You can tell a holiday is looming in our household when the place starts to look unusually tidy. As if the effort of planning and packing for a trip away is not enough, I pile on the pressure by insisting that the house is spick and span before we go. It never looks tidier than the day we go away.
“Who are you tidying it for, burglars?” asked a friend, curious as to why I was in such a frenzy one morning.
Actually, it’s for me – so that when I walk back into the house on our return, I think “Ooh, how lovely – I’d forgotten how nice our house is!” rather than “Oh god, what a mess”.
Until now, I’d always assumed that when our cat Dorothy regards us with suspicion as we prepare for our holidays, it is because she equates the act of packing with being abandoned her for a fortnight, and she’s anxious as to whether she’ll get her daily biscuit ration. But as I cleared a longstanding collection of my husband’s shoes from the bottom of the stairs this afternoon, it occurred to me that she’s probably just bewildered by so much sudden change to her territory.
I also hit upon a simple way to keep a tidy house all year round: I just need to go on holiday more often.
(This post was originally written for the August issue of Hawkesbury Parish News.)
Need some light reading for your own summer holiday? My collection of very short stories is perfect for whiling away time in airports and on the beach. Available to order from all good bookshops, and from the usual online stores.
A post about Britain’s favourite birds, originally written for the July issue of the Hawkesbury Parish News
Britain’s top bird, apparently
On first hearing that the robin had been voted Britain’s favourite bird, I felt indignant on behalf of the blackbird who sings so beautifully from the apple tree outside my study window. Robins may be cute garden birds, hopping companionably close as we dig the garden, but I know that’s only cupboard love: they’re just waiting to grab a juicy worm. Continue reading “Britain’s Got Favourites”→
A post about writing fiction and finding inspiration in public libraries
In the blue corner, my business desk
For the first time today, I decided to take a mini writing retreat in my local public library, and I’m jolly glad I did.
I’m lucky enough to have my own study at home, in which I’ve squeezed both a business desk for my freelance work and, for my fiction writing, a tiny upright bureau that used to be my grandfather’s. Even though it’s currently in a relatively tidy state, I needed some cooler air in which to write. My study’s upstairs, and all the heat in the house seems to gravitate towards it and stay there.
In the red corner, my fiction writing desk
As I had to go into our nearest town anyway to run an errand, I decided to take my notebook with me and sit in the calm, open-plan space of the Yate Public Library, where it might not be much cooler, but at least the air would circulate better.
Like a human thermometer, I roved around our large, single-story modern library, trying to decide the best place to settle. It’s a new, light and airy building, thanks to a National Lottery grant a few years ago. Easily the coolest spot was the children’s section. This was also one of the quietest, as I was there during school hours.
Always inspiring: a new spiral-bound notebook
After I’d been scribbling away happily in my new notebook for half an hour, a small girl aged about 3 arrived with her mum. She made a beeline for the open boxes of picture books and quickly made her choice. “But you’ve had that one before!” complained her mum. Undeterred, the little girl curled up in a chair to read it, or at least, to read the pictures – a great way to develop future reading skills, by the way, as is enjoying the same books over and over again.
Seeing how much pleasure this little girl was gaining from her favourite story gave me a real filip. It reminded me that writing stories isn’t really about the author getting words on the paper, to satisfy his or her own compulsion to write, but about filling the reader with pleasure. What better incentive could there be to any writer? I carried on writing…
Further Encouragement
On arriving home, satisfiedwith my morning’s work, I was torn between whether to close my eyes for a few minutes (gosh, this heat is enervating!) or to plough on with writing my story. While deliberating, I had the urge to check whether I’d received any new reviews lately. (Yes, authors do this a LOT.) To my delight, there was a new one against my Christmas collection of short stories, Stocking Fillers. Though the review was brief, it said enough to make me happy:
As a compulsive writer, I sometimes find it stressful that I never have enough time to write everything I want, either on paper (where my fiction writing first takes shape) or on my blogs.
This morning, for example, I’ve been staring at a list of topics and events I need to write up while they’re still fresh in my mind, including recent writers’ festivals that I’ve attended and some social occasions. I know that another day will go by before I manage to make a start on them thanks to some pressing deadlines for some paid freelance work. Continue reading “What To Do When There Aren’t Enough Hours in the Day”→
If you’re not familiar with the concept, here’s the nutshell summary:
flash fiction is another term for the very short story (typically 500 words or fewer)
National Flash Fiction Day was founded by author Calum Kerr to celebrate this story format on or around the shortest night of the year (see what he did there?)
this year we’re marking it on Saturday 27th June with events in real life and online around the world
Here are four ways that I’ll be celebrating:
reducing the price of the ebook of my first flash fiction collection, Quick Change, to 99p for the weekend, on all the digital distribution platforms (it’s also available in paperback for £5.99, featuring two bonus stories)
publishing one of the stories in the book, The Comfort of Neighbours, in the online FlashFlood journal that pops up today like a rarely blooming exotic flower
reading the many excellent fiction stories that will appear every few minutes in FlashFlood
writing some new stories for my next collection, Marry In Haste
The paperback includes two bonus stories set in public libraries
How will you be marking National Flash Fiction Day? I’d love to know!
