What I'm Reading and Writing

A few years ago I read Ann Voskamp's excellent and inspiring book, 1000 Gifts. It really challenged me to be thankful for the small and everyday things in my life, and I recommended it to many people. I was thrilled, therefore, to see that she'd written another book--and one that seemed to speak directly into my life. It's called The Broken Way and its subtitle is 'A Daring Path to the Abundant Life'. The essential theme is that we need to be emptied to be filled, we need to give to receive, we need to lose ourselves in order to be found. It's thought-provoking and poetic--Ann Voskamp's style takes some getting used to, as it is more stream of consciousness than straight narrative. But I'd highly recommend this book!

As for what I'm writing... well, I've already written it, but the second book in my Willoughby Close series is available for preorder. It's called Meet Me At Willoughby Close and it's about a Manchester single mum and an Oxford professor and their unlikely, funny, and heartwarming romance. You can preorder it here.

Inspiration all around

Our moving truck in New York City

For those of you who follow my admittedly sporadic blog, you have probably noticed that my family moves a lot. We always hope we'll settle where we land, but so far that hasn't happened. Since I got married I've moved from Cambridge to Yorkshire to Connecticut to New York City to Cumbria to the Cotswolds to Wales. Whew!

Starting over isn't easy, even when you're used to it. My children have all been in school a week and that feels like a relief. They are starting to know their way around and have made a few friends. The worst, I hope, is over.

One nice thing about living in lots of places is the inspiration I've found in each one. Most of my books are set in places I've lived, whether it's my women's fiction such as This Fragile Life (set in New York), my Tales From Goswell series (set in Cumbria) or one of my Christmas novellas such as A Yorkshire Christmas (set--well I'm sure you can guess).

Next month I have a new series coming out set in the English Cotswolds. I only lived there for a year but I was inspired to write about the beautiful village and countryside where I lived, as well as the interesting mix of people--London transplants and old farming families, and how they all managed to get along. A Cotswold Christmas is the first book in what is The Willoughby Close series, set in the entirely-fictional-but-a-little-bit-based-on-reality village, Wychwood-on-Lea. You can preorder it here.

In the meantime, I am trying to get to know my new surroundings, a small, friendly market town in Wales, built between two rivers, with beautiful, hilly countryside all around. Will I become inspired? Watch this space...