I am not a Stephen King fan but I seem to be quoting him a lot lately; he is brilliant on the craft of writing. There was a fascinating interview with him The Atlantic in which he explains why he spends ‘months and even years’… Read More

‘Fall in love in Central Park’ – the Italian title of If I Could Turn Back Time So, recently I wrote about naming characters. I’ve always found this (touch wood) pretty easy. Book titles, on the other hand, have had me curled up and weeping… Read More

Claire Underwood in House of Cards: Likeable, no. Interesting, yes. As I’ve been writing my new series, which features four different main characters, I have been thinking about ‘likeable’ heroines. One of the notes I was given on an early draft of one story was… Read More

This cartoon by Tom Gauld is brilliant. (If you want more his book of cartoons, You’re All Just Jealous of My Jetpack, is out now.) In a similar vein, I often find when writing that things that were hilarious in real life tend to die… Read More

Tough love, but good advice from Chris Cleave. The whole thing is worth reading, find it here. This happened to me last week; I had no idea what to make happen in my story. I was (figuratively) poking my characters and saying ‘Do something!’ But… Read More

Marc Blucas couldn’t stop laughing when he heard he was in a romantic novel Today I was meant to be posting a very long and meaningful post about something I’ve now completely forgotten about, because I have a COLD. The kind of cold that maroons… Read More

Should you write in the first person like Helen Fielding? I love it when I receive queries from readers about writing. Here’s one I got recently: is writing in the first person (ie narrating ‘I woke up’ instead of ‘Clare woke up’) better for chick… Read More

(My book cover, complete with moped) I chuckled today when I read this very funny post by Lisa Jewell. When I saw it was about readers’ reviews I HAD to read it. I really admired Lisa’s honesty and I felt for her as she engaged… Read More