Kitty Johnson's Blog

Finding the right place to start your novel is important. After all, it could make all the difference to whether your story gets published or not. Whether or not it holds the reader’s attention.

The choice of beginning can be especially difficult with a dual timeline story with two main characters, as is the case in WHERE THE SEA LAVENDER GROWS, to be published on 1st May 2026. Elise’s story takes place in 2006, Lilias’s during WWII. They have equal billing - or at least, I hope they do, because that’s one of the things I worked hard to achieve during my many rewrites!

Elise or Lilias?

I tried both. I had Lilias arriving late to the village hall where a raggle taggle line of evacuee children were waiting to be ‘picked.’ I had Elise and her conflicted feelings as she discovers her job application to restore historic art works at Marsh House has been successful. Neither felt quite right.

The novel is actually told from four points of view - Elise, Lilias, Ruth (Lilias’s sister) and Nadine (the mother of the evacuee Lilias takes care of) - although Elise and Lilias’s viewpoints are in the majority. So, in the end, I chose to start with Ruth, since she appears in both the 2006 chapters and the WWII chapters. And finally, everything felt right. Phew! What a relief. Here’s that first chapter to give you a little taste.

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There was music. A Chopin Nocturne. Ruth kept her eyes closed, her thoughts drifting to her aunt’s Paris apartment. Aunt Sophie, bent over the piano keys, her blonde head bobbing, her face twitching like a rabbit’s as she emphasised the notes. Lilias seated so close to Ruth on the chic white sofa Ruth could feel her body shaking with suppressed laughter. Their mother in the armchair opposite, frowning slightly, well aware of their torment.

‘Morning, Ruth.’ A cheerful voice suddenly interrupted the memory, dissolving Sophie and her rabbit-twitching features, bringing Ruth back to the here and now.

‘You look cheerful today.’ Heather, one of the care workers at the care home. Ruth’s favourite.

‘The music made me think of when we went to visit my aunt in Paris before the first war.’

‘Nice, isn’t it?’ said Heather. ‘Though some people would prefer a bit of singing, I think. Vera Lynn, The White Cliffs of Dover; that sort of thing.’

Ruth frowned. Why anyone would want to hear music from the awful, awful years of the Second World War was quite beyond her.

Heather noticed her expression. ‘Your hip hurting again, is it, lovely? Here, let’s give you your meds, and then we can see about getting you a bit of breakfast.’

Breakfast made Ruth think of the turquoise kitchen of Marsh House. The smell of baking that permeated every room after Lilias had baked bread. But Marsh House was gone now. As was dear Lilias.

Heather had pulled the curtains open, but now she returned to Ruth’s bedside, frowning at her sudden tears.

‘Hey, what’s all this?’ she asked, taking Ruth’s gnarled hand in hers.

Ruth blinked, the tears dripping down her cheek, and as Heather reached out to wipe them away, Ruth saw the sparkle of a diamond ring on the care worker’s finger.

‘You didn’t have that yesterday,’ she said. ‘Did you?’

Heather grinned. ‘I didn’t. Well spotted.’

‘Who’s the lucky man or woman?’

Heather laughed. ‘That’s one of the many things I like about you, Ruth, your enlightenment. Not many people would think I might have got engaged to a woman.’

‘Not all of us ancient clingers-on are narrow minded bigots. There’s a lot I don’t like about these times, but this new civil partnership thing they’ve brought in is a good thing. Though it doesn’t go far enough of course.’

Heather smiled at her. ‘It’s a man actually. Karl. We’ve been seeing each other for two years now. My daughter really likes him.’

‘That’s good.’

‘It is. None of this would be happening if she didn’t. My girl will always come first for me. I made sure Karl knew that straight away. Anyway, what can I get you to eat?’

But Ruth didn’t hear her. She was thinking about another child. A child lost forever.

‘Ruth?’ Heather prompted her. ‘What’s the matter? You’re crying again.’

Ruth reached out to clutch Heather’s hand hard, the diamond ring biting into her bony fingers. ‘Keep hold of your little girl, d’you hear?’ she said. ‘Don’t ever let anything happen to her.’

Heather reached out to smooth down Ruth’s hair. ‘I don’t intend to; don’t you worry about that. Now, how about joining the others in the dining room for that breakfast?’

WHERE THE SEA LAVENDER GROWS is available to pre-order now!

I didn’t realise how many versions of my forthcoming novel WHERE THE SEA LAVENDER GROWS there were on my computer until I wanted to find a version that included one of my main characters Elise coming across an alpaca walking party on the North Norfolk coast. (Yes, it’s a thing, for those not in the know. I took a group of friends alpaca walking to celebrate my birthday a while back. It was great fun). I keep my old versions and drafts because sometimes I need to go back to copy and paste something, and sometimes I’ve been known to use old scenes in a completely different book. If it sounds verging on the chaotic, you’re right, it is. But what works, works, I guess.

The first Sea Lavender file is dated 2018 - though, in early incarnations, the novel was called The House on the Marshes. When a novel takes a long time to become a reality, there are many rewrites, which means a lot of editing. One - painful - casualty of these edits was the alpaca walking scene. Here it is below, as I wrote it, seen through Elise’s eyes in the first person. The novel is now completely written in the third person, giving Elise and Lilias, the main characters in the two timelines, equal billing. (Side note: can you imagine how tedious and time-consuming it is to change a novel from the first to the third person? I hope never to do it again. Though I expect I will).

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After breakfast we set off from the hotel to walk along the footpath at the top of the salt marshes. It was harder to make out the distant band of the sea without the benefit of our raised balcony, but the reflections in the lagoons were sharper down here, and the mournful cries of the black and white sea birds even louder.

I lifted my head to watch their progress, making an effort to speak my thoughts out loud even though I didn’t feel like it. ‘Their beaks are so long, aren’t they? And such a bright orange. I guess that’s for finding food in the mud. I wonder what they are?’

Robbie had his hands in his pockets, hunching along looking out of place – a figure in an alien environment. ‘No idea,’ he said, nipping the conversation in the bud.

Oh, well. I didn’t want this place to start to affect me anyway – that haze of soft colour, or the bright blue of the sky reflected in all the pools and gullies left by the retreating tide.

Robbie was looking back the way we’d come. ‘God,’ he said. ‘That looks like the famous alpaca walkers the woman at the hotel was on about.’

I turned to see a gaggle of people and animals heading in our direction. ‘Maybe we’d better wait and let them pass.’

Robbie nodded. ‘Probably a good idea,’ he agreed, and we moved off the path slightly, to wait on the edge of a belt of trees.

They were all smiling – that was what struck me as the group drew close. Holding on to the leashes attached to the alpacas’ bridles they smiled at their furry charges, at the view, at each other. At us.

Morning! Thank you! Lovely day for it!

My responses were automatic. ‘Morning. No problem. Yes, it is, isn’t it?’

Forced to wait, I couldn’t help noting the animals’ impossibly soft fleeces or their individual characters – the one that wanted to stop and eat everything in sight. The one that was determined to push to the front. The one that wanted to be next to his friend. But none of it made me smile. I didn’t want the alpaca’s cuteness or the group’s camaraderie and their desire to include us in their experience.

When a caramel-coloured alpaca comically threw itself down on the ground to roll about, legs thrashing in the air I heard Robbie give a snort of laughter beside me. But I didn’t laugh, because Charlie was suddenly there with me. His reaction was so vivid I could hear him as if he was actually speaking. See him pointing and laughing. Look at him, Mummy! He thinks he’s a dog!

Suddenly I couldn’t stand it a moment longer. There was a footpath behind us, into the trees, and I took it, leaving Robbie to follow.

‘Elise? Where are you going?’ he called after me. ‘Is this even the right way? Elise, wait!’

I didn’t stop until the thick trees had blotted the sights and sounds of the alpaca walkers right out. When Robbie reached me, I was fishing in my day sack for my water bottle.

‘What was all that about?’ He sounded annoyed. Impatient.

I looked at him, my hand shaking slightly as I held the bottle up to my mouth. I didn’t bother to try and hide my grief. ‘Charlie would have loved that so much.’

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I wanted to include this scene because, as I say, I’d been alpaca walking on this stretch of coast. It was a joyful experience, and I thought it would contrast well with my bereaved character’s emotions, as well as saying something about the state of her marriage. But…I’d already shown these things elsewhere, and it was repetative. So, sadly, the alpacas had to go. But I remain very fond of them, and I’m sure they’ll put in an appearance in something else I write one day. I mean, they have such personalities - as did the man in charge of the alpaca walking business! But that’s for another time.

A few years ago, when our dog Billy was nearing the end of his life, I took him to one of my favourite places in North Norfolk - Stiffkey, a village next to the salt marshes, and the inspiration for Where the Sea Lavender Grows (published May 2026).

A long wood stretches above the coastal path between the salt marshes and a campsite, and it was here I wanted to walk, to catch glimpses of the marsh through the twisted trees.

Billy’s legs were no longer strong - they’d always been something of a design fault, to be honest. So we took our time, me stopping to take photos and to remember weekend breaks spent at the campsite. Of joining the crowds to watch glorious sunsets reflected in the creeks and pools, or of being tucked up inside the tent playing games with friends while the rain beat against the canvas. This was when I first discovered and fell in love with this landscape, and that love, more than twenty years later, has never diminished.

Eventually, that day, after much sniffing and pottering, Billy caught up with me, and we continued on our leisurely way together. When we reached the end of the wood, we crossed a track and entered a field. Here, we both lay down for a rest, me tucked right into Billy’s warm body, not a soul in sight, and no sounds except for birdsong. Perfect peace.

Billy’s first visit to Stiffkey after we’d adopted him was anything but peaceful though. He was nine months old when he came to us, and, like many rescue dogs, he hadn’t been exposed at a young age to many things dogs have to be able to deal with in order to function as part of a household. In Billy’s case, this was most commonly illustrated by a tendency to lurch towards car headlights after dark - yes, very alarming - and, less dangerous, but very hard on our nerves and eardrums, by a habit of trying to kill the windscreen wipers whenever you put them on.

We’d had him for only a few short weeks when we first experienced this phenomenon. We’d driven from Norwich to Stiffkey to go for a walk, but we never made it out of the car because it began to pour with rain on the approach to the car park, the wipers went on, and Billy went completely crazy. Despite the stair rods rain, it was a good deal stormier inside the car than out as Billy waged war on the windscreen wipers.

Fast forward three years, and Billy is sadly no longer in our lives. We had to let him go after he broke one of his poor arthritic legs perhaps three months after this North Norfolk outing.

I only lasted a matter of weeks without a dog - the house felt unbearably empty without Billy. Walter, a chihuahua crossed with a pug - and many other breeds - now dominates our lives. Walter doesn’t bark at windscreen wipers. However, he does bark at every single neighbour in our street, even those he likes. He also has a deeply-rooted aversion to older men with white hair, which can be every bit as inconvenient as Billy’s windscreen wiper hatred. Anyway, Walter has accompanied us on the same walks at Stiffkey on many occasions, and, like Billy, he adores it there.

Is it any wonder that dogs feature in Where the Sea Lavender Grows? I think not. There are two - Lilias’s Jack Russell terrier Compass, so called because he often goes missing but always finds his way home - and Lulu, the adored pug dog of Elise’s dead son Charlie.

Like Billy and Walter, these dogs are devoted companions and treasured company, sharing a love of the great outdoors with their owners, and of the salt marshes of North Norfolk in particular. Also like Billy and Walter - and Lilias and Elise - they never met, being alive at different times. But I feel sure they’d have got along. That they’d have chased each other through the sea lavender, jumping over creeks and barking with delight. Just as Lilias and Elise would have delighted in each other’s company, sharing their love of the salt marshes and speaking together about art and the joys and frustrations of a creative life.

I feel them all - both real and imagined - whenever I visit Stiffkey. Billy, Walter, Compass, Lulu, Lilias and Elise, all walking and leaping amongst the sea lavender as the tide comes and goes and the oyster catchers call to each other across the salt marshes.

I can’t wait for you to get to know them all!

Q & A with Kitty Johnson

Why do you write under a pen name?

I’ve published a lot of books in lots of different ways! Prior to my Kitty Johnson books, I self-published several books under my own name – Margaret K Johnson – and I’ve also written lots of short fiction for people learning to speak English as Margaret Johnson. (These are published by Cambridge University Press and Cengage Learning). With so many different titles to my name, it was getting a bit confusing. Hence, Kitty was born! I chose the name Kitty because it would have been the name I gave to my son, had he been a girl.

When and how did you first start writing?

I went to art college straight from school to study Fine Art, Painting. After I’d completed my degree, I had no idea how I was going to support my career as an artist. Then I thought to myself, ‘I know! I’ll write a best-selling romance novel so I can carry on painting!’ I thought it would be that easy. It wasn’t. However, by the time I’d finished writing the novel that ended up being rejected, I’d well and truly caught the writing bug. It took a few more goes before I had a novel accepted, and the money I got for it was by no means enough to live on, but I was ecstatic.

What did you spend the first money you earned from your writing on?

One very unglamorous thing – a new heater for my flat – and one slightly more glamorous thing. Well, it should have been glamorous, but it didn’t quite turn out that way. My then boyfriend had never flown – we were both pretty young at the time. I thought it would be romantic to surprise him to use some of my earnings to treat him to a flight in a light aircraft. He was indeed surprised; thrilled too - and we duly turned up at the airfield and boarded the plane. All went well until the pilot asked my boyfriend if he wanted to have a go at using the controls. Alas, I’d forgotten all about my travel sickness when I had my bright idea about the surprise… Things quickly went down hill after that.

What is the hardest thing you’ve had to learn as a writer?

Oh, goodness. The process of writing is about continually learning to do hard things. The more experience you get, the more difficult things seem to pop out of the woodwork! I think, in my case anyway, it’s because I always want to challenge myself rather than just coasting along. But I do remember it took me a long time to really get to grips with how to bring a character to life when I was writing in the third person. I remember one editor telling us would-be authors to imagine our heroine had a camera on her shoulder - (a bit like a parrot). That advice didn’t work for me at all. In the end, I learned to treat the third person - she/her, he/him etc, etc - pretty much the same as the first person writing. You definitely learn by doing as a writer, or I do anyway.

A little bit of magic has been creeping into my writing lately. I’m not talking about what goes on in my notebook, although I have to admit, that does sometimes feel like magic. Not all the time - my notebooks are full of crossings out and arrows to add extra text or to make changes - I challenge anyone to make sense of them! But sometimes, when I come to type up my early morning scrawlings, I’m thrilled by what I’ve written after my first cup of coffee. However, as I say, in this case, I’m not talking about that kind of magic.

Where The Sea Lavender Grows, my next novel, due to be published on April 28th 2026 (which incidentally happens to be my birthday), includes the unseen ghost/spirit/soul/ essence of a long-dead artist who communicates with an artist working to restore a house. Shades of Green and Time, the novel I’ve recently been working on, includes time travel. And the novel I’ve just started…well, it’s a bit too early to tell you about that, but if I tell you it’s a bit like The Midnight Library, that will give you an idea.

Those of you who’ve discovered me in the last few years might think all this is a bit of a change. But those who’ve read my earlier writing will know that I’ve included magical elements in my books before. Jade Gate, the workshop leader in The Goddess Workshop has a bit of magic about her; she’s certainly mysterious and other worldly even as she encourages women to be their best confident and sensual selves. And Nessa in Perfect Responses, well she’s an angel, or my version of an angel anyway.

In Perfect Responses, Corrine Walker, a self-help author, is dead but she’s currently in limbo and can’t move on to heaven. Why? Because having preached to women that neutral responses to events - no matter how painful or trying - lead to a better life, Corrine proceeded to tear up her own rule book when her husband cheated on her, resorting to gratifying, but now frowned-upon acts of revenge. She’ll remain in purgatory until an angel - Nessa - can prove that at least three women down on Earth have benefitted from her teachings. But Nessa has her work cut out, because the three chosen women have big problems. Janet’s just been abandoned by her fiance before their beach wedding in Africa, Debbie’s having a hopeless affair with her married boss, and Kate’s just married the love of her life only for him to become an uncommunicative stranger overnight. Can straight-talking Nessa make the most of Corrine’s theories to help the women become the best versions of themselves before it’s too late?

Perfect Responses and The Goddess Workshop are both available to buy now. Why not give one of them a try?

Last week marked one year since my novel PRICKLY COMPANY was published. The time seems to have flashed past since I wrote this story about a community trying to make life easier for local hedgehogs and dealing with the dramas that take place as a result!

When I set out to write Prickly, I’d just read Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere. I loved that story for so many reasons, but one thing I found really inspiring was the way that Shaker Heights, the setting for the book, was almost seen from above at times - as if the people and events were like ants, and then we zoomed in closer and they became people. Shaker Heights and all it stood for was like a character in itself.

I decided I wanted to do something similar with PRICKLY COMPANY; that I would show the reader the community in its entirety - people, hedgehogs and all - and then swoop down into - mainly human- viewpoints. As I wrote the novel, the occasional hedgehog perspective crept in too. I wanted these perspectives to be many things - sometimes amusing and entertaining, occasionally sad and moving, but also educational. I had things to say about how hedgehogs live and how human habits affect them, and I wanted to tell the reader about these things in a way that was part of the story.

I had a lot to say about people too, and the way that, all too often, we keep our pain and struggles hidden from each other when, possibly, if we were more open, we might get help and understanding from the most unexpected sources.

It was a lot of fun to write.

So, Happy Birthday, Prickly!

Today’s the day! CLOSEST KEPT is officially released into the world, taking along with it long hours of work and re-crafting, hundreds of lines of dialogue delivered to me from my characters as I walked the dog, and emotions - plenty of emotions! As a writer, I always feel things along with my characters, and there was a lot to feel with Lily, the viewpoint character of CLOSEST KEPT. I like to think that, were she able to read the novel, she’d like the way I told her story, even if she found the words painful to read at times.

CLOSEST KEPT celebrates friendship and the power of taking the risk to face up to what might be holding you back in life. I hope you enjoy it, and if you do, I’d be eternally grateful if you could help to increase visibility by leaving a review!

A while ago now, I fell deeply in love with the Before series of films: Before Sunrise (1995), Before Sunset (2004) and Before Midnight (2013) starring Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy, directed by Richard Linklater.

If you haven’t seen them, the films follow the spark and evolution of a relationship between a couple - Jesse and Celine - who meet on a train (in Sunrise) and decide to spend a night in Vienna walking and talking the night away. They meet again in Paris after 9 years apart (in Sunset), and then, (in Midnight) we pick up with them 9 years later on holiday in Greece after they’ve had two children together. The actors and the characters age in real time, and the films were an amazing collaboration between the actors and the director, with the actors helping to write their own dialogue. And dialogue is what the films are really about - hours of conversations between Jesse and Celine about life and love, time, self-discovery, age, loss, and parenting as the couple gets to know and love each other.

The films largely break the “show don’t tell rule”, and yet remain - to me, and thousands of others - hugely interesting, all those conversations brimming with subtext and crackling with attraction, vulnerability and emotion. Humour too.

So what has the Before trilogy got to do with Closest Kept? Well, when I set out to write a novel about the shifting relationships between two couples, I had the kind of subtext and emotions of those long conversations between Jesse and Celine in my mind. I wanted to try and see if, here and there, I could create something similar - to allow the reader to really get an insight into the dynamic between the friends and lovers as well as to get to know the individual characters. I was unsure, when I started working with a developmental editor, whether these long scenes of dialogue would make it into the finished novel, or whether I’d be asked to cut them down.

So much about the novel deepened and changed during the developmental editing process - it was a painful, but extremely worthwhile experience which I’ve spoken about before. The novel is certainly very much stronger than it was before all the changes. But, hurrah, those two long scenes of conversations between Lily, Inga, Matt and Alex that were so close to my heart survived pretty much intact.

You can read them - and the rest of the novel - from publication day on 6th May.

It occurred to me the other day that all the major world travel I’ve done so far has been as the result of some big life-changing event. I’ve used travel to far flung countries - a bit like challenging myself to perform stand-up comedy - as a way of proving to myself that I’m okay. Or, if I’m not quite okay just then, that I will be soon. How could I not be, when I’m a gutsy, brave woman, travelling somewhere exciting, making my own decisions, and, in some cases, planning how the hell I can make enough money to pay for it all.

The first time I did this, years ago, I went to Belize, on my own, but as part of an organised group. I’d recently been dumped by my commitment phobic boyfriend, Christmas was fast approaching, and I couldn’t face spending the festive season back home with my family, feeling like a failure and engaging in the same old rituals. As far as I was concerned, Christmas was cancelled. I’d send everyone exotic postcards instead of Christmas cards. So I got myself a series of short-term foreign student lodgers and saved up the pennies.

Belize was fabulous. Colourful. Exotic. Butterflies bigger than my hand. Brightly-coloured iguanas everywhere. A vivid green frog living on my shower curtain. Howler monkeys and a procession of leaf-cutter ants in the rain forest on our trip to the jungle on Christmas day. Sadly, there was also Bing Crosby’s White Christmas playing in the shops and decorative Santas ho, ho, hoing everywhere - turns out they celebrate Christmas in a big way in Belize. But I could forgive that, because it was such a paradise. Or it would have been, if it hadn’t been for my annoying room mate Linda, who drove me crazy with her ziplock bags of clothes and her constant commentaries about her activities: “I’m just going to find a clean T-shirt. Zip. Now where did I put it? Zip. Oh, here it is. No, not that one. Zip. I’ll save it until later. Zip. I think I’ll have a shower. Are you okay? Gosh, what a lively crew we are in here…” Etc.

Still, I was even grateful for Linda in the end, because she - together with everything Belize - inspired a novella (for people learning to speak English) - Jungle Love - that was published by Cambridge University Press.

Another break up, another adventure; this time to Cuba, where, happily, my room mate, Sharon, was delightful - we’re still friends twenty years later.

Cuba appears in my self-published novel For Hannah, With Love, but also in a therapy/revenge book called Murder Maker about a woman who becomes a serial killer as a result of being cruelly dumped.

The whole story is related to the viewpoint character’s ex, so he knows his murder is imminent. In real life, my ex saw the book in a book shop window after it was published and was compelled to go in and buy it, so he got to find out exactly what I might like to do to him if I wasn’t bothered about a prison sentence. But the real revenge was that the book sold around the world and is still selling today.

More recently, there was the trip to New Zealand, somewhere I’d always wanted to visit. This time, I went with my then 14-year-old son. No break-up to get over on this occasion - my beloved mother had died and I’d inherited some money. It was a trip to honour her; an attempt to sooth my grief. It was also a celebration of my close relationship with my son who, because of his age, was about to start growing away from me.

Words can’t describe how fabulous it was. We went at the end of 2019 - once again over Christmas, and instead of the usual festivities, we visited a glow worm cave and made use of the hotel launderette on the big day. (Though we did also go to a fabulous eat-all-you-want buffet in the evening). We returned home in January 2020, just before Covid hit. How lucky were we to get our trip in?

My most recent big trip was last year, in 2023, to attend the amazing Women’s Fiction Writers Association conference in Chicago, celebrating 10 years of the organisation. The impetus for travelling all that way this time, apart from wanting to meet lots of like-minded writers and to gain important insight and knowledge? My son was leaving home to start university. An empty nest was rushing towards me, and I needed, once again, to prove to myself that I would okay. I had to be okay, because, look at me, doing something brave. Going all that way by myself. (Especially brave, because I’m not over confident at such events). But it was fantastic. Life-affirming. As all my big travel adventures have been.

But the thing is, what next? I’ve come to terms with my son being gone. I’m in a happy long-term relationship. My books are being published and warmly received. I don’t want my boat to be rocked, thank you very much. So, I suppose I’m just going to have to do some exciting world travel because…well, I want to take a holiday. The way most people do!

(Please consider pre-ordering my next novel, Closest Kept to help fund future world travel).

It has been quite a week. Last Thursday I gave a talk to The Golden Triangle Girls Women’s Institute group - of which I’m a member - on the topic of: My life as a writer, and the role my life has played in my writing. And on Saturday morning, I woke up to discover that, while I was asleep, my novel Five Winters had won a Star Award from the Women’s Fiction Writers Association!

The Women’s Fiction Writers Association is so important to me. I’ve made some amazing friends through being a member, and I wouldn’t have my agent if I’d never joined, because she found me via a pitch event organised by the WFWA.

So I was thrilled to win the Star Award, as I’m sure you can imagine. Emotional too. In fact, I’ll admit to shedding more than a few tears. Winning an award like this is validation, I guess, for all the years of hard work. It’s humbling and extremely gratifying to know that readers have enjoyed your book; that your characters have spoken to them, entertained them. That you’ve kept them up at night reading your words.

As I told the Golden Triangle Girls, Five Winters is packed full of experiences and emotions from my life. The main character, Beth, is not me at all. But, during the course of the novel, she deals with some of the same issues I’ve dealt with myself over the years. Unrequited love (happily a long time ago now)! A strong yearning to have a family. The need to pick yourself up and make a new start when things go wrong.

I’ve heard that, when they’re preparing for a role, actors search their memories for a time when they felt the same emotions as their character - it’s the same with writing, or at least, it is for me.

If you’re a writer, nothing in your life needs to be wasted! I once had a dog who liked to race trains if I walked him near a railway line - in the book. At my mother’s funeral, one of the pall bearers was shorter than the others, which made the coffin feel alarmingly precarious - in the book. I was once a part-time stepmother to two girls who resented me - you’ve guessed it - in the book. Nothing is exactly the same as in real life, but the core of the experience - the sadness, the panic, the laughter - can be used to sweep your reader along with you.

My next novel, Closest Kept, is equally emotional. Like Beth in Five Winters, my main character, Lily, has a strong friendship that plays an important part in her life. But things change, and the future suddenly looks as uncertain for Lily as the past she does her level best to forget. Closest Kept is available to pre-order now! Published on 6th May 2025.