Those of you who are particularly eagle eyed will have noticed that I have changed the description of what I am above (the bit below the title of this blog).

[Warning: I may ramble]

Now, there is a reason for this: saying who I am and what I do isn't something I find particularly easy. I do a lot of different things. Firstly I'm a writer. I write. But I write all sorts: poems, short stories, flash fiction, my book for children (which is back in stock at Amazon) - and goodness knows what else. And I run workshops. And a writing group. And I've had features published. And photographs.

So. Anyway. I decided, a little while ago, that the most appropriate definition of me, one which would appear at the top of this blog, was: Writer and Poet.

I kept it simple.

Last week, I stumbled upon a blog who'd kindly linked to me. It belongs to Emerging Writer and is well worth a look.

What she said initially made me chuckle (in a nice way), because she wondered how I created poems (if I didn't write them: writer and poet, see?).

And then I worried: had I said something really silly?

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Apparently (well, it's a fact) when you get to 65 your tax code goes up. If I'd sent back the form asking 'Have your circumstances changed?' and tracked down my NI number before Christmas, I'd have found out earlier. I wouldn't have accumulated enough to make me throw caution to the winds, though. Well, I wouldn't have bought this picture.


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I've just asked my daughter what to blog about - inspiration sagging after a day storming ahead with the novel, and then wading through a deskful of admin - and she said, 'Chocolate'. Unfortunately, this isn't really a cooking blog, or a chocolate eating blog, though both are high on my list of pleasures. I was wondering what had happened to fifteen years of education, when I remembered how a friend of mine described one of our favourite authors. Trying to pin down the appeal, she described Georgette Heyer as 'brain chocolate'.

Just in case there are a few readers who don't know what I'm talking about, permit me to point you towards the piece I wrote for Vulpes Libris, which attempts to describe her appeal. Or if, even then, you don't get it, just subsitute your own best in-the-bath or in-bed-with-a-cold reading.

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It's good to read, just like it's good to talk (according to BT).


Of course it's good to read, I hear you say. If your nose never graces a book, then realistically what hopes do you have of ever becoming an author?
Granted, you may have been a great speller at primary school and top in the creative writing competitions, but if you don’t read much, let alone stop to analyse a book, then halt your writing dreams now I say.

And this brings me onto what I deem a very valid question - what makes a good book? It’s a question which has been asked many times and one which has generated all manner of interesting replies.
Is is a good story? Interesting characters - ones which the reader can relate to? Or is a good book one which, when you take it to bed, simply allows you to escape the last few hours of a mundane Monday thanks to its engaging plot and intriguing storyline?



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Nothing fills my heart with more dread or makes me feel more like a bona fide gibbering dolt. Honestly, I’ve given it a lot of thought and it really is my number one social anxiety. It climbs head and shoulders above such trivial concerns as having spinach in the teeth, garlic breath, broken knicker elastic or unzipped flies – all at the same time. Even calling one’s closest friends or nearest and dearest by the wrong names fades into insignificance in comparison.

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Writing – any writing – is an exercise in communication. Writing fiction, in particular, is a peculiarly intimate kind of communication. The writer creates a private world which she wants others to share and enjoy; she puts down on paper, through the medium of story, some of her most personal thoughts and feelings about life, relationships and the things that are truly important, because she feels she has ideas to impart. And then…?

For the unpublished writer, the hoped-for dialogue is all in the future; the lack of anywhere to obtain feedback and validation is a perennial and much-vented problem. But when I am published, you tell yourself, all that will change. At last people will read what I have to say. I will get to communicate...


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Luckily, the Fylde there is flat, particularly if you take the coast road, instead of the shorter route via Kirkham and the High Gate Hotel. I did this sometimes, glad to see the pub sign at the top of the long haul with its message:

'The gate hangs high,
And hinders none.
Refresh yourself,
Then travel on.'



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Since I wrote about the Wirral library closures just before Christmas, I’ve had loads of hits from people searching for info on them, so although there are far more authoritative websites on the subject (principally Campaign for the Book), I want to spread the word about the latest thing you can do to protest ...


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This morning I received a really nice email from another writer who seems to be in the hideous maelstrom that is the submission/rejection process. Now...

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I woke up this morning to a lovely email from one of the editors at Literary Mama who wants to read from my short story, The Swimming Pool and the Sea, at a national conference

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