Holidays and Champagne Days

It's been too long! Sorry for not updating enough... must try harder. Life has been hectic, on the writing front and on the wife and mother front. Lots of end-of-school-year stuff to attend to - sports days, school plays and so on. Busy times! And hot days too with all that sunny weather, a proper spell of summer. Bliss!

I've also been busy reading the proofs of Mrs Sinclair's Suitcase and sending corrections/amendments. That was quite hard work actually, and it was all on paper, for the first time. All laid out like the book will be, which was exciting. It "read" differently laid out in book form and I spotted a few things I wanted to change, notably repetitions, which I'd not noticed until then.

I've also been indulging in this ...

... because I'm delighted to report that I have an American publisher for Mrs Sinclair's Suitcase - Amy Einhorn Books, which I am very excited about. Amy made a pre-emptive offer for the novel, which has been accepted, and I can't tell you how excited I am. I honestly didn't imagine that any of this would happen when I was writing the story. It was just a story that I hoped might find a home one day. I'm still pinching myself regularly.

I'm also working on my second novel and I've reached 70k words, which is a big breakthrough for me. Now, just another 10k needed... the hard part!! I write short. I'd like to have it ready for submission by Christmas... we'll see. It takes a while to write a novel and rushing, for me, is counter-productive.

Hope your writing/reading/summer is going well.

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