Life and Holidays and Life

I've been sort of taking the easy route lately with my blog. On Mondays posting one of my short stories and on Wednesdays recycling my columns from The Voice newspaper that many of my blog readers aren't able to read. I thought today we might do a bit of a catch-up.

1. Most of this year so far I've been working on editing my far too ambitious novel, If Not For This, which I discussed in My Next Big Thing. I reorganised a lot and edited as much as I could and now I've sent it off to three people who were brave enough to offer their incredible brains and eyes in an attempt to improve on my mess. My hope was that I would get all of their comments back and then get invited to one of the two of the writers residencies I applied to, then I would go off and spend a month or so with their comments and my manuscript and try my best to make it as good as possible. Which leads us to No. 2....

2. This week I found out I've been chosen to attend a month long writer's residency in Switzerland at Chateau de Lavigny from the end of June until end of July. I'm so very excited.

3. The other quite big news is that my kids book The Second Worst Thing (Oxford University Press-SA,2013) is to be included in the schools' catalogue in South Africa for grade 7s. The book is a happy take on divorce and how families cope with all of the changes.

3. I recently wrote a post for one of my publishers, HopeRoad about my writing process, here's an excerpt: 

I grew up in a working class family. We were taught that a person should work hard and the work they do should put food on the table. So, I’m not that writer who knew since she was four that she was going to grow up to be a writer. I was going to be a cowboy. If not that a teacher or I wanted to work in the circus. I came to writing in a circuitous route and thanks to a big pile of hard work that now sees me having twenty of my books published, and a fair amount of good luck, I’m able to write full time and make a living wage.

You can read the entire post HERE

4. Also recently I was asked to give a short quote about love for a series at Efrika TV:

Love is human and, like us, stinky. It is messy and undecipherable. Cotton with hidden knives.  Exciting and dog-dull.Simple as making bread and as complex as string theory. We need more, and less, and in-between amounts. But we always need some. Sexy and wet and missionary dry, and ubiquitous in its artificial form, but so rarely found pure and unadulterated. So rare, we kneel down and weep at its alter.

An unalienable human right.

Maybe the only one that matters.

 Any sense?? I guess they thought I knew something about love since I've written a few romances. Little did they know I'm as lost as the next person.


 ...And life goes on. It's autumn here and the leaves are falling in the pool. The days are lovely, warm with a breeze and blue skies. My puppy is no longer a puppy. The fish population has exploded and my little family here are all healthy and relatively happy. And it's just about a holiday and I get to do some relaxing. Hope you do too!