Things I Love About…

  Today I have put together a list of the things I love about reading. It’s by no means comprehensive and it’s definitely a bit random, but I hope it will strike a chord as a fitting way to sign off on my last post for Girls Heart Books…so here goes… I love how many … Continue reading →

Starting a Story – Settings and Siblings

It has struck me this past month or so how important a setting is for a story. This probably makes me sound quite stupid. I mean, it’s an obvious thing to say, settings are important – they are one of the key elements of any story – but I think to date I have taken … Continue reading →

Friendship

This month I’ve been thinking about friendship. My best friend, Zanna, went away at the beginning of February for 7 weeks, and despite the wonders of Whatsapp and Skype, what with the time difference and her working long hours it’s been hard for us to connect and I have to admit I’ve felt pretty lost … Continue reading →

Rollercoaster or Merry Go Round? Which would you choose?

Last week I had a different sort of week. I didn’t do any of my normal duties or routines. I didn’t go into the school where I work supporting readers each week, I didn’t cook everyone’s tea back at home each night, and I didn’t even put out the crazy mess that is the recycling … Continue reading →

On Distraction…

Two weeks ago I moved house, and whilst this was a brilliant and exciting event in my life, it was without doubt extremely distracting. And then as soon as I’d got over the move, and unpacked (well, almost…), I was faced with the fact that it was very soon to be Christmas – EEK! I … Continue reading →

Inner Worlds and Outer Worlds

I’ve been really struck this week by how as a writer one is flipping all the time between inner and outer worlds. Perhaps this is because I have recently had my head down working on a first draft for a new book. Last week I spent the whole week at home, at my desk, staring … Continue reading →

Writing about Selective Mutism

October is Selective Mutism Awareness Month, and so I wanted to talk today about Situational or Selective Mutism (or SM as it is often known) and add my voice to those tweeting and blogging about SM this month to try and help raise awareness. As some of you may already know, Tessie, in my book … Continue reading →

New Ideas, New Beginnings by Faye Bird

Hello! This is my first post for Girls Heart Books and it’s very lovely to have been invited into the fold and be here with my first post today and it feels somehow fitting for this post to be about firsts – about new ideas and new beginnings! I did lots of different jobs before … Continue reading →