Normal service.....

....will be resumed soon, i hope.

It's been an odd time for me, recently. The crappy happenings of a few months back have started to hit hard. Silly me, I assumed that once the initial crying and bleeding was over with it would be onwards and upwards. I am lucky in one respect, as i have had little experience of grief in my life. However this meant that I was blissfully unaware that grief is a sneaky little bastard. It lurks beneath the surface until you think you've got your head above water, and then it grabs you by the ankle, pulling you down before you've had a chance to grab your breath. So these last few months have been like wading through mud.

And yet, whilst part of me is emotionally sapped, I'm doing great in other areas ~ I made the long-list (although not the short-list) of a short story competition that i had forgotten I had entered, which was an unexpected boost.

And I'm writing a lot. The novel is a bit of a fluffy duvet, which I can wrap myself up in and be far far removed from all the cacky mundanity. I have got almost an entire notebook of longhand to type up, and I've added a few new characters. Really pleased with how its going.

Also, I'm back on stage, which is another extremely fluffy duvet to wardoff all the nasty reality. Short version: husband is a professional actor, and we met through the theatre. I used to be involved in a lot of productions both on and back-stage. And, if I may be so bold as to blow my own trumpet, I wasn't too shabby an actress. And then allsorts got in the way ~ working full time & doing a part-time degree, writing, planning the wedding, moving house and so on ~ and so in the last fours years I've only taken one part on stage. And then out of the blue I got offered a part in a new play. A big part. And of the other adults cast, I'm the only non-professional, which I'm taking to be quite a compliment. And it's great. There really is nothing like being someone else for a while to literally take you out of yourself.

So, a mixed bag, this last few months: some bits are up, some bits are down, and I'm just in the middle trying to make some sense of it all.

And I still can't shake the feeling that there's something amazing on the horizon....... :-)

Freezing, but smiling

Hell, I know I'm pretty far north, but where is Spring, please? I am sick of being cold....and there's snow forecast for the Easter weekend.

So, in an attempt to cheer meself up I have shamelessly nicked Caroline's idea of a post about 34 things that make her smile. And so, in no particular order, we have:

1. home made soup

2. little round chocolates in bags (Maltesers, Revels, minstrels, et al)

3. my morning cup of strong tea, in my pint mug

4. waking up early

5. sticking on my running shoes and going for a challenging run…

6. …especially in my local park

7. puppies.

8. daffodils ~ such happy, happy faces

9. putting kitchen scraps into the wormery

10. pyjamas ~ I would wear nothing else, if possible... but people tend to point and laugh at you in the supermarket

11. the glass of wine on a Friday evening which signals the official start of the weekend….

12. ….to be sipped from one of my beeyootiful crystal glasses (engagement present from Grandma)

13. my husband

14. the crispy bits of cheese you get around the edge of a lasagne

15. a long hot bath

16. camomile and peppermint tea

17. being so absorbed by a book that you live it, breath it, dream about it

18. and deciding what to read next, after that one’s finished

19. my best friend

20. steak, with grilled onions and mushrooms

21. opening the curtains to see that the carpet of crocuses in my front garden is in full bloom

22. Seinfeld

23. making a ‘to do’ list….

24. … and then crossing things off it

25. unexpected compliments (giving and receiving them)

26. music, of (almost) any variety

27. detective novels

28. CSI Vegas and NY ~ but NOT Miami!

29. money in the bank

30. feather pillows and duvet

31. a new notebook

32. Waterman fountain pens

33. coincidence and synchronicity

34. rice pudding


So, what makes you smile?

Catching up.....

Not a huge amount done of the writing front of late ~ I've been felled by a rather vile projectile vomiting bug which has laid me low (but on the plus side my trousers are a wee bit looser, so silver lining and all that). The geyser-like qualities have subsided, but I'm quite run down, and it's all I can do to drag myself through to the end of the proper job work day at 5pm at the mo. Lots of ideas have floated through my slightly addled and dehydrated brain, though, so I've got lots to be cracking on with once i regain the strength to lift my pen again.

One of the best things about being ill is that bed rest and book reading are entirely compatible. So I've finished 'Behind the Scenes at the Museum', and WOW! I can't stop thinking about it, and I'm still seeing everything through the eyes of Ruby Lennox. I am in awe at Atkinson's ability to conceive of, such a complex family history and in such holistic, vivid detail. If you haven't read it, do so NOW!

I'm now reading 'In Search of Adam' ~ very powerful, and another admirably individual narrative voice. And the fact that it's set in my locality gives me a little frisson everytime I recognise a setting or place name.

I'm racing through ISOA, as it's so very 'readable'. Any recommendations for what I could read next?

Violence is golden

So, No Country for Old Men won four Oscars.

Hhhhmmmm.

I am seemingly in a minority of one, given my dislike of the film. Not dislike, even, more total apathy. I sat in the cinema wondering is this was really the film which scored 94% on Rotten Tomatoes?

I found the juxtaposition of underplayed acting with a Tom & Jerry-esque level of violence somewhat jarring. And if character is destiny, please can someone tell me why none of the leads appeared to have any real motivation behind their actions? Moss was running from Chigurh because Chigurh was chasing Moss.

Maybe it's Cormac McCarthy I can't quite take to ~ I seem to recall skiving off uni the week were supposed to be studying All the Pretty Horses. Although I'm tempted to give it a go now. Anyone read it? Yay, or nay?

Speaking of reading, I'm currently reading Behind the Scenes at The Museum, and loving it. How did it take me so long to discover this? I'm already getting sad at the prospect of finishing it. Still, I've discovered a wonderful new author, so now I can add a fair few more books to the TBR pile, and drift ever further from my resolution to buy no more books until I've read all the ones in the house.

I predict a dramatic increase in the word count next week, following the finale of the shoutiest cooking show on TV, Masterchef. I am desperately addicted, and will be bereft without it next week. It's James' to throw away: Emily has made too many mistakes this week, and Jonny will no doubt seve up a variation on meat and potatoes like he does for nigh upon every meal.

You're not the only one

The deadline for submissions for the charity anthology "You're not the only one" is looming, and i'm toying with submitting this piece (any crits more than welcome :-)) :


You’re not the only one. Happens all the time, quite common, really.

But it doesn’t happen all of the time to me. It’s not that common to me.

And at least now you know that you can conceive.

Thank you. But this was our baby, not a dress rehearsal.

I’m sure that everything will work out fine next time.

Are you? I wish I was. I’ve heard that before, in tones implying that I was a silly little thing, so anxious over a few spots of blood.

Its nature’s way, you know.

Ah, is it? And here’s me thinking I was being punished by some particularly vengeful god.

And at least it wasn’t born with something wrong with it.

We’ll crack open the bubbly.

It was probably for the best.

There have been a lot of ‘bests’ in my life so far. Losing my baby isn’t one of them.

I don’t know what to say.

No-one does. And that's just fine. There are no words that can make a difference. “Sorry” will do just fine

Word of the day

hypnopompic (hip-no-POM-pik) adjective


Pertaining to the semiconscious state before waking.

[From Greek hypnos (sleep) + pompe (sending away).]


Lovely word, for a delicious gauzy part of the day ~ my favourite part of the day, perhaps :-)



I haven't been blogging much lately ~ I've felt the need to curl up into a wee ball and attempt a form of hibernation. In fact I've been fairly hypnopompic. Haven't done much running or writing either, and that is offically A Bad Thing. I have promised myself I'll be a bit more proactive next week. maybe. If it's a bit warmer.



The lovely Iain Banks tells us Why he writes in The Guardian:

Q: What advice would you give to new writers?

A: The Three Ps: practice, practice, practice. Writing is like everything else: the more you do it the better you get.


Gawd bless him. He speak the truth.

Getting there

First and foremeost, heartfelt thanks to everyone who has passed on their kind thoughts following news of the miscarriage. I really do appreciate it.

And thank you to Zinnia for pointing me in the direction of Boob Pencil. So much of Clare's experince mirrors mine, and there's a comfort in reading about someone else going through, and ultimately coming out of the other side of, the same load of shit. "21 Reasons Why a Miscarriage is A Bit Rubbish" made me laugh, a lot, at a time when I didn't think I could manange to twitch the corners of my mouth into any semblance of jollity. The following excerpts were especially welcome [& I hope it's ok to reproduce this here?]:

(11) It goes on forever. I think most people assume (I certainly did) that you collapse in a big pile of blood for a few hours, and then it's all over. But no. It takes days, sometimes weeks, for it all to come out. And modern scanning techniques mean you often know (as we did) it's going to happen before it actually happens. So first you get the waiting. Then the bleeding. Then more waiting. More scans. More bleeding. And so on. It's rather tiresome.
(12) You don't get anything proper to grieve over, so you feel you have to gloss over it all the time. Unfortunately, your hormones don't agree.
(14) Babies and pregnancies and all related matters are fucking everywhere. You will not escape.
(15) It's a very common complaint. It doesn't even make you special. At least if I'd given birth to a half-horse-half-hippopotamous it would have given us something to talk about.
(19) People's faces. Ally said last week he didn't want to go into work cos he couldn't be arsed arranging his face. People are either too sympathetic or not sympathetic enough. I don't want people to act like nothing's happened, but I don't want them fawning all over me either. Sorry folks, you're best avoiding me for a bit. I don't have an Etiquette Guide for this one, and I'll change my mind from one moment to the next.
(20) Sick leave. The pain and the bleeding come and go. The tears come and go. Sometimes I'm fine. I feel crap for taking all this time off work. But I really don't want to go to work. But I still feel guilty.

Number 20 is especially pertinent to me. I took all of last week off work. Coming back on Monday was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. Not because I dreaded the sympathetic head tilt and wan smile that I’ve seen a thousand a day since it happened (see number 19 above), but because it marked the end of it all. Back to normality.
When I was pregnant I loved having this tiny little secret that I carried wth me everywhere. And even following the miscarriage everything in my life was still all about the baby and the pregnancy, albeit the loss thereof. I enjoyed (as far as possible, given the circumstances) my week of coccooned protection from reality. Things were still going on outside my four walls, but they didn’t touch me. I was safe, removed from it all. It was all still "special”, somehow. But starting the week on Monday was like someone had hit rewind, and I’d gone back in time two months, to the days before the wee one existed at all. And I hated that part of it, the sense of erasure. Things aren’t special anymore. My breasts don’t hurt, I don’t feel sick, I’m not exhausted. And I can’t talk to him in my head anymore, which I miss, because I used to do that all of the time.


But on the plus side I have thrown myself into reading (such an escapist pursuit) and writing (ditto), and I’ve been running again. In fact, on saturday I went running in my gorgeous local park. I was really enjoying the catharsis, until I bumped (not quite literally, but almost) into the lady from the hospital who peerformed my scans and had the unenviable job of telling me that there was no heartbeat. I ran away pretty fast, not least in case she told me off for runing 8 days aftr a miscarriage, but it shook me up quite considerably.

But I'm much much better now. I'll never be totally over it, but I'm getting as close to "over it" as I can.

Sad news

Sadly impending baby #1 is no longer impending.

On Thursday I had a further scan, as I had more slight bleeding. Unfortunately there was no heartbeat.

I was advised that I would need to undergo a medical procedure to remove the foetus and associated tissue. However on Friday morning nature took care of things, and I miscarried. It was harrowing, but somehow better than an operation, and helped me to feel as if it was "finalised".

Physically, I am recovering. Emotionally, I don't think it's quite sunk in yet ~ I'm still flooded with pregnancy hormones, and I have to keep reminding myself that I am no longer pregnant.

My husband has been outstanding in his support and care of me. We are both extremely saddened, but hope to try again soon.

In telling people I've been astounded by the number of people who have been through the same thing, and I'm finding that rather comforting. The woman who hasn't miscarried on at least one occasion is few and far between, and the vast majority of those woman have gone on to have one or more healthy babies.

Thank you to everyone for their kind comments over the last few weeks. Hopefully there'll be more good news soon (but ONLY to be announced after the magical 12 week point.)

Trust in the universe

Impending baby#1 has lead us to start clearing out a lot of the old rubbish from our spare bedroom (otherwise the baby will be sleeping in the garage).

In going through my many boxes of pointless old tat I was reminded just how pretentiously "New Age" I was in my younger years ~ embarrassingly so, in fact.

Over recent years I've become much less hippy dippy ~ maybe it's age, although I think my psychology degree went a long way towards instilling a hefty dose of scientific pragmatism into me.

But I haven't lost that side of myself completely. There's still a part of me that believes that if you take a leap of faith, with the best of intentions, then the universe will throw a safety net beneath you.

Yesterday we had quite a harried day ~ I've entered the headaches and mood swings part of pregnancy, which is bringing much joy to husband and myself. We have been very worried about money ~ how we will afford the essential renovations needed to the house prior to the birth, how we will afford the mortgage once I'm reduced to Statutory Maternity Pay, how we will afford childcare once I go back to work....... And after many tears, recriminations and frantic calculations, I decided that we just had to trust that things would be alright. There are lots of people a lot worse off than ourselves, and they manage. Something would turn up, though i couldn't envisage what that would be.

And, unbeliveably, it did. This morning. Access to a wee pot of money which will see us through the renovations and ease the financial strain of my reduced maternity income.

I have never been so relieved, or so grateful. I owe an enormous "thank you" to someone or something, somewhere. So lets call that someone or something the universe.

You can take the girl out of the New Age.....

A post with no title ..... cos I can't think of one.

It has just occurred to me that the blog title here is incredibly outdated, given that The DeadBeats novel floundered some time back and is currently in a coma, possibly to be reawakened at some unspecified point in the future. Ah well, I don't think you can change them on blogger (although if anyone knows different, please share!)

I know it's premature, but i LOVE 2008! It's been a rather sparkling start to the new year for me so far:

* Got my first 1000 words off to The "Wannabe a writer?" novel opening competition. Seriously doubt it will get anywhere (I lost track of the days due to the Christmassy suspension of real time, and ended up hastily editing it early saturday morning before diving into the post office to catch the post en route to a wedding. Not the ordered and considered approach I would have preferred). Of course, this was technically 2007, but I'm counting it as 2008 as that is when the judging will commence.

* Lots of writing done so far this year. And we're only 3 days in. Hurrah!

* Have not wigged out, panicked, or been unbalanced and control-freaky in any way shape or form yet.

* I'm pregnant so I don't have to bother pretending that I'll try and lose weight this year. Bring on the rice pudding!

* Looking back over 2007 I achieved, or made progress on, all of my goals. Yee-haw!

2008 is going to be a good 'un. I can just tell.

David Mitchell: Why I write
What advice would you give to new writers?
A maximum of one killer metaphor or simile per page should be ample, and watch out for the word "seem": it debases one's own currency, somehow. Think about how the writers who you love manage to make you love them. Prose that contains too many sentences beginning with the word "I" soon gets as tedious as people who begin too many sentences with the word "I".


I'll be adding the above to the writing resolutions. This eveing will be spent tippling on non-alcoholic champers (tastes vaguely of dry roasted peanuts, weirdly) and finalising the list of "Things to do in 2008", before putting it somewhere for safe-keeping, never to be seen again by human eye.


Put up or Shut up, Susan Hill (sort of) implored in the most recent post of her online Creative Writing course. This year I'll be putting up, and will be a veritable writing demon. The impending arrival of baby #1 has given me a focus and deadline that I have lacked previously.

Feeling very very optimistic about 2008!

Best Christmas present ever!

Back from the hospital, and all is well.

I saw my baby, and their tiny little heart was beating away like billy-o. That's him / her posing for the camera on the left :-)

From the size, they have dated the little sprog at seven weeks and one day, so slightly younger than we thought.

I don't think I have ever felt so relieved in all of my life. Ah, the joys of parenthood! I'm sure this is just the first of many, many worries about the wee one.....

Tenterhooks....

Although I haven't "officially" announced it, most people have deciphered my shamelessly obvious hints and concluded, correctly, that I am pregnant. Eight weeks, to be exact, which I know is prior to the golden public deadline of twelve weeks, but I just couldn't help myself. We've told family and close friends, given that the impending festive season was going to make my sipping of a soda water look thoroughly "bah, humbug!" otherwise.

Today is going to be the longest day of my life. I've been awake since around 5 a.m., and I've been counting down the hours for the last two days. At 3p.m. I am booked for an early scan, as I experienced some bleeding earlier in the week ~ very light, and not accompanied by any pain (this is apparently a good sign, according to the 4000 websites I have pored over for the last few days) .

It has happened on three occassions now, and being a highly-strung worrying type I am beside myself.

I have convinced myself that I no longer "feel" pregnant ~ the sickness has subsided, the breast tenderness that would keep me awake half the night has disappeared ~ and so I am reconciled to the worst outcome. At least that way any good news will be a bonus.

Only four more hours, and I'll know if my little bean is still hanging on in there. This will either be the best or worst Christmas I've ever had.

Apologies for the lack of festive tone to this post, but I felt the need to get it all out there.

Update will follow as soon as is feasible.

Distinctly pleased!

I've just received my mark for the OU Creative Writing course A215, and am thrilled to announce that I received a DISTINCTION!!

Only 6% of the course finishers acheived that grade (91 out of 1444) so I am very very pleased indeed.It's one hell of a boost to my writing confidence, and seeing as I'm full of bouncy new motivation for the WIP it will inspire me to bang that word count up quite considerably.

My voice and use of language were classified as "excellent", which is especially useful to me as I've never been fully confident in my voice, and have a tendency to over-write.

If only I could have a drink to celebrate (but that's a whole other lot of good news .... ;--) )

*************************************

Good news is abounding all over the place. Bestest best friend in the world has just got engaged, and I couldn't be happier for them. And it means I'll get to go to another wedding, one where I get to watch it all unfold before me rather than being slap bang in the middle of things, like I was at the most recent wedding I attended (i.e. mine).

But the universe is nothing if not balanced, hence my shocking unpreparedness for Christmas, and the husband's perforated ear-drum. Ah well, Christmas is only one day, and ear drums heal (I'll just have to shout at him in the other one....)

Progress continues apace

Things acheived yesterday:

A big in-road was made into the mountain of bags and boxes which are still, shamefully, cluttering up our spare bedroom since we moved TWO YEARS AGO!!
This resulted in two HUGES bags of rubbish and two HUGE bags of charity shop stuff, as well as a pile of vintage stuff from my younger days which I anticipate will make a mint on ebay ~ sadly I don't fit into any of it anymore, it's all stuff from when I was 15-19 ish (and at least a stone lighter), but it's very good 60's & 70's vintage. Sadly my days of retro dressing pre-dated the vintage boom of the last few years, as sported by Moss et al, and so I was regarded as something of a jumble sale odd-bod back then. But hey, pioneers are always misunderstood, aren't they? I'll be sorry to see it go, to be honest, those clothes represent such a wonderful time in my life, but my house isn't big enough to be a museum to the younger me. Time to move on.....

Also got quite a bit off writing done yesterday evening, and a bit more this morning too ~ all longhand, as the laptop is officially dead, but momentum is picking up gain.

So, all in all a very useful day.

Incidentally, found out today that a colleague of mine has run off with her next door neighbour. Now, if I put that in a story I'd be criticised for resorting to cliche. Stranger than fiction, eh....

C'mon, Kingsley!

Decided that after the general apathy of the last few weeks (some of it entirely self-indulgent, some of it due to a horrible cold-y thing that I couldn't shake off, which gave me the energy levels of a dying fly) I decided to start this week with a good old shake and dust-down.

Decided to be super-positive, and I whizzed through the day with bags of energy. Then I managed to take myself off for a not-too-shabby three mile run, followed by a bit of structural research for the novel.

The "bounce-back" attitude clearly worked: This morning I was delighted to be offered a fantastic part in a play (I've been known to tread a board or two, in my time, although its been a few years), working with a script by a writer I know personally and admire a great deal, and a wonderful director who I've worked with a few times before. I'm going to have to turn it down, sadly (reasons why will follow ~ they're non-negotiable), but just to be offered it was an amazing boost, and extremely flattering.

It's been a good week so far.

Lack of (pro)creativity

All those years of scrupulous contraception, the fearful frissons of "what if??..." following an unwise risk, the sea-shanty of nausea that sploshed around me on the occassion I took the morning after pill, the assumption that my perky wee ova were brazenly touting for the attention of any passing spermatazoa ~ I thought getting pregnant was as easy as falling on your back.

Turns out it's far far harder than that. Or at least it is for us: we know six couples who fell pregnant first time of trying, including two who were using contraception at the time too. And so I had an inkling that statistically we wouldn't be quite so lucky, that we'd be that 10-20% of couples with subfertility issues.

Not that we've been trying for years and years, like some couples~ but when you're the wrong side of 30 (and just a kick in the pants off 35) you don't want to hang around for too long.

So, this morning I had a nice chat with a lovely doctor, and she explained to me all the dignified and entirely unrevolting, stress-free procedures me and the husband can undergo if this month doesn't prove to be a winner in the baby stakes.

This pre-occupation with baby business has sapped my creativity rather a lot recently, hence my absence from blogdom, and the miniscule amount of novel progress. That, and the fact that my laptop is proving as dysfunctional as my ovaries. The man in the shop tells me I have something wrong with my motherboard.

Oh, the irony.....

Cosy sloth

Clocks have gone back, winter is chipping in, and I’ve just turned 34. And all I want to do is sleep. Is anyone else finding impossible to get into gear? Maybe it’s the lack of a decent summer, making the chilly weather all the harder to bear. And it’s odd, because I’m more of an autumnal than summer person ~ I hate being too hot, and I’m much happier in a cosy jumper and a pair of boots than a flippy sun-dress.

But so far I’m not slipping into November quite the way one would a warm bath. I want to spend every evening curled on the sofa in my jammies drinking green tea and watching Gordon Ramsey lambaste the latest “worst”kitchen he’s ever seen (seriously addicted to Kitchen Nightmares. What with that, CSI:NY and Strictly Come Dancing I may not make it out in public again till at least January.) Work has been busier than usual too, which hasn’t been helping with the “oomph” factor. I think I was born to hibernate.

Running, writing and renovations have been on the back burner. Anyone recommend any energy boosters for November slothiness?

One thing which may jolt me into alertness is a recent critique from Jacqui Bennett Writers Bureau ~ lots and lots of stuff was picked up (despite my best efforts I tend to fall down a little on the proof reading side of things ~ I’ve generally been over my pieces again and again and again, to the point where I know them by heart and I read what should be on the page rather than what actually is on the page) but I am the type who relishes criticism, the balder the better, so I’m raring to take those comments back to my other writings and trim some of the fat from them. Hearteningly the critique concluded “it is clear that you are an imaginative and talented writer.” So that’s added a little warm glow that will possibly bouy me through to the New Year.

An Evening with Hilary Mantel

Some people choose to spend their Saturday evenings perched on a brown faux leather cube-stools bingeing on over-priced drinks in ultra-modern bars where you can’t talk to anyone because the DJ is making their ears bleed. Not me (far too old, you see ;-) ). No, this Saturday evening saw me attending an evening with Hilary Mantel (part of this year’s Durham Literature Festival).

I love Hilary Mantel ~ not least for the breath-taking quality of her prose, whereby electricity pylons “lift their skirts in a ferrous gavotte”. Also, we both went to Sheffield University (although some years apart, and in different departments ~ she studied Law, I studied English Lit) and we both lived in Roebuck Road in Sheffield (and its not a huge street, so it is a fairly impressive coincidence, to me at least).

So, she read some sections from “Beyond Black” (if you haven’t read it do so as soon as is feasibly possible!) and discussed some aspects of the novel, such as her research processes, the character balance and back-story, and then finished up with a brief Q&A.

Being a swotty Eng lit graduate I took along a notebook and made some notes, as I knew I’d never remember it all afterwards. They’re fairly illegible and incoherent, but here are a few of the more salient points:

· Psycho-geography ~ she is interested in “what lies beneath the soil…..Every place is seething with potential, beautiful or otherwise.”

· In “Beyond Black” the character of Colette operates as the reader’s ‘way in’ to Alison’s world. Alison and Colette were there from the start, and their experiences are somewhat circular

· Is Alison a fraud? We don’t know, and it is not something that Mantel consciously addresses in the book. However she does think that the comparison of writer and medium is a viable one: both listen to the voices in their heads and spend large portions of their time engaged with characters that no-one else can see. As a predominantly historical novelist Mantel feels that she herself is often “talking to the dead” (and alluded to the fact that she had brought most of the court of Henry VIII with her to the reading, as that is the setting for her next work.).

· She doesn’t work to a pre-prepared plan, but explores themes. And she’s not looking to provide redemption for her characters, but to observe their actions, citing Waugh’s advice to“Write what they say and what they do” . Her task isn’t to educate her characters, but to see where they take themselves, and she demonstrates her characters’ intentions rather than their psychology

· “Beyond Black” is a black farce (and those who have read it will testify that humour imbues every page), and the consequences of the action pay off after the book finishes, which leaves some work for the reader to do. Not all of the loose ends are tied up. Alison and Colette redeem each other, to an extent, but their relationship is a tied and somewhat poisonous one.

· With regard to the haziness of Alison’s childhood: “recall does not always bring benefits in its wake.”

· One of many ‘laugh out loud’ moments: whilst researching mediums, psychics and their ilk for this book one lady took her hand, looked at her palm and said “Oh, what a shame! You have no imagination whatsoever!”

· Her characters tend towards a condition of marginality ~ she likes to operate in the space created by ambivalence

· Don’t spoonfeed the reader ~ they get bored. But don’t give them too little ~ they’ll be baffled. The craftsmanship is to give them just enough information. She feels she got this balance wrong in “Eight Months on Ghazzah Street”.

· Her next novel is set in the court of Henry VIII and will be publshed in 2009

· “Nobody is clever enough to write a novel” ~ at least, not all off the top of their head. It comes form a deeper place.

Well ,that’s it as far as I can make out , I was scribbling pretty fast! And annoyingly I cannot decipher my last comment, which appears to read “Sit down to write ~ no idea her mind of day” (??) .


A summary of the evenign with A S Byatt will follow in the next day or two. Although be warned, for that event I was not only scribbling quickly but in the dark too, so it may all be a bit “fax me a haddock”....

Bloggity blog

A215 is done and dusted! Big scary end of course assessment was posted off on Tuesday, and I’ve got confirmation that they received it (and therefore beat the postal strike which was cunningly contrived to coincide with our deadline of 5th October)

So, now that I have my life back, here’s what will be happening:

1) Don’t lose the momentum ~ A215 was designed to assist me with the novel. Instead it took over as the course requirements were greater than I realized. However I have come away from it with a good daily writing discipline, as well as bags of confidence from all the great marks and comments I received, so I need to capitalize on this, rather than slip into post-course ennui….

2) Write up a summary of my A215 experience for this blog and the Novel Racers ~ It might prove useful to anyone else considering the course, and it will make me take a good hard look at what I have gained from it.

3) House renovations. …..err. moving swiftly on….

4) Embark upon the counselling training and voluntary work I need to progress onto an MSc in Counselling psychology

5) And also apply to the Clinical Psychology doctorate in the hope that I can get on without a jillion years of experience as I am a (cry) “mature applicant” (hedging my bets on Clinical vs Counselling at the minute, you see).

6) Back to the novel with a VENGEANCE!! Starting with a print out & edit of what I’ve written so far (that has the potential to be rather depressing…)

7) Catch up in Blogland

8) Get pregnant

So, that should be about enough to be going on with for a week or two, eh?