Was thrilled last night to get my second review of Thorn in the Flesh from Margaret Gill, author of young adult novel, Narwhal - as below:

“Thorn in the Flesh is a gripping psychological thriller whose central character Kate goes through a whole gamut of emotions from the deeply sensual to the tenderness of true friendship, betrayal, loss, fear, a sense of personality annihilation and nail biting terror. I am constantly amazed by Anne Brooke's ability to understand abnormal levels of perversion. But at the end of this novel one is left not with the feeling of an abnormal caricature but more with a query and urge to understand what strange twist of otherwise normal events could have sown such a tragic seed.” ...

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My new e book Don't Mind Me is now available at £5 from www.chipmunkapublishing.co.uk and the paperback version will be out towards the end of the year!

Don't Mind Me deals with my dysfunctional childhood my abusive first marriage my experience of rape and domestic violence, my descent into psychosis and my remarkable recovery

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My story, Seconds are Ticking By, is now up over at Smokelong Quarterly. Looking forward to having a read of the rest of the issue - I am a big fan of it.

Oh, and there's also a small interview with me about the piece, and flash fiction, there, which you can see by clicking here.



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Hello everyone. Having stretched out the time as much as possible in my old, much-loved house, I finally caved in and moved in with my dad for a while. The owners are selling the old house, sad as it is, so I’ve had no choice but to jump ship.

The good news is that, for the meantime, I’m back online! I even have access to a fully functioning office in which to finish my book (I’d say I’m about 3 months off the end now, if I stay at the present speed, sans editing...I'm getting excited!). The bad news is that my love life has taken a little knock...

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Lots of rain today. We were thinking about going for a quick walk and looking at birds but the weather soon put a stop to that. However, I have to say the garden was a riot of birds - blue tits, dunnocks, robins and green woodpeckers. Fabulous. And how much more pleasant that we could just stay in the warmth and look out at them ...

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Lately, there’s been a lot of all three around. I’m not going to dwell on the usual newspaper fodder – crazy weather, annoying (possibly corrupt) politicians, shamefully mistreated military personnel, crime, violence, binge drinking and mind-bendingly dull ‘celebrities’. I’m sure you already know all you ever wanted to (and probably quite a bit more) about those subjects. Instead, I offer you just a few examples of each from my own recent experience:

The Good:

1. The members of lovely online writing community WriteWords have been enjoying a lot of success lately. Recently published books include Mothernight by Sarah Stovell, A Vengeful Longing by Roger Morris, Chips, Beans and Limousines by Leila Rasheed, Thorn in the Flesh by Anne Brooke, Split by a Kiss by Luisa Plaja, and Ways to Live Forever by Sally Nicholls - also the well-deserved winner of the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize.


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A lazy lie-in this morning and then I continued with the Darshan edit for Goldenford. I'm now on Page 123 and am enjoying the flow of it. Not making many suggestions either - just typos and one or two minor changes only. Certainly nothing major. It's lovely to edit a novel where it's been given a good polish already. Makes all the difference to the job!...

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It's been a hard week, beginning with the last of my World Book Day visits (I can hardly believe that this has been my third World Book Day, by the way) which was followed by hard writing work. I spent all week tweaking a short story. Goodness me, it was hard work! I reminded myself of the poet in that joke (the one which goes something like: a poet was telling a friend how hard he'd been working. 'I spent the whole morning putting a comma in,' he said, 'and the whole afternoon taking it out.').

With the story almost done I found myself with a few little niggles to sort out. So I sent three different questions (they came up at different times) to three trusted readers. And you know what? Every one of them not only answered my question - they all went into real detail, commenting on the piece as a whole; far beyond the call of duty

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Lord H and I have spent a wonderful day at the Glyndebourne Members' Open Day today, doing all sorts of strange and bizarre things. First off was the Sing-a-long Carmen session, where we all sat in the opera house and were put through our paces by the enthusiastic and rather too optimistic chorus master. Carmen from scratch in an hour - well, I certainly hit notes I didn't even realise I had though not necessarily at the time I needed them. I have also discovered that my skills at singing and clapping in the right place at the same time are utter crap. I just can't do it, dahlings. Not without medical attention and a strong tailwind ...

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Alexandra interviews Leila Rasheed, author of Chips, Beans and Limousines: The Fantastic Diary of Bathsheba Clarice de Trop, reviewed by us here

Hello! How did you get the inspiration for Chips, Beans and Limousines?

Well, lots of different places, but I think sometimes the world just irritates me and one thing that annoys me is that we live in a culture where getting the next expensive gadget or glamorous jeans or whatever is supposed to make you happy. And, hey, guess what, it doesn't. So I wanted to start from the point of view of a girl who has everything, and is not happy at all, because she lacks some very simple things that everyone takes for granted - like a dad, friends, someone to love her and pay attention to her. I wrote it really quickly, and I think perhaps in reaction to a phase of feeling low in self-confidence (probably I'd been rejected by an agent or something!). I just wanted to imagine someone who was totally self-confident, to the point of arrogance, and just was convinced she was the best and didn't need anyone else's approval. That's where the voice came from, and the character - who in fact turns out to be far more vulnerable underneath - developed from the voice.

Do you sympathize with Bathsheba?

Yes, definitely. My mum was always working when I was a teenager, I mean, she had to, but sometimes one would hardly see her for days. And my dad was working abroad. So in that sense I do know how she feels.

How did you come up with the name: Bathsheba Clarice de Trop? It comes across as perfect!

Do you know, it almost had to be changed in the editing process - but thankfully it wasn't in the end! I love it, I think it works perfectly. I was just looking for the most over the top name I could think of, I probably looked in the Bible or something for a melodramatic name and found Bathsheba, then I wanted something to keep the rhythm so that's where Clarice fitted in, and then de Trop finished it off nicely, and also means "over the top". I think the rhythms of names are really important - look at Roald Dahl's character names, they all sound so good! Charlie Bucket and Harry Potter have the same rhythm and bounce - I think that's significant.

Have you always been a writer?

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