With a mixture of fun, chaos and stupidity, I messed up my first year at University royally.
I thought I would breeze to a 1st without so much as a hand ache.
Sadly it turns out one can't go out, crawl in at 6 AM to be up at 8 AM.
I find out soon if I'm allowed back next year. The only reason I haven't been booted out already is due to rather great grades with the creative pieces; the essay writing is hideous however and may need the help of a tutor *hangs head in shame*.
Since being on summer holidays I haven't written anything other than one poem. I'm a writer. It's the 2nd thing I am after a woman. But I'm so naughty.
I know if I don't write I'm not me and don't sleep yet I play my crazy life so well, suddenly months have gone by- I haven't kept to simple deadlines and I haven't written a single thing.
So I'm a fabulous, party-going, fun and popular princess who isn't really real.
Must write. Must write.

Goodness me, what a thundery rainy day today. Lord H and I do so love a good thunderstorm. Shame it seems to have vanished away now - we were hoping for more drama. Ah well.

This morning, I've had a nice lie-in (at last! At last!) and have then packaged up the rest of my free/review copies of Maloney's Law for sending off in one fell swoop on Monday (I missed the post office opening hours yesterday, dammit). Honestly, the more I look at that cover, the more I love it. The back is pretty ace too. And perfect for Paul's obsession with whisky and time. The cover artist, Tracey Davis, is a genius, to my mind ...


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gay pride glasgow pics posted.

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Really, people, could yesterday get any better after my fabulous hole in one (um, did I mention that already?)?? Well, apparently, yes: when Lord H came home, complete with congratulation flowers (what a super-hero indeed!), he found a box of Maloney's Law copies on the path (the postman must have been tired, poor love ...) hot off the press from PD Publishing. Triple hurrahs and let's all throw our hats in the air! My baby has come home!! I then spent several glorious minutes ripping apart the box, taking out all 18 of my babies and clutching them to my bosom whilst crooning. So no changes there in my reaction to getting author's copies then ... The sad part comes when I have to send them all out again as review or thank you copies and in one case to my hugely patient competition winner - hope you enjoy the read, Tony! Though I will keep one or two just to hug in the long winter evenings. As you do ...


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It’s just over six months until Kill-Grief is published, and lots of small, unconnected things are making me very nervous...



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Writers spend a lot of time trying to get away from their work: trying to stand away from the individual words and see it whole - the woods-for-the-trees problem - and then to stand outside it all over again to see it as others would see it - the Rabbie Burns problem. Whether you write the whole first draft without reconsidering a single word, or you don't move on from a single sentence till you're as sure as you can be that it's right, you're still having produce the novel sentence by sentence, or even word by word. You can't easily tell if it 'works' in the way that you hope it will, or fear it won't, for a reader coming to it for the first time. And what will your writing buddie/tutor/agent/editor/reviewers think?

As writers we develop all sorts of strategies for putting distance between ourselves and our work. I've got to the point where I can't put a note out for the milkman without leaving it on the kitchen table overnight, in case I have second thoughts. But it can be that there's too much distance between us and our work.I know it can happen after I've finished the work on a novel, in the long, draughty days before I see it in print. And I was reminded of this again recently, when a writing acquaintance talked about how disheartened he was with the project that his agent was keen on.

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Today's supercalifragilisticexpiallidocious (and really who gives a damn about the spelling of this glorious word) and utterly splendid news is that I've actually achieved a real-live hole in one!! Yes, people - on the golf course and with all the rules of the great game in play. Quadruple hurrahs and bunting all round. I couldn't believe it! I thought the shot looked pretty good, and Marian & I watched it as it landed on the green, headed towards the hole and ... um ... just vanished!!! There was a second of silent shock and then we both started shrieking like banshees! (I'm always the consummate professional, as you know...). Not only that but I managed to get my best ever score, and so did Marian - after she achieved not one, but two pars! Ye gods and little fishes, Tiger Woods better watch out now as we have him in our sights for sure. I am still grinning like a banana - one the right way round. Gosh. All I need now to make my day complete is a publishing deal for The Gifting (ho ho!) and my work here is done, Carruthers ...


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Here I am, trying to sound a teensy-weensy bit cleverer than wot I normally do, with my review of Kate Grenville's superb The Idea of Perfection.

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Took a while to get into Hallsfoot's Battle this morning - but suddenly in the last half hour before I had to leave I was there. In that skin-tingly zone where the writing is okay and even almost flowing. Ye gods indeed. Lordy, but it's so good when that happens. Ideas were zipping their way from the head to the fingertips and I knew how to end the scene and start the conflict. Ruddy hurrah! It's thrown up a whole load of other ideas and themes for the rest of the book too, but hell that's the way I like it. It's best to have too much in the head than too little. Here's hoping I can remember at least some of it, eh. Anyway, I'm at 29,000 words now and might even reach 30,000 over the weekend. That's about a quarter of a fantasy novel then. Heck. Somebody phone for an ambulance - I need a lie-down ...


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The neighbour seemed better last night, thank goodness – his daughter decided to stay over and the situation seemed to be much calmer. Phew. Will pop round after work tonight to see how things are, but I suspect that Daughter has it all in hand. She’s great.

Oh and I thought last night’s first episode of “Mutual Friends” was pretty fabulous, apart from Keeley Hawes, who must surely have cornered the market in cold women by now … But I loved the menfolk and am, I suspect, already hooked. Being me, I particularly loved the child-hating man, who couldn’t remember the names of his friend’s children. Bliss! And actually so very true – I do always have to think about that ...


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