blog about mine. It's still not finished. It's been well over a month now and it still looks like a shed... Why, in the name of all that's holy, we ever got into this mess, I still can't quite understand.

It all started when The Toyboy Trucker decided he'd like a telly in the bedroom. I'm anti telly-in-the-bedroom for all sorts of reasons - main one being The Toyboy Trucker falling asleep with something loud and violent blaring out and me having to stuff my ears from the explosions and screams and avert my eyes from the blood and gore and eventually having to stumble from the cosiness of the bed to switch the damn thing off. The Toyboy Trucker convinced me that we've moved on technologically since 1987 and he'd have a remote control and headphones and I'd never notice it...

So, I gave in, and said okay - we'll have a telly in the bedroom... The Toyboy Trucker excitedly bought one - all flat-screen and DVD-playing-and-recording etc etc - and that's honestly where it all started. Because we quickly discovered we actually hadn't got anywhere to put a telly. We had one socket and a bedroom full of old brown furniture - lots of dressing tables and chests - that had belonged to my Nan. And none of them were in the right place for a telly, and they were all crumbly and rickety and decrepit to boot. And the walls wouldn't support a bracket because they were covered in pictures and lots of disintegrating 1970s wardrobes... So, it was decided - all for the sake of a damn telly - that we'd have a bedroom make-over. We'd ditch the mis-matched clutter and, despite my private yearning for a purple and pink girly glory-hole, have something pale and plain and pristine.

It all sounded so easy. We measured the room. Men from the furniture shop measured the room. All the measurements tallied. We chose an entire range of pale beech furniture, hand-built, and made-to-measure. In Germany. We were going to have a bank of wardrobes at one end of the room, including a walk-in, and lots of new matching chests, and one of those over-the-bed-and down-the-sides contraptions incorporating masses of cupboards and shelves and little twinkly hidden lights. Men-in-shorts were brought in to remove all the old stuff and decorate the room in a nice tasteful cream and rewire the bedroom to enable us to have a telly.

The new furniture arrived. Thirty boxes of it. The delivery men chuckled as they hefted it upstairs. As soon as they'd left I understood why. Most of it was self-assembly, very little of it was labelled, and the instructions were in German...

I'll gloss over the August Bank Holiday weekend. Tempers, it must be said, were frayed... By the Monday night we were no longer speaking but we'd got two-and-half wardrobes built; the walk-in wasn't built or even slightly walk-in because we had two left sides and no right one (it's going to take another 6 weeks to get a replacement); the drawers didn't fit the chests - and funniest of all (okay, not at the time - but with hindsight....) was the fact that the over-the-bed contraption didn't fit bloody anywhere... The measurements had been taken across the middle of the room. No-one had taken into account that a) there were big chunky skirting boards at the bottom and b) this house is 70 years old and the walls aren't exactly even...

Men-in-shorts were recalled to do what they could. Suffice it to say they had to remove part of a wall. It took three days to burrow through plaster and bricks and breeze blocks. The upstairs looked like Beirut, we were all coughing and spluttering and sort of permanently grey, and the lovely fresh cream decor was covered in dust and rubble... Oh, and we'd got a kind of knock-through effect into the spare room. Still, the over-the-bed thing eventually fitted - even if we're now sleeping at a rather odd angle, the bookshelves slope like they're starring in the final throes of the Titanic, and the little twinkly lights are somewhat intermittent.

Of course, because the wardrobe cluster (that's how it was described - honest) isn't finished owing to the lack of right-side-of-walk-in, most of our clothes are in bin liners and suitcases. I'm still picking brick rubble out of the cats and from between my toes. The bedroom looks like a bomb site - albeit a nice cream one.

And the thing that started all this? The telly? Still in its box until such time as the bedroom is finished, which, as far as I can tell, *might* just be before the start of the 2012 Olympics...

Unaccustomed As I Am....

2010-08-17T08:45:00.005+01:00

Just back from staying at Swanwick Summer Writing School where I was an after-dinner speaker! That was a first for me - well, two firsts really. I've never been to Swanwick before and I've certainly never been an after-dinner speaker. Think they were VERY brave to ask me...

Swanwick is amazing! What a fabulous place! What elegant surroundings! What incredible food and hospitality! And such fantastic, enthusiastic and completely crazy people... THANK YOU to everyone - especially Xanthe and Joyce and Fiona and Ann and Roy who invited me and looked after me brilliantly and made me laugh all the time, and to Fliss and Jan for suggesting I'd be a good speaker (are you insane???), and to Della for everything, and to everyone else who made me feel as though I belonged from the moment I arrived and who will now always be good friends.

Mind you, if I'd known that the after-dinner speaking involved being in a theatre, on stage, with a microphone and an audience of hundreds I'd have turned tail and fled back down the motorway - but as it was, like the proverbial lamb, I trotted happily into it without having a clue what I was doing. Par for the course, I know.

I'd written a speech. I'd practised it over and over again to the Toyboy Trucker and the cats who were all fairly unimpressed. It lasted 30 minutes. I had an hour - a whole HOUR - on stage... And, I'd torn my speech up because it was rubbish and just had a few scribbled notes... Still, I thought as I gazed nervously at my cheerfully expectant audience, I'll never have to see any of them again...

In my new-from-the-market long frock and B-I-G ear-rings I took a deep breath and trying not to meet anyone's eyes in case I spotted boredom, sleep or even death, I just launched myself into the story of how I started writing, the ups and downs, the ins and outs, the good times and the bad. Oh, and I told everyone about my life, and about the neighbours and about the cats and just anything else I could trawl from the depths of what was left of my brain.

Mercifully, they were a brilliant audience and they laughed at the first sentence and carried on laughing, and the more they laughed the more indiscreet I became until they were chuckling all the time and I'd convinced myself that a career as a stand-up beckoned. The hour simply flew by. I answered all sorts of questions and told more tall tales (actually true stories, but even to me some parts of my life sound pretty impossible) and incredibly got a standing ovation.

Now, I'm ashamed to say, this all went to my head a bit. Afterwards, having signed and sold loads and loads of books and been congratulated on being funny a lot, I practically preened and flounced. I was an inch away from snapping my fingers and throwing back my hair and demanding roast swan and the finest champagne. Happily, because I'm a vegetarian and only drink beer, it didn't quite come to that. But almost. As I clutched my pint and my cigarette and skipped round Swanwick's glorious grounds in the moonlight, I was very nearly getting above myself.

Thankfully The Toyboy Trucker brought me down to earth with a "your bra straps are showing, you've got lipstick on your teeth, your hair looks all funny and you've lost an ear-ring - you look like you've been in a brawl".

Now I'm home again, all diva-ness forgotten, and as is the way of my life, the TWTAWH proofs have arrived in Pdf format and have to be done online and returned by Thursday and we're having the bedroom renovated (posh way of saying the 1970s built-in crap wardrobes are being pulled out and the one measly electric socket is being - er - extended and the funny little wash-basin thing in the corner is being turned into something altogether more swish) which means intermittent electricity so I really ought to get on with them... Have to say that even after severe editing, TWTAWH is still standing at 455 pages!!! 455!!! That's almost War and Peace! I've got to proof-read War and Peace!!!! Aaargh!!!!

A Month Of Madness

2010-07-31T11:04:00.038+01:00

Having got wildly excited over finishing this - THE WAY TO A WOMAN'S HEART (note my huge self control in not even mentioning Midnight Feast...) - I have unashamedly skived for the last month. Well, sort of...

I've actually been here for a few days and given a talk or two at the Lit Fest and had a truly brilliant time - what an amazingly friendly city Middlesbrough is! Thank you to everyone who came along and was so lovely....

And here for the weekend... (I do so love a gut-quivering jet engine roar or twenty...)

And here... where I also gave a talk (and giggled a lot) and met up with my lovely, glamorous and really good friend Jane and had a wonderful evening even if the local paper managed to get ALL the facts wrong!

And here with The Toyboy Trucker for some much needed R&R - not to mention alcohol and food and far, far too much ice-cream...

Oh, and here because my recurring conjunctivitis isn't - it's blepharitis which is totally different and has a completely different treatment and I'm really happy now because I can see!!!

And most excitingly of all - here....
And this was like walking on to a film set! Having seen the pictures and heard all about Debs' fabulous shed for so long, to actually be there was almost overwhelming. It's amazing! And gorgeous! And pretty! And I WANT ONE!!!! Thanks so much Debs (and Grumpy, for allowing me over the portals) - it was simply brilliant.

I've also written five short stories - and sent them...

And I've started The New Book - which I've called NEVER CAN SAY GOODBYE in an attempt to find my own "let's get away from the cutesy magicky titles" title.

And today is Jonah's 15th birthday. He's celebrated well with chicken breast and steamed fish. As we were told he would be lucky if he survived to his 3rd birthday we're really proud of him. But not half as proud as he is of himself! Showing-off, swaggering and preening all seem to come very naturally to him.

Other less pictorial catch-up stuff from previous posts - one-eyed Maddy is absolutely fantastic now, although she has turned into a bit of a prima-donna with all the earlier attention, but is managing to live with her restricted vision with no problems at all. Elle and The Doctor's ill-fated Carlton Epsom handmade bed eventually arrived - damaged and in the wrong colour... back to the drawing board for that one, then. Sigh.... It is now fifteen months since we spoke to the outlaws after the no-show wedding fiasco. Feel that it is too long to even try for a reconciliation. Shame...

Sooo, now I'm back with bum-on-seat and fingers-on-keyboard and after my month of skiving madness will try really, really hard to be A Good Blogger in future. I think...

Ta-ra Tramuntana

2010-06-17T09:43:00.006+01:00

Sorry blog - I've been ignoring you - AGAIN. But there's been a really, really good reason - honest. I mean, as well as doing the TWTAWH edits - I've also skived off and been here. That's the place in the picture, blog, in case you're not following my drift...

The Toyboy Trucker and I have been to the Tramuntana Mountains and it was BLISS. Yes, I left unfinished edits behind which makes me a Bad Writer, but we'd planned to have the hol at the end of May/beginning of June ages ago in those halcyon days when I was convinced TWTAWH would have been delivered/edited/all over and be nothing but a blurred memory and I'd be well into The Next One by April. Of course, this was a mistake - but the hol was booked and paid for - so, off we went.

Did I fret about the un-done edits? Did I hell! Sorry - Bad Writer moment again. No, we joyously embraced the non-stop Mediterranean sunshine and the crystal-clear turquoise sea and the wall-to-wall tapas and the sheer gorgeousness of the laid-back way of life. We whizzed up and down the mountains (amazing hairpin roads - felt like something off Top Gear!) in little wooden trains and through citrus groves in rattling wooden trams and stayed in an old-fashioned hotel that was exactly like something out of a lavish Agatha Christie adaptation. Oh, the absolute decadence of eating late, strolling beneath the palms and pines at the foot of the mountains in the moonlight, and then returning to the hotel to sit in cushioned wicker chairs on the vast tiled and candlelit-terrace with a jug of sangria and people-watch...

And now we're back, and The Toyboy Trucker is embroiled with lorries and parcels again, and TWTAWH is FINISHED!!!! I ignored everything else (except the cats, of course) when I returned and spent about 16 hours a day, every day, on the edits and rewrites and sent it yesterday! It's DONE! Phew!!!!

Sooo - it's ta-ra to TWTAWH and to the Tramuntana. I hope the former will never need to be revisited - but the latter, oh, yes - we (in the words of Arnie) will be back...

For The Love Of Maddy

2010-05-12T10:55:00.003+01:00

This is Maddy. To the rest of the world she's a very ordinary little black cat. To me, for fifteen years, she's been my close friend, a source of constant amusement, and the inspiration for the name of my very first heroine in my very first novel. Two weeks ago Maddy had to have her left eye removed after developing an ulcerated optic abscess. The operation went well (I spent all day pacing up and down with my stomach in knots, as you do), she came home two days later and, the vet said, was on track to make a full recovery.

Maddy looked awful. Half her face was shaved away, she had six huge stitches in a sort of gash shape from the top of her head down to the tip of her nose, and she was very wobbly. However, after a couple of days of TLC she started to make progress. She'd eat a little and venture outside occasionally and the other cats stopped giving her a wide berth because she reeked of VET. Then she changed. With no warning she started clawing at her face, shaking her head violently and falling over. She couldn't eat, drink, walk or even stand up. Every time I put food down for her, she'd lower her head to it and then jerk it frantically away almost as if she'd just smacked her face into an invisible glass wall. She hid behind the sofa, hunched up, looking terrified.

I rushed her back to the vet who checked her over and said he'd never seen such violent and distressing reactions, that the eye socket was clean and clear, there was no indication of an infection, and that unless she'd had a post-op cerebral bleed he had no idea what was going on, but that he was very worried. He wasn't the only one...

Two days later, with Maddy's violent shakes and panics getting worse, and still having not eaten or drunk anything, I took her back. The vet removed her stitches, checked her over again, said she wasn't in pain but was very weak and he had no idea what was going on, and said he didn't hold out much hope for her survival, and that it might be kindest to have her put to sleep...

Now, at that point there was no way I was going to let her go. Not until I knew there was no alternative. If she'd been in pain then yes, of course, I'd have agreed. But as she wasn't... I took her home. She crawled behind the sofa. And I crawled with her. And for an entire week that's where she stayed and - for most of it - so did I, just talking to her and stroking her and reassuring her. I reckoned that it was vital for her to have fluids more than anything, so spent ages syringing water into the side of her mouth. We both got soaked but at least she got some of it. Then, still talking to her all the time, and stroking her, I smeared pate round her mouth and on her paws and the side of her face. At first she just panicked, but I persevered to the expense of everything else. For seven days I did nothing - certainly no writing or housework - but sat with her in the darkness, smearing food on to her and talking to her until she gradually, very gradually, started to lick it off.

After another two days she crawled from behind the sofa and, keeping her away from the other cats, I put the food on a saucer in front of her. She went through the violent shying away/head shaking thing again, but then - amazingly - started to hook the food off her plate with her paw and eat it with her "fingers". Not much, admittedly, but some. I was so encouraged by this breakthrough (yes, I cried) that I started teaching her to stand and walk too. Just supporting her underneath her tummy and moving her forward inch by inch, and putting her into a litter tray and holding her steady. And after another day she could do this on her own too.

Then she started eating normally from her dish, admittedly very, very slowly with her head all skewed round at an odd angle, but she was eating and drinking and walking unaided...

By the end of last week, Maddy was back to normal. Yes, she's finding it a bit odd only having restricted vision - but this hasn't stopped her resuming her tree-climbing and bird-watching activities. As I'm typing this she's chasing butterflies in the garden. She's the first in for food, the first one with a clean plate, the first one on the bed at night seeking out the snuggliest spot.

Now I'm miles behind with the TWTAH edits, the house is a tip and The Toyboy Trucker is beginning to look like beans on toast - but I'm making no apologies. Maddy's back, I'm ecstatic - and I'm thinking, should the writing take a nose-dive, of setting up in business as a cat-whisperer.....

Short Story and Poetry Competition

2010-04-26T10:34:00.004+01:00

A proper writerly blog post - and possibly one that should be on Womag's blog really...

Anyway, if anyone out there in blogland fancies having a go at writing a winning short-story or poem with the chance of some GREAT prize money - the following might be of interest....

Poetry and Short Story Writing Competition with £4000 worth of Prizes!

The Writers Bureau – Britain’s leading Creative Writing home study college – has launched its annual Poetry and Short Story Competition for 2010.

Now in its 16th year, the competition will, once again, be judged by Iain Pattison and Alison Chisholm. Alison commented on last year’s winners saying, “The wide-ranging subject matter and a host of individual voices made this a fascinating competition to judge. Many of the entries reached out and captivated the reader, who was drawn into another world and invited to become a part of it. The winners were spectacular.”

Last year’s winners can be viewed at www.wbcompetition.com.

Total prize money is £4000: First prize in each category is £1000, second prize £400 third prize £200, fourth prize £100, plus six runners-ups prizes of £50 each.

The theme is open so entrants can choose to write about any subject.

Poems should not exceed 40 lines and short stories should not exceed 2000 words.

The winners will be featured in Freelance Market News and on The Writers Bureau competition website giving the winners a chance to showcase their work and boost their profile.

The entry fee for each poem or short story is £5.00 and the closing date for entries is 30th June 2010. Entry can be either online or through the post.

For entry forms or further information contact:

The Competition Secretary, Dept Comppr, The Writers Bureau,Sevendale House, 7 Dale Street, Manchester, M1 1JB Tel: 00 44 161 228 2362

Or Visit www.wbcompetition.com

Contact: Diana Nadin Email: dianan@writersbureau.com Tel: 0161 228 2362 (day)

Carlton Epsom and Me

2010-04-19T09:05:00.008+01:00

Carlton Epsom may well become a mean and nasty character in a future book, but right at the moment I never want to hear the name again... It's been one of those weekends that honestly could only happen to me.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin...

We, The Toyboy Trucker and I (re-united again!), had planned a weekend with Elle and The Doctor. We were going to forget all about me editing TWTAWH and him starting yet another newly-elevated job on Monday morning. We were going out shopping with them on Saturday to buy them a new bed for their new house as our house-warming present, then on Sunday we were all off to London for lunch with The Doctor's parents. A lovely, family weekend...

Sooo - on Saturday, we trailed round every furniture shop in four counties. Elle wasn't taken with any of the 23 million beds we looked at... She then announced that she remembered she'd seen "just the one they wanted" on a certain well-known furniture shop's website. Off we trotted (another cross-country trek) to the aforementioned store - and yes, the bed (the Carlton Epsom) was one they stocked, but not in-store - on t'internet only as it was hand-built to order...

With The Toyboy Trucker muttering that only Elle could find a hand-built must-have bed and it had always been the same with her, she could never settle for anything off-the-shelf even as a child, and then started on about the designer wedding dress that cost more than our first house and things were getting a bit fraught, we changed the subject back to volcanic ash (again) and politics (again) as these were much safer topics - and hurried back to Elle and The Doctor's house and t'internet.

And - yes! - there it was! The Carlton Epsom! As Elle provided refreshments, and The Toyboy Trucker and The Doctor discussed football and F1 and volcanic ash and politics, I snuggled-up to their laptop and tapped in all the complex details, mine as payee and Elle's as recipient, on several lengthy online forms and pressed the "buy now" button. Nothing happened for ages then I got a "sorry - page not loading - invalid order" message.

So, I tried again and again and again and again.... Each attempt took ages. Still nothing. The page wouldn't load and the whole thing was rejected over and over and over... However, there was a phone number to place orders verbally. So I tried. Sadly, there wouldn't be anyone there until Monday morning... As we'd then spent longer trying to order the Carlton Epsom online than we had trailing round the bloody bed shops, I was beginning to wish Elle and The Doctor would settle for a futon or a sleeping bag or even the damn bed they've already got...

As soon as The Toyboy Trucker and I got home I thought I'd just try one more online order attempt in case the problem was with Elle and The Doctor's computer - but no, the site still wouldn't accept my order. So, deciding to leave it until Monday morning when I could speak to a Real Person and place my order, I forgot all about Carlton Epsom.

Sunday dawned gloriously warm and sunny, and knowing the sort of fabulous hospitality we'd receive at The Doctor's parents' house, I made an early-morning sortie to the shops for visitor-gifts of posh flowers, chocs and wine... I got to the check out, realised I didn't have enough cash, so used my debit card - which was immediately humiliatingly rejected in front of a queue of people loaded with barbecue goodies and knowing grins... As this was clearly turning into "one of those weekends" I negotiated (slowly) with the check-out-boy and raked up enough cash for the flowers and chocs and had to abandon the wine and everyone behind me was getting pretty unpleasant...

Once home again, I rang my bank, demanding to know why my card had been refused. A very perky lady told me it was due to "insufficient funds". Well - I got pretty uppity I can tell you. The Toyboy Trucker has just been paid, I've just had more German royalties (yay!) and for once I knew the bank was wrong. And I said so in my most-exasperated voice. The perky lady asked if I'd like her to check my recent activities. After a moment's hesitation while I completely misinterpreted the question, I said yes, of course, but I knew down to the very last penny what we'd spent in the past week or so...

'Well' she said, still perkily, 'there's a payment pending of XXXX thousand pounds to XYZ furniture store for 6 online orders...."

I screamed... A lot. Noooo! SIX orders! I'd ordered SIX Carlton Epsom beds! Each time I'd tried to order online and the page had assured me it had been rejected, it hadn't!!!! Each order had gone through... And somehow, our bank account was about to relieved of all the money we'd just been paid plus far more money than we actually possessed and Elle and The Doctor were going to get enough beds to start a small hotel...

Sucking desperately on my electronic cigarette (really effective by-the-way), and hoping to God that The Toyboy Trucker was still immersed in Jensen's progress in the Chinese Grand Prix and not listening, I whimpered and asked the perky lady what I could do... She perkily informed me that I'd entered into a legally binding agreement the minute I'd pressed the buy button. My only recourse was to contact the furniture store and explain the situation and hope they were sympathetic... And of course, the furniture store was closed to telephone calls until first thing on Monday morning...

So, off we went to London and had a fabulous day with The Doctor's family eating an al fresco Indian banquet while I hoped we wouldn't need to use the debit card and panicked and wondered if there was ever going to be a right moment to mention to The Toyboy Trucker that I'd just spent all our hard-earned money and then some on SIX Carlton Epsoms, or to Elle that she better start clearing out several more rooms and setting up a B&B sign...

And this morning, after a sleepless night, I nervously rang the furniture store. And, oh joy! They were brilliant! Not only did they see the funny side (something I'd failed to do for 48 hours) but they assured me that all six Carlton Epsoms were firmly cancelled, my money was safe, and starting afresh we ordered one Carlton Epsom - just the one - to be hand-crafted and delivered to Elle and The Doctor in 30 days time...

And now I've told the bank, and they laughed (oh yeah - very funny...) and reinstated my money and I'm never, never, never going to order anything online EVER again... Oh, and if anyone mentions the words Carlton Epsom anytime soon I'll definitely spit.

Memories and Madness

2010-04-11T09:31:00.007+01:00

First the memories - oooh - it was one year ago today, the loveliest day of my life -big, big soppy sigh... So, here's wishing a very, very Happy First Wedding Anniversary to Elle and The Doctor - oh, and a very happy birthday to The Doctor today as well. They're away for the weekend - somewhere secluded and romantic... I'm not.

And the madness? The edits and rewrites for TWTAWH are back! Already! Aaargh! Mind you, I actually enjoy being edited, so once I get to grips with the "yes, of course I'll change that - it's so much better" and "no way, over my dead body!" bits I'll be fine - I think... It's always a good thing to have someone else's perspective (a professional person, I mean - it's no good relying on your best mate or your mum who will always tell you it's the best thing you've ever written) on your writing - and I must say I agree with about 90% of Emma Editor's points. Sooo - I'll be bum-on-seat and fingers-on-keyboard for the next week hopefully honing TWTAWH into A Good Book.

The madness has also involved loads of stuff going on while I was trying to finish TWTAWH - mainly because I couldn't see for most of it having developed viral conjunctivitis after the shingles episode, so while I looked like Quasimodo and had to wear Matrix-type sunglasses INDOORS (and wouldn't go out because I couldn't wear eye-make and I haven't been outside with bare eyes since I was 14!) neither could I see the screen. I was typing in a massive font and The Toyboy Trucker said I looked like the least attractive half of Peters & Lee... I'm better now, thanks.

And Elle and The Doctor have been buying a house with all the angst that brings, and finally move at the end of April. They already had a house each, sold his, lived in hers after the wedding - now they've sold that too and bought what they're referring to as "a proper family home" in the country... Am getting very overexcited at the thought of the patter of tiny grandchildren... Elle tells me this is NOT on the agenda anytime soon - but then she said that about getting married so I remain "broody-by-proxy"...

And I've been writing a couple of commissioned things: a feature for Prima on "the way we holiday'd" which was great fun (but tricky again as I couldn't see the screen) and includes lots of black and white holiday snaps and made me very nostalgic (but NOT weepy as "weepy" still hurts!), and a short story for a Your Cat magazine competition - which was lovely as the readers had to send in details of their cat and I had to choose the winner and write a story round him/her... I wanted to use ALL of them - they were amazing!

And The Toyboy Trucker has been promoted AGAIN (I knew no good would come of suddenly deciding to get himself an education!) but this time to here - well, almost - but reasonably locally which means he'll be living at home again from April 19th. Can't wait... Not sure about him - think he's probably really enjoyed being young, free and single for all these months... But it has meant a lot of disruption as we've had to move his whole life from the wilds of "the other side of London" back here again...

Oh, and I've also been child-minding for a friend while she had surgery - they (the children - not sure how many of them there were but it seemed like a lot) were quite good (if a little blurry) and most days I just chained them to the Wii while I wrote TWTAWH and fed them on pizza every now and then...

Sooo, somehow amongst that lot, TWTAWH got written and now it's going to be rewritten and I'll be back again as soon as it's DONE!

TWTAWH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2010-04-07T09:47:00.003+01:00

It's finished!!!! I've done it!!!! And "almost" on time too... So, I'm back in the land of the bloggers, and will now start to answer emails and - er - try to reclaim my life... Finishing TWTAWH kind of took over everything for the last month - and came out at a stonking 470 pages so will clearly need a severe editing - but it's DONE!!!!

Oh, and I absolutely love, love, love the cover...

Loads of stuff to say - but first must go and try to dig my way through the housework/washing (amazing how it all seems to accumulate...) that's piled up during my love-affair with TWTAWH and The Toyboy Trucker's continued absence. Funny how one woman and several cats can make so much mess....

Just really, really happy to be a TWTAWH free zone at the mo - now just the edits/rewrites to look forward to...

Oh, and a quick PS - having just proudly announced that TWTAWH is already on Amazon can I now also proudly announce that the blurb accompanying it bears no resemblance at all to my story... which is a relief as I've only just finished it and that would have been really spooky if they knew more than I did. And the heroine isn't called Sally and the cookery prog isn't called Midnight Feast (not any more) and - ah well, you get the drift...

Better Late Than Never

2010-02-25T11:48:00.006Z

No, not the title of my next book (although after TWTAWH it may well be), or even an indication that the aforementioned TWTAWH is finished (although it's getting there), or even a must-needed apology for non-blogging for a MONTH (see above deadline mention), or even the fact that I have stuck to my diet and am halfway back to my proper weight (okay, a more reasonable size after the horror of the Express thing) - but a better-late-than-never sighting of me in the M-O-T-B frock!!!

I know it's been nearly a year since Elle and The Doctor's wedding (and where did that year go???), but these pics have just come to light and at least they prove I was there, and did wear a scarlet silk frock and a black beaded jacket - even if you can't see much of it - or me - which, on reflection, can only be A Good Thing.

These are pre-ceremony (obviously) and show me lacing Elle into her dress while muttering through gritted teeth "you wanted a size 12 frock that cost more than my first house and you will damn well fit into it even if it kills me and you in the process". You can see Elle holding herself in bravely as I cut off her circulation much to the amusement of bridesmaid Kat - but clearly not that of the hairdresser...

So, yes, still deep in deadline hell - two weeks to go - and then I'll be back with all sorts of general rubbish again.

Must take time to say a big thank you here to my friend Spikey (the pilot who taught me all I needed to know while writing Walking on Air) who phoned me to tell me that while he was passing through Manchester Airport (doesn't that sound glamorous?) he spotted loads of Moonshines on the bookshop shelves! Thanks, Spikey! You've made my day! See you in the summer...

In the month of non-blogging and deadline hell I've also done my local book launch (coldest day of the year, not a Terry Wogan turn-out sadly but still sold about 30 books, took HOURS to thaw out), and appeared on BBC Radio Berkshire - I had a lovely hour long programme with the fabulous effervescent Rory who asked all the right questions and laughed in all the right places and played my emotionally-charged "Desert Island Discs" selection and made me cry on air - great... Have also been booked for three more library talks, one after-dinner speaking engagement, one writing workshop, and had fan mail from Germany... All this has helped no end to make me realise that maybe I am A Real Writer. I am, I am - I think...

Now back to TWTAWH... B-I-G sigh...

On Being Gok'd

2010-01-29T08:39:00.005Z

Yesterday I was "made over". Sadly, despite the post heading, I wasn't made over by the wonderful Gok - my stylist was a beautiful, elfin child called Simona. However, the experience was - um - well, an experience...

I was made-over for the Daily Express. My made-over-image is to illustrate a feature I've written, which in turn is to promo Moonshine. I was chuffed to bits that the Express liked the feature, and assumed (always bad to assume) that when they asked for a pic, it would be the publicity photo I've used everywhere for the last couple of years, and I'd just have to email it. But, no - they wanted to take their own. Gulp...

So, yesterday, Elle and I trekked to London(a journey not without its disasters but we got there - eventually) and found ourselves in the amazingly space-age Northern & Shell Building's (honestly - it's like a set from Star Wars!) photographic studio.

Simona had phoned me and said I'd be wearing a frock (erk!) but it would be a long one and were there any parts of my body I didn't want to show. That was an easy one - all of them.

Sadly, Simona's idea of a long frock was obviously one that didn't show your knickers. I stared at the rail of thigh-high, jewel-bright, tiny, shift dresses with mounting horror. They looked like they'd been nicked from the wardrobe department of Mad Men. Gorgeous, stylish, and definitely not for someone built like me...

Before I had time to panic too much, I was whisked off by the lovely Debbie who dealt manfully with my hair and make-up. I'd arrived with my usual smudgy eyes and pale lips and curly hair. I emerged with minimal eyes and huge red glossy lips. And my hair had sort of gone BIG and had a side-parting... It was a fabulous glam job but it wasn't me... I thought I looked a touch like Margaret Thatcher: the early years. Elle thought it looked lovely. And said so. A lot. Treacherous child.

Then it was back to wardrobe to be shoe-horned into the frocks. Simona said they'd be doing two shoots in two different outfits and which ones did I prefer. I clutched the purple one first because I liked the colour and it was the only one with sleeves... Off, it looked sensational. On, it looked like a sack tied up with string... I'm a lumpen girl and the purple clung to every one of them. I didn't just have VPL - I had V Damn Everything.

Simona manfully gummed me together with double-sided tape, then produced a pair of flesh-coloured tights (aaargh!) and some DDG purple shoes with 5" heels. I staggered (my feet were already numb) out into the studio. Elle laughed. Shara, the photographer, kindly didn't and asked me to pose "in a sort of cute and kooky way". Fine, if you were Twiggy in the 60s - but cute and kooky I'm not. But I tried. Dear God, I tried.

Half an hour and three million photographs later, it was time for the second outfit. After failing to get either the electric blue or scarlet frocks to meet anywhere round me, Simona and I settled on the lime green. I've never been a lime green person, but it sort of went on (eventually) over my bulgy bits and the colour was the least of my problems. It did involve Simona getting up close and personal to make it fit, but if I held my breath it stayed done up. Sadly, being sleeveless, it displayed my bingo wings to their very best advantage. This time the beautiful shoes were pearlised beige with 6" heels. I had to be carried out to the studio.

Shara was very, very brave and kept a straight face. Elle didn't. She had to go outside. Again, I was cute and kooky and laughed a lot because I felt the whole thing was mad. Completely mad. But Simona, Debbie and Shara were wonderfully professional and another twenty million photographs later, it was all over.

I staggered back to the changing rooms, struggled out of the lime green and the tights and the killer heels, and threw on my black jeans and big grey sweater and black and purple boots with total delight.

The delight was short-lived. Shara then let me see the pics. Now, she'd done a stonking job - she's brilliant, and they were Proper Photographs. But they were of someone else. I know I'm currently a good 2 stone overweight and have lots of lumps and jowly bits - but I suddenly realised I looked like my mother... Elle said it was a good look. Well, maybe it was - for my mum about fifty years ago...

Debbie, Shara and Simona seemed to agree that the Express will use one of the lime green frock pics - because they were "lovely and funny and colourful" - oh joy! And luckily, as I don't know when any of this will be published, that's the way it will stay. DO NOT expect to see any excited announcements about my Express appearance on this blog. Not until that particular edition - lime green frock, dead-slug sausage legs, Jagger lips, and more rolls of fat than a Crufts champion pug - has become a wrapper for fish and chips...

MOONSHINE Publication Day!!!!

2010-01-21T08:30:00.003Z

Ooooh - at last! MOONSHINE is "out there" today. I'm so excited. No excuses - I'm filled to the brim with publication day euphoria!!! And having just flipped back through this blog, I've read the posts I wrote last year about the struggles (me and the computer being - er - out of action at the same time and the panic about meeting the deadline) I had with actually getting Moonshine written at all, I think it's nothing short of miraculous that it all turned out so well.

Heartfelt thanks are due to Emma and Donna, my editors, who must have wondered if they'd ever see the finished manuscript, and to Broo, my agent, who was wonderfully kind and supportive throughout the whole racketty business.

Today I'm celebrating solo - but the lovely Debs is very generously running a publication day competition for me over at her fab blog:
http://debcarrs-daydreams.blogspot.com

Debs has a signed copy of MOONSHINE to give away. If you want a chance to win a freebie copy, you have until Sunday to post a "pick me" message on her blog. I hope you'll all rush over to Deb's "shed blog" (vbg) and have a go.

Thanks so much to everyone who has reported MOONSHINE sightings already. Very cheering. It's so lovely to know it really is, well, REAL - at last. I shall spend today lurking round WHS (again) just in case... Our great local indie bookshop - The Bookstore - is arranging a shop-front display today, but keeping it low-key as I'm doing my official launch party/signing session there on Feb 13th to tie in with Valentine's Day.

Ooooh, sorry - I'm so excited - think I might have to go and lie down now...

MOONSHINE Publication Week Countdown Day 1

2010-01-20T09:41:00.004Z

Today's MOONSHINE promo picture is "falling in love"... I Love it and think it's Lovely... Not much else to say about it really, except there's an awful lot of "falling in love" in MOONSHINE because it is a romantic comedy after all... Cleo falls in love with Dylan, Dylan falls in love with every female with a pulse, Elvi falls in love with Zeb, Zeb falls in love with Elvi - but there are major family objections, Mimi has fallen in love with Ron in their distant past but Ron is now in love with Amy and Mimi is now in love with Mortimer who is in love with.... Well, you get the picture (hah! a neat circle back to the beginning of the paragraph. My editor would be SO proud!)...

Amazon have changed their "out of stock" to "delivery in 5 - 9 days" which has cheered me up immensely. It doesn't take a lot to cheer me up...

No MOONSHINE sightings anywhere else yesterday but I'm nothing if not dogged in my mission and will set off again today - snow permitting.... Yep, SNOW. Last night, the man on the weather forecast said it "might fall but wouldn't stick" - er, sorry love - it's stuck... Two inches of it in the last hour and it's still tumbling down.

Anyway, until I pull on the snow boots and get out the huskies (joke - I think it's Katie Fforde who does husky-racing - it wouldn't go down well here on the estate) I'm off to write some more of TWTAWH which takes place in a very hot summer and I'm finding it very difficult to remember what hot summers feel/look like...

MOONSHINE Publication Week Countdown Day 2

2010-01-19T09:24:00.003Z

Well, I've already made a huge mistake in this MOONSHINE promo plan. Already! Dear heavens, there's no hope is there? Look, I've got a three-day countdown - the clue being in the title. CountDOWN - and I started yesterday on Day ONE which would be a CountUP, wouldn't it? Oh dearie, dearie me... I've now correctly re-numbered yesterday's post 3, and today's - because it's a countDOWN - is 2, which means tomorrow's will be 1... I know it's no excuse, but I failed my maths O level 3 times.

Anyway, MOONSHINE Day 2 promo pic is a waterfall. I love waterfalls. This picture is EXACTLY as I'd imagined the waterfall in MOONSHINE, which is called Lovers Cascade. It plays a very important part in the plot. I also made it the grazing place of unicorns and orcs - but sadly that got edited out.

No early sightings of MOONSHINE in WH Smith yesterday. Lots and lots of celeb novels out there in the Big Splash Slots, and some pretty heavy literary titles in the charts, but no MOONSHINE. Yet. Sigh... The lad-in-charge-of-books gave me some very funny looks as I lurked, clearly thinking I was about to tuck several copies of the Twilights saga under my cagoule and do a runner.

So, ever hopeful, I dared to look at Amazon (akin to sticking pins in your eyes for an author) and aaarghh - it's "out of stock"!!!! Just when I've started telling people it's available out there - it isn't. The Toyboy Trucker helpfully said it was because they'd sold out on pre-orders. Hmmm.... The more cynical side of me thinks this is very kind of him but unlikely...

Off to WHS - again - just in case...

MOONSHINE Publication Week Countdown Day 3

2010-01-18T11:31:00.004Z

I'm doing a bit of a belt and braces job here and posting my MOONSHINE countdown all over the place... Nope, you're right, I have no shame! Sooo - with three days to go until it escapes, I'm slapping pics of "things you'll find in the book" all over t'internet. Today it's wine because there's an awful lot of magical wine in MOONSHINE. I like this picture. I like it a lot... In fact it's probably far too early in the day to like it as much as I do, to be honest... I'll have to stop staring at it...

Wine is off my list of Things I Can Have. Actually most stuff is off my list of Things I Can Have. I've just weighed myself. Oh, lordy.... How did that happen???? Okay, so the festivities were a bit sloth-like and involved a lot of sofa-slumping and eating/drinking anything and everything that came to hand/mouth, and the cold weather meant I HAD to eat more (yes it did - it's the law) - but - blimey!!! Weight Watchers here I come - again...

We've thawed! The Toyboy Trucker is cruising (in the nicest possible sense) in the Home Counties, the cats are stalking Fieldfares in the garden (Fieldfares are very pretty and apparently, according to the RSPB, Specially Protected - I also think they must be Specially Stupid to fly all the way from Scandinavia and set up home in a garden with NINE cats...), Elle and The Doctor are planning their next holiday, and I'm STILL writing The Way To A Woman's Heart - hey! I said it without thinking Midnight Feast - I'm getting there!!!!

Now off to hang casually round our local WH Smith and see if I can get an early sighting of MOONSHINE...

14 inches minus 18 degrees = 2010

2010-01-08T10:05:00.008Z

Well that's the last time I'll wish for snow... Beautiful, yes, stunningly so - but this is my third day of being snowed in (can't open the back door due to 18" frozen heaps {pictured} - can't get out of the terrace owing to 18" frozen drifts - can't use the little single track road because it has disappeared under a foot of frozen snow - can't walk on the pavements because they're solid ice...) and I'm BORED. Oh yes, this is be very careful what you wish for with knobs on!!!

On Tuesday and Wednesday we had 14" of snow (we measured it!) and on Thursday we were officially the coldest place in Britain at -18... Today the sky is blue and the snow is sparkling and glittering under the sun but showing no signs of melting. More snow is forecast for the weekend. This no longer fills me with gleeful anticipation. The cats have got cabin fever. The Toyboy Trucker is axle-deep somewhere in the wilds of Hertfordshire. And I'm b-o-r-e-d...

Of course this is the ideal opportunity to write The Way To A Woman's Heart like billy-o. And I am. Well, sort of. When I'm not searching for something to eat, or staring at the snow, or hugging a radiator. And I look like a bag-lady. Not that it matters as the cats don't care as long as I feed them regularly, and there's no-one else to see me... So, today's outfit is 1980s leggings, thermal socks, pretend-Uggs, The Toyboy Trucker's biggest sweater and a purple sequinned beanie. Nice.

Anyway, on a brighter note, 2010 has started well (weather apart) as my PLR statement - out this week and paid in Feb - was fabulous and well up on last year. PLR (info for non-writers only) stands for Public Lending Right and is money paid for the library borrowings of your books. They take a random selection of libraries each year and authors are paid a little over 6p for each time one of their titles is borrowed. My most-popular title last year was Heaven Sent with over 12,000 borrowings, but even my really early books are still being borrowed regularly and earning me money. Thank you to everyone who has borrowed and read them!!! I'm a huge supporter of libraries and am very grateful to everyone who worked so hard to bring in PLR for authors - it's a lifeline for so many of us.

I'm also featured in the Feb edition of Writers Forum which is out this month, have been signed up to do a session at Middlesborough Literary Festival in June, give an after-dinner talk at The Swanwick Writers Summer School in August, and take part in BBC Berkshire's Desert Island Discs show on February 18th.

So, I'm sitting here looking like a skip-hopper but (for once) feeling like a Proper Writer. All I need to do now is stop faffing and stop eating and stop staring - and WRITE!!!!

Happy New Year to All in Blogland!!!!

2009-12-31T07:45:00.000Z

No, I still don't believe it - I know I keep saying this, but it can't be the end of 2009, let alone the end of the "noughties", can it? It doesn't seem five minutes ago that we were doing the New Millennium stuff - remember having to stock the cupboards with enough food to last a lifetime and waiting for your computer to crash forever because civilization as we knew it was going to come to an end at midnight on New Year's Eve 1999? How can that be 10 years ago???

But it was, and here we are, somehow just about to go into Twenty-Ten. I hope it's happy and peaceful and brings you everything you need/want/hope for. I'm not big on resolutions (never manage to keep them, then always feel guilty and even more of a failure), but I do always feel sort of energised at this time of the year. I've got my new (Jersey) calendar ready to put on the wall in front of the desk and my new diary (really pretty - pink with hippie flowers) poised by the keyboard, and a list of writing projects in my pristine Pukka Pad to tackle once Midnight Feast - er, The Way To A Woman's Heart - is finished, waiting beside the computer. Today I'm itching to get on with writing again, and can only hope the itch lasts longer than my erstwhile resolutions...

2009, against all the odds, has been a lovely year for me. After a dire and dreadful 2008 I held out no hopes at all, but what with Elle and The Doctor's wonderful wedding (and subsequent blissfully happy marriage), and The Toyboy Trucker's exam successes and promotion (I still miss the jeans and T-shirt and boots and heady whiff of diesel though...) and the fun of making the Writers Bureau telly advert, and getting a new two-book deal with Piatkus, and my books selling so well in Germany and therefore giving me a regular income, and none of the cats dying - what more could I ask for? We're happy and healthy. We've got a cosy, comfortable home, enough food to eat, loads of great friends, no real worries, and an okay future. I know I'm lucky. Very. If 2010 is half as good I'll be delighted.

So, no resolutions - but a real intention to write, write, write in 2010 - and keep writing. Because I'm lucky there, too. I'm published. It was my hopeless dream for so long that I'll never, ever take it for granted.

Enough of the sentimental waffling then - just want to say a huge thank you to all my blogland friends for being brilliant - and again, whatever you want in 2010 I hope you achieve it with bells and whistles and fireworks and fanfares of celestial trumpets. I'll raise a glass of fizz to you all at midnight as me and The Toyboy Trucker scamper around the terrace with Shaz and Dave, Nikki and Memphis, Vee and the kids, Wilf, Maudie and Jerome, and Nancy - and wish you everything that you wish yourselves.

Oh, yes - and there's just one more little selfish wish - MOONSHINE is published three weeks today and I really, really hope that people buy it and read it, and more importantly, like it - because I do...

Happy New Year - and THANK YOU!!!!

Winter Wonderland

2009-12-28T11:31:00.000Z

I hope everyone had a magical Christmas. I was going to post about mine but decided other people's Christmases (much like other people's children) are interesting only to those closely involved. Suffice it to say, it was great - way, way better than last year's when I was skint (through not reading my contract), as this year I'd done the (unusual for me) b-thing and Budgeted!

Elle and The Doctor were here, the outlaws weren't, friends came from all over the place - and we had a lovely, lovely time. And that's about as much as I feel I should bore you with. So, for this post-Christmas pre-New Year blog I thought I'd post some pretty festive pics of last week's wonderfully seasonal weather instead...

It does go to prove that a heavy snowfall can transform even the most mundane landscape into something completely sublime. Our estate (council) and the terrace (basic) and the green (pretty but functional) were suddenly turned into images of Larkrise-to-Cranford-cum-Disney-via-every-Dickensian-Christmas-card-scene ever published... I took all these from our house in a state of childish excitement (not a new emotion for me, I must admit) at the sight of Proper Snow.

Fortunately The Toyboy Trucker eventually arrived home late on Christmas Eve after two weeks away battling through the ice, snowdrifts, and disgruntled unfestive customers who'd ordered their Christmas presents on t'internet and expected them to arrive the same way - i.e. through the ether without the interference of lots of Real People, Real Vehicles, and Diabolical Weather Conditions. When he got here it was like one of those heartwarming 1940s films with Daddy making it home just in time for Christmas... it was really romantic and old-fashioned and just - well - lovely...

And now, according to the weather forecast, we're going to have a snowy, arctic re-run for the New Year. Great for me being snug and warm and happily typing. Great for the cats all snug and warm and hogging the radiators/fires/beds. Not so great for The Toyboy Trucker and everyone else out there working to keep the country ticking over. Thinking of you - you're all stars.

Oh, and here's to an amazing, safe, happy, successful and peaceful 2010 - just in case I don't blog again in 2009 (no sorry - still can't believe it's over - where did it go???)

Happy New Year!!!

Strange...

2009-12-07T09:51:00.000Z

This year (and where did it go??? How can it be nearly Christmas already???) my writing has been a bit - well - sluggish. I seem to have spent half the year completing, editing, copy editing, proof-reading Moonshine - and the remainder writing Midnight Feast (okay, The Way To A Woman's Heart) which is nearly finished now and is going okay and I still like it. But there's been no ooomph. No fizzing of new ideas. No exciting new plots fighting to be heard. No avalanche of brilliant stories simply itching to see the light of day or computer screen. Just a sort of becalmed, day-to-day "must get this finished" sort of doldrummy feeling. Until now.

Now, out of the blue, I've got more ideas than I know what to do with. How weird is that? Goodness knows if they're any good - but where on earth did they come from? Suddenly I've got the titles and opening paragraphs for a dozen short stories (and to my shame, I haven't written ONE short story this year), the next novel in the Hazy Hassocks series has sort of popped, fully-formed, into my head when I least expected it to, two more are buzzing about, and even more odd - I've suddenly got an idea for an entire new series for a genre of novels (Young Adult) that I've never even thought about before.

I've had weeks - nay months - this year when I'd have killed for one original idea, just a single even vaguely interesting new plotline. Weeks and weeks when I've sat and doodled and given myself brain-ache (and a feeling of palm-sweating terror) wondering if this was the end of the creative road. And let's face it, if I don't make my living from writing we're doomed to the eternal breadline because I'm definitely unemployable. Now for some unknown reason, I don't know which novel and/or short story to start on next - well, when TWTAWH is finished and delivered at least.

This has NEVER happened to me before. I've never been one of those writers who claims they'll be dead before they've written all the stonking novels they've got planned. Never had more ideas than I know what to do with. Never ecstatically started A New Book within a nano-second of the last one leaving the computer. For me, each book or short story becomes more difficult to write because I'm so sure it's all been done/said/written before - and probably much, much better...

Of course, being realistic, half these ideas are probably rubbish and will possibly never develop into anything saleable - but oooh, it's so lovely to have them. It's like going back to the early days of being a writer when everything was all shiny and new and my enthusiasm knew no bounds. Back to the days of being all starry-eyed about being published - and I LOVE it!

That's The Way To Do It

2009-11-27T11:16:00.000Z

Well - I've just come back from a book signing session. At The Bookstore. In our little market town. And there were thousands of people there. Thousands - honestly. Before I'd even crossed the road to head for the precinct, someone said "I shouldn't bother, duck - they'm queuing, six deep, way past Nat West..."

And they were. I've never seen so many people in one place in my entire life - well, apart from football matches and rock concerts of course - but for a book signing in the indie Bookstore, in our tiny, tiny town...

Sadly, they weren't queuing for an early signed copy of Moonshine. No, they were there for Terry Wogan. And so was I.

What a coup for The Bookstore! Sir Tel - in person.

As The Toyboy Trucker is also a huge fan I joined the throng, prepared to wait for hours to get the hallowed signature for one of his Christmas presents. And it was one heck of a wait - TOGS, TYGS and all those in-between were determined to see TW no matter how long it took. Terry had dragged out a huge cross-section of the community (some of whom possibly haven't seen the light of day since 1955) but I was surprised that it wasn't just one huge beige army - no way. There were also schoolchildren, and dreadlocks, and suits-and-boots, and young mums and well, everyone...

Eventually I made it to the front of the queue, shared a few nervously giggled words with "the veteran broadcaster", had the book suitably inscribed, and, completely star-struck, skipped out into the still-crowded precinct. Oh, but what a lovely man. Truly. Everyone was treated as an individual, he had time to listen and chat and laugh and be photographed, and no lengthy inscription was too much trouble.

Terry Wogan is a true gentleman. Warm, polite, amusing, unassuming, genuinely interested in everyone and everything. When Jane and Ian at The Bookstore said that his allotted hour was up but the crowd was still weaving its way out of sight, he said it didn't matter, he was staying until the queue was gone. And he did. For hours and hours.

What a star! So many of today's so-called celebs could learn so much from him. No histrionics, no demands, no hint of self-importance - just well-mannered, old-fashioned friendliness, dignity and decency.

I love Terry Wogan!!!

But - oooh, if only my next book signing ( Moonshine - January 16th 2010 - sorry, gratuitous self-promo moment!) in The Bookstore could be a millionth as well-attended....

Loves Me, Loves Me Not

2009-11-20T16:48:00.000Z

This week (the shingles having mercifully abated) I've been to the swish launch party for LOVES ME, LOVES ME NOT. This lovely book is an anthology of romantic short stories of every hue, from historical to hysterical, written by members of the Romantic Novelists Association, and published to celebrate the RNA's Golden Anniversary next year.

It was quite amazing to be in the same room (and what a room!) as so many famous faces! My less-than-famous-face can be spotted here in the official photo in the back row right-hand corner just to the left of the painting, sandwiched somewhere between, and breathing the same air as, such literary luminaries as Joanna Trollope on one side and Carole Matthews and Adele Parkes on the other. How cool is that? I'm holding a glass and grinning. As per... And laughing with the fabulous Jan Jones with whom I not only share a name and a writing past but practically everything else.

It was a wonderful party. Held in the Cavalry and Guards Club in Piccadilly - truly sumptuous surroundings - it was glamour and luxury personified. As I don't get out much I was practically beside myself with excitement. My plus-one was Em-next-door-as-was because The Toyboy Trucker was away working in Crewe or Cleethorpes or Croydon or somewhere exotic like that. Em and I had a whale of a time (not to mention quails eggs - a first for me) and it was so lovely to meet up with old RNA friends and chatter to new ones. The chattering may have been a bit off the wall as I'd had several glasses of wine - and for this, and ignoring people - especially Nell who I didn't say anything sensible to at all until the last minute scramble for taxis-to-the-station, I apologise...

Loves Me, Loves Me Not contains over 40 original short stories by members of the Romantic Novelists Association and proves what a diverse lot we are, and even more so, what a broad church "romantic fiction" really is. I'm so proud to have a story included - mine's called The Wrong Trousers and is, hopefully, funny. I wanted to write something to show that falling head-over-heels in love is not simply for the young, rich, beautiful and perfectly-formed. I even managed to get a mention of magic knickers in there without falling foul of the editors (thanks, Sue and Jan!) - a subject close to my heart (well, more my nether regions) on the night as I was very brave and wore a frock and yep, magic knickers. My frock (Tesco and very low-cut so to prevent a wardrobe malfunction I stiched up the gaping cleavage on the train and managed to attach it to my bra and my skin) was purple, as were my tights and my lovely, lovely long suede boots (Primark) and I wore my trophy necklace made up of purple Fender plectrums - a throw-back to my mis-spent yoof when I collected bass guitarists...

And now it's all over and I'm back at "work" on Midnight Feast (yes, I know it's now officially called The Way To A Woman's Heart but it still says Midnight Feast on my computer files and that's how it'll stay in my heart and my head for the time being) and the frock and boots are back in the wardrobe and the magic knickers are in the washing basket and my fifteen minutes of glamour and fame are simply a lovely memory... Sigh....

Sssshhhhh....

2009-11-12T09:52:00.000Z

That's not sssshhhhh as in library-speak (sorry Karen - I know that's a cliche) or sssshhhhh as in a truncated expletive - nooo, it's sssshhhhh as in shingles - because I've got 'em.

Ooooh... Now I feel really, really old - even though everyone assures me that you can get shingles at any age, it still sounds like An Old Person's Thing to me...

And I didn't even know. I assumed the flu-ish feelings and the pain I've had for the last couple of weeks in my neck, shoulder and back was a combination of a bit of a cold and a pulled muscle. Okay, I was feeling a bit woozy and the pain was a funny tingly burning sensation - but even so... Then my shoulder and neck and back started hurting a lot. And I itched - and I scratched - and that hurt even more.

Now I don't know about you, but I never really look at my back - it's a sort of no go area. I can't see it much to be truthful, even if I wanted to, even in the mirror, so I couldn't see what was going on - just feel it. Anyway, as the pain hadn't gone away I thought maybe it was Something Awful the way you do (or is that just me?). So, I made the hideous mistake of typing my symptoms into NHS Direct....

Dear God - no matter which computation of yes/no answers I put in it came up with the big screamy page telling me to dial 999 for an emergency ambulance.

As a semi-reformed hypochondriac I was in a state of terror but managed to keep a grip long enough to ring NHS Direct and speak to a real person - just to make sure -before filling the house with paramedics. After answering loads of questions I'm sorry to say that I collapsed in giggles over "are your lips blue?" - well, only when I've been eating licorice - and "can you swallow your own spit?" - yes, they said spit not saliva - and do you know, it's something I've never thought about, but once I'd started thinking about it I found I couldn't and got quite agitated... Not quite as agitated as the poor NHS Direct person who frostily suggested I should see my GP.

Actually, that's not the greatest thing to suggest to me as my last visit to the doctor's surgery (when I had Urticarial Angiodema with Vasculitus - I know! Fancy - huh?) resulted in the receptionist helpfully suggesting that I might be allergic to mangoes and the last person they'd had with a mango allergy had been dead within 20 minutes.

Anyway, I went - and yep, I've got shingles. Mild, apparently, but shingles never-the-less. And because my pustules haven't yet crusted over (sorry - possibly far too much gross information) I'm still infectious and therefore have to stay away from normal people.

This is a bit of a bugger as I'm supposed to be in London today having a lovely celebratory lunch with my editor and agent to talk about publicity for Moonshine and toast the signing of a new two book deal. (Yippeeee!) And I was SO looking forward to it. I'd bought new shoes. With sparkles on them. I am SO miffed now as I sit here, typing and wincing and scratching - and not being feted in a swish eatery.

Hopefully I'll be crusty enough to attend the launch party for the Romantic Novelists Association's Golden Anniversary short story anthology - Loves Me Loves Me Not (buy it! It's brill!)- next Wednesday. If not, then I'll really have to spit...

Remembrance Day

2009-11-11T11:24:00.000Z

Really no need for words. Just the picture and thoughts. Remembrance Day seems even more poignant today somehow. War is no longer something sadly remembered by the older generation. It's now horribly real for everyone. We're on the flight path for both RAF Brize Norton (where the bodies of the servicemen lost in Iraq were repatriated) and RAF Lyneham (where the Afghan dead are now flown) and the sight and sound of those low-flying Hercules on their heart-breaking mission is truly harrowing.

I held my own two minute silence at 11 just now - in the garden - and it was made even more poignant by the nearby army base sounding the eerie WW11 air-raid siren, and the local infant school getting all the children into the playground, and their excited laughter dying away on the first stroke of eleven o'clock until all I could hear was - nothing. Absolute silence. Very, very moving.

Firework Wedding and Strange Shopping

2009-11-05T09:49:00.000Z

Happy Anniversary to The Toyboy Trucker (and me)! Still think it was a lovely sparkly colourful noisy day to get married - and we're going for the annual full communal village green firework, fish and chips and champagne anniversary party tonight. Can't wait!

The Toyboy Trucker brought me a cup of tea in bed this morning, along with a card and a shopful of flowers. It was wonderful - even if it was 5a.m. Luckily I'd bought him a card this year too - and the words in both were identical - romantic not sloppy or funny - which we reckon shows we're still on the same wavelength even after all these years. And they said it wouldn't last! Honestly - most people gave us six months at the most. Hah and ya-boo-sucks to them! I bought him chocolates. Elle and The Doctor gave us a pantechnicon-load of fancy doughnuts for tonight's party. We had to test-drive them though - even at 5a.m.... Fantastic!

While I was buying the chocolates yesterday (in Thorntons - there's posh!) - the customer in front of me was having a message iced on to her chocolate thingy (not sure what it was meant to be). She wanted "Keep Smiling". The assistant carefully manoeuvred her icing bag with a steady hand and eventually held up the result. I shook my head. It said "Keep Smileing". I pointed out the mis-spelling - and after much argument with two other assistants and three customers, the offending icing was scraped off and a second attempt was made. This time it said "Keep Smilling". There was a further prolonged argument and a lot of huffing and puffing before the third attempt passed muster. After the customer had left happily clutching her correctly-spelt confectionery the assistant suggested, a touch tersely, that it would have been far more economical for the shop if I'd just kept my mouth shut...

And then, even worse, in the card shop, while browsing through umpteen anniversary cards and discarding the ones with pipes and slippers or cartoon pictures of pneumatic blondes, they started playing smooth, chill-out background music. Unfortunately, it was Cavatina - the theme from The Deer Hunter - which is a total no-no for me. It holds such heart-breaking memories that I'm always reduced to a soggy, sobbing, heaving wreck within seconds... This is Not A Good Thing in a small shop crowded with pensioners punching their way through the "350 Christmas Cards For £2.50" section. With tears pouring down my face, and hiccuping back howls, I dropped the card I'd chosen and forced my way through the throng into the street. Not-too-hushed hisses of "...she'm drunk!" and "...shoplifting, you mark my words..." and "...they're all doo-lally up on 'er estate..." followed me. Ooooh, the humiliation...

Happy Halloween

2009-10-31T12:36:00.000Z

I love Halloween. I always loved it when I was little, before it became commercial, and my mum would make cut-out witches and black cats to dangle round the house and we'd have tea by candlelight and my dad would tell really scary ghost stories. This was possibly because both my nans tended towards witchcraft anyway, so it seemed quite normal. It would probably be classed as child abuse today... I'm not sure that I love today's updated and far more sinister Trick or Treat - but we do have a bowl of cheap and nasty sweets ready for tonight's onslaught by the yoof of the estate. The Toyboy Trucker is hoping tonight's forecasted heavy rain will keep the yoof of the estate indoors so that he can chomp his way through the crud while watching Match of the Day.

It's also Dexter's birthday today. He's two. He was named after the psychopathic, amoral serial killer of the telly series because - well - he is a psychopathic, amoral serial killer... He's also cute. Very. And as he was dumped in mid-November at a few weeks old when we found him we guessed his birthday must have been around now and Halloween seems a very suitable birthdate for him. Happy birthday Dexter!

And the rest of the non-writing non-Halloween weekend will be spent clearing out the last remnants of the living room ready for the tarting up process to begin on Monday. Gulp....

Parish Notices

2009-10-29T11:41:00.000Z

A very brief blog post to pass on info... (oh, and a trillion years ago I used to live in the village in the pic)

First, an impassioned plea from the lovely Lynne Hackles who is trying to sell her house and is cleverly using the web/blog network to spread the word. Anyone who might be interested in moving to/in Wales (or who knows anyone who might be interested) please take a look at Lynne's website (fabulously glam photo, Lynne!) www.lynnehackles.com where there are some gorgeous pictures (it's stunningly beautiful and original and extremely reasonably priced - am sorely tempted myself!) of the house and a detailed description of all the rooms and the glorious surrounding area.

Secondly, I've got two new online interviews up and running - both on sites which will be of interest to new writers and old hands alike. They're at www.newbiewriters.com and www.novelkicks.co.uk.

Thirdly, the renovating of the lean-to is finished. It is now officially A Sun Room. When we bought the house it was described (in estate agent speak) as a conservatory. It isn't and never was. Over the years it's become a general glory hole/cat sanctuary/garden store. It's now beautiful and painted and wood panelled and carpeted and has furniture in it!!! We shall be opening it to the public in the spring...

Fourthly - I've gone mad - madder? - (after hating the new dining room - mind you, I'm much happier now it's got *stuff* in it and looks like home) and am allowing the living room to be tarted up next week. I know I'll HATE it to start with - especially as we're going for a radical change from navy blue and gold to burgundy and cream... gulp...

Fifthly, I have a Christmas deadline for Midnight Feast (now called The Way To A Woman's Heart according to Amazon - I always find it really scary when a novel I'm still writing, and especially when I'm wallowing in the muddly middle, appears on Amazon as a Real Book That People Can Order!!! - so it clearly wasn't just Sunny Strange or my house that had to have a makeover) and now I've really, really got to get a move on and finish it - and it only seems five minutes ago that I was saying the very same thing about Moonshine...

Killing Two Birds...

2009-10-20T12:02:00.000+01:00

The two birds of the subject line are Facebook and Names. Firstly, Facebook - well - I've gorn all technical (with a lot of help from the lovely alzamina - thank you so much!) in my newly-found self-promo-ing zeal and added a CJ Fan Page to my normal Facebook page - hence the rather odd link-widget-thingy (see how quickly I've picked up the appropriate jargon?) on the right. And I'd really, really appreciate it if someone would click the "become a fan" button otherwise it'll look really sad...

And the second bird - names... Well, it's just that my friend has named her new daughter Sukie Lulu after two of my heroines - which I think is lovely but I sincerely hope Sukie Lulu won't grow up to hate me, and also I've had an email from a lovely lady who tells me her three sons are all named after my heroes - Drew, Rory and Ellis - which is again very flattering and probably a lot more acceptable...

But it does mean in future I'm going to have to be very, very careful about "christening" my H&H just in case some poor newborn gets lumbered with something I think is sweet now but they'll hate like poison when they get to 25... Elle, bless her, was near as dammit called Poppy Star. She is SO glad I saw sense...

And funnily enough, while on the name thing, the heroine in Midnight Feast has also had to have a bit of a name make-over. I'd called her Sunny Strange because she is both of those things - but this was considered just a bit too - er - goofy - so she's now Ella Maloney. It took me ages to get used to it - plus I did "find and replace" and therefore now have loads of things like "it was a lovely Ella morning" and "there was a Maloney atmosphere" splattered right through my carefully crafted and beautifully honed 75,000 so far and counting words. Sigh...

Happy Diwali!

2009-10-17T13:12:00.000+01:00

Today is Diwali - the Hindu Festival of Light - and I'm that excited! I'm just off - with the Toyboy Trucker, Elle, The Doctor and his family - to celebrate it in style for the first time. As it involves sweets, lights, candles, and fireworks - I'm in my element.

We're going to the Hindu Temple first, then off to Wembley for the lights procession followed by fireworks, rounding it all off with a celebratory Indian banquet. I've got an Indian silk tunic (multi-coloured) to wear plus some sparkly shoes (naff but lovely) and masses of bling. I think I probably look like a fat Christmas tree but I don't care.

Sooo - sweets, sparkly, twinkly lights, glittery candles, loads of fireworks, masses and masses of colour and FOOD - oooh - I can't wait...

Happy Diwali to everyone (oh, and next year Diwali is on November 5th which is our wedding anniversary - so how good will that one be???).

Birthday, Debs and Other Stuff

2009-10-05T16:52:00.000+01:00

Last week I was taken away for a Long Birthday Weekend. To Jersey. In a beach hotel. With sea-view and balcony. And The Toyboy Trucker arranged for me to have my birthday breakfast on the beach terrace in the (really hot) sun with the sea - brilliantly blue and sparkling - only feet away, and he gave me a fabulous new engagement ring to replace the old one which had worn thin and fallen apart and has been glued together and is on a chain round my neck. It was SO romantic. And I cried. A lot.

We spent the Day Before My Birthday at El Tico's (pictured above) with the beautiful Debs and her lovely R and the gorgeous world-famous Grumpy. It was fantastic. We had a really, really l-o-n-g lazy laughing lunch in the sun and it was wonderful to chat for ages face-to-face instead of simply through the ether. The weather was amazing (like Karen I've got a burnt chest and am proud of it!) and I could have stayed there forever with D, R and G, gazing out across stunning St Ouens Bay and being lazy... It was so nice to be at El Tico's again and I love the way it's been lovingly restored without losing any of its original 1930s feel - oh, and the food was wonderful - as was the champagne! Thanks Debs - I'll remember it forever!

I do love St Ouens. When I lived in Jersey I worked (among other things) as a waitress at Le Braye (pictured below) just along the road from El Tico's and was sacked for releasing the freshly-caught lobsters each morning. They lived in a tin bath at the back of the cafe and were served fresh (i.e. alive - well, at least, not alive on the plate of course, but boiled to order) and I became a one-girlie-lobster-liberation-squad. It took the then-owners weeks to discover who was pinching the makings of their lobster salads... We sometimes go back now (I think it's safe to do so after many, many years) and have lunch at Le Braye and joyously there's not a lobster on the menu these days!

Now I'm back home and it's cold and grey and raining a bit. And I'm trying to write Midnight Feast but keep drifting off to Jersey in my head...

Fortunately I'm falling in love with the dining room now. Having taken all your advice, I've incorporated some old bits, added some new ones, and there's lots of colour splashed about. It still looks a bit clean and neat for me, but it's beginning to feel like home. And the table (the only old thing I couldn't fit into the shed) has a lovely new home at our local British Legion - so I think my Gran wouldn't have minded that at all...

Elle and The Doctor, having JUST got their wedding photos back (oooh, there may yet be a pic of the elusive m-o-t-b frock!), are on holiday in Vegas at the moment. The Toyboy Trucker and I are baby-sitting their newest acquisitions - four goldfish called Lambert&Butler and Benson&Hedges... (this we feel is Not A Good Thing for health professionals). The cats are very excited...

And we have new neighbours. At last. Will give their arrival a blog post of its own. I hope they'll cope with life in the terrace. They seem very nice and scarily normal.

I met Wilf-next-door this morning, he looked very smart and a bit glum, and said he'd just come back from a funeral. I made all the appropriate noises and he said "ah, but she asked for it. Smoking related, it was. She was a heavy smoker. Silly girl." I winced (yes, I smoke) in terror and vowed to give up (again) and murmured about that being very sad and asked how old she was (praying that she wasn't anywhere near my age or - God forbid - younger)and Wilf shook his head and said "bless 'er, she were only ninety seven...". I skipped all the way home and lit a fag by way of celebration.

Oh, and my Writers Bureau ad has been seen on the telly by lots of people - but not by me. However, it is on YouTube now - and (if you want to see the result of my fab time in Manchester) I think this link below works if you cut and paste it...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK_CQvwGHwI
well, it did for me. Elle thought it was weird to see me with dead straight hair and a lot of slap and looking a bit "stiff", but she also thought I looked "quite thin if a bit wrinkly". There's a compliment in there somewhere - I think...

I'm Not Normal - Official

2009-09-17T08:30:00.000+01:00

The decorating is done. Normality (or what passes for it in this house) reigns. The tidying up is done, the fripperies are in place in the newly-tarted-up dining room. The dining room was cluttered and old-fashioned. It was painted sunshine yellow with lots of dark green and terracotta bits. It was jumbled with old furniture (Elle always called it The Dead People's Room because everything had belonged to someone else) and piles and heaps and cascades of mementos and shelves and shelves of nick-nacks. It was, according to most people, a hell hole health hazard.

Now it's cream. And white. And silver. And tidy and neat and uncluttered and has NEW furniture and looks like other people's dining rooms. Em-Next-Door-As-Was's brother did the decorating business. Brilliantly. It's a spectacularly professional job which has brought oohs and aahs of appreciation from everyone.

And I hate it.

See - I'm not normal...

It's not my dining room any more. It's perfect. Beautiful. It's pale and minimalist and spotlessly clean and uncluttered. It's like something out of a catalogue. It scares me rigid. I tiptoe in in the mornings to pull the curtains (very carefully because they're cream silk - oh God! I knew I should have read the label - and show every mark) and feel like I've stumbled into someone else's life. The cats, who loved to snuggle up against the radiators and lined the window sills to watch the world go by, hover in the doorway then run away.

The Toyboy Trucker, Elle and The Doctor all think it's amazing. There's talk of doing up the rest of the house to match. Lordy! Over my dead body. I'm a messy person. I love colour and crap and everything on show. I'm useless at cleaning and tidying (never have the time to do it properly) and I love cluttered and cosy. The dining room is one thing - the rest of the house? No bloody way!

And I cried when I had to chuck out the crumbling, dirty, useless stuff. Cried! It was like losing old friends. Okay, the dining room table and chairs and bookcases belonged to my Gran (and she didn't get them new) and were falling apart, and the chiffonier was eaten with woodworm and leaned backwards because the legs had disintegrated, but they'd belonged to my childhood and I loved them. The new stuff is smart, practical, lovely - and soulless...

Yes, it was my idea to "do" the dining room. No-one forced me into it. I was really enthusiastic to start with. But now I just want the old room back again. The Toyboy Trucker says I'll soon get used to it and love it - but I'm not holding my breath...

For Karen

2009-09-07T14:57:00.000+01:00

This is possibly gross misuse of a blog - but I've just done something stupid. No? Really??? Yep. You see, I've just had a lovely email from someone called Karen (who says she's reads the blog)and I was going to reply to it and instead of hitting the reply button I hit delete - and it's gorn!!! Forever! And I can't remember anything else other than your first name and I'd hate you to think that I've ignored you - so PLEASE Karen if you read this can you email me again. My only excuse is that we're being decorated (at last!!!) and the computer is perched on the landing (which is the only safe and non-disrupted place in the house) and it's a bit gloomy... Do hope you'll see this and send me the email again....

Oh Dear

2009-08-27T07:21:00.000+01:00

Dear Blog, I'm really sorry I've been ignoring you recently - but I've been really BUSY writing. Well, no that's not strictly true - I've been a BIT busy writing (Midnight Feast) but I've also been away. Yes - again! Don't nag. The Toyboy Trucker and I snook away for a few days, okay? And that's why I'm posting this and why you've got a Proper Literary Person as an illustration today. All will be revealed, promise...
love, Chris xxxx

This is cross-my-heart true:-

While on hols last week and browsing (i.e. rearranging my books face-out in front of other people's who don't need the royalties as much as I do) in a bookshop I witnessed the following...

Bookseller (wearing bookseller badge) deep in conversation with junior assistant (wearing bookselling assistant badge) about the merits of Katie Price's "Sapphire" which was currently splashed in its dozens over three shelves of "Number One Best-Seller" was interrupted by a middle-aged female customer.

Customer: Excuse me, where can I find Somerset Maugham?
Bookseller: Somerset Morn? Sorry, never heard of it. Who's it by?
Customer: It's not a title. It's an author.
Bookselling Assistant: Oh.
Bookseller: What's she written?
Customer: He's a man.
Bookselling Assistant: Oh.
Bookseller: What's he written?
Customer: Lots of things. Cakes and Ale? The Painted Veil? The Moon and Sixpence?
Bookselling Assistant: Oh.
Bookseller: Which one are you looking for?
Customer: Of Human Bondage.
Bookselling Assistant: Have you tried Erotica?
Customer: No. Doesn't he have a section of his own?
Bookseller: Is he in the Top Fifty? Does he write crime?
Customer: No, his books are classics.
Bookselling Assistant: Ah, classics. Like Dickens? We've got some Dickens classics - and lots of Jane Austen.
Customer: More recent than them, but yes, maybe in the same area.
Bookseller: No, I don't think so. How are you spelling Morn?
Customer: M-a-u-g-h-a-m.
Bookselling Assistant: Oh.
Bookseller: That's a funny spelling. I've never heard of him.
Customer: But do you have any of his books?
Bookselling Assistant: Not if he's not in with Dickens and Jane Austen. Do you want me to look under M in contemporary?
Customer (exiting shop looking defeated): No thank you.
Bookseller (watching her go): Have you ever heard of Somerset Morn before?
Bookselling Assistant: Nah. Can't have written much, can he?

Oh, dear......

I Wanna Be A Girlie Girl

2009-08-07T10:04:00.001+01:00

In the late spring of 2007 I decided I was going to "go into frocks". The late spring of 2007 was HOT. I fondly imagined that months of warm summer weather stretched ahead. I also fondly imagined that I could look sweet and feminine. I'm not and never have been either of those things, and since becoming a Real Writer and thrilled to not have to wear tights-to-the-office have lived in jeans/trousers/cut-offs. Anyway, frocks were always something that looked good on Other People. I wasn't girlie enough - but that could and would change... Inspired by two things (apart from the lure of a hot summer) - Judy Astley's incredible frock wardrobe and that line in Aretha's Say A Little Prayer - "...while wondering which dress to wear..." which always conjures up such a pretty image and makes me very jealous - I bought four frocks.

The summer of 2007 was wet. Very, very wet. We were flooded for most of it. The frocks stayed in the wardrobe and I lived in jeans-tucked-into-wellies and a cagoule. However, come the following spring, thinking that the summer of 2008 had to be better, I bought another four frocks. The summer of 2008, as you may well remember, was even wetter and windier and colder. I lived in jeans-tucked-into wellies and three jumpers and a cagoule. Eight frocks now hung prettily in my wardrobe.

So, this year, three summers on, and being promised a heatwave that would split the pavements, I bought two more. And yep, all ten of them now hang in the wardrobe in all their gorgeous, colourful, floaty, floral glory. Unworn. But not unstroked. I sigh happily over them on a daily basis. And I'm still in jeans and wellies.

So? If I was the proper girlie girl I long to be, would I have worn the frocks for the last three summers regardless of the Noah/Ark/monsoon conditions? If we have a burst of late heat will I ever rescue them from the wardrobe and wear them with pride? Or is it too late for me? Have I had too many years of comfortably "dressing like a bloke" as The Toyboy Trucker once helpfully said? Will I actually feel (as I fear) like a drag queen or one of those Disney dancing hippos if I ever abandon the jeans/trousers and pull on a frock at last?

Rain is pouring from a leaden sky as I write this. We're already into August. I'm typing wearing jeans and a big sweat-shirt. The frocks, I fear, will moulder for at least another 10 months. So - maybe next summer...?

I'm On The Telly!

2009-07-19T12:08:00.000+01:00

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No, I knew I wouldn't be able to keep quiet about this any longer - so here we are - no blog posts for weeks and now two in one day.... Well, at last I can come clean about what I've been doing. Huge bragging moment coming up... Last week I was on location in deepest beautiful rural and exclusive Cheshire, filming three television adverts for The Writers Bureau

Sooo - this is my face being done-over... and the end result... Hmmm - shame about the hair - but they did say to "leave it and we'll sort it out" - hmmm again...

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It was absolutely brilliant!!!! After last year's hoo-ha with the Advertising Standards Agency (who thought I shouldn't be in the WB adverts because I wasn't a genuine ex-student - I am! - and couldn't be called a best-seller because my books, while appearing in lots of best-seller charts, had never appeared in the Sunday Times - but who have now agreed that I can be called "award-winning") and the damning mention in that article in The Times about the WB and me being a gurning non-entity - my paraphrasing by the way - I wondered if the WB would ever use me to publicise their wonderful distance learning writing course again. But they did and have - and I LOVED every minute of it.

The adverts (two 30 second ones and one 60 second) will be aired from the autumn on terrestrial and satellite TV stations as well as having a You Tube slot, and will run for at least 18 months. And of course it was fantastic reciprocal publicity as the ads will feature all my books as well as extolling the virtues of the WB course.

I've just dotted the photos about on the blog - I think they're fairly self-explanatory - and hopefully they'll give some idea of what it was like.

The film crew were amazing - especially given that I'm a giddy amateur - and were very patient and made it all wonderfully easy. And I had a proper screen make-up session and my hair was all gussied-up by the lovely Debra (an award winning make-up artist who works with Very Famous Film and Telly People), and I was wired for sound and had three scripts (and a blissfully easy auto cue!) and still managed to not be able to walk, talk, look at a book, sit down, smile, read lines and type at the same time... Duh!

We arrived at the farmhouse location (they filmed in the very pretty courtyard garden and the weather was perfect) at 10 a.m. and left again at 5.30 p.m. All that time to shoot three little adverts!!! So many takes - so many things (for me) to get wrong.... But no-one seemed to mind and we even had a proper chuck-wagon roll up for lunch time like Real Filming - and I can't remember ever laughing so much for so long.

And mindful of the fact that the camera adds POUNDS I'd crash dieted (not to be recommended) for 2 weeks beforehand and lost 14lbs in 14 days (two Slim Fast Shakes and a Weight Watchers soup - 600 cals per day) but still looked billowy on screen... Now realise that those really thin people you see on TV must be Really Really Really Thin in real life.

At the moment all the ads are being edited and cut and sliced and spliced (or whatever the technical terms are) and I've been promised that I'll get a preview as soon as they're ready - and that's going to be the really scary bit... Still, right now, I'm back home and still floating with the glamour and excitement of it all. So -a huge THANK YOU to The Writers Bureau for being brilliant hosts and friends and for giving me not only this fantastic opportunity and experience but also such a magical time Oop North - and I truly hope I didn't let you down.

Dizzy!

2009-07-19T09:16:00.000+01:00

As is usual with me, for the past few weeks I've been running round in disorganised dizzy circles, and swearing that when I've got a spare minute I'll blog; write; answer emails; write; cut the grass; write; clear out the dining room; write; clear out the study; write; paint the living room (as in decorate - not a nice watercolour...); clear out the sheds; write.... And here we are, at the end of the third week in July (where the heck did June go? And May...?) and I haven't done very much at all.

I have written though. Midnight Feast. Not all of it - this is me we're talking about - but at the moment I'm more or less on schedule with this one and, not wanting to sound slightly grown-up or smug, it's a really nice feeling not to be panicking at the last minute. And after chapter two it took off all on its own, so I scrapped my notes/synopsis/outline and let it go its own way. Now it's definitely Cold Comfort Farm meets Masterchef, and possibly way way OTT, but I like it...

So, the Reeding at Redding (sorry - should have said all this before) went really well. Ann and Liz at the library were wonderful; we had a flatteringly nice crowd, they all asked questions I could answer and they laughed in the right places (with not at - always a bonus) - and I was taken out for a brilliant meal afterwards (a huge plus for me as I'm a pig). And I sold and signed loads of books and met some great people. The local press turned up and took photos (which I've now seen and of course now wish a) I'd stuck more rigidly to Weight Watchers and b) had my hair done...). There was a funny-peculiar moment when I'd spent ages discussing with one lady in the audience whether the River Kennet could actually run through Hazy Hassocks (as it does in my books), or whether it could flash-flood (as it does in Happy Birthday), and everyone joined in and there was quite a debate raging, then I remembered that I'd made it up and it really didn't matter about the geography because it's all fiction. I think...

And I've been on holiday - well, sort of. The Toyboy Trucker and I (after last year's disastrous financial blip) cancelled both this year's glitzy hols - and took off for a last-minute cheapo week to rediscover the bucket and spade holidays of our yoof. We toured the south coast from Sussex, through Hampshire, to Dorset, stopping off in beach huts, chalets and caravans. The weather was lovely, and so was the accommodation, but most of the places had changed (okay, we should have known they'd change but we sort of thought they wouldn't have) beyond recognition. So sad - I guess it's true that you should never go back. However, our best day of the whole week was spent at Bognor (are you laughing???). We just threw ourselves into everything wonderful about the British seaside holiday - we played in the amusement arcades (amazing how fiercely you can want a cascade of 2p pieces!!!), got very competitive at crazy golf, paddled eating ice-creams, sat on the beach with egg sandwiches and bottles of warmish lemonade, bought a lot of tat, and got sunburned. Fabulous!

Elle and The Doctor were left in charge of the cats while we were away and everyone survived. Oh, there is one rather sad bit here - it seems the official pics of me in the m-o-t-b frock may never see the light of day. (Yessss!). It's now three months since Elle and The Doctor's wedding and they still haven't got their wedding album. The photographer did his stuff, but the company he used to print and collate and produce the albums has gone into liquidation. Eeeek. Well, that's not eeek from me (the longer the m-o-t-b pics stay a secret the better as far as I'm concerned) - but it's a huge EEEK from Elle and The Doctor. The images are all safe - but are still only on disc and until a new printing/producing company is found that's where they'll stay. Phew...

Oh, and I have been doing something else as well - last week was taken up with it and it was very exciting - but it really needs a blog post of its very own, so hopefully tomorrow I'll have sorted out some photos and things and will be able to do it justice.

Now on with the gardening and writing and clearing out and answering emails and...

Tears and Laughter

2009-06-30T14:47:00.000+01:00

Loads to say - have been on hols and will catch up with everything else asap, but this post is just a memorial to my Best Friend Forever, Pat Powell, who died suddenly 8 years ago today.

It was an equally gloriously scorching June day in 2001 and I wasn't there. I was helping ma-in-law move house and didn't know. It seems impossible that I've now lived for 8 years without Pat. It also seems impossible that my life has changed so much without her. I've had to do so many things differently. Having a Pat-less life was something I'd never even thought about. No-one prepares you for losing a best friend.

We'd been best friends since we were 16 - we did everything together, worked together, went on holiday together, saw each other all the time and spoke on the phone several times a day. Pat was my social life; she was my happiness and laughter; and the kindest, most loyal and generous person I've ever known. Today I cried for her - I still miss her so much - I've got loads of friends, really good friends who I cherish, but you only ever have one lifelong best friend - and there'll never be another Pat.

Pat and I had always decided we were going to die when we were 97 and we were going to have a joint funeral with blue and yellow flowers, lots of rock music, champagne and cream slices (our favourite indulgence). So this afternoon, on this sweltering sultry day, I've been doing what I've done each June 30th for 8 years, sitting in the garden on Pat's special seat (an ancient bench, crumbling now but I'll never part with it), listening to AC/DC, drinking (warmish) champagne and eating a (very slippery and melting)cream slice, with my Californian poppies and lobelias providing the properly-hued floral background.

I raised my glass and my cream slice to her - and now I can say again on here what I said to her just now: "I miss you every day, I think about you every day, I still expect you to walk up the path, I still wait for your phone calls, I still hear your laughter. I hope you're happy - and please, please don't be resting in peace. Please be having the best time ever with loads of fun and giggling." Then I sniffled a lot -which would have made her very cross - so I came indoors to write this as a proper memorial.

We had "Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone" played at her funeral - and today, for me, it's true.

Reeding At Redding

2009-06-14T09:52:00.000+01:00

Sorry - had to do the title phonetically as "Reading at Reading" looked weird. And of course this post is far too late to be any use in a promotional way (the story of my disorganised life) but this is just a quickie to say if any friends and Bucolic Frolic readers are anywhere in the Reading (that's Redding) area tomorrow (Monday June 15th) I'm giving a reading (that's reeding) at the Central Library at 6 pm as part of their Arts Festival shindig - and I'd be thrilled to bits to see you there.

More details at http://www.readingarts.com/othervenues/whatson/event.asp?id=SXC621-A7818625 - think you can cut and paste that... (she says in her usual non-techy manner) - anyway, there are refreshments included which makes it well worthwhile in my opinion...

And, to be honest, it's not a reeding (but I still liked the reading/Reading thing so I used it in a sort of artistic licence way) - it's more a Q&A session as a) I make everything I read aloud sound like a dirge and b) I've got a bunged up nose and therefore keep sniffing and c) at least if people ask questions they might stay awake...

I'd love to see anyone who might be in Redding at 6pm (although why anyone would want to be I have no idea, as surely the shops will have shut and everyone will have gone home for their tea?) at the Central Library (in Abbey Square) because, quite frankly, if it's just me and Em-Next-Door-As-Was (she's coming along to organise me - making sure I have a clean hankie and have been to the loo etc - and to sell my books for me - hopefully) and three librarians I'll probably cry...

This is the first time Redding have invited me to do anything - and I'm really looking forward to it - and as all my books are set in Berkshire I think it indicates that they must have forgiven me for portraying the royal county as a mad place inhabited by even madder people...

Am just off now to polish up my spontaneous answers to pithy questions like "why don't you look like your photo?", "why aren't you Katie Fforde?", "do you earn as much as that Harry Potter bloke?" and "why don't you write like Jackie Collins. I likes Jackie Collins. Why don't you do sex?" - all things I've been asked more than once and really should be able to answer without sobbing by now.

And if you can't make it in person I really, really hope you'll be there in spirit as I think I'll need all the help I can get...

You Couldn't Make It Up

2009-06-05T06:13:00.000+01:00

As the computer has been having yet another on/off hissy fit and I've been forced to work off-line (again), I've been writing more (yay!) and procrastinating less (well, sort of) and realised just how much "stuff I've overheard" goes into my books and stories. If asked, I usually say it's all made-up - but it isn't, well, not all of it...

This year, because last year was horrible for all sorts of reasons, The Toyboy Trucker and I have been making the effort to go out on a Friday night. Nothing swish you understand. Just for a cheapo meal in one of the many restaurants in our small town that are practically empty these days (along with the pubs - a sad sign of the times), so that we can actually talk to one another about our week instead of slumping in front of the telly and grunting. And every Friday night, because the places are so empty and the sound carries so well, I can also listen. And not just to The Toyboy Trucker...

Recently overheard (and squirrelled away to be altered ever-so-slightly and used at a later date) snippets include:

"... and I'm on statins and Warfarin and aspirin and me blood's like water and you can't say better'n that..."

"... and then when HE comes home she 'as to perform 'er wife's duties straight away - an' sometimes HE'S that impatient she doesn't even 'ave time to take off 'er Marigolds..."

"To my mind, it was the last thing you'd expect to see in Weston-Super-Mare. Alf didn't know where to look. I said to him, 'It's not like it's Lloret nor nothing, is it? You'd expect to see that sort of thing going on in Lloret even though it's practically like Weston-Super-Mare only hotter and with more people wearing less clothes.'"

"... just listen to yourself. You're setting her up to be some sort of saint. Yes, I know she's only just died but she was a complete cow and I don't mind who knows it. Oh, and she hated your guts - always did - even if she was your mother..."

"So then, once we'd got the pearl barley out with the tweezers..."

"Why in God's name would anyone with her problems want to wear that colour? She looked like a bloody turnip."

"Don't you talk to me about political correctness, I said. I'll speak my mind - I don't care who I insults, me. People should 'ave thicker skins. I always tells the truth. I think it's why people like me. Silly sod wouldn't 'ave it and just kept crying though..."

"Boils run in our family. Me dad was a martyr to boils. Always had pus on 'im somewhere."

"... we went to Madeira. Nice place but we wouldn't go back again. It was full of foreigners..."

"Joan - her with the big nose and the poodle - she won the lottery last week. A tenner she got. She's only been playing for six months at a pound a week so she's quids in..."

"So I said to Nev, you don't want to mix with the likes of her. Everyone knows what she gets up to. She votes Liberal Democrat."

"... and it never even said swingers on the invite. And even if it had we wouldn't have known what it meant because we don't read the posh papers, and then even when that fat girl from Londis - you know the one who had the accident on the bouncy castle who thinks she's a cut-above? - said what it was we thought it was something to do with Frank Sinatra or big bands because it was for their silver wedding and it was in the village hall after all, and you could have knocked us down with the proverbial feather when we realised it meant - well - swapping. There wasn't anyone there I'd have wanted to swap with thank you very much. And, I ask you, who'd want our Frank with his feet? He's never had his socks off since 1983. Our Natalie said afterwards that what's you get for trying to mix with the upper classes..."

Ooops!

2009-05-26T09:20:00.000+01:00

Well, that's been fun. One big bang, two small fizzles and a nasty on-screen "fatal error" message - yep, it's been another almost-two weeks without the computer...

Well, not quite true - I've been able to work off-line (which is good news for Midnight Feast which is now almost up to the 45,000 words it was before I deleted them - and this time they're much nicer, funnier ones - I think...) and this time it wasn't me pressing the wrong buttons - it was the ISP's fault.

Sadly, we (TTT and I) only discovered this after replacing the modem (twice), calling in an expert (12 years old and quite amazingly clever) to sort out a) the mother board and b) the hard drive - neither of which needed sorting. It was only after an exasperated telephone call to the ISP (prior to chucking the whole damn thing out of the window and making yet another trip to PC World) that gave us the answer. Ooops, they said, our error. Nothing wrong with your computer. Our fault - we're really sorry... We'll get it back on track soon as. And they did.

So, now I'm back online - and will no doubt catch up with blogging and answering emails and things as soon as poss. That's after I've read everyone else's blogs, and checked message boards, and wasted hours catching up with all the really vital online stuff that makes up my writing day. Ah, it's lovely to be back...

Interview Techniques

2009-05-13T08:37:00.000+01:00

For some reason, I've suddenly been asked to offer my pearls of wisdom and alleged writing expertise on a wide range of subjects. For a really, really brief period I got a bit big-headed and thought I must be the current author-of-choice, but only briefly. Now I've decided that it's probably because they've run out of Proper Writers...

Whatever - I'm not proud. I'm just delighted to be asked. So, this week I've done a stonking FIVE interviews with different people for various publications on all sorts of subjects - from fireworks to Epstein Barr; from how I manage to write in such a mess and muddle to how I bit the bullet and gave up the day job; from my research methods to why I stopped writing mainstream chicklit and started writing magical bucolic frolics. I've loved every minute of it. And I really, really appreciate being asked.

No publicity is bad in my opinion - no, not even that rather painful and corrosive piece about me being a gurning nonentity in The Times by a far more literary writer than I'll ever be - and any opportunity for anyone who writes to get their name out there in any capacity is A Good Thing. So this is a public thank you to all those who took time to ask me questions and patiently sorted out the dross of my answers.

I really welcomed being interviewed by fellow rom-com author Olivia Ryan. She's written a fab feature on Giving Up The Day Job (to be published later in the year - will post details as soon as I know). I was included with such romantic novelist luminaries as Judy Astley and Katie Fforde and Fenella Miller - and am still basking in the afterglow.

It's always flattering to be asked for your views by another author, and especially so as I LOVE Olivia Ryan's books (check her out at www.oliviaryan.com). I bought second copies of her hilarious and oh-so-true Tales From A Hen Weekend and Tales From A Wedding Day as a honeymoon beach-reading present for Elle (they'd make great engagement/hen night/wedding presents for any dedicated chicklit lover) who read them on Waikiki Beach and absolutely loved them and is now a hooked Olivia fan. We're both now feverishly waiting for the final book in the trilogy - Tales From A Honeymoon Hotel - which is out on July 2nd. Oh, and if you're reading this, Olivia, I've already got my order in on Amazon - I'm not asking for freebies!!!!

I've always found it's better to be honest when being interviewed - even if what you have to say isn't exactly what's expected. I'm certainly not a typical writer (come on - take a look at my lifestyle!) but try to explain how writing fits in with my Other Life (with difficulty, usually). I know I love to read about how other writers work - even if it does make me wonder how I ever manage to get anything done - or how other writers got started, or anything at all that might just help me to improve how I do things. We can all learn from one another - and I know I've gained numerous nuggets of brilliance from authors I admire.

One area of writing I'm rather proud of this morning is my new found ability to delete at will! Yesterday - after a sleepless night of agonising - I deleted Midnight Feast and started again. And now it's flying! I've been up since 4.30 (it wasn't even light!) and have done over 3,000 words already today. I'd written myself into a turgid corner and knew that there was no way out. So, I've just kept all my characters (who I loved) and changed the setting and the start and made it funnier and really, really off the wall - and it's suddenly zinged into life for me now. Hopefully it'll zing into life for Those Who Matter...

I've happily told The Toyboy Trucker (sorry, still can't get into Toyboy Transport Manager) that it's now "Cold Comfort Farm meets Masterchef". I won't tell you what he said - but hopefully he's wrong, wrong, wrong....

Home Again

2009-05-05T23:18:00.000+01:00

Elle and The Doctor are home from here! This is where they've spent the last three weeks. It's Hawaii's only 6-star hotel - and is clearly paradise. It's called Halekulani and means "house befitting heaven" - which it obviously is and was....

They had an amazing honeymoon in Hawaii and came home via Chicago and Washington. Jealous? Me? What do you think???? But it was wonderful to collect them at Heathrow and do that embarrassing hurling myself at them (I'd sworn I wouldn't - but just got swept away in the heat of the moment) as they emerged into the arrivals hall. And they were so brown! The doctor, of course, is always brown - but was, to his delight, even browner - especially his legs (which he showed us straight away much to Heathrow's amusement) and Elle is a gorgeous toffee colour. Sigh...

Despite having just travelled for 26 hours (business class - natch) they talked non-stop all the way home in the car and I gather that Hawaii is simply the best place on earth. It all sounded quite incredible - especially the vivid colours everywhere and the exotic flowers (Elle is no gardener and The Doctor can't tell one plant from another but they both seem well up in hibiscus, oleanders and orchids now) and the rainbow fishes and the warmth and friendliness of the Hawaiian people... I am not jealous, I am not jealous, I am not jealous....

This was their bathroom - gulp - where they could simply float in scented, candlelit water and gaze at the sea - and no, I'm still not even a teeny weeny bit jealous... And they can now both do Polynesian dances and were very moved by the Pearl Harbour memorial, spent a day on the Lost island, did the Obama trail, and have discovered the joys of The Cheesecake Factory... I'm sure there will be lots more stories emerging once they're no longer jet-lagged and have stopped sulking about it being All Over.

Still, now they're home, hopefully we can get to grips with the official photographs of the wedding - blimey, how long ago does that seem now??? I'm really looking forward to having a wallow in the memories of the day - and might even manage to post a pic of the m-o-t-b frock at last...

Now - back to reality. I'm getting on with Midnight Feast, The Toyboy Trucker is getting to grips with being a Toyboy Trucking Manager, and Elle and The Doctor have to go back to work! Hah!

I've Got A Happy Trucker!

2009-04-28T14:39:00.000+01:00

This post is simply to say a HUGE HUGE HUGE public congratulations to my darling Toyboy Trucker because today he's passed his CPC!!! I'm SO proud of him. It was a killer - both in terms of studying and the legal, business, management and practical exams themselves - and although the slog was all over in February (and of course he was convinced he'd failed miserably) the results weren't known until today - and he's passed! All three exams! He's now fully qualified to run his own haulage company (if he ever wants to), has the top professional qualifications in road transport management and national road haulage, and is a STAR!

I do know how hard these exams are because when I wrote my lorry-driving novel - Running the Risk - Georgia, my heroine had to have a CPC in order to run her transport company and I sent for the study courses and exam papers as research. Sheesh! I was glad then it was only fiction.... Little did I know...

This is just the sort of joyous news we needed to lift our flagging post-wedding spirits while the Happy Couple are still frolicking in Hawaii and while I'm still dredging through the Moonshine proofs.

Hopefully we'll be celebrating wildly tonight!

However, I do have one reservation though - Toyboy Transport Manager simply doesn't have the same ring to to it somehow,does it?

Reality Check

2009-04-16T09:44:00.001+01:00

The morning after the night before. Sad photo of Elle's forlorn and abandoned wedding dress (think she must have leapt out of it from a standing start!), unloved and unwanted on the floor of the honeymoon suite. Which just about sums it - and my current feelings - up...

Well, that's that then. Wedding all over; Elle and The Doctor frolicking in the surf on Waikiki Beach (they've sent phone-pics - bless them!); all staying-over friends have left - T&T have flown back to Jersey, J&I ditto to Switzerland, R,J,M & B have returned to York, and F&S have coupled up the caravan and headed back to Devon.

It's all over.... Sigh...

I've no doubt that I'll be using gratuitous snap-shot wedding photos to illustrate the blog posts for a while yet. Well, at least until we get the official ones and I can edit them for a hopefully suitable pic of the m-o-t-b outfit... However am now having grave concerns that the entire outfit was way-too-bling and that the vintage beaded jacket was just a tad too sparkly, and the silk frock was just a touch too frou-frou and the red satin killer heels were probably - well - frankly - tarty... Everyone said I looked nice. Nice isn't what I'd aimed for. I'd aimed for spectacular - and now think, with all the aforementioned doubts and having abandoned the fascinator as too silly for words and having forgotten to wear any jewellery (too much of a rush before getting Elle into her wedding dress), I actually looked like someone half-dressed for a fancy dress party. Will wait and see what the official photos show of course - but I'm not optimistic here...

Still outraged that the outlaws didn't even send Elle and The Doctor a wedding congrats card! Not one single one of them. Not even ma-in-law - and she was actually there (although under protest and VERY bad-tempered). Surely they could have managed a card? Wouldn't that just be good manners or a sort of family-friendly thing to do? As Elle and The Doctor didn't want presents, a card - especially when you've ditched attending the wedding at the last minute - wouldn't have been too much to ask? I think this just underlines their ignorance and rudeness and shows they clearly want nothing more to do with us -which is good because that's what they're going to get!

Hurrumph.... Sod 'em all!

And now today the Moonshine proofs have arrived - and I really, really must get back to work.

Sigh again....

So, on a writerly note (I AM a writer, I AM, I AM...)- I've sold yet another short story to Yours (this seems to be my target market at the moment - and very welcome given the rapid demise of magazine fiction generally) - so thanks again Womag - wouldn't have done this without you. Am 5 chapters into Midnight Feast and have side-lined Off The Wall for a while. Have also had a couple of ideas for new series to follow on from the practical magic ones and am hoping my agent and editor will also think they've got legs - the stories, that is, not my agent and ed...

Oooh, yes! And I've had royalties again!!!! Loads and loads of royalties!!! Got really excited about it - it's a rare occurrence for me I can tell you, but one I could get used to. Have been very, very circumspect and shovelled them away for a) the next tax bill, b) unexpected disasters/household bills, and c) those months later in the year when I know (wise after the event and having now read my contract!) when I won't have any nice chunks of money. Still, it's kept the bank happy and made me smile. And After The Wedding, smiles are in short supply here, I can tell you.

And thanks to my wonderful German publishers buying my entire back list, I've been having an ongoing conversation with my German translator/editor because she's currently working on Hubble Bubble and there's a mention of my hero resembling Heath Ledger in it, and because of HL's sad and untimely death, we both felt it would be better to replace him with another movie star... And - eeek - she wanted Leonardo di Caprio. Now, I'm sure little Leonardo is lovely in his own way, but he certainly isn't how I see my wild-haired, dangerous-dark-eyed, sexy Shay. We've argued for a couple of days and I think I've now convinced her that Johnny Depp would be a worthy stand-in for poor Heath... Will let you know.

And coming right down to earth, have just taken Jonah (above) to the vet for his twice-yearly check-up on his ongoing ulcerative gingivitis (all clear) - and discovered during the tests that he possibly has hyper-thyroidism... He had to have more bloods taken which have been sent away for analysis and we'll get the results on Monday. If they're positive for hyper-thyroidism our lovely vet explained it'll involve either life-long medication or surgery. Either of which will chomp nicely into the royalties - sigh... Still, as The Toyboy Trucker and I would sell our souls twice over for Jonah we'll do whatever it takes....

And now I will open the folder that says WIP - and Will Get On With It! When I've done the Moonshine proofs, and looked at the wedding pics again, and slashed and hacked the jungly bits in the garden, and cuddled Jonah and....

WOW!!!

2009-04-13T17:19:00.000+01:00

So - Elle looked totally, totally beautiful. The Doctor looked wonderfully handsome. Neither of them were nervous. Neither of them ever stopped smiling for a minute all day. The Toyboy Trucker and I have now got the most wonderful, kind, gentle, funny and amazing son-in-law in the world. The bridesmaids were sensational. The best man was a star. The weather was warm - it was partly cloudy but the sun shone brightly all afternoon, and despite the dire forecast there was no rain, and no wind at all. The stately home venue was out of this world - and the whole day went like a dream. No, it was even better than that - it was a living, breathing fairytale.

Take back all I've ever said on this blog about the whole thing being way, way OTT and a huge waste of money - it was simply breath-taking. It was the best day of Elle and The Doctor's life - and of mine. Everyone there (over 200 of them) said they'd never experienced anything like it!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you for all your support - you were absolutely right - those outlaws who opted out simply don't know what they missed - and to be honest we didn't even notice they weren't there. It was the most blissful - um - counting on fingers here - 20 hours of my life...

Will just post a few pics today - like this one of Elle sharing a joke with her lovely new in-laws - but as these are ones I took, there were huge gaps in the proceedings when I couldn't get at my camera (the actual ceremony and the reception and the speeches etc) - and the official ones won't be available until Elle and The Doctor are back from Hawaii in May - there possibly won't be any of me in the m-o-t-b frock for a while (phew!) but I think they give some idea of what it was like... An absolute dream come true... Huge sigh of happiness...

Elle and The Doctor had planned it down to the last minute detail - it wasn't simply a wedding, it was a true celebration of their love and a fusion of cultures and an entertainment event no-one will ever forget!!!

From the second The Doctor and his family swept up the drive in a cavalcade of cars all bedecked with red and gold ribbons and playing bhangra music, on to me helping Elle into her dress, both of us amazingly calm and happy, through the heart-stopping moment when The Toyboy Trucker walked Elle so proudly down the aisle of the 16th century wedding room, all through the beautiful, emotional and very personal marriage service, through the champagne-and-Pimms reception on the terraces and in the glorious gardens while the official photos were being taken, on to the Indian banquet Wedding Breakfast (in a fabulously decorated dining room awash with red and gold, masses of flowers, and the most gorgeous HUGE garlanded Ganesh - all this, I must add, presided over by an ex-Blues and Royals toast master in full regalia and complete with his Buckingham Palace ceremonial sword for cutting the fabulous three-tiered, three-flavoured chocolate wedding cake!!!),

then the amazing moment after the meal when the black curtains, all twinkling with thousands of white pin-prick lights, swept back to Elvis's "Viva Las Vegas" to reveal a full-blown casino! There were roulette wheels and black jack tables and fruit machines - and proper croupiers - and everyone was given a starting $100 to play with!!!

Then there were two bands - one bhangra, one rock - and then, when it was properly dark, a spectacular twenty minute firework display (certainly the most amazing display I've ever seen!) in the grounds with more champagne and strawberries. And then, when we all thought we couldn't manage any more, we all swept back into the ballroom and danced until dawn to the rock band while waiters circulated with huge bowls of chips, hot bacon rolls, nice veggie samosas and things like that - and of course cake, cake and more cake... Then we all staggered off to our bedrooms (everyone stayed overnight) to emerge bleary-eyed a few short hours later for a Full English...

Oh, and this final pic is a clutch of Mates From The Estate just about to bombard Elle and The Doctor with confetti...

And, in case you were wondering, apart from a few tears when Elle and The Toyboy Trucker first walked down the aisle, I didn't cry! I even did my reading and a small speech in the reception without faltering, and just think I was far too happy to cry... Awwww - it was truly the Best Day Ever - and I don't think I'll EVER come down to earth!

Four Days and Counting

2009-04-07T08:42:00.000+01:00

Just back from The Final Fitting of THE DRESS which is now hanging, swathed in a white protective carrier, on the back of the bedroom door. I'm actually surprised I can see to type as I'm still moist-eyed and soggy. I sniffed bravely as Elle stepped into it, snuffled not-at-all-bravely as the fitters all fussed around nipping and tucking, then howled uncontrollably as she finally swept into the showroom.

O-M-G. All those years ago when Elle was tiny and she'd teeter around the bedroom in my shoes and a net curtain playing weddings I'd hoped that one day it'd be the Real Thing. And now it is. And she looked so beautiful (of course I'm TOTALLY unbiased) - and that's without the hair-do and the make-up and the additional tiddly accessory things... She'll blow them away... She looked radiant and calm and just so HAPPY. The dress is sensational - just right for the princess wedding she's always wanted -and so is she... Elle, if you're reading this, I'm SO proud to be your mum.

Then there were the bridesmaids to final-fit, and me - and the whole place was awash with net and silk and frou-frous of every imaginable type. And despite us being in crack-of-dawn Tuesday morning scruffy-ish hair and minimal slap, I think we all looked wonderful. And in FOUR days time it'll be the Real Thing. FOUR days!!!

On Sunday the boys had their final suit fittings and they were transformed too. And yes, I cried - again. Writing has been abandoned, emails have gone unanswered (sorry!), all normal life is on hold until After The Wedding. I'm wallowing in every joyous minute of this. And it's all gone wonderfully to plan - except for the weather forecast of course - and they might be wrong about that (and even if they aren't it's the one thing we can't alter so I am not going to worry about it - honest)...

There is one other minor hiccup which I'll gloss over in as few a words as possible as I've done my stomping and swearing and ranting and screaming in private. The Toyboy Trucker's family have decided (at the eleventh hour) that they won't be coming.

I'm not going to expand on the reasons why or how I feel about it because the blog would probably explode - but suffice it to say the "family" table will now look a little bare... As I have no family it was all down to my in-laws to wave the flag for our side. Something they all seem unable to do now - despite all having replied to their invites in the affirmative. I'm hurt, Elle's hurt, The Toyboy Trucker is hurt - but hell, that's families for you. I'm actually glad today that I haven't got one.

All our friends, some of whom are travelling immense distances, Elle's friends, The Doctor's friends and family (who will be there in supportive force, bless them) and the entire estate (and you should see some of their wedding outfits - amazing!!!) will more than make up for the ill-manners of my outlaws (who you'll be unsurprised to know I have now excommunicated for ever). And it's their loss - and all the more food and drink for the rest of us.

And as everyone told me there'd be at least one hitch, and everything else has gone smoothly, if the lack of family support is the hitch then so be it. We won't miss them - but I have a feeling they may well miss us in the future.

Am now going to help Elle pack her trousseau (isn't that a lovely old-fashioned romantic word?) for their honeymoon - they're off to Hawaii for three weeks and I'm not in the smidgiest jealous (hah!) - and practice walking on my killer heels again and try to rehearse my in-service reading without bawling...

Four days to go!!!!!

April Fool?

2009-04-01T09:07:00.000+01:00

I've always thought it was highly appropriate that my only child should have been born on April 1st. Nature, not content with giving her a slightly skewed mother, made sure she had a birth date that everyone else would snigger at...

And I couldn't even use the old adage about "April Fools jokes are only valid until mid-day" as she was born at 9.20 a.m. Duh!

So, we spent her childhood informing all the playground bullies and those prissy little girls with angelic eyes and vitriolic tongues that you get in every mixed infants class, that being born on April Fools Day was A Good Thing, A Happy Thing, A Funny Day, A Day When Everyone Becomes A Prankster - sort of like an early comic relief...

Mercifully, Elle has always been a strong-minded and very grounded child (amazing given she has me as a mother) and has long since risen above being labelled an April Fool. Now she enjoys sharing her birthday with such mixed luminaries as Philip Schofield, Otto von Bismark, David Gower and Ali MacGraw - and being April 1st babies doesn't seem to have harmed their careers.

When Elle was little we used to make the most of the day by throwing childhood parties that were a cross between a circus and the Edinburgh Fringe. You didn't get in to our caravan (another story!) unless you were dressed up in something amusing and could tell jokes.

So - Happy Funny Birthday, Elle, have a wonderful day, enjoy the meal tonight - and I'm really sorry...

Happy Hens

2009-03-30T08:20:00.000+01:00

Elle had her Hen Day/Night on Saturday - and here she is with her bridesmaids, all of them looking (in my immensely proud and totally biased m-o-t-b opinion) every inch as glam as The Pussycat Dolls. These girls are total stars. Close friends since childhood they are (in no particular order) a nurse, a police officer, a paramedic and a residential social worker.

We had such a brilliant girlie day and night - the day being pampered at a spa (I LOVED it! The facial was sublime - and I'm now addicted to the pool-side heat beds...), and then a surprise night out in Oxford (complete with loads of pink frous-frous - which I think I loved more than anyone!) organised by the bridesmaids, with a fabulous meal. Then, having taken over the centre of Oxford in a 40-strong can-can kicking conga line, us older ones returned home and let the girlies continue their celebrations at their favourite night-club.

This is my beautiful Elle all dolled-up with loads of embarrassing Bride-to-Be paraphernalia. Yes, of course I cried...

This post is going to be mainly pics of The Big Night Out - so thought this one was quite amusing too. This is Vee, me and Em-Next-Door-As-Was before we left for the restaurant. Not as glam as The Pussy Cat Dolls, but hey...

We all wore Little Miss T-shirts with suitable slogans on the back - this is mine...

And a by now slightly squiffy bride-to-be complete with compulsory and even more embarrassing head-gear...

And one final pic of the bridesmaids all looking amazingly gorgeous considering the number of champagne cocktails they'd managed to consume in a scarily short space of time...

As I'm now completely obsessed with wedding preparations - 12 days to go! - my blog posts will probably be even more dazed and confused than ever - at least until after Easter. Today Elle (who has just about recovered) and I are off to the florists to make sure everything is organised - then we're hoping to have a quiet mum-and-daughter lunch somewhere calm - tomorrow we sort out the bridesmaids shoes (being dyed to match the frocks), on Weds it's Elle's birthday so The Toyboy Trucker and I are taking her out as it'll be her last singleton birthday, Thurs is the photographer, Fri the caterers, Sat is the Final Frock Fitting, and Sun is the last fitting of the Boys Suits... Soooo a nice leisurely week...

Oh, and as I am supposed to be a writer - my token writerly comment is that somewhere in amidst this excitement I AM writing Midnight Feast...

Green Eyed Writer?

2009-03-19T09:30:00.000Z

Before I know whether or not I'm still a published novelist, I thought I'd jot down a few other writerly things that have happened recently while I've been off in Bad Blogger territory. Because IF it all goes tits-up with the prospective new deal I know I won't be able to mention the word "writerly" for months...

There has been yet another German deal. I am so delighted with the way things are going in Germany - so, it must be said, are my bank and the Inland Revenue and everyone else I owe money to... This time it's for yet another book-club deal for Love Potions (Sommernachts Zauber). The last one was to supply a large on-line book club, while this one is a hard-copy, magazine type one - and again, it was a lovely surprise. Still can't quite believe it. And the German version of Heaven Sent (Sternenzauber) is out on April 1st (not as bad as it sounds as April 1st is also Elle's birthday - so we don't make jokes about it - okay???) so it'll be interesting to see if it does as well as Love Pots. Me, the bank and the Inland Rev sincerely hope so...

There's also been a deal for Happy Birthday this week - not in Germany, but with a UK indie publisher who are going to do a 10,000 copy print run for cheapo bookshops. I know a lot of Proper Authors are horrified by this sort of thing - but I ain't proud. Okay, these deals don't bring in much money for the author (sob!) BUT they are vital in getting the books into readers' hands - I did a similar one with Hub Bub and sold loads AND got lots of new readers to boot and shifted a lot of my backlist as a result. And to be honest, it'll just be nice to see Happy Birthday on a shelf...

The magazine outlets seem to be dwindling by the minute, don't they? I've sold another story to YOURS (THANK YOU Womag!), and have another couple almost ready to go to them, but with the recent demise of of the fiction slot in Best, the markets are getting fewer and fewer. I'm going to have a go at something for My Weekly and People's Friend - and may well bite the bullet and see if I can manage to write whatever it is that Woman's Weekly wants at the moment. Must say here that I did have a hissy fit while reading something in a story in a recent WW - because it was WRONG! WRONG!! WRONG!!! It was SO wrong factually that I felt like dashing off a letter to the editor - but fortunately my sense of self-preservation prevented me putting fingers to keyboard just in time. After all, a wannabe contributor slagging off a) another author and b) the ed's clear oversight in checking the story's background, probably wouldn't endear me to anyone, and I'd hate to be thought of as green-eyed...

Mind you, I am. Jealous I mean. Yes, of course I'm genuinely pleased when my friends and fellow-writers are successful, and I'm really happy to share any info I think might help anyone trying to be published - BUT - it still doesn't mean that I'm a Nice Person. I'm not. I can get catacylsmically (sp?) jealous of others' successes if I think they're undeserved. I gnash my teeth and swear a lot - and yep, I've had plenty of those "my books are better/as good as hers and yet my career bobbles along in the mid-list while she soars into the literary stratosphere being lauded and fawned over..." moments. Oh, yes, I have quite a few moments of sheer unadulterated HATRED while ensconced here in the back bedroom... It's lovely.

Oh, and meant to say - again - that everyone who writes magazine stories and/or features should register with ALCS - the Authors Licensing and Collecting Society -you don't have to be a novelist, ALCS will collect royalties on anything you've had published, either in books or magazines (think they're currently going back to 2006) - so dig out all those back issues, and they pay out either in Sept or March. I've just had a unexpectedly lovely amount appear in my bank account for all sorts of royalties collected across the globe for my UK magazine work.

And as this is now Friday lunch time - and The Meeting To Decide My Future took place yesterday - and I haven't heard a PEEP from my agent I'm now going to slink off into a dark corner and gibber.

Wedding Count Down...

2009-03-17T11:41:00.000Z

Well - I've had a lovely two-week non-writing gap doing very, very little - except drafting four new outlines for the next four books because I'm now OUT OF CONTRACT and therefore unemployed and need a new deal pdq but am not overly-optimistic (I'm never overly-optimistic...) - and my agent is meeting my editor on Thurs for prelim talks - so it's all very tense chez Jones at the moment.

Which is why I'm glad I've got the wedding stuff to distract me. THREE weeks on Saturday - and such gorgeous spring-like weather at the moment... However, the long range forecast for Easter is not looking good - cold, windy, wet and possibly snowy is being hurled around on the met sites... That'll all play havoc with me fascinator - not to mention the silky sleeveless m-o-t-b frock. I WILL NOT worry about the weather just yet. And yes, I know we had a white Easter last year and it was lovely - but I really, really don't want one this year, okay?

Anyway, tomorrow we whisk Elle and her bridesmaids off to Gatwick, where they then fly to Majorca to catch a cruise ship to drift round the Mediterranean for 5 days of hen-bliss. Jealous? Moi? What do you think???? The other hen weekend is at the end of March and involves a spa - so I think I'll be okay with that. I quite fancy being pampered (I've never been to a spa or even had a facial before - is that a terrible admission??? - so it'll be a whole new experience).

Last weekend The Doctor had his stag do. It was very funny - apparently. They had a boys-doing-boys-things party first - go-karting, clay-pigeon shooting, quad biking etc etc. Then all dressed up as clowns (my dad would have been SO proud) they did the town. The Toyboy Trucker seems to have forgotten everything that happened after about 1a.m. and he came home without his wig (that's his stag-do wig, you understand, he doesn't need a toupee just yet...) and looking very pale... The Doctor took three days to recover...

Sadly there are no photos. Or that's what they all tell me.

Anyway, everything else is all coming together nicely. The seating plan is done (and what a minefield that was!), the menus sorted for those who are veggies, vegans, think tomato sauce is daring etc, the final frock fittings are on the 27th (DO NOT ask if mine fits at the moment!), the speeches are written (by me - AND Elle and The Doctor have asked me to do a reading in the service so I've written that too and I know I'll bawl all though it...), and accommodation has been sorted for those who need it.

All I need to do now is find a lovely personal "thing" to give Elle and The Doctor on the day. They don't want presents, and I've got my clever friend Jane to embroider a personalised wedding card, but I need a little keep-sake thing... All the websites seem to be much of a muchness - photo frames etc - so any/all suggestions will be more than welcome.

Done It!!!!!!

2009-03-03T23:37:00.000Z

Moonshine is done!!! 25 chapters, 315 pages - all done! Written, delivered to my agent and my editor, checked, line-edited, revised, sent back - and today it's been accepted. On Friday it goes for copy-editing and out of my sight until the proofs. From today - now - this minute - I am a Moonshine-free woman!!! I've bloody done it!!! And I met the deadline! And I'm SO happy!!!! And totally exhausted. Tomorrow I shall do nothing but wallow - then I'll catch up on all those unanswered emails (sorry!), and the blog, and maybe the housework (or maybe not) and then I'll start writing the synopsisisisisi for the next two books - because (gulp) I'm now out of contract... Can't say any more now as my eyes won't work and my fingers have atrophied and I'm falling asleep at the keyboard - but I've done it!!!!!!!

How Much????

2009-02-19T09:40:00.000Z

Sorry - I'm on the last knockings of Moonshine (goalposts have been moved again and it now has to be delivered next Thursday and I've just done a word count and - aaargh!!!) and shouldn't be blogging at all, but I just had to break off and share this wonderful piece of news about my newly-elevated status.

I've clearly arrived in the land of the must-have authors!!! JKR eat your heart out.

This little snippet from Amazon was passed to me by a friend this morning - and it's made my day!!!

I knew spotting a copy of Happy Birthday in the shops was rarer than finding unicorns' eggs - but even so I had no idea it had become a collector's item...

Ahem...

"Happy Birthday (Paperback)
by Christina Jones (Author)
Price at a Glance
RRP: £6.99
Used: from £1,186.14
Used (1 from £1,186.14)
Ready to buy? £1,186.14 + £2.75 shipping - Used - Like New.
Comments: As new book delivered in the UK in 2-3 days."

Magic or what????

Oh, and thanks again to Womag I've sold another story to YOURS this morning. THANK YOU!!!

And I've just bought a gorgeous vintage black beaded velvet bolero to go with my m-o-t-b frock (in case it gets chilly) from eBay for 75p.

So all-in-all, a truly great start to the day!

Now back to tying up the Moonshine ends, beaming broadly.

Friday 13th - Lucky For Some

2009-02-13T10:33:00.000Z

Today - Friday 13th - is The Toyboy Trucker's birthday. He was born on Friday 13th too - so draw your own conclusions... He's been away this week but will be home this afternoon and Elle and I have got cards and pressies and a chocolate and toffee birthday cake waiting, and I've booked a romantic table-for-two at a local hostelry (NOT one that I work in) for this evening.

This will be a very brief post because I'm over my ears in Moonshine - but I wanted to mark the occasion and wish The Toyboy Trucker happy birthday in public so that he knows I love him. I think he doubts it sometimes - especially times like these when I'm stuck at the computer and only grunt. He's a star and I could never do any of this without his support.

Writing news - good, again (blimey, I could get used to this...) - I've made a further sale in Germany!!!! This is just amazing - and shows what a bizarre career this writing lark is. Surprisingly, and completely out of the blue, I've now sold second rights to the German edition of Love Potions to an online bookstore (German - natch) - for another stunning sum. Between ourselves - and as an antidote to the earlier grizzling posts - this week I've actually earned more than TWICE what I earned in the whole of last year. How bizarre (and fantastically lovely) is that??? Friday 13th? Bring it on!!!

Weight Watchers news - this week I've lost 5lbs! I think this is because I've been flat-out with Moonshine and forgotten to eat. Don't care how it happened - am just thrilled that it has and that it means I'm 5lbs closer to squeezing into the m-o-t-b frock.

Wedding news - replies to the invites have flooded back, proving that most people we know are only too happy to leave their offspring for a childfree day (and night) of Bacchanalian revelry. The boys' suits are ready. The bridesmaids' frocks ditto. Elle has her final fitting on March 27th. And there are only EIGHT weeks to go!!!

Now back to Moonshine with renewed enthusiasm. Well - almost...

Not Such A Secret Agent

2009-02-09T08:24:00.001Z

This post should come accompanied by bells and whistles and rainbows and lollipops and cascades of fireworks and volleys of celestial trumpets because - I'M A HAPPY WRITER!!!!

It should really also be illustrated by a picture of my wonderful, wonderful new agent - the sublime Broo Doherty - because she's just worked several miracles in a nano-second.

In the very short time she's been my agent, Broo has worked tirelessly on my behalf to improve my writing lot because she's brilliant and a total star...

Today she's told me that she has had the rights to all my out of print titles reverted to me (something my previous agent had been asked to do for years and said was "difficult if not impossible") - so that Going the Distance, Running the Risk, Stealing the Show, Jumping to Conclusions, Walking on Air, Nothing to Lose and Tickled Pink can now all be sold again to a new publisher (hopefully my current one!!!), re-jacketed and re-published, giving me my full back-catalogue in print again for the first time in years and years. This will give my finances a desperately-needed boost and will, hopefully, up my presence on the bookshop shelves.

And as an added bonus (this is an understatement - vbg) she's also just told me that she's sold Hubble Bubble, Seeing Stars and Happy Birthday to the German publishers!!! For a stonking sum!!!! Half of which I get on signature of the contract - and which will keep the bank manager off my back for the foreseeable future. You have no idea how delirious I am this morning. I laughed, cried, yelled, cried some more, and am still wearing a huge and silly grin.

The German publishers apparently love my books - thanks to the great sales of Love Potions (proved by those fab royalties last year) they had already bought Heaven Sent - so they'll have my entire magical series in print in Germany and are intending to really up my profile as a rom-com writer in Germany. I AM SOOO HAPPY!!!

This has (naturally) increased my enthusiasm for Being A Writer, and for finishing Moonshine (they want to see that too) and for brushing up on my O level German just in case they'd like me to pop over any time soon...

My admiration for Broo knows no bounds. She's simply amazing.

THANK YOU, BROO!!!!!! You've changed my life!!!!

May disappear for a while now to finish Moonshine in a spurt of excited and unusual (for me) optimism that maybe being a writer isn't really a stupid way to try and make a living...

I Could Have Danced All Night

2009-02-03T10:04:00.000Z

Started writing this earlier then got sidetracked by writing Moonshine all week (going okay - I don't love it but I haven't deleted any of it - YET) but have now been snowed in for 48 hours and am going stir crazy. I LOVE snow - but we've had it for five days and now we can't even get out of the house and the little single track roads round here are impassable and today the entire Oxfordshire section of the A34 has been closed by the police, so we're marooned...

So, I thought I'd finish this blog post about last weekend's Big Night Out - The Toyboy Trucker's firm's dinner-dance - because it did throw up a rather wonderful writerly event.

First though, the whole swish "do" was amazing - the way only a company's swish "do" can be when most of the invitees aren't used to doing swish...

I loved it! We were all installed overnight in the utterly decadent Millennium Hotel -all opulent gold and cream and acres of glass (we had a bedroom big enough to live in for a year without ever getting in each other's way), with miles of silent, immaculate, spacious corridors and very friendly and helpful staff. It was funny, really, the way we all went around after checking in, mouths agape, staring in awe at the splendour like Dorothy when she first got to Oz. And everyone belted off to see A&B's twin room which had two sunken spa baths!!! We really were Hicks from the Sticks R Us...

The evening venue was the Jazz Cafe - somewhere I'd never been before but will definitely visit again for a superb night out. The food was wonderful, the drink flowed courtesy of the company and they had a live soul/jazz/funk/fusion band (I only know about the fusion bit because Elle explained it to me when we got home) playing stuff I knew and recognised (a tricky area when you get to A Certain Age and make only rare visits to nightclubs, I find...) and could dance to.

There were drawbacks of course. I went all dolled up (it said "dress to impress" on the invite) and was pretty happy with my long and flowing purple frock and purple glittery sandals, plus new hair-do (short now - but not as short as the Disaster Cut some of you may remember I had a couple of years ago when Elle's friend offered to do it at home, and she'd just had her elderly beloved dog put to sleep and she cried all through the snipping and I cried with her and neither of us could see what she was doing and I ended up with bristles) and carefully applied slap when we left the hotel. On arrival at the Jazz Cafe and meeting up with the other departments it was abundantly clear that I am now firmly - whatever I may think - in the "matronly" department. The majority of the company's female staff were in size 6 LBDs and stilt heels and looked like Girls Aloud... I felt soooo old....

However, I've got stamina, and I threw myself into the jollies and danced a lot of them young 'uns off the floor (I always knew those years of being a bump-and-grind nightclub cage dancer would come in handy one day). The Toyboy Trucker, it must be said here, doesn't dance. Can't dance/won't dance. He'll stand and sway if absolutely necessary but then only when very, very drunk...

But as I said at the start of this, the main point of posting (apart from being able to boast that for one glorious night my life didn't revolve entirely around the computer in the spare bedroom, worrying about money, fretting over deadlines, the cats, the madness of the estate, and spending most of my time in my PJs) about our Big Night Out is actually a writerly one. Well sort of.

The evening provided yet another of those "I know I shouldn't be thinking this right now but it'd make a bloody good plot" moments. Oh, not quite on the lines of the P&S&S's wife triangle that I was faced with at the last party (neither P nor S were at the Jazz Cafe thank heavens!) - but fascinating none-the-less - and something I knew I'd have to share.

Okay - so we've all heard of the sailor having a girl in every port. Now think of the trucker having a girl in every distribution depot...

I'll call the trucker Dave because that honestly isn't his name. Dave is in his 30s and single. It soon became apparent that several of the girls (all pretty petite blondes in gorgeous frocks) were watching the door of the Jazz Cafe and constantly checking their mobiles for text messages. It also soon became apparent to anyone with half an ear (me, nosy, listening-in) that they were all waiting for Dave.

Now Dave is a mate of The Toyboy Trucker's and I knew he had cried off at the last minute due to "family problems". Being a cynical old bat, I quickly guessed that the problems were far closer to hand. All Dave's ladies were in the same place at the same time - and none of them knew about the others.

As the wine flowed, and tearful visits to the loo were made, and sobbing confessions emerged, the girls gradually realised they all had something (or someone) in common, and weren't, as they'd fondly imagined, Dave's one and only. Cries of "but he told me he loved me!!!" echoed all around our table. Dave, it appeared, really managed to keep all these ladies happy and apart - until the Big Night Out..

Of course, if he'd turned up, it would have been much more fun (well, for me) although possibly not for the ladies involved or for Dave who might have been lucky to escape with his bits intact. You had to admire his tactics though. He'd managed to keep all these girls happy for several months (years in one case!), by spending a couple of nights a week with each and blaming his frequent absences on - well - trucking.

What the other men in the party found so totally confusing was how he'd managed to do it. Oh, not keeping the girls apart which is fairly easy when you're out on the road all the time, but getting them in the first place. They were mystified and not a little jealous.

"I just don't understand it," The Toyboy Trucker's boss said to me as he peeled yet another glamorous sobbing blonde from his tux. "Dave's a nice bloke, but he's just - well - a bloke. He's not Brad Pitt. He's got no money to speak of. He's got loads of baggage. He's nothing special. What on earth do they see in him?"

And I smiled and shrugged in a mysterious (hopefully) womanly way. Because I knew very well. Because I'm a woman. Dave is average height, average build, average looks. But he's charming. He's also got a fabulous smile and beautiful eyes. And he's intelligent, articulate, compassionate, very funny and gentle. He makes you feel as though you're the only person in the world when he talks to you. He remembers everything about you, is genuinely interested in you, can make you laugh, and can not only talk but also listen. Dave is, without doubt, one of the most charming men I've ever met.

As a happily married woman, I'm immune to the charm, but yes, I can completely understand how he managed to get all these lovely girls to fall in love with him.

Yes, of course, he's a bit of a rat. But then he hadn't promised them anything other than fun. He'd never made any sort of offer of a permanent relationship, or told them they were his one and only. And I'm sure he was being honest when he said he loved them. Love the one you're with should be (and probably is) his motto!

Dave is, I realised during The Big Night Out, perfect romantic hero material. Flawed, but ultimately redeemable by the heroine. It will be such a coup for the lady who eventually does make him fall properly in love and manage to curb his philandering ways... And yes, I did have one particular candidate in mind for my perfect romantic heroine - she'll be just right for him... (I do hope one day Dave will realise it too).

All this, of course, I kept to myself last Saturday night, as it would have been no comfort whatsoever to the bevvy of broken-hearted beautiful blondes, each one of whom had a sumptuous room and a superb king-sized bed, revved-up and waiting for Dave... The Invisible Love Rat or Perfect Romantic Hero????

Mixed Emotions

2009-01-30T12:24:00.000Z

A bit of a sensible writerly blog post today - so, as usual with my chosen "career", this means some good news and some not so...

First the good because it's cheered me up no end. My lovely editor has responded to my cries of desperation and extended the Moonshine deadline until the end of February. Yay!!! I now have FOUR whole weeks to finish it - and I WILL!!! You have no idea(or maybe you have...) what a relief this is. I'm so happy!!! Because I write in a sort of muddle (no? really?) and don't plot or plan, it isn't just a question of having to type stuff up - it's got to come out of my head, down my fingers and on to the keyboard first.

However, the book is already written in my head, the sort of rough fuzzy framework is actually down on paper (well, on the screen) and the research is done. All I needed was enough time to pull it all together into book-shape. And now I've got it. So - a huge THANK YOU to Emma for not screaming, swearing, spitting (at least, not in my hearing) or sacking me on the spot as the most useless author that ever lived...

Moonshine is now romping ahead and I'm smiling.

And the bad writerly news - well, should have known really... The long short story commissioned by Woman's Weekly which I abandoned Moonshine to write-and-send in the hope it would bring in some much-needed money, has been rejected. Now, I honestly don't expect to sell everything I sub - I've been writing short stories for long enough not to expect that, nor do I have any sort of over-inflated opinion of my abilities, BUT I'm so miffed because I wrote exactly what I was asked to write: 5-6,000 words, humorous, another one in the series of my odd childhood tales. I really liked Take Your Partners - but sadly, WW didn't. They said "nothing original here", "some nice touches but not enough for us to use it", "this one isn't suitable for us" etc etc.

With hindsight, I've worked out that I've not sold anything to WW since their editorial changes and their fiction guidelines altered - and they published nearly everything I subbed before - soooo, I can only surmise that I'm not now what they're looking for, and I've decided I'm going to give them a miss for a while. I've still got about 5 ordinary shorts that they've rejected, and the three-parter serial (also asked for) - and most of them certainly can't go anywhere else as they are and I don't have time to rewrite them for other markets until Moonshine is out of the way. This has given me a sulky face and a full-on disgruntled pout....

Anyway, on the glass half full side, I've got my extended deadline which is far more important at the moment, so that'll give me a happy smiley face soon - pretty damn soon... but in the meantime I'm a sulky, flouncing, grrr-ing rejected dejected writer...

Buggeration!!!!! (as my mum used to say)

And I Only Went In To Buy Cat Food...

2009-01-25T00:37:00.000Z

What a to-do! And I'd only abandoned Moonshine (another chapter written today but still nowhere near meeting the deadline, but it's all going well at the moment so I'm optimistic that maybe in about three weeks I'll have a book - don't hold me to that though!) for a few minutes to pop across the road to the Eight til Late (there has been a bit of a Store Wars here recently as rivals have set up across the green with a more daring Seven til Eleven - but I'm still faithful) to grab some cat food.

Before becoming indispensable (???) behind the bars at the Weasel and Bucket and Hairy Harrys, I used to do a few hours in the Eight til Late, and Ravi is one of the nicest bosses I've ever had, always slipping me a few ounces of pineapple chunks (the retro-sweets-in-a-jar sort, not the tinned fruit in syrup which would be very messy), or a quarter of haslet (he never grasped that as a vegetarian, haslet wasn't really ever on my menu - anyway I used to give it to Maudie next door for Wilf's sandwiches, so it went to a good home) at the end of my shift. Anyway, as usual, I've digressed...

There I was, pushing my way through the throng that always gathers by the "special offers" basket - this week consisting mainly of Christmas puddings, mince pies, After Eights with snowflakes on them, and a selection of rather dented novelty Santas - when I became aware that the crowd round the counter was even more frantic than usual. The customers in The Eight til Late would put any City trading floor to shame the way they wave their arms around and shout and barter for a good price, so we're used to a bit of noise, but today it was total mayhem.

Ravi's wife, Shulie, who is usually the epitome of calm unflappability, was yelling into her mobile phone for an ambulance and directing some sort of military operation at the same time, egged on by a lot of very verbal pensioners in woolly hats. By the time I'd managed to grab two boxes of As Good As It Looks (it isn't by the way - The Toyboy Trucker inadvertently tried some once after a night shift and was sick) and found a gap near the counter, I could see what all the fuss was about.

Big Lorna, the Eight til Late's part-time assistant, had gone into labour just in front of the "Eastern Delights" chiller cabinet. This was something of a shock I think (to everyone else I mean, presumably not to Big Lorna) as no-one had actually noticed that she was pregnant.

Fortunately, once she'd called the ambulance, Shulie managed to get Big Lorna out of her tabard and away from the shelf of sardine samosas as they were on pensioners' special and some of the older estate residents wouldn't have been averse to scrambling over Big Lorna to reach a bargain. As I'm pretty squeamish and luckily my close-encounters with childbirth have been minimal, I stood well back, but I did suggest to Shulie that it might be a good idea to get Big Lorna out of her tights and sandals too - otherwise it would be like Daphne on Neighbours who gave birth without removing a single item of underwear.

The ambulance arrived remarkably quickly. They're very good, the emergency services, at turning up to things on the estate. I suppose they always know it's genuine. And once the paramedics had thrust their way through the audience and managed to stop Big Lorna biting them (her language - always ripe - was frankly appalling), it only took them seconds to shovel her up onto a stretcher. Everyone stood back like Moses parting the Red Sea and clapped as she left the shop.

The Eight til Late went pretty quiet after that, and I paid for the cat food and came home and back to the computer, wondering if I could incorporate an unexpected corner shop birth scene in Moonshine, and eventually decided I couldn't as it would probably be edited out.

Heard later from Shaz and Nikki that Big Lorna gave birth in the back of the ambulance in a lay-by on the A34. Shaz said it wouldn't be the first time Big Lorna had been legs-akimbo in a lay-by on the A34 which I thought was pretty harsh. True, though... Anyway, she's called the baby Clint. She says it's after one of the paramedics. Shaz and Nikki reckon it's because it was fathered by the cowboy builder who came to repair her guttering last summer. Mother and baby are doing well.

Suits You

2009-01-23T18:02:00.000Z

More excitement on the wedding front - the first fitting of the suits for the boys in the wedding party! Again, not your usual trip to Moss Bros, oooh no, Elle and The Doctor have hooked up with a wedding suit hire company that comes to the house!!! So, yes, poor Moonshine got a bit sideswiped while I rushed around making coffee and sandwiches while the wedding party boys - The Doctor, his brother who's Best Man, The Toyboy Trucker as Father of the Bride, and J and T the ushers - were measured and tweaked and primped and preened by an extremely pretty girl from the outfitters. Despite all the early grizzles and moans that it was all too girly and not for real men and surely any old suit would do, they absolutely loved it and were soon swaggering around like a load of Gok Wans!

The suits are all going to be the same - long coats, baggy-ish trousers, white shirts, cream, gold and scarlet embroidered waistcoats and scarlet floppy ties. The Doctor's suit is going to be gold and the rest are in black. Even in the embryo stages they looked absolutely stunning - so unbelievably glamorous - and, yes, I had to sneak off and have a little cry...

The next fitting will be in a couple of weeks and I can't wait.

The invites must have arrived okay because we've already had a few phone calls along the lines of:
"Thanks for the invitation - it sounds fantastic - can't wait - er - but you only put me and Horace down and not the kids..."
"Er - yes, we all really want you and Horace to be there and -"
"But Snot, Crap, Puke and Mungo aren't on there and they so love a party and they're really looking forward to it. Was it a mistake?"
"No."
"Sorry?"
"Um, look - Snot, Crap, Puke and Mungo aren't on the invitation because they're not invited."
"What! But the kiddies all enjoy a wedding! They love to run around and mess about and dance and -"
"Exactly. Sorry, but neither Elle nor The Doctor want any children at the wedding."
"You've got to be joking?"
"No, deadly serious. It's their choice, their decision. This is to be an adults-only affair. A child-free zone."
"But that's not fair!"
"It's their wedding, they're paying a fortune for their perfect day to be perfect - and they don't want children there. They really want you to be there to help them celebrate their marriage, but they don't feel it's suitable for children."
SILENCE
"Look, it's going to be a long day, a lot of eating and drinking and various grown-up things going on - an awful lot of weddings these days don't have children - you can surely find a baby-sitter?"
"Maybe - but we've always had children at weddings and - "
"Elle and The Doctor decided they didn't want anyone's little darlings yelling, shouting, or crying through the service, messing around with the very, very expensive food, running around or doing knee-slides across the dance-floor - I'm sure Snot, Crap, Puke and Mungo will be really well behaved, but not everyone is as good a parent as you. So, sorry, no children..."
SILENCE.
"We'll put you and Horace down as a yes, then shall we?"
"Yes - well, maybe - I don't know if we can both come - one of us may have to stay at home with Snot, Crap, Puke and Mungo..."
"Let's hope not - but you've got 3 months to sort out childcare, haven't you? Looking forward to seeing you. Love to Horace. Bye!"

Yes, we all knew this no-children thing was going to be contentious. But Elle and The Doctor have maintained right from the start that they only wanted adults, and as far as I'm concerned it's their day and I can honestly see their point of view. Hopefully most of the guests will eventually see it too.

The one thing that should cheer all the invitees up is that as well as no children it's a no-presents wedding too. Elle and The Doctor say they have everything they could possibly want or need, and all they want is for friends and family to be there to have a wonderful time at their all-day and almost-all-night celebrations. So, even if the kiddies are no-no, at least those on the invitation list won't have to fork out for a gift.

I really, really hope that'll go some way to mollifying those who at the moment are more than a little affronted at the exclusion of their offspring - but somehow I doubt it...

Distractions

2009-01-21T09:07:00.000Z

I'm still ploughing away at Moonshine. I've written another chapter. I'm nowhere near meeting the official deadline, my self-imposed deadline, or any other bleeping deadline... There have been distractions.

Lennox (at 17, she's now our senior cat and a very fit, active and healthy old lady) was suddenly taken really ill on Sunday night. Monday was spent at the vet's - Lennox being operated on, me pacing the floor, wringing my hands, my mind on all sorts of awful outcomes (well, after all-too-recent similar scenarios with Carlo and Clyde and the awful results of their investigative surgery, my hopes weren't high) and certainly not on Moonshine.

By Monday evening Lennox was back home, eating her head off, purring, fully restored to rude good health with her own medicine cabinet full of antibiotics, anti-inflammatorys, and pain relief. I was a gibbering wreck with a zero-word count for the day and a further gaping £175 hole in the illegal overdraft...

On Tuesday, the distraction loomed in the shape of The Writers Bureau 20th Anniversary Awards. Ages ago I'd been thrilled to be asked to be a judge for these awards and happily agreed, completely forgetting that this judging had to take place in January. So, yesterday I had to abandon Moonshine and everything else and immerse myself in the shortlist. Fortunately, all the short-listees are anonymous so there's no chance of me being swayed in either direction by anyone whose name I might know and/or recognise. I still haven't reached my decision - they're all brilliant - and as with any piece of writing that isn't mine, I'm totally in awe of the talent, the emotion, the humour, the sheer creativity that other people manage so effortlessly and which always seems to elude me and I've tended to sulk...

Then last night, just as I thought I might manage to write a Moonshine sentence, Em-next-door (as was) turned up (haven't seen her since she moved) and we had a lovely evening catching up and speculating on who might move into her house once the decorators have moved out, and discussing her outfit for The Wedding, and making plans for a girls' night out as soon as Moonshine is finished (sometime in 2010 then).

This morning I was up really early, filled with high hopes for a clear writing day - at least three chapters (well, okay, maybe two) of Moonshine beckoned... Then I got distracted by the wonderful womag (again). I made the mistake(?) of popping over to her blog - http://womagwriter.blogspot.com - again, can't recommend this highly enough for anyone who wants to write short stories, features, articles - for those who don't know, womag is unbelievably generous with the time she spends sourcing markets, and in her generosity in sharing the information on her blog. Her latest post is about writing features, fillers, letters etc for a whole raft of magazines (again some I'd never tried) - sooo, thanks to womag I've now written and sent another short-short story to Best, a health feature to Take A Break, and a true-life story to Real People. Moonshine never got a look in... I NEED to be earning while I'm writing and this seems to be the only way. A note on the Real People sub though - I received an auto-email back saying they'd received my piece and they are always on the look-out for true stories about "love-rats, tragedies and medical miracles". Mmmm - mine wasn't any of those, being more jaunty and feel-good - so I somehow feel that one might not be a hit...

So - now it's late and I'm just going to open the Moonshine file and I'll probably just faff about taking commas out and putting them back in again. Oh, dear....

Open Invitation

2009-01-18T09:41:00.000Z

This is Lord Ganesh. Ganesh is the Hindu elephant god who is The Remover of Obstacles, The Bringer of All Good Things, The Master of Intellect and Wisdom - and he also has a very sweet tooth. I love Ganesh - The Doctor gave me a tiny Ganesh to sit by my computer - and I think the vibrant colours and gilding and glitz and sparkle are fantastic. Also, Ganesh features heavily in Elle and The Doctor's wedding (hence today's subject line)and will also feature later in today's post.

Anyway, because I've incorporated Ganesh into my own personal hotch-potch of beliefs, I've decided to forget all the whingeing of the past few weeks (sorry for inflicting it on you too - but this is my Dear Diary let-off-steam safety valve) - after all, there are millions of people worse off, we've still got jobs, and I've been through far more worrying times in my chequered writing career - and wallowing in self-pity isn't going to help anyone, especially me. So, in this new state of enthusiasm and optimism, I've written two and a bit chapters of Moonshine since Thursday (it's now Sunday - I think...).

I'm not sure if they're good chapters but I'm not going down the old route of re-reading them now and tweaking and messing about with them so that by NEXT Thursday I'll still have only written two and a bit chapters... By the end of today I intend to have turned that *bit* into a third chapter and started a fourth. Ho-ho-ho!

I did start writing two chapters at once (I have two separate viewpoint characters in Moonshine - Cleo and Elvi - and was giving them a chapter each) but I got into a bit of a muddle so I might have to abandon that plan... And, being me, and despite KNOWING that all I should be doing is writing Moonshine I've been sidetracked by a) Woman's Weekly and b) the wedding stuff.

One of my backlogged emails was from Woman's Weekly asking if I could do a long/short story (around 5,000 words) for their Fic Spec. So, yesterday and last night and very early this morning I did and I've just sent it. No - I know I shouldn't have, BUT my thinking here was that if I wrote it and sent it WW *might* just love it and buy it which would bring in more money to shore up the bank while I'm writing Moonshine. And also, if a magazine actually asks for something you should produce it pdq unless you're dead because if you don't then they'll find someone else who can deliver and probably never ask you again... So, Take Your Partners is winging its way to WW as we speak and I have my fingers tightly crossed.

And the wedding stuff - well, yes, I also wasted valuable Moonshine time by sending out the invitations. Elle and The Doctor wanted to stick with the tradition of the bride's parents sending the invites, so The Toyboy Trucker and I were delighted to oblige. In my day, according to the wedding etiquette books, you sent out the invitations a maximum of 6 weeks before the Big Day. Now apparently, because everyone has such busy lives, it has to be three months beforehand to make sure everyone leaves a window - so they went yesterday...

Elle and The Doctor are financing the wedding themselves (phew!) - although of course we will chip in with a bit of help as soon as the bank account is back in the black (again - thank Ganesh and God for PLR!) - and they had the invitations designed and made in India. They're absolutely stunning in scarlet linen with masses of sparkly jewels on them and a really cute Ganesh sitting at the top. The invitations will, I hope, indicate to those far-flung friends and family who receive them and who have not yet had the immense pleasure of meeting The Doctor (yes, he is - a doctor and Indian - oh, and absolutely gorgeous), that this isn't going to be a totally conventional wedding...

It's going to be a half-and-half celebration, with some traditional English stuff and a lot of Indian things too (like the two meals: the wedding breakfast straight after the service and champagne reception is going to be traditional sit-down Western, while the evening meal is a full-blown Eastern feast - and the music - they're having a harpist for the ceremony, and a rock band and a bangra band for the evening shindig). The service itself is completely non-denominational (the stately home has done a lot of half-and-half weddings so they were fine with that) and the chapel will be all white and flowery and Western, but the rest of the decor is going to be mostly Hindu - which I LOVE because it means loads and loads of colour and candles and lights and really beautiful flamboyant gorgeous fabrics - with a huge splash of Bollywood thrown in for good measure.... Sorry - getting carried away a bit - but I'm SO looking forward to it...

Now down to earth - oh, speaking of which - we did have a bit of excitement here last night. In the middle of the storm (storm? it was a flipping tempest!) while the roof was being ripped off our shed and everyone's garden furniture was flying through the air, one of the trees in the little wood at the end of the terrace (next to Nancy's house) was blown down. It was a mature tree, a good twenty-foot silver birch (shame), and crashed right across the road. It was so lucky that no-one and nothing was anywhere near it - and no damage was caused except to the poor tree. As our roads here are single track, we all rushed out - the noise was incredible and terrifying, like a tower block collapsing - and tried to move it. Of course we couldn't - so the police closed the road, and at the moment we're cut off from the rest of the village while the fire brigade (yay!) and a crane hack and haul the poor tree out of the road...

I will now drag myself away from the window and get on with Moonshine. I will... I will... I will...

Reasons To Be Cheerful

2009-01-15T23:45:00.000Z

Ooops - sorry. I've been a Bad Blogger again - but I've just been completely overwhelmed by the amount of stuff that had accumulated during my illness and the computer's absence. Not least by three backlogged emails from my publisher saying a)they expect Moonshine to be delivered by the end of January latest, b) they've booked Moonshine's copy editing for early Feb and c) Moonshine is going into production in mid-Feb.

Now this all sounds very efficient and encouraging - but when you're the one writing Moonshine and it's now mid-January and you've only done 5 chapters...

See my problem????

So - I'm writing like stink to try and do it. No, I know and you know it's not possible, but I'm not going to admit that yet. Not to myself and certainly not to my publishers... Yes, I've told them that because I've lost over a month's writing time that I'm miles behind but that doesn't seem to be a good enough reason...

So, I've set myself a sort of manic target - like, if I write two chapters a day I might just do it. Hah! Or, maybe if I write at least 7,000 words a day, every day, I might be close. Double hah! Or, perhaps, if I live on Red Bull and other stimulants and give up sleeping and eating and any sort of life at all and just sit here and type, it might just turn into a finished 100,000 word book in two weeks... hah-de-hah-de-hah!!!

Anyway - to alleviate the panic about the deadline and my lack of book - I've been thinking about the things that are currently making me cheerful (glass half full every time!).

First is the reason for the pic - hot water bottles! Pure bliss in this freezing winter - we were down to minus 12 the other night and they're forecasting snow again next week. So, The Toyboy Trucker and I have reverted to childhood - wrapping the PJs round the bottles before bedtime, then snuggling into the warm hollow and having the bottles on our feet. The cats love them too. So much pleasure for absolutely no financial outlay!

And I feel so much better. It's great to feel well again after so many weeks of being ill.

Then there's my PLR statement - and the money to be paid in early Feb. Oh, thank the lord for PLR. This year it's absolutely BRILLIANT and I'm not even thinking that most of it will probably have to pay the January tax bill (a bit of a downer, always having to pay the tax bill on a good year's earnings from money in a year when I've earned sod all - and no, I don't put any away for the tax bill as you're supposed to. Are you kidding? I have to live on every penny I earn...) - it's still a lovely wodge of cash and something my poor bank account hasn't seen for MONTHS. And it means that however bad the book sales seem to be, lots of people borrow my books from libraries which means they DO like them and I DO have readers out there. Sadly, my PLR earnings and the payments from my magazine work currently make up a much larger chunk of my writing income than the books... Maybe next year this will all change???

Next, it's only 12 weeks until The Wedding!!! We're all so excited - and Elle has her final fitting of the gorgeous, fantabulous Ian Stuart dress at the end of Jan and I shall be awash... And having now lost the December 5lbs and some more, I now have 12 weeks to lose 11lbs to be able to fit into the m-o-t-b frock - and I honestly think I can do that!!! Oh, and as I've lived in the red satin killer heels indoors ever since I bought them (they look fab with my PJs - vbg) I'm getting used to them and don't even wobble on them now...

Then there's the weather - I LOVE cold weather (sorry Debs) - and have taken every opportunity to do my walking in snow showers and freezing fog and frost - and it's cheered me up no end. And it's lovely to come home all glowing... And I can wear my beloved ancient collection of woolly hats (mostly berets in bright colours with sparkly bits on them) and fluffy scarves - none of these have seen the light of day for ages because of the recent mild winters...

And yesterday, while rooting around in our local clothes shop (they're having a massive sale and I'm ever hopeful) I found some real linen sun dresses reduced from £40 to - wait for it - £1!!!! £1!!!! I bought 4 (one in each colour)! I've never bought four dresses in one go - and they fit like a dream and skim my lumpy bits and look wonderfully expensive... Can't wait for the fabulous summer we've been promised to show them off (Debs, you've been warned!)...

And finally - the Toyboy Trucker's firm cancelled their Christmas dinner-dance party because everyone had various bugs and lurgies and they're now having it in a couple of weeks time instead, but because it's after Christmas and everywhere is offering really cheap prices, they're going to put us all up in a 5-star hotel as well - so, I'll get to wear a posh frock and swan about in luxury and forget about being broke and depressed about Moonshine (even if it is only for one night)...

So - I'm happy. No, I am, honestly. And now I'm going back to chapter 6 of Moonshine while chanting "I can do this.. I can do this... I can do this..."

Rumours of My Death...

2009-01-05T10:50:00.000Z

... have been greatly exaggerated - although my prolonged enforced blog silence has been because both the computer and I have been bed-ridden for most of December. The computer was in hospital (released today - fully recovered - yay! I can work again!!!) - and fortunately I managed (just) to avoid hospitalisation this time... My Epstein-Barr seems to choose the most inconvenient moments to chuck up a few sneaky viruses - but as I was already at a pretty low ebb (thanks to all the accumulated writerly/money crap etc), and everyone I know seems to have had at least three bouts of something unpleasant in December, I think it was bound to happen...

Anyway, not going to dwell on it, I'm feeling much better, a bit scared at having missed an entire month of writing - but had no choice - and am now raring to go. Always feel quite keen on everything at the beginning of January. The enthusiasm has usually waned into my usual boredom and inertia by about the 14th...

Many thanks to everyone who emailed me to see if I'd slit my wrists. Have just opened my backlogged emails (hundreds of them) and will answer them asap - promise - but you're brilliant to care. Made me cry...

One thing I've learned though: don't ever think that if you pay a few months money into your mortgage account - as I did when flush with the German royalties - it'll cushion you when you have a shortfall as we did in December. The bank rang to say there wasn't enough in the account to pay the mortgage; I said no because I'd miscalculated my December income on a huge scale but not to worry as I paid three months mortgage money into the account earlier in the year so that would cover us, wouldn't it? Silence. Then they said no, that an over-the-top deposit didn't entitle you to a mortgage payment "holiday" - you couldn't just not pay for a month or two - all it did was reduce the overall amount you owed. What I should have done, apparently, was put the three months mortgage money into a savings account and then drawn on it when things went financially tits up in December... Sooo, we missed out on paying the mortgage in December and will now have to pay twice in Jan - oh joy!!!

Other things that went by the board during December as well as the mortgage - apart from Christmas (well, being broke didn't matter too much as I was too ill to give a stuff!) - Weight Watchers, wedding plans, writing anything at all, giving a toss about writing, eating, drinking, being even slightly sociable... And Em-next-door moved which upset me because I just felt like I was losing everything. We still don't know who's moving in - do hope it'll be someone as lovely as Em - she was the best possible neighbour and friend.

Now have to get a grip - will (if I spend 20 hours a day at keyboard) deliver Moonshine by the end of January; will start dieting and will be skinnied into the m-o-t-b frock by April (somehow managed to gain 5lbs over Dec - despite not being able to eat/drink); will sort out wedding invites/accommodation for guests travelling from a distance/practice walking in m-o-t-b red satin four inch killer heels (FIVE quid in the sales); will write two new synopsisisisisisi for next book deal (ever the optimist!!!); will buy magazines and tailor stories/features instead of my current random scatter gun approach - and will definitely stop procrastinating and bloody do something about the stuff that infuriates/scares/worries/upsets me.

Oh, yes - and I'll blog. I've really, really missed it....

Flat Broke

2008-11-30T00:08:00.001Z

On top of the bad cold and bronchitis (me), the man-flu (The Toyboy Trucker) and the snuffles and sneezes (the cats), the last week has been pretty crappy for various reasons. Particularly writing ones. So, this is yet another cautionary writing post because I think it's only fair that you should know I have the brain of a retarded amoeba. And that may be a little unfair to the amoeba...

I was considering not blogging about this horrendous mess at all. I thought about keeping it all to myself and simmering and panicking and weeping alone - and then appearing with another bright and breezy post when I felt better. But that wouldn't be right. I started blogging to be honest about my life - real and writerly - and that's how it's got to be. So - here we go...

This year has been a particularly badly-paid one on the writing front for all sorts of reasons. I've sold quite a few short stories, but no serials and very few features. Several acceptances have been payment on publication - and publication won't be until next year. My sales figures for the novels are frankly pretty disappointing. And the advance on my last two book deal was very, very small indeed. The smallest I've ever had in 10 years of being a novelist - and something I accepted because it was better than not being published at all (been there, didn't want to go there again). My (then) agent was ill and away from work at the time my contract came up for renewal and the negotiations were done more or less without any input from her. This was my choice. I didn't have to do it. I knew it would make things difficult financially, I knew I'd have to keep working in the pub, and I thought I'd be able to make up the difference with magazine work. My choice.

So, as with all my novel contracts, I assumed (note the dreaded "a" word there) that payments would be divided into four for each book as they always have been in the past: one on signature of the contract, one on delivery of the manuscript, one on publication of the hardback, and one on publication of the paperback. So far so good... Memo to self: read your contract! Read every bloody word. DO NOT rely on someone from your (then) agency (not my agent I hasten to add) emailing you to tell you "the terms are exactly the same as the last two contracts" and accepting this as a good enough reason NOT to plough through the small print yourself...

Yes, I've been happily sitting here, merely weeks before Christmas, thinking that all my festive spending (and it's not massive - but we do like to eat) and those bills that always come in with the Christmas cards (especially the last enormous vets bill), and possibly the purchase of a nice new little laptop from PC World (to replace the current crashing-and-freezing model) so that I can actually do some writing and earn some money, will be covered by the small but much-needed and very-welcome Happy Birthday paperback advance.

When it hadn't arrived earlier this week, I breezily emailed my lovely editor to ask when it would be paid. Bless her - she had to tell me that it already had been. In August. On publication of the hardback. That there was only ONE publication payment on this particular contract...

Eeeeech!!!!

No money to come!!!! Not a bloody penny!!!!

And yes, it's my fault. I should have read my contract. I should have done my maths and realised that the money I was paid in August was actually a third of the contract deal - and therefore I'd had all I was going to get for Happy Birthday. I should have - but I didn't...

If I'd known/realised then I'd have budgeted. I'd not have spent it and the unexpectedly lovely German royalty money on silly things like bills and getting the decorating finished and a holiday for next year and a bit off the mortgage. If I'd known/realised that was the last money I was going to be paid this year then I'd have saved it - but I didn't...

So, after a few days of complete panic, a lot of stomping around declaring Christmas cancelled, several bouts of histrionic weeping and screaming, and even more bouts of deep, deep gloom, doom and despondency I've at last accepted the awful truth. This Christmas will be done on a shoestring. It will be a return to the Good Old Days.

It'll be a challenge but one we'll cope with, I'm sure. We've been through worse - and we're lucky, at least we've still got jobs and a home - and we're warm and safe and well-fed.

So - there you have it. I can have books in the charts, can win awards, can be published in umpteen countries - but I still can't afford Christmas. It's just one of the many unpredictable joys of being a writer... but oooh, how I wish I'd read that bloody contract....

Mainly Man Flu

2008-11-24T13:14:00.001Z

This is Dexter. Today he's got a cold. So has Jonah. The cats get colds like children - one comes home with it and - whoosh! - they've all got it... Alexia started this one, and passed it on to Emily, Flo and Maddy, but being girls they didn't let the sneezes and snuffles interfere with their lives. They still managed to eat and play and chase things and bring home bits of other people's dinners and dead mice/frogs/unidentifiable things. Not Dexter and Jonah though. Oh, no. They're boys. They're suffering. They're wrapped in their blankets in their little beds looking very, very sorry for themselves. They need to be ministered to, and tended, and fed by hand, and coaxed with warm chicken breast and lightly poached fish. They have, without doubt, got the feline equivalent of man flu.

Which, of course brings me neatly on to The Toyboy Trucker. I told you he'd get man flu didn't I? What a bloody palaver. Didn't matter how many times I said "it's just a cold" - he roared and shivered and stomped and groaned and moaned and sneezed and coughed until I thought he was going to burst. And of course no-one in the history of the universe has ever felt as ill as he did. No-one had ever suffered so much. No-one had had such a high temperature, such a sore throat, so many aches and pains... I was damn thankful when he took himself to bed with Lemsip and Benylin (do they sound like pole dancers to you, too?) and left me in peace alone with blissful hours of trash telly...

Which, in turn explains why this post is ages late - because then I caught it too. Not man flu, of course, I'll leave that to The Toyboy Trucker and Jonah and Dexter - but a really nasty cold with an awful chesty cough, which then developed into bronchitus and tonsillitus, and has meant I've had to have antibiotics, and has rendered me pretty unpleasant for the last week. I've even spent a few days in bed. And the computer has been on strike again, and I've really not had the inclination to even try to fight it - so I've done nothing to Moonshine, nothing to the WW stories, but did manage (after studying Womag's fantastic pages) to finish and submit that short story to Best, and two features to My Weekly and two features to Woman's Weekly as well. Still not a great output for someone who fondly imagines they're making their living from writing, even on an "ill week"...

Because the blog has been all over the place, I've not kept up to date with the Weight Watchers stuff either - well, because of the cold I didn't go to the meeting last week, but have lost another 3.5lbs in the last 2 weeks, which because my head is still too muddled to work this out, I think means I've lost half a stone now and have another stone to go before Easter - which is - um - 14lbs in about 17 weeks??? Which, allowing for about half a stone gain over Christmas (I kid you not!), then I have to lose 21lbs in 17 weeks, which means - and - ooooh! I really, really don't care!!!!

The only other thing that's changed in the last week is that Em-next-door is moving at Christmas. I'll really miss her - she's lived next door for seven years and we're good friends and had some great times. And of course we're all wondering who we'll get in her place... It'll have to be someone pretty special to fit in round here...

Watch this space...

Mad Hatters

2008-11-22T14:28:00.001Z

Today I went wedding-hat-shopping with Elle and my ma-in-law. That is, Elle didn't want to buy a wedding hat because she's having something called diamond spirals threaded in her hair (no veil - no ta-ra-ra - no flowers - no hat), and I didn't want to buy a hat because I'm having a fascinator. So we actually just went shopping for ma-in-law's wedding hat.

I'll cut the whole boring thing short here by saying we didn't find one. Not one. Clearly not a good time to look for wedding hats - the only hats we found were Santa ones or ones with flashing antlers and although they would look quite amusing on ma-in-law I don't think she'd see the funny side. Having exhausted Oxford's hat shops we're going to try Reading and Newbury. After Christmas.

Ma-in-law is wearing red to the wedding. I think we're all wearing red except Elle. We'll look like Arsenal Ladies Second Eleven. Ma-in-law wanted a frou-frou cartwheel hat in black and red. She's quite short and Elle and I did say we thought a big hat would make her look like a mushroom. Fortunately she's a bit deaf too.

I tried on some fascinators. Couldn't afford them because they were Jasper Conran and therefore about three hundred quid a feather, but it was nice to see what they'd look like. Once she'd stopped laughing, Elle took pictures on her mobile phone to send back to The Doctor because she said I looked like an electrocuted emu. As this wasn't the look I was aiming for I put them back. I may re-think the fascinator. Maybe fascinators aren't for people like me who tend to look a lot like Benny Hill.

There was a funny moment in Debenhams (Debenhams has been "modernised" recently - which means they've done away with much of the floor space and now have all the departments crammed together upstairs like a posh jumble sale and the lower floors that used to have all sorts of nice sections like haberdashery now just house massive escalators) when Elle and I lost ma-in-law. It's quite hard to spot your own small bubble-permed pensioner in a sea of small bubble-permed pensioners. Especially when they're all wearing the same coat.

Giving up the search in the melee that was the evening-wear department (Dolce et Gabana sequinned vests at £2,500 anyone?), we thought she might have decided to go downstairs, so we took the plunge earthwards on the down escalator. Halfway down to the basement we passed ma-in-law sailing upwards alongside us. We all waved at one another and made extravagant hand gestures indicating that she should stay put and we'd her meet at the top. Suffice it to say that no sooner were we on the up escalator in hot pursuit when we passed ma-in-law sailing downwards. We all waved again. This went on for almost half an hour. What seemed quite funny at first soon became bloody tedious.

In the end, I stayed at the bottom and Elle stayed at the top. Ma-in-law didn't arrive at either of them. Feeling a bit worried that I'd have to go home and tell The Toyboy Trucker I'd mislaid his mother in a department store, we searched high and low (literally). Forty five panic-stricken minutes later we eventually found ma-in-law having a skinny latte and a Danish in the coffee shop with a man from Croydon who had lost his wife in bedding.

Nothing much else to say about the day really except The Toyboy Trucker declined to come with us because he has a cold. It'll be man flu by this time tomorrow - or I'll eat my hat....

Ivy, Interview and Interruptions

2008-11-20T14:06:00.000Z

Well - phew - the Radio Europe interview went really well. Just finished and apart from um-ing and er-ing far too much (as always) I managed to keep up a flow of (hopefully) reasonably sensible dialogue. Hannah, the interviewer, was brilliant (she'd done loads of research, was very upbeat and asked all the right questions), let me chat for ages about Happy Birthday, gave it masses of plugs, and even allowed me to get a good name check in for the RNA and the Writers Bureau. So - that's that completed successfully, then. Mind you, this being my life, it could have all gone horribly wrong...

The neighbours (Wilf and Maudie) are getting to grips with their garden. They chose today, just now, while I was doing my interview, to decide to remove the rampant ivy which partially covers their house wall - and ours. I actually quite like the ivy because it makes the house look softer, the birds feed from the seeds, it looks pretty in the winter, and gives us some much-needed shade in the lean-to in the summer. However, Wilf and Maudie have decided (more likely someone in the Weasel and Bucket who's seen a BBC2 prog with Griff Rhys-Jones on the decimation of ancient buildings and totally misunderstood the structural difference between a 14th century abbey and a 20th century council house has told them) the ivy is eroding the brickwork and invading the roof tiles and the chimney and will therefore destroy the house by February, and so it has to go.

Wilf knocked on the door just as I was waiting for the phone call from Spain and explained they'd need to get into our garden to hoik out the ivy roots that can't be reached from his side. I said okay, but be quiet because I'm going to be on the phone... Wilf laughed. He probably thought I was talking to the speaking clock. Wilf is the only person I know who still phones the speaking clock.

Anyway, Radio Europe phoned me just as Wilf and Shaz's Dave knocked on the front door and shouted that they'd have to bring their ladders through the house because they couldn't negotiate the side alley into our garden (too complex to go into here - just need to say that Wilf was instrumental in getting all the alleyways in the terrace gated-off by writing to the council complaining that "schoolboys keep riding up my back passage"). So, while I'm trying hard to sound professional and calm on live radio, Shaz's Dave and Wilf are thundering through the house with ladders and bolt cutters and a buzz saw (for the ivy roots - hopefully) and loudly singing Alesha Dixon's "The Boy Does Nothing" - very badly.

Radio Europe thought it might be better if I went somewhere quieter. Like Budleigh Salterton? I went upstairs into the study. Dave and Wilf grinned at me through the study window from the top of the ladder and waved and sawed (nosily) at the ivy and sang some more Alesha Dixon. I closed the window and pulled the blind, phone under my chin, still trying to sound calm and cheerful as I explained to the ex-pats in Spain why I wrote romantic comedy rather than something darker.

Then Jerome called upstairs from our hall, looking for Wilf. I ignored him. I hate Jerome being in the house anyway because his electronic tag causes all sorts of interference with our electricals (and we've got enough problems with the computer) and the phone picks him up in a series of intermittent squawks. As Jerome reached the foot of the stairs, I vanished in a flurry of Morse Code bleeps, so Radio Europe and I dived into the bathroom. I did the rest of the interview sitting on the loo.

When I came out, Wilf had fallen off the ladder, Dave had cut himself and Jerome had eaten three rotten apples which I'd earmarked for the birds and some ham that was well past its sell-by and was set aside for the cats...

Most of the ivy, I'm happy to say, is still in situ and is likely to stay that way.

Spandex, Surprise and Spain

2008-11-18T23:36:00.000Z

I haven't been off living it up in Bad Blogger territory - honest. It's the computer having a funny turn again. It's decided to shut down on me halfway through anything I've tried to do over the past few days. A joint problem with a) the server and b) the hard drive (allegedly). We've had it sorted (allegedly) and it should keep going now. I really hope it manages to stay alive until Moonshine's finished (although I've got quite good at remembering to save on to the memory stick each night - but you don't want to know how damn long it took me to learn how to use the memory stick... I know a child of three can do it - but I can't.) - and no, Moonshine won't be finished by Christmas. Not a chance. Not now. That's the deadline of Oct, Nov and Dec missed then - oh, well done - that has to be a deadline-missing record - even for me...

During the intermittent moments while it (the computer) has been behaving itself I've been writing Moonshine in tandem with some more stories for Woman's Weekly. Yes, I know it's masochistic given the last lot of rejections, but I had these ideas and they wouldn't go away...

Then we had the two parties over the weekend - a sort of grown-up one and a 1970s night (hence the pic). Now, I'd have expected the 1970s one to be the shocker - but no! It was fun - camp, noisy, nostalgic, enjoyable - but nothing remotely odd happened. (Well, apart from everyone we know wearing acrylic fright wigs and spandex and platform shoes and singing Long Haired Lover From Liverpool a lot.). No, it was the posh party one that threw up the big surprise.

With hindsight it was a great *what-if* plot line - but at the time I was too stunned to think of anything apart from how the hell do I handle this... Quick scene setting: glitzy restaurant in Oxford; a crowd of people known to both me and The Toyboy Trucker (some to both of us, others individually); we all travelled separately and met in the bar. After the initial scrum, and clutching drinks, we all started introducing ourselves as you do. The Toyboy Trucker fought his way through the mob and said "... and this is P who works at our place and this is S, her new boyfriend..." And I turned and smiled and started to say hello - then stopped. S, P's new boyfriend, was someone I knew well. Very well. But not quite as well as I knew his wife...

Aargh!!! Well, what would you have done? S and I just stared at each other in frozen horror, I babbled something stupid at both him and P, then avoided them like the plague for the rest of the evening. It's none of my business. Or is it? I won't tell S's wife - not a chance! I won't tell P either - that's down to S, isn't it? It made the evening really weird though, and I felt very uncomfortable. Discussing it with The Toyboy Trucker when we got home, he agreed that it was best to leave it alone. I'm sure someone, somewhere will inform all interested parties pretty damn soon - but it won't be me! Will keep you posted of any developments...

Oh, and the Spain bit in the subject line is because I've been asked to do The Book Show on Radio Europe Mediterraneo on Thursday this week. I got very, very, very excited about this because REM is based in Malaga, and I had visions of being whisked off by private jet to a few days of sun and sangria - but bugger - no... It's being done over the phone. I said I hoped it would be in English as my Spanish O level was pretty dismal and things have gone right down hill linguistically since then - and they've assured me that REM is the biggest English-speaking radio station in Spain - a station especially for ex-pats on the Costa del Sol, Costa Blanca and Costa Dorada. Last week REM's Book Show had Sophie Kinsella and Marian Keyes - oh goody - no pressure there then!!!!

I'll let you know how it goes - but until then - um - adios amigos....

Shock Frocks

2008-11-12T23:57:00.001Z

Now this is exactly how I see myself as Mother of the Bride - all those frills and flounces and layers of petticoats - and the long gloves, oooh yes - and the feathers in the hair... I absolutely love it!!!

Elle, of course, won't.

Anyway, I'm only talking about frocks because this afternoon Elle got a phone call to say that the bridesmaids' dresses had arrived and were ready for the first fitting. As only one of her bridesmaids was available, and because I love going the wedding frock shop, I tagged along. And oh my! They're gorgeous.

Sadly (because Elle now reads this blog) I'm not allowed to describe them in detail as everything to do with the wedding has to be a SECRET - but anyway, they're silk strapless designer cocktail frocks, boned and shaped to give maximum ooomph. And believe me they do. Elle's having her three closest friends as bridesmaids (they've been friends since infant school) and they're all glam blondes so they'll look absolutely stunning. N, the one available bridesmaid, turned up with no slap, scraped back hair, and dripping from today's non-stop rain. Then she shimmied into her dress and - wow! I went all misty-eyed. God knows what I'll be like next month when Elle's dress arrives from the designers (scary stuff - it's an Ian Stuart and cost as much as my first HOUSE!) and she puts it on for the first time... The frock shop ladies think I'm an emotional wreck now - they ain't seen nothing yet...

While Elle and N and the frock shop ladies fussed around about whether there was too much cleavage on show (I said there could never be too much cleavage in my opinion and got frowned at), and if there should be a tie belt or a silk wrap and if the bridesmaids' shoes (satin, killer heels, diamante buckle) should be dyed to match the frocks, I just drifted among the frou-frou rows and rows of satins and silks and lace and net and all that lovely glittery stuff and sniffed back happy tears...

I did try out a couple of fascinators (tricky little buggers - especially with wet hair) but they didn't look their best with my jeans and cagoule. Then, before I could become too besotted with some sparkly and way OTT jewelery, N shimmied back out of her frock and Elle said she thought it would be better if I didn't come when C and K try theirs on if I was going to cry so much and we went home.

However, that wasn't the end of the tears today, because I've now just wept with laughter at the local paper's coverage of the launch party. For a start they've stretched the head-and-shoulders photo to cover the whole of the top of one page - like a banner - but made it very thin so that the balloons and my face are elongated to about three feet wide and a couple of inches high (like when you look at yourself in the back of a spoon - er - you do do that, don't you? It isn't just me, is it? Is it? Oh - right...) and Ian (who is very tall and very skinny) looks exactly like a much-fatter much-squatter Matt Lucas... And you can't see hide nor hair of a bloody book.

Then there's the coverage... God bless local journalists for getting straight to the nub of the matter. It reads: "Christina Jones recently held her birthday party in the local book shop. As well as books there was an artist drawing goblins. Owner Ian Collett said "we were heaving all day"." No mention of it being The Bookstore's 10th birthday, or my book launch, or the fact that the book was called Happy Birthday and I was a local author. No mention of Jane at all. Oh, and the goblin artist had been engaged by Ian to sit in the children's section to keep the kiddies amused. And I can only assume Ian was heaving all day due to a surfeit of cake and fizz... Such typical local press coverage and absolute bliss!!!!

Weight Watchers update: I've lost 2lbs of last week's 4lb gain. Which means, I think, with the aid of my logarithm tables, that I'm now 3lbs lighter than I was when I started WW FIVE weeks ago but still 2lbs heavier than 2 weeks ago... Bugger. And we've got TWO parties this weekend... sigh...

Oh, and on a writerly note I've amazed myself with steaming ahead with Moonshine after weeks of faffing and procrastinating - somehow it seems to have suddenly all fallen into place - I just love it when that happens. And today I've sent 5 short stories to Allers in Sweden, 3 to People's Friend, and another off-the-wall one to Yours. I'm wondering if the TaB rejects might be any good for Best. I've never succeeded with Best - so, still dreaming about frocks and frills and flounces, I'm now off to look at Womag's brilliant subbing guidelines...

The Birthday Party

2008-11-11T09:37:00.000Z

With apologies to those of a literary bent who might think I've gorn all upmarket and am alluding to Harold Pinter in today's title. Sorry - nope. I'm still as downmarket as ever and this is just about my little local shindig launching Happy Birthday which co-incided nicely with our local indie Bookstore's 10th birthday - so we had a joint party on Saturday.

This is me, looking chubby and mumsy and dressed as Harry Hill (I thought I looked nice and smart and reasonably tidy for a change - didn't realise how huge the damn collar was until I saw the pics - sigh...) outside *my* window. I get so excited when I see my books on shelves in shops. I'm always so grateful and I don't think the magic will ever wear off.

The whole shop was awash with balloons and bunting and glittery stuff (and wine and cake) for the party, and it was lovely.

Fortunately the local press and photographers arrived early, so all the embarrassing pictures of me and Ian (the Bookstore's owner) fighting our way through bunches of balloons were taken before anyone arrived. Unfortunately, The Toyboy Trucker still managed to get this shot of me, Ian and the photographer as I was being eaten by balloons... "...no, that's it, love - we don't wanna see yer face - just the new book - that's it! Lovely! Nah - don't smile - no need, we can't see you... smashing... "

As with everything in our town, the event was flatteringly well-attended - (yes, I've done the soul-destroying signings in Strange Towns where there's been me and fourteen shop staff and absolutely no-one else all day) - mainly because a) if there's a bit of a crowd gathered anywhere here, people come and have a look in case there's been an accident or something exciting and b) there were balloons. We also had a bit of a scrum drummed up by the Town Crier in full traditional regalia, marching through the town ringing his bell and bellowing his birthday greetings from an unfurled parchment. He bustled into the shop (still ringing and shouting) followed by a lot of children, two dogs and several drunks. The mayor, also in full regalia, was slightly behind this raggle-taggle procession, but finally made it.

Then there was cake-cutting and champagne-popping and more balloons and lots of clapping. I smiled a lot and signed books - any books - and chatted to all and sundry. Most of the all and sundry were my friends and people from the estate who find the book stuff quite amusing. Still, they kindly bought copies of Happy Birthday and let me sign them - and there were even quite a few people who didn't know me from Adam and came along simply for the signing session which was very flattering. One woman seemed quite affronted that I'd actually written a whole book, by myself, and didn't live in London. She felt, she explained quite seriously, that I couldn't consider myself a proper author as everyone knew all writers lived in London, but she thought I'd done ever so well anyway...

My good friend and fellow-local-writer, Jane Gordon Cumming, was there as well, signing copies of her fabulous rom com A Proper Family Christmas (top tip: buy it for Christmas pressies - it's brilliantly funny) and was only a little fazed by some of the estate's more colourful residents. After meeting Vee, Jerome, Shaz and Memphis and a couple of The Toyboy Trucker's fellow drivers (all shaven heads, piercings and tattoos) who'd come along to offer their solidarity and see what there was for free, Jane said knowingly that she could see where I got my characters from... However, nothing but nothing could have prepared her for the arrival of the Snowdons.

The Snowdons also live on the estate, but not in our terrace, and I first met them during one of my evening shifts at Hairy Harry's. They'd come in for a meal - Mr and Mrs Snowdon, both in their seventies, and their middle-aged daughter Marcia - and it was they told me, the first time they'd ever eaten out. It showed. Hairy Harry's is a pretty run-of-the-mill estate pub with a fine pub grub menu - anything with chips - the Snowdons were Dressed Up for the occasion. In evening clothes dating back to the 1950s. Mr Snowdon had a tuxedo and a flat cap. Mrs Snowdon was wearing a fur stole. And Marcia looked like something from the Ascot scene in Pygmalion but possibly not Audrey Hepburn. I served them with Chicken New Yorker and Chips three times with extra tomato ketchup and three halves of shandy without batting an eyelid.

So, I really shouldn't have been surprised that they'd Dressed Up again for their visit to the Bookstore. This time they looked like rustic extras from an Agatha Christie adaptation. I was touched that they'd made the effort. It was, Mr Snowdon informed me and the whole shop, very loudly, their first visit to a book shop. He didn't hold with books. He'd never read a book. They gave you ideas. However, Marcia liked them so they'd come along. He then insisted on introducing me to everyone as Mrs Townsend "... she'm worth a mint, this gel... millions she'm got from that ol' book writing. Blame wrong if you asks me - why would anyone wanna pay money for them ol' books. Loada bloody rubbish she writes..."

Yes, I kept a straight face. I'm not sure about Jane - I didn't dare to look at her. Elle, who was there as moral support for just such an occasion, simply screamed with laughter and ran away, and The Toyboy Trucker staggered outside for a restorative cigarette. Anyway, I bravely signed a book for Marcia who curtsied (not that I can make any comment about this as when I was first introduced to Katie Fforde many years ago I was so star-struck that I also curtsied...).

Anyway, on the whole, the party went well. I sold nearly fifty copies of Happy Birthday, ate a lot of cake, drank too much fizz, and carried several balloons home while lustily singing Bobby Shaftoe.

And now I can't wait to do it all again next year!

Book Winners

2008-11-09T22:36:00.000Z

Sorry for the blog silence recently - my computer is having an off spell - a very off spell - anyway, while it's allowing me thirty seconds online, I'd like to announce that Ellen and Lori have been picked as the winners of last week's double-book-giveaway. Congrats to you both - you'll both be receiving signed copies of Margaret's Dr Devereux's Proposal and my Happy Birthday. If you could let me have your snail mail addresses via the email link on my website http://www.christinajones.co.uk/ then I'll get the copies of Happy Birthday in the post straight away. Many thanks for taking part - and I really hope you'll enjoy reading both books.

Happy Birthday - again!

2008-11-06T09:25:00.000Z

Because the computer has currently got the heebie-jeebies, this post should have appeared last Thursday and didn't - so it's a bit out of date, but I'm sure it won't matter and anyway it's only a bit of trumpet-blowing really. Soooo...

Hurrah! At last! Happy Birthday is published today! Well, in paperback (the hardback in August doesn't really count as it was for libraries and book clubs and not for general sale in shops) and I'm so pleased with it. Well, not with the writing of course, because that would be showing off, but with seeing it as a real book in its lovely, lovely Ella Tjader cover. Digressing a bit here - I emailed Ella to thank her when she did the stonking cover for Heaven Sent, and she replied and said she'd done a lot of book jackets but I was the only author who had ever said thank you. I couldn't believe that. She's brilliant - and unless you're a huge name it has to be the cover that makes readers pick the book up in the first place. So here's another massive thank you to the lovely Ella - a genius par excellence!

Hopefully, Happy Birthday will be on bookshelves in shops soon, but I never go and look any more just in case it isn't. There's nothing more gutting than excitedly tiptoeing towards the alphabetical lists in WH Smith or somewhere only to find that I'm not nestling cosily between Erica James and Belinda Jones...

This was another of my early and naive writerly assumptions - that every book published just automatically ended up in book shops. Wrong! The publishers have reps who trawl the stores for months, wheeling and dealing and trying to get/buy shelf space for their latest titles. Some succeed, others don't. I've had two books that never appeared anywhere. They were available on Amazon etc, but as for real shops - not a sniff. I've no idea why this happens - but it does and has, and hopefully it won't happen with Happy Birthday...

Oh, and as a bit of good news after all the recent rejections, today I've sold two more stories to Allers in Sweden and a longish, youngish romance to People's Friend. Three hits in one day - this has cheered me up no end I can tell you. People's Friend also asked for more young rom coms - so if any of you have anything remotely suitable languishing on your pc maybe PF is the place to try??? I'm certainly going to have another go.

If the computer behaves and stops crashing and freezing, I'll post again tomorrow about my book launch party on Saturday which was great fun and quite funny (especially the bit with the photographer and the balloons, oh and the town crier and the mayor in full regalia - oh yes, and especially the man who thought he knew me intimately and that I was someone called Mrs Townsend...).

Happy Anniversary!

2008-11-05T11:38:00.001Z

Today - November the Fifth - is my wedding anniversary. Well, not just mine, The Toyboy Trucker plays a fairly important part too, of course. This morning he left for work really early, but woke me up in the darkness with a kiss and a cup of tea and a tiny Toblerone (I love him! He knows me so well!).

And after he'd gone, and I'd staggered knee-deep in hungry cats to the kitchen, I found a hand-written anniversary card from him. Now, we don't usually do anniversary cards because we know how we feel and tonight's anniversary firework party says it all for us - but we've had a particularly trying year for all sorts of reasons, and he'd written:

"I just wanted to say thank you for sharing my hopes and dreams and for being wonderful. You support me, laugh with me, make my successes sweeter and my disappointments more bearable. I'm so lucky that you share my life. Where would I be without you? Happy anniversary - with all my love always..."

I was in bits! Awash! Schmaltzy? Maybe - I don't care. Bring it on! I thought it was just wonderfully romantic... All these years together and he can still surprise me and make me go - oooh!!!

And we're having fireworks and champagne and fish and chips on the village green outside the house tonight - and everyone turns up and joins in and it's great. We had a Novemberthe Fifth firework wedding (and an even more explosive wedding reception which is why the majority of our wedding photos have a paramedic in them) because we love fireworks... And to celebrate this and to give Heaven Sent another bite of the cherry (and because other people find it amusing, I think) Little, Brown have asked me to post a piece about my lifelong love of fireworks and the wedding day (I left out the bit about the paramedics because it's scary) on their website - so if you want to know what really happened (except not the bit involving the paramedics) go to.... www.littlebrown.co.uk/home

Now off to read that card again, feeling even more gooey and romantic and starry-eyed than usual...

Reflections on Rejections

2008-11-04T10:39:00.000Z

Lordy! I'm absolutely amazed the postman didn't have a hernia delivering my mail this morning. There were eleven chunky packages - all from Take a Break...

Yep - ELEVEN!

Eleven stories rejected in one hit.

I didn't even remember submitting eleven stories and thought there must have been a mistake and they'd sent me someone else's manuscripts as well - but no, sadly they were all mine. Take a Break must have been storing them up for ages to give me a lovely surprise... Eleven rejections in one go has to be a record - even for me. And despite me saying, when I subbed them, that if they weren't accepted then I didn't want the manuscripts returned, I've got them back in all their unwanted glory. And, as I've said, they all came in separate envelopes.

Eleven envelopes each containing one rejected story, one standard letter saying they were rejected as they weren't suitable, and one set of guidelines to explain to me what "suitable" is. Aaargh!!!!

Eleven rejections at once is a pretty good way to knock the bounce out of even the most cock-eyed optimist - and with the eleven unwanted and unloved manuscripts in front of me it makes it sort of even more gruesomely real... So, yes - sob! It's official. I'm a failure. No, worse than that, I'm a fat failure. I'm probably going to have to eat cheese. Or a Toblerone. Or both. Together.

Now (half a day on from the above litany of awfulness) I've stopped swearing and pouting and grizzling and behaving like a prima donna, and have taken notice of a) the guidelines, and b) my rejected stories, and c) re-read my latest copies of Take A Break and Fiction Feast, and have to grudgingly admit they might have a point. Okay, they might be right. All right - yes, they were right. Maybe my stories weren't quite suitable... just maybe... But I'd have appreciated them being not quite suitable in smaller quantities. The sheer volume of not suitableness is just a bit overwhelming.

So, being positive here, currently I'm sitting with eleven TaB rejections, five Woman's Weekly rejections, and that three-part serial that might just be okay for My Weekly when it's been rewritten with all the bleak bits removed... So, being even more positive, that means I've got sixteen already-written stories that just need a bit of a tweak (and a serial that probably only needs working on for a day or so!!!) - then all I need to do is find a new home for them... Piece of cake (oooh no! Don't mention cake!) - this writing game is easy-peasy - just have to try and work the eleven rather sordid TaBs into something nicely cosy for People's Friend, and cull the WWs into something sassy with a twist in the tail for TaB... There! Sorted! Bring on the next problem...

On the plus side, Little,Brown have sent me three great reviews for Happy Birthday which all appeared in papers over the weekend and it isn't even out yet. This cheered me up no end as everyone seemed to like it and said all the right things like - funny, warm, cheerful, humorous, charming, compassionate, well-observed characters, satisfying story lines, gentle, romantic and lovely.... Two of them even said they loved it, and they all recommended it as a Good Read.

I'm not bragging you understand - just trying to offset the grimness of ELEVEN rejections...

ELEVEN!!!!

BIG Book Giveaway!!!

2008-11-02T11:15:00.000Z

I've got loads to blog about (Halloween, the Radio Oxford broadcast, organising the Happy Birthday launch party in Abingdon next Saturday, finally decorating the hall/stairs/landing, eating 6 chocolate meringues in Asda car-park, having a cold) but it'll have to wait because today I'm giving away books!!! New books! As-yet-unpublished books!

I'm really excited to have been included in a joint romantic novel giveaway with Harlequin Mills & Boon. Not only will the winner receive a signed copy of my latest bucolic frolic, Happy Birthday (okay, so it's out this week but it's not out yet), they will also get a signed copy of the sizzlingly sensational Dr Devereux's Proposal by Margaret McDonagh.

Margaret, as regular blog-readers will know, is one of my closest friends (and given to encouraging me to eat my body-weight in ice-cream, and to spilling the beans on most of my misdemeanors - as only truly good friends can), and she's been kind and generous enough to include me in her own HM&B giveaway.

Margaret is a terrifically talented and prolific author who writes warm, sexy, believable romantic novels about the most gorgeous medical men you'll ever meet, and the lovely, flawed and compassionate women who are lucky enough to get to fall in love with them, all set in glorious surroundings (Dr Devereux's Proposal is set in Cornwall and I was there). Oh, and I fell head-over-heels in love with Dr D on the first page!!!

You have two chances to win copies of these signed books. Simply answer the two questions at the end of this post – the answers can be found on Margaret's and my websites. Visit the NEW BOOK page on my website - http://www.christinajones.co.uk/ – for an extract of Happy Birthday. And at Margaret's website – http://www.margaretmcdonagh.com/ – for an extract for Dr Devereux's Proposal, found by going to the BOOKS page.

Margaret and I will each draw a winner next week and the two lucky people will get signed copies of both books. We'll both post the winner's names here and at Love Is The Best Medicine at http://medicalromance.blogspot.com/ the HM&B Medical Romance site, so do check back to see if it is you!

My question: What is the name of Phoebe's best friend and chief bridesmaid in Happy Birthday?

Margaret's question: What is the name of the greyhound Lauren has rehomed in Dr Devereux's Proposal?

Good luck!!!