What I'd really really like

Do you know what I'd really like?

....to have something like a book group meeting with my blog readers so I could hear your various views on EVEN WHEN THEY KNOW YOU - on the plot, the characters, the use of the journal excerpts, the characters, the themes, whatever.

What made me think of this was talking to an old friend on Saturday who I hadn't seen since she read the book. She said she thought Jane was unkind to Joe, and we discussed that. I said "Well, she is an imperfect character. I always planned she'd be imperfect." She is judgmental and impatient and impulsive: there's three character flaws straight off.

Since then I've been thinking about other imperfect fictional characters. No-one is perfect, of course, but I've been thinking about those with striking imperfections, such as Olive Kitteridge. If you've never read the book, I recommend it. (The author Elizabeth Strout has a new book out at the end of the month called Olive, Again. I can't wait to read it.)

And have you ever watched Gilmore Girls? I have a love-hate relationship with this TV series because of the central character, Lorelei. She is physically very attractive, but she never stops talking and thinks she's awfully witty and clever, and she gets on my nerves, to put it mildly. But there is one scene in which she really annoys me. She is clearing out her fridge, which because she doesn't cook, involves pulling out box after box of fast food, such as half-eaten pizzas from a week before. She has the waste bin next to the fridge and she crams in the whole box, food and all, into the general waste bin. I want to shake her! I suppose they might not have been into recycling in small town America when the series was made.  But why has she never learned to cook? We are supposed to believe she is bright. How has she managed to raise a child single handed without knowing how to cook? How could she afford for them to live on nothing but fast food? I digress. I'm an old fart.

This week I have been tired after a 10 day visit from my beloved American family, plus various other happenings, but I've managed to get out on my bike on the Trail three times. The autumn colours are taking hold and it's beautiful.

p.s. Last night I dreamed that Marmee, one of my long time blog readers, rang me up. I don't know what we talked about. Are you OK, Marmee?

Back to writing

The dust has settled, the autumn is here, and it's time to get back to the main event - writing.  When I've just had a book published, as I have this summer, 

Cover photo by Valerie Dalling

I always say to my friends, 'Well I shan't be writing any more. What's the point?' and everyone laughs.

Dave is currently reading a book called Shoot for the Moon: How the Moon Landings Taught us the 8 Secrets of Success by the esteemed psychologist Richard Wiseman. Near the beginning of the book he gives nine long questions to ask yourself in order to identify your main passion in life. I asked myself the questions in a genuine spirit of wanting to know because I really wasn't sure. Guess what? The answer was writing.

I had a chat with an artist friend on Saturday night about having to do what we do - she to paint, draw and create, me to write - whether or not we get recognition or payment. That's the deal. 

So what happens now? I have had an idea for a book for some months now, and I've begun to make some notes and to gather material. I had in mind that this novel was going to be a fast paced comedy, but now I am not so sure. I'll have to wait and see what comes out.

I like this Charles Bukowski quote about writing:

"Somebody at one of these places [...] asked me: 'What do you do? How do you write, create?' You don't, I told them. You don't try. That's very important: not to try, either for Cadillacs, creation or immortality. You wait, and if nothing happens, you wait some more. It's like a bug high on the wall. You wait for it to come to you. When it gets close enough you reach out, slap out and kill it. Or if you like its looks you make a pet out of it."

and I like this poem of his as well:

so you want to be a writer

if it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don’t do it.
if you’re doing it for money or
fame,
don’t do it.
if you’re doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don’t do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don’t do it.
if it’s hard work just thinking about doing it,
don’t do it.
if you’re trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.

if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you’re not ready.

don’t be like so many writers,
don’t be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don’t be dull and boring and
pretentious, don’t be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don’t add to that.
don’t do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don’t do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don’t do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

Photo by Valerie Dalling

Recovery

They left the village yesterday at 5 a.m. on a horrid rainy Monday, driving down the motorway to Heathrow, and meeting a one hour delay on the M25. Poor Isaac. But they made it to the gate in time and now they're home in Colorado, and our house is tidy and quiet. 

Back to normality. I'm blogging in my pyjamas and Dave is in the kitchen, listening to Today and ironing. The guttering we keep for making marble runs is stashed back in the attic, along with the yoghurt cartons, and we're eating the oatcakes the girls made with Dave and couldn't take on the journey. We have a jar of conkers they collected and Cece's conker on a shoelace. Lux took one home to show the kids in school. Hey ho.

The girls were droopy with sadness to say goodbye. I was too tired to be sad, but now I'm bereft.

One of my favourite times in the week was going for a family bike ride on the Trail. I've waited so long to take the kids on there...

...but I have to say it's pretty demeaning when your 7 year old granddaughter shoots off into the distance and the only way you can catch her up is to shout her to stop for a photoshoot. Isaac tried to cheer me up by pointing out that Cece cycles at altitude at home (a mile high where they live) so is mega fit, and that's why she zooms off like a rocket. A noble effort but I'm not convinced.

Grandkids visit

Letter from home

I am too excited to be in charge of a keyboard right now because Isaac and Wendy and the kids are arriving from the USA today - woo-hoo!

...and here is the quiet news from Hepworth Towers:

Dave has cleared out his yoghurt from the fridge to make room for family supplies. The yoghurt is now residing in a huge, covered, black plastic container on wheels outside the back door. 

Dave snapped it up at Aldi for £15 and because he was so enamoured, he dashed back and bought another one. We are currently arguing over whether he should be allowed to keep his clothes in it. Why did I encourage him to buy a second one?

This takes me back to when we first moved into Hepworth Towers after a warehouse fire had destroyed all our stuff, and we had to refurnish from scratch. I wrote a piece for the Times about it. Here is an excerpt:

It was a case of traditionalist with a penchant for period style meets radical minimalist who thinks that form should always follow function. What possible middle ground in clothes storage is there between someone who wants an Edwardian chest of drawers in satin wood, and someone who prefers a stack of wipe clean plastic boxes ?  

(for full version see here.) 

In other furnishing news, Dave persuaded me to have all my book cover posters framed. He has hung them on the landing and they look very fine. There is not yet a poster for EVEN WHEN THEY KNOW YOU -(my latest novel) but there will be soon.

The other news is that my wounded foot is much better for all the resting, and the abstinence has meant I had time to finish making my cardigan (which looks much nicer on that it does here)

while watching a film called I'll See You In My Dreams. This quiet and thoughtful film is about a woman in her sixties facing a change in her life - rather like my character Jane in Even When They Know You. I had some misgivings about the film, but I did like it, and am going to watch it again. The star is Blythe Danner. I recognised her from somewhere and couldn't think from where, and it was bugging me all through the film.  I found out on the net she was Hawkeye's long lost lover in M*A*S*H. If it wasn't for Google it would still be racking my brains and driving me bonkers.

Lastly, I may have been premature in telling you what my plans are for the next novel. Sally Howe might not be appearing in it. It might not be a comedy. I'm still thinking.

Miscellanea

I am so excited about Isaac and family flying over on Saturday that I can't settle.

On the other hand, I've hurt my foot, possibly broken a toe, and I've been advised to rest it as much as I can. So I am trying to sit still with my leg up and concentrate on planning my new book. 

Those of you who have found the newest one too serious for their taste will be pleased to hear that the next one will be lighter. There are four main characters - all women - and one of them will be Sally Howe, of Plotting for Beginners and Plotting for Grownups fame. Before I start a book I do studies of all the main characters, with six page questionnaires to fill in on them asking questions like:

What does she think she wants?
What does she really want?
What is her biggest dream?
What is her worst nightmare?
What is her guilty secret?     etc etc

It's a long time since I thought about Sally Howe, so in order to answer the questions about her I've been reading Plotting for Grownups. This morning I came across this interchange she has with her brother Richard, which is pretty much a word for word record of a conversation I once had with Dave:

Richard called at lunchtime and I showed him a pair of jeans I’d bought in the Scouts jumble sale. They are just Richard’s size, and they look quite hip to me.

He tried them on and said precisely what I expected: “The waist is far too low.” Richard spends the entire day hitching whatever pair of trousers he is wearing up round his waist, and these wouldn't go high enough for his liking. They weren't the kind that exposes your pants, they were merely an inch lower than the M&S seconds he bought off Bakewell market five years ago. “I want something more robust,” he said.

“They are robust!”

“I'm looking for something more workaday. I need something that genuflects less to fashion and more to safety and comfort.”

“But you’re trying to look attractive to women, aren’t you?” I said.

He pulled up his sweatshirt and exposed the flesh above the waistband. “This low waistband is an outrageous ploy to dupe the consumer. Dickies don't skimp on material like this.” (Richard worships Dickies work clothes because “they are commodious, they shrug off stains, and they have wonderful pocketry.”)

“These jeans make you look ten years younger, Richard.”

“I don't think I'll be wearing them,” he said, vainly trying to hitch them up high again. “They look like a high risk trouser. Edgy.”

And talking about clothes, you know that dress I showed you last week...

...that I thought I was too old for?

Today's paper has a photo of Debbie Harry, aged 74, wearing this:

Maybe I just need to grow my hair long, bleach it, and wear dark glasses.

from a lovely reader..

Jenetta, a long time reader of the blog has sent me this -

Thank you, friend. I love it.

Prescription for the mean reds

I had a night out last night watching a live screening of One Man, Two Guvnors, a hilarious farce starring James Corden. No news, no politics, a real night off.

And this morning I dismissed the forecast of rain and rode to the end of the Trail and back. Pure heaven. I recommend getting out into nature for a couple of hours if you've got the mean reds.

Right now it's the rosebay willow herb that's looking stupendous. I think I should have made more fuss about how beautiful it can be in the book (EVEN WHEN THEY KNOW YOU) but then Jane was in Colorado in September so she missed it. This is an excerpt from August:


A light breeze ruffled the rosebay willow herb and it brushed her cheek. She pushed it away. Dante and Amy had lived with her and Alex until Dante was school age and they had moved away, and Dante, at the age of four, went through a phase of collecting sticks and taking them on walks to whack at rough vegetation.  One September she’d forgotten her stick and had picked up a dried-up stalk of rosebay willow herb and swiped at Jane’s face with it, and Jane had said ‘Dante! Don’t be so aggressive.’ The next time they’d gone out for a walk, Dante rushed to a clump of the flower and said ‘I want a gressive!’ It had become part of the family lexicon – a term only Jane and Alex used and only between themselves... 

Here are some pictures from this morning:

p.s. If you've read any of my books and have not reviewed them online, please will you consider doing so on Amazon and/or Goodreads? Two lines and a rating is all that's necessary and you don't need a PhD in English Literature to do that.

Why am I asking?

Because it boosts sales.

Hey ho

You know I struggle to keep politics off the blog, but today I'm going to try.

You can be sure I am all churned up about our constitutional crisis, hugely relieved by the unanimous verdict of the Supreme Court, and yet anxious and gloomy that Johnson and his cronies continue with their adherence to the Trump playbook, brazening everything out with more lies, and playing to the gallery of people who don't understand what representational democracy means.

Enough. I was going to allude to what's been going on in one simple sentence and out comes a paragraph. That's how anxious I am. 

Now for the trivia.

I speak as someone 

• about to turn 70 (which weighs rather heavily upon me) 
• who wants to dress like a rock chick next time around 
• who watched and enjoyed Fleabag

What do you think when you see this picture? My immediate response was - "Good for her. Maybe she'll be able to afford a more modest dress in future."

I don't like this fashion for dresses that plunge to the waist and display the wearer's breasts to such an extent. Do you?

Am I being a prude? I have no problem with breastfeeding in public. None whatsoever. And I think it's really weird when breastfeeding mothers feel the need to shroud themselves and their babies under an apron. But necklines like the one above make me think of Phoebe in Friends saying to Rachel "Don't give away the farm."

What do you think?

Monday morning

I felt wrecked this morning after a bad night, and Dave is out with the car all day, but it's market day in Bakewell, and that's the only place to get my favourite apples - new season Coxes - so I cycled down the Trail to Bakewell. 

It's always quiet first thing Monday morning. What a joy.

On the way home I crossed over the footbridge and thought again how much the lovelocks deface it.

Bakewell is a pretty town and the riverside is particularly lovely, and we get oceans of tourists all through the year. It's a pity that so many of them want to hang lovelocks on the simple, modern, previously stylish bridge. It's happening to bridges all over the world and not only are the locks unsightly, the weight of them poses a risk to the safety of the bridge. I am as romantic as the next person but I loathe these lovelocks.

I am happy for Rachel and Jody and all the others, but I wish they would find another way to declare their love.

There may be a way. A Derbyshire engineer and his daughter have designed a lovelock tree. Read about it here. I really hope it catches on.

Scraps from my roller coaster week

It gets harder and harder to write the blog. And it's late this morning because my brother rang up for a chat in the middle of my writing it.

'Hang on,' I said, 'I'll just save what I'm doing. I'm just writing the blog.'
'About time,' he said.

I think my difficulty is to do with the turbulent times -  worldwide horrors, the constitutional crisis, the charlatan in No 10, my belief that whatever the supreme court ruling is on Johnson's prorogation it won't make a blind bit of difference - but it's also to do with an acute awareness of aging and mortality. Two good friends have recently lost their partners, and another dear friend will be facing death before too long.

And then there's September. The sunshine this week has been fabulous, but I always find September sunshine bittersweet. Is it related to the angle of the sun? I find that April sunshine makes me melancholy too, when I estimate the angle will be the same. At least in April the spring is springing: in September when the summer is dying it feels like the end of life.

Altogether it's been an emotional week. One afternoon in Sheffield I had an hour between appointments and I thought of going to sit on Mary's bench but I felt too sad, and rang a Sheffield friend to see if she was home and available and she said 'Come round!' She gave me a cuppa and a hug and a chat. 

There have been some lovely days when I wasn't sad, and there have been days when I've been acutely aware of my dodgy memory. On Thursday I couldn't remember Alan Rickman's name. Sacrilege.

I've spent time with my fabulous grandsons and their new kitten who is so small and black and quick she is impossible to get a good photo of, but I shall keep on trying.

I had a long sunny walk through the fields around the village with Dave on one day, and another walk yesterday with Liz through woods and fields near Chatsworth. Here's a roadside stream with the light playing on it.

We had lunch in a village cafe with a sunny courtyard. It was blissful. The only thing missing was a margarita. Liz and I began the morning, though, by attending our nearest climate strike, which was in Matlock, a small local town. 

Seeing these children holding their placards and imagining their future brought tears to my eyes. 

The Matlock strike was organised by young teenagers but surprisingly the majority of those attending were over 60. I expect the local secondary schools were not sympathetic.

Another day I decided to stop making quick scrawled notes of ideas for my new book and to get started on planning it properly. The sunshine had been holding me back, because I didn't want to be holed up in my study writing. I took my laptop outside... 

Dave went out on his bike after taking this photo, and I felt so sleepy I shut my laptop and had a nap on the sunlounger. It'll come, it'll come. There are six grey months of winter ahead when sitting at my desk inside making up stuff will be a treat.

While we're on the subject of the future, this is a dress I shall be wearing in my next life for one of my birthdays:

What do you think?

Pleasure

Last week I watched a film about David Hockney. It focused on his return to the UK from California, to paint the Yorkshire Wolds. It was a fascinating film, showing him painting outside in all weathers and seasons, and returning again and again to a place he called The Tunnel - a green lane with trees running along each side. 

If you google Hockney The Tunnel you'll see a panoply of his paintings of the lane. His fascination and love for 'The Tunnel' reminded me of my feelings for the Monsal Trail, and my love of seeing it week by week,  following the seasons and the changing vegetation, and the different angles of the sun according to time of day and time of year. You'll find some of my observations in my latest novel EVEN WHEN THEY KNOW YOU, but the novel is about people as much as it is about the healing nature offers.

Hockney said he got ‘intense pleasure from looking.’  I've never heard anyone else express the same idea. 

A couple of days ago I was sitting in bed drinking my first Yorkshire tea of the day. It was 8 in the morning and the sun was shining through the east window of the bedroom catching one side of the jug of sweet peas on the south facing window. The jug is wide and squat and glazed a pale green - halfway between pale sage and eau de nil. Zoe made it and gave it to me. I love it. I looked at the sweet peas in the jug against the backdrop of the trees outside and didn't want to stop. I know exactly what Hockney means. I feel just the same.

Ah - Wensleydale!

I'm sorry I've been away for so long, but I've been in Wenselydale with my sibs, and life has been non-stop catching up, taking the air, loving the scenery, banter, eating pork scratchings, keeping up with Johnson's shenanigans, and trying to lure our brother who lives up there to take more than one day off work to spend with the rest of us. Here he is on his village green showing us how to play quoits. 

"Pork scratchings?" you say?

Yes. They sell some of the best in the dale, and my big brother bought two boxes to share - as he usually does. Jen and I have both taken a box home from previous visits, but oddly they didn't taste as good at home. We can't decide why  - is it that when eating them alone the guilt overrides the pleasure?

Here's a tiny sample of the beautiful scenery... 

and here are two my big brother took...

The village green at Bainbridge

Yay!

I’m on holiday in Wensleydale with my lovely siblings and just read two of them this great new review of EVEN WHEN THEY KNOW YOU because I am so so chuffed with it, and my big sister Kath said “Yes! I want you to write a sequel! Are you writing something now?”

“I’m planning something, so beware. I’m already collecting material.”

We’re staying in a converted chapel in Bainbridge:

This is the view from the garden:

Embraced

When we lived in Sheffield, and the family member who declines to be named went back to school in September, I would cycle up to the Mayfield Valley (the beginning of the Peak District) and pick blackberries. It was a marker, the beginning of a new chapter.

Yesterday I was getting ready for my sister visiting, and was cleaning. I HATE cleaning. I got to a point when there was still much to do but I couldn't stand it any longer. It was a fine blustery day, so I got on my bike and cycled up the Monsal Trail. It was the end of the afternoon so there were very few people about. In any case, the summer holiday crowds were gone. It was heavenly. 

The margins of the Trail were edged with dried leaves, and the wind was chilly enough to require an extra layer of clothing, and it was clear the autumn had arrived. Surprisingly, I didn't feel wistful. I relished it, but not because I want the summer to end or that I like the autumn. It was rather that I felt overtaken and embraced by the natural world and it's unstoppable, overarching 'plan.' With all the tumultuous politics going on right now - down there in London -  it was refreshing and comforting to be in a space where none of that was relevant - at least for two hours. I relished the breeze, the clouds, the sunshine, the shadows in the valley, the open views - it was magical. I came back on a high. 

I love living here.

Under the radar

It's a quiet September morning and the rays from the rising sun stream through the bedroom window and all the way down the landing. It does this when we're nearing the equinox. I love it that I could make a good guess at the month of the year just by looking at where the sun comes up.

I haven't posted recently because I've been doing things I can't tell you about, such as spending time with my teenage grandsons. I would LOVE to tell you about their progress but I'm forbidden. I understand. I expect that soon Lux (9)

and Cece (7)

will be laying down similar prohibitions. 

I asked a question on Twitter recently and no-one answered it. I retweeted, and still got no response. So I am asking you. Is literary fiction (i.e. the kind of novel that is entered into big competitions such as the Man Booker) supposed to merely engage the brain? Or is it supposed to engage you emotionally as well? I don't often read this kind of book because they usually sound so unappealing, but I am two chapters into A Visit from the Goon Squad and am so far not enthralled, emotionally or intellectually. Do you recommend that I carry on?

Second question - do you ever read a book that entertains and grips you, a book where the inside front covers are full of positive reviews, and you race to the end and put it down and think 'So what?' I did this with Amanda Craig's The Lie of the Land, and last week with The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar. I'm not complaining about the writing. And as I said, they are both entertaining, and there is a heartwarming streak in the mermaid book. It's just that I don't find there is anything to take away from either of them. They are both books I will give away, rather than keep to reread.

I welcome your thoughts.

Washing the duvet

Someone recently reminded me of the time Dave didn't want to pay to have the duvet washed.

We don't have a local laundrette so I'd rung a dry cleaner's in Sheffield and they'd quoted me £16.99 and a two week turnaround.

Dave was horrified “That’s ridiculous!” he said. “They don’t know what to charge! I’ll wash it myself.”

“But it’s a double one. It won’t fit in the machine. Really Dave, please don’t bother.”

“I know! I’ll do it in the fun tub!” The fun tub is a huge plastic tub - three feet across and three feet deep – of the kind that builders generally use for rubble, and which Dave uses for DIY. But it was languishing in the shed stuffed with used plastic cartons which Dave said would one day “come in useful.”

“It’s fine, Dave. Really,” I said. “I’ll take it to the cleaners.”

“I’m not going to be defeated. I’ll do it in the bath. That’s more commodious and it has running hot water. Better than the fun tub!”

He swung the duvet into the bath and turned on the taps, but the duvet behaved like an enormous sponge and soaked up every drop of water. He couldn’t swish it around to make a washing motion, and had to bend right over and pummel the thing. It was like wrestling with an alligator, though Dave looked less like the hero in Crocodile Dundee and more like an also-ran in a wet T-shirt competition.

Even when rinsed and squeezed, the duvet was so heavy that he found it hard to pick up. He had to bundle it up and clutch it to his chest like those contestants in The Strongest Man in the World competition, who stagger for a hundred yards carrying a boulder as big as a buffalo.

He planned to go down the stairs with it, through the open front door, and outside to the washing line. But he slipped just two steps from the bottom, lurched forwards into the wall, squeezing the duvet and depositing a couple of gallons of water on the hall floor.

Eventually he got the duvet outside and edged it bit by bit over the washing line, which then swooped grasswards in a giant parabola, though miraculously the trees to which it was tied remained rooted.

It was February. You can imagine how long it took to dry.

Life at Hepworth Towers

I'm looking back on my week and trying to remember what went on. I know I picked a lot of sweet peas. They've been fantastic this year.

I know I've cleaned out a lot of cat poo. 

Last year Peanut - the cat belonging to the-family-member-who-declines-to-be-named and his lovely wife Jaine - lived here for a month (much to our cat's disgust) while T-F-M-W-D-T-B-N and J were on their honeymoon. 

On Monday, Dave and I were saying to each other smugly, 'Thank God we don't have to have Peanut again this year,' when the phone rang. It was T-F-M-W-D-T-B-N telling us that Peanut had broken his leg, and would we look after him  while T-F-M-W-D-T-B-N and Jaine went to Greece for their hols? He had been booked into the cattery but obviously that was now no-go. 

Peanut was supposed to be kept in a cage 

and to wear a cone to stop him picking at his stitches, but he hasn't needed the cone, and most of the daytime he's roaming around my study. 

This year Dave and I finally decided to give up our massive strawberry patch because the weeding is so tedious, and Dave is digging it up and extending our lawn.

He's using one of his favourite tools - a mattock. When I went out in my pyjamas to admire his progress, he said he loved the fact that an Iron Age man wandering into our garden this morning would immediately recognise the implement and would probably set to and help.

Because a blisteringly hot weekend has been forecast I decided to wash the loose covers from the sofa. We don't have a tumble dryer, so weather matters to me when I'm washing. I wish I could persuade Dave to only wash on good drying days, but after 49 years I know it's a lost cause.

When I took the covers off, I found these plastic things in a fold which are half the width and half the length of my little finger. I challenge you, dear reader, to tell me PRECISELY what they are.

Last week Moira Redmond, whom I have never met and who who writes an amusing and interesting blog called Clothes in Books, devoted a post to my new book EVEN WHEN THEY KNOW YOU. How fab!

And last night after my evening dose of Call the Midwife, I checked the listing of my book on Amazon to see if there were any more reviews, and there was!

Dear Reader, if you've read any of my books and you enjoyed them please be a peach and review them on Amazon and/or Goodreads. It helps sales, it really does. Also, it encourages me to keep on trucking writing.

Have a lovely weekend!