Well, THAT didn't go according to plan...

Oh dear. I have now been back at work for over five months, and haven't blogged at all.

There are a lot of reasons for this.

Firstly the complications I referred to in my life in April were that my beloved mother was dying. She was diagnosed with terminal brain tumours in February, and though we thought she might get to the summer, she went downhill very fast, and died at the beginning of May. Subsequently, my first few weeks at work involved trekking back and forth to Shropshire on my days off, pretty much abandoning my family for weeks (although actually they all seemed to cope pretty well without me). Then we went straight into exams. I'm very very proud of my daughters who both did extremely well in incredibly difficult circumstances.

So it's been a funny old time. And I also had to do the rewrites on my new book, Coming Home for Christmas, the last in my Hope Christmas stories. This was particularly poignant for me, as I had written the whole series with motherhood very much in mind, and the first two books were affected  by my lovely mother in law being ill and subsequently dying, and this time it was my mother's turn. Hope Christmas is based on the town of Church Stretton where she lived, so this last book I have invested with love, and put in tiny little details about places we walked as a family as my tribute to her.

I will be writing about my mum at some time, but still assimilating my thoughts, and need to check that my family don't mind.


But in the meantime, here's the cover of the new book. I hope as life starts to calm down a little, I'll be able to blog again sooner.


And if you're interested, the book is out on November 6th.