crime writer

New year, new books

/ Caron Allan / Leave a comment

Most of us had to get back to work this week, and that includes writers! I’m at the creative stage, ideas flowing, crazy ones or a bit more sensible, I’m making a huge amount of notes, then just as likely, crossing them out the next day, only to come back a day after that and think, ‘Yes, actually, I like that idea, it could work really well.’

I’m not much of a planner but I’m doing my level best. I’ve been looking ahead, and trying to plan a work schedule.

I’m intending to spend the next five weeks drafting my new Dottie book – hopefully that will be out in December. That will be book 9 of the series, and I’m calling it The Rough Rude Sea. Dottie and William return by steamship from their honeymoon. Obviously it’s not going to be smooth sailing. (sorry about the pun).

Then, mid-February, it will be all change, and I’ll be in editing mode as I tidy up and polish Through Dancing Poppies, the third book in the Miss Gascoigne mysteries series. Miss Gascoigne.

Then…

…at some point I’ve got to crowbar in rewrites and polishing etc of Dirty Work, book 1 in the new trilogy Families Can Be Murder. This is a spin-off of my original trilogy Friendship Can be Murder, book 1 Criss Cross was first published in 2012. This time it’s Matt, not Cressida, writing the diary entries and confessing all.

Apparently I’m also going on holiday… I think I might need it!

***

 

Queen of Grime: book 1 of a new crime thriller series with secrets and dark humour

/ Caron Allan / 1 Comment

The Queen of Grime is about to pay. Big time.

Erin Flett is used to clearing up the sad debris of forgotten lives and tragic deaths. A crime and trauma scene cleaner from a deprived Edinburgh housing estate, she’s made a good life for herself and her daughter. But a secret from the past is about to catch up with her.

Ten years ago, Erin told a desperate lie with serious consequences. Now, someone else knows, and they’re determined to make Erin and her loved ones pay.

Following a terrifying late-night attack, the tension mounts until Erin doesn’t know who she can trust. As she struggles to keep her family safe, little does she realise just how close the danger is…

Queen of Grime is the first in a new series introducing Erin Flett, crime and trauma scene cleaner, and a rich cast of characters, set against the backdrop of the city of Edinburgh. With an occasional undertone of dark humour, it is a tale of family lies and family ties, friendships, secrets and loss.

My Review:

I need to confess something. I’d already read this book a while ago, before I got involved in this blog. There. I’ve said it. Phew. Now you know I was already a fan. I feel so much better now.

What did I love about this book?

I love Erin, the main character, she tough, she’s snarky, she doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and she is a smart lady. She’s got some great – and not-so-great friends and family, colourful characters you completely believe in.

BUT…

She’s got a secret. And someone – we don’t know who – but someone knows that she has this secret. And they are determined to get it out of her. A series of seemingly unrelated minor events and issues arise, and Erin is asking herself, is it all connected?

As readers, we KNOW that, of course, it’s connected. But how? And who is the person lurking in the dark?

Because this book is full of lurkers. There are people everywhere Erin goes, just watching, waiting, setting her on edge, attacking her, attacking people she loves. Who is it? Are they sinister? Or is there some other motive behind all this? You just can’t tell. Erin herself is observing them all, and trying to figure out what’s on their mind, unable to let herself relax with them for a moment.

I reread this book again last week after a break, and the thing that makes me smile about it is, I always say to myself, I’ll just read that next chapter, then I’ll put it down. But I get to the end of that chapter, and I can’t help myself, I just have to read the next one, and the next… It’s compulsive.

So yes, I absolutely recommend this book. I’m really looking forward to the next in the series. Hint, hint.

BUT I’d seriously advise you to read the prequel, Spoils of the Dead, it sets the scene perfectly, introduces some back story and the main character and her people, and the eBook is only 99p so why not? If you’re going to do a thing, you’ve got to do it properly, right?

LINKS TO BUY Queen of Grime:

Paperback 

Kindle 

About Helen:

Helen Forbes is an author of Scottish crime fiction. She lives in her home-town of Inverness, in the Scottish Highlands. Helen began by writing contemporary and historical fiction, with no intention of turning to crime. It was a chance remark at a writing group about one of her short stories that led to her debut police procedural novel, In the Shadow of the Hill, set in Inverness and South Harris, featuring Detective Sergeant Joe Galbraith. Madness Lies is book 2 in the DS Joe Galbraith series, set in Inverness and North Uist.

Helen has had two standalone crime thrillers published by Scolpaig Press. Unravelling, set in Inverness, was published in July 2021. Deception, set in Edinburgh, was published in January 2022.

Spoils of the Dead, a novella, was published in November 2022, and Queen of Grime, the first in a new series, was released in December 2022.

Helen would be delighted to hear from readers. Please contact her and join her mailing list on her website http://www.helenforbes.co.uk to get her author news and a free copy of the novella, Spoils of the Dead.

WEBSITE AND SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS:

Facebook 

Website

Amazon Author Page

#QUEENOFGRIME #Scottishauthors #crimewriters

Coming soon: The Cousins

/ Caron Allan / Leave a comment

I’m always a little bit surprised when I meet a deadline. Not quite sure why, maybe it’s because a book seems such a huge thing to undertake, until, bit by bit, it’s done. I imagine it’s the same with any project – you break it down into small chunks and that makes it easier to handle. It’s also easier to measure progress, and you don’t (sometimes!) get overwhelmed by the enormity of the thing.

So with more than a little relief, I’m pleased to announce that The Cousins will be released on 12th December as planned.  It will be available in eBook format, paperback and large print. It’s not part of a series, it’s a stand-alone book.

Please be aware that it contains some emotional scenes, and some description of memories of child sexual abuse.

Here’s a little bit about it:

The Cousins.

Secrets. Everybody has them.

When Caitlin sits by her grandfather’s side as he lays dying, she thinks she’s about to lose her entire family. Before he passes, he makes an odd comment, leaving her with something to puzzle over, along with a set of old black and white photographs.

Then at his funeral, she meets her long-lost cousins, and soon there are even more questions to answer and puzzles to solve. Where have they been all these years? Why haven’t they been in touch if they care so much about ‘family’?

The past holds secrets. Everybody seems to have something they are keeping to themselves.

And that includes Caitlin.

Intrigued? Click here to read more.

If you’d like to order this book, please click here.

‘So, where do you get your ideas?’

/ Caron Allan / 3 Comments

I know I’ve written on this topic a couple of times before, but it’s one of those questions that never goes away.

‘Where do you get your ideas?’

This is one of the first questions people usually ask me – and I’m pretty sure it happens to other writers all the time. It kind of makes me want to groan, because it’s next to impossible to give a sincere and considered answer to this question without boring the pants off everyone by talking for an hour. The short, somewhat trite answer might be, ‘Everywhere!’

But if we really want to answer the question, it takes a minute or two longer. Because really there’s no single answer. Ideas don’t come from one unique, unvarying source. Nor do they come in the same way each time. Anything from the world seen or unseen can come to my attention and lead me to think, ‘Hmm, that’s interesting…’

Inspiration, which is what ideas really are, comes from everywhere and nowhere. A snatch of song, a news story, a little patch of colour on a card in the paint section of the DIY store, the turn of a person’s head making you think just for one split second it’s someone else, someone from another time, someone who should be dead. An unexpected view of yourself in a shop window, that odd moment before you recognise yourself, that brief second when you think, slightly puzzled, ‘I know you.’

An overheard snatch of conversation, ‘Don’t lose my hat, man, my hat’s my identity,’ and ‘Of course she never did find out who’d sent it.’ A film, a book, a taste, a smell, a memory, a story your mother told you – you’ve known her all your life yet this is the first time she’s ever mentioned this particular incident.

I have based two full-length stories on dreams, three short stories and one novel on songs, a poem on a piece of art, a novel based on a documentary I saw on TV about ancient tapestries, (Opus Anglicanum: Latin for English work), and another about the Reformation. I’ve written a short story about an arrowhead, and another about ancestral bones and the relevance they might have to a Neolithic man, about a couple of  trips to Skara Brae in the Orkneys.

I’ve written a whole series of stories about the fact that all too often people think it’s okay to take the law into their own hands. (I’m looking at you Cressida, MC of the Friendship Can Be Murder trilogy!) I’ve written about work situations, about hopes and plans for the future, about family tree research, about children, and pets, and parents. About love. About the absence of love. About Faith. About fear. About books I read as a child. And books I read as an adult. I’ve written about identity and what it means to be who I am, who you are. I’ve written about death – loads.

I saw a gorgeous man on the bus many years ago and wrote a story about him, (The Ice King – still not ‘available’, but if you’re intrigued, here’s a link to a short bit about him.) I’ve read news reports and been inspired to create my own story around some of those. I’ve written in hospital having just given birth, in hospital awaiting treatment for cancer, at work during my lunchbreak when I felt so depressed I just wanted to run away and hide. I’ve written when sitting on the loo, sitting in the garden, on holiday, in bed with flu, and in cafes all over Britain, Europe and Australia. I’ve written on buses and trains and planes. I’ve written when someone I cared about has died. I’ve even got inspiration from sitting down at my desk every day and just making myself write. Sometimes I’ve written page upon page of ‘I don’t know what to write’, like lines that we had to do at school, and still nothing has come to me and I’ve gone away desperate, feeling that the well has not only dried up, but was only a mirage to begin with.

If you are a writer, you squirrel away in the eccentric filing cabinet known as your brain EVERY single thing that you ever experience, and a bit like doing a jigsaw puzzle or creating a patchwork quilt, you keep trying pieces together every which way until something fits and makes a pleasing and meaningful picture. There’s not really a pattern to it, there’s not a system or a set of regulations to follow. You just do it.

That’s where I get my ideas.

***

Criss Cross: Friendship can be Murder: book 1

/ Caron Allan

I first published Criss Cross in Feb 2013.

It wasn’t the first book I wrote, but it was the first book I decided to take the plunge and self-publish. An early reviewer said it was the worst book they’d ever read, which made me feel quite proud. It was an achievement of sorts, though maybe not in the way I’d hoped! 😀

I suppose it’s not for everyone–stylistically, it doesn’t suit a lot of people’s taste. It’s written in the first person, in diary-entry sections rather than chapters, and the character herself, our narrator Cressida is ‘posh’ (which is why the trilogy was, to begin with, called the ‘posh hits’ murder series).

But I like to think the story has heart. and it’s not so much a murder mystery as a murder confessional – throughout, Cressida tells us–more or less–exactly what she’s up to. Of course, the joy of first person narration is the reader can only know what the narrator knows, so if she doesn’t know everything, well, well, well…

Some people liked it though. One reviewer seemed to ‘get’ it. To my great joy, they said:

“…the heroine is completely without morals…You really should not like her, but you find yourself wishing her every success in her increasingly bizarre schemes and personal entanglements”

Whilst another (I’m bragging now – sorry!) said,

“Outstandingly witty, daft, exciting and so enjoyable!! This is the best book I have read in a long time. Exquisite!!”

And someone else said,

“…enables the reader to enter into the twisted world of the main character … reading her journal … you take voyeuristic pleasure in her inner thoughts, plans & audacious exploits”

Why am I going on about it? Well, I’ve just started writing a new book for a new trilogy, which is a ‘twelve years later’ spin-off of the Friendship can Be Murder series. The new one is called Families Can be Murder, and book 1 will be called Dirty Work. You can find an extract from the book on this page:

These books are quite different to my Dottie Manderson and Miss Gascoigne series. It can be helpful to write something different. I don’t want to get into a rut with my other two series, and it’s nice to write something that feels new and different, and gives me scope to write outside of the historical periods of the other books.

The first books, though, Criss Cross and the other two books in the series were a bit of a leap of faith for me. Could I really do it? Could I actually write–and publish–books that would sell? It was scary, and 12/13 years ago, self-publishing was still quite a new concept to many people.

Some people told me I was kidding myself, that I was just a wannabe, that if it wasn’t published by a traditional publisher then clearly my book was rubbish, and a mere hobby or wishful thinking. Oh well, you can’t please ’em all!

Just in case you’re interested though, let’s go back to the beginning. Here’s what Cressida had to say in book 1:

(Caution: contains bad words!)

Blurb:

Spoilt society girl Cressida Barker-Powell wants to murder her interfering mother-in-law. In her diary she carefully plans the perfect murder but when she arrives at the scene, she finds the old woman already dead. Soon it becomes clear that her Hitchcock-Movie-loving best pal, Monica, has carried out the deed for her! Taking the murder-switch idea from their favourite Hitchcock movie, Cressida decides the only real way to show her gratitude is by killing off Monica’s philandering husband and his bimbo girlfriend. Monica should appreciate the idea of swapping murders. That’s what she wants, right?
Wrong!
Cressida quickly discovers this was not what her friend had in mind, and a devastated Monica is now hell-bent on revenge. Which means their friendship is definitely over. Isn’t it?

Criss Cross:

Sun 24 June

To my darling Cressida

Happy Birthday, Sweetheart! Have fun writing down all your thoughts and plans and dreams, then when we’re old and grey we can sit together on that terrace in Capri and watch the sun go down, drink a glass of wine and you can read me the spicy bits from this journal and we will have a good laugh and talk about the old days!

With all my love forever and ever

Thomas xx

Same day: 10.35pm

She must die!! I hate her!! I refuse to put up with her a moment longer, she is an evil, conniving old bitch without a grain of family feeling and it’s time she was dead!!

Mon 25 June—2.35pm

Have you noticed how some people just never seem to realise they’ve gone too far?

I was going to start off my new journal with something terribly erudite and wise. Like a new school notebook, I particularly wanted the first page to look lovely. But I suppose it really doesn’t matter if the first page isn’t perfectly neat and everything: the whole purpose of a journal is to pour out one’s innermost thoughts and give vent to all the frustrations that, as a nicely brought-up person, one can’t give full reign to in ‘real’ life, and so obviously even the first page can get a bit messy. And now just look at it!

But I digress. I must explain from the beginning…

It was my birthday yesterday. 32 already. God, I’m old! I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror this morning and even in the flattering south-facing light and all steamy and fresh from the shower, I’m absolutely certain I could see the tiniest line down the left side of my face from my nose to the corner of my mouth—I’m convinced it wasn’t there yesterday. Wonder if I’ve left it too late for Botox?

Among a number of very extravagant birthday gifts, my Darling Thomas gave me this sweet little journal. I’d mentioned weeks ago that I used to keep a journal when I was a melodramatic teenager, and how nice it was just to write down everything that happened and to really get it out of my system and add in lots of ‘grrr’ faces and heavy underlining, and lo and behold, the dear man, he surprised me with this journal for my birthday. So here I am.

It’s an absolutely beautiful book. It has a hard cover with a weird kind of gothicky design in the most gorgeous shades of black and purple and gold, with a magneticky bit in the front flap to keep it closed, and the pages, somewhere between A5 and American letter-size, are edged in gold too, so it feels very glamorous to write in—In fact I was a bit afraid to begin the first page, hence all the fuss about it looking nice and neat, I almost got a kind of writer’s block!

But all my good intentions and deep thoughts and years of accumulated adult wisdom and the desire to create something really special went out the window when my cow of a mother-in-law turned up on a ‘surprise’ visit and now my first page—well second really, under that really sweet little message from Thomas—Is absolutely ruined! I only hope to God Thomas doesn’t read it!

Not that she’d remembered it was my birthday any more than my own mother had—oh no! One can’t expect her (or either of them in fact!) to keep track of trivial little details like that. No, she needed Thomas’s advice about some financial matters, and thought she’d pop over. After all what’s an hour and a half’s chauffeured drive here or there? Of course she didn’t bother to ring first, see if we were in or free or anything. Clarice is used to everyone falling in with her plans.

‘I knew you wouldn’t be doing anything important,’ she says as she breezes in, dropping her coat in the middle of the hall, frowning around at the décor before settling herself in the drawing room, demanding tea. Not just the drink! By ‘tea’ she means that Victorian/Edwardian meal between Luncheon, as she calls it, and Dinner. She expected crustless sandwiches, crumpets, cakes (large and small), scones, jam and cream, the works. And copious amounts, of course, of tea-the-drink. China, not Indian. With lemon slices in a dainty little crystal dish, not 2 litres of semi-skimmed in a huge plastic container.

Thomas reminded her that it was my birthday and that consequently we had plans for the evening. She waved a negligent hand. Her hair, a shade too brave, was salon-perfectly waved if somewhat stiff-looking, and her clothes were at least one generation too young for her, but hideously expensive as well as just—well, hideous. Did I mention I hate her?

‘Oh that can be set aside. You can easily go out some other evening. My financial affairs are of the first import.’

Thomas looked at me. He didn’t want to fight with his mother and I knew there would be no point in trying to push him to resist the onslaught, so for poor Thomas’s sake, I sighed and shrugged and he sat down next to the old dragon and asked what she wanted to know. Meanwhile I dashed off to ring Monica Pearson-Jones and a few others, to let them know that we would either be horribly late for the theatre party, or quite possibly not turn up at all. I have to admit I was feeling quite cross and rather sorry for myself. However, Huw and Monica’s machine had to take the terrible news, as they were out. I hoped to God they weren’t already on their way.

***

Thanks for reading!

Quick catch-up!

/ Caron Allan

Writing.

It’s one of those things that everyone you meet says they could do too if they only had the time. Maybe they are right. but I’ve always felt that if something means a lot to you, you find the time, you make the time, you figure out your priorities and squeeze your passion into every crack and crevice you can.

I can remember grabbing time on my commute to work, or during lunch breaks, in the evenings when my better half was watching something on TV that didn’t interest me, or just any spare moment or snatched ten minutes I could find. Ten minutes, several times a week can give you one or two thousand words, times that by 52 weeks in a year, and you’ve got a novel.

These days, I’m officially old, and I no longer work outside the home, so I can spend quite a bit of time every day (not as much as you’d think, there are always distractions…) writing or thinking about what I’ve just written or what I might write next.

My latest book, Midnight, the Stars, and You: Dottie Manderson mysteries book 8, came out in September. And in December, I have two books being released, The Cousins, a sort-of mystery, a stand-alone novel, is one of them, the other is the German language edition of my book A Wreath of Lilies: Miss Gascoigne mysteries book 2. The German title is Ein Kranz aus Lilien.

I’ve already started looking ahead – I’m always doing that – and have plans to publish Miss Gascoigne mysteries book 3 Through Dancing Poppies in maybe April next year.

Then after that… well, so many decisions to make, so many books to write…

We’ve just come back from holiday. In fact, I’ve been lucky enough to have a couple of holidays this year and they had elements in common: a seaside location, and a large number of diverse people in a small area. This is exactly the kind of thing that breeds ideas in my head. I made COPIOUS notes, did a ton of people-watching, took hundreds of photos, and now I’m sitting at my desk thinking, ‘Hmm… what if…?’

It’s too soon to make any announcements, but something is definitely brewing…

 

cover image by Agalaya.

***

Marsali Taylor’s An Imposter In Shetland #blogtour #ANIMPOSTERINSHETLAND

/ Caron Allan / 4 Comments

About ‘An Imposter in Shetland’:

When an internet lifestyle influencer arrives on Shetland to document her ‘perfect’ holiday, the locals are somewhat sceptical.

Joining a boat trip to the remote islands of St Kilda with sailing sleuth Cass Lynch and her partner DI Gavin Macrae, the young woman seems more concerned with her phone than the scenery.

But when it’s time to leave, there’s no sign of her. Despite mounting a desperate search, she’s seemingly vanished without trace – from a small island in the middle of the sea.

As a puzzling investigation gathers pace, there are more questions than answers – and uncovering the truth will reveal dark and long-hidden secrets…

Review:

5 stars!

I absolutely loved this book. It was good to catch up with some favourite characters from previous books, not just our protagonist Cass, but her lovely boyfriend/partner/cat daddy Gavin, a detective inspector with the police, and their sailing colleagues and Shetland pals, Magnie, Donald, and Inga… not to mention the cats!

Wouldn’t it be lovely to be in that sitootery right now with a cup of coffee and a chocolate digestive or two, with this book on your lap but really it would be as if it was a play going on in front of your eyes…

Add a cast of intriguing characters – some local, some visitors, a range of ages and experiences, yet all with a common passion for sailing around the Shetland isles, visiting the famous island of St Kilda along the way. Cass is teamed up with some trusty sailing colleagues to head up the trip. Then as always in this series, there is the constant challenge of the natural elements – human against the wind and the waves, Cass is teaching youngsters how to find their way at sea.  There’s an ‘influencer’ who keeps herself to herself – has she planned this? Is someone out to harm her? Questions and layers emerge as the story progresses, and like me, you’ll be trying to solve this case before Cass and Gavin do!

You’ve got to read this book! I’ve read them all and this is even better than the last!

The Blog Tour

Check out these other brilliant blogs and social media pages which are featuring this book this week:

kaz loves books 

miriam drori’s blog

bookaddict twylie

jo fenton’s blog

vicarious living

donna morfett andrews

writers block

anita d hunt

mason’s menagerie

bookaholic

val penny’s book reviews

bookmark and stages

sheena macleod all about books

celtic connexions

Author Biography

Marsali Taylor grew up near Edinburgh, and came to Shetland as a newly-qualified teacher. She is currently a part-time teacher on Shetland’s scenic west side, living with her husband and two Shetland ponies. Marsali is a qualified STGA tourist-guide who is fascinated by history, and has published plays in Shetland’s distinctive dialect, as well as a history of women’s suffrage in Shetland. She’s also a keen sailor who enjoys exploring in her own 8m yacht, and an active member of her local drama group.

Links

Facebook

Website

Amazon Author Page 

To Buy

 

Midnight, the Stars, and You: Dottie Manderson mysteries book 8 – coming September 2025

/ Caron Allan

So this happened…

Like an eejit I decided to go ahead and put my next Dottie book on Amazon for pre-order. It will be released on Saturday 6th September 2025.

It’s eBook only at the moment, I’m afraid.  Paperback, large print paperback and hardback will follow around the same time, but are not available to pre-order, sorry. The paperback version will also (eventually) be available from other online bookshops.

This is book eight in the Dottie Manderson mystery series. I’ve mentioned it a few times before, but here’s a bit more detail:

Book 8 of the Dottie Manderson mysteries finds Dottie fed up with waiting and all the fuss, and just wanting to get on with being Mrs Detective Inspector William Hardy.

An unexpected invitation could be just what she needs. How wonderful it will be to get away to a weekend house party and forget all the worries of organising the wedding! Unfortunately it’s a house party that will never be forgotten: squabbles, cliques and even unexpected death.

Of course, William, like all husbands-to-be everywhere, has no interest whatsoever in the problems of the right kind of lace or the perfect place setting. In any case, he’s got a special kind of investigation going on, one that means bringing a good friend to justice, stretching his loyalty to his profession almost to breaking point.

Interested? If you are, you might like to read an extract here!

If you would like to pre-order the eBook, you can click on these links below, or search on your local Amazon platform.

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Amazon.de

Amazon.au

Thanks for reading!

In the Neolithic Village

/ Caron Allan

If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you will have seen this one before… I do quite often repeat myself. Mainly because I know anyone who has already seen it will either have forgotten it by now, or will be happy to gloss over it once more, but there will be many people who (hopefully) won’t have seen it yet.

Recently I’ve been digging out photos and other pictures for posting on Pinterest – it’s one of my favourite platforms, as I’m a very visual person, I am inspired by what I see. And during this digging out process I found some more photos I took years ago when we went to Skara Brae, in Orkney, an island group off the north coast of Scotland.

Seeing those houses had been a goal of mine since I watched that iconic Simon Schama documentary A History of Britain, and I had to see it for myself. It’s not often something inspires me to that extent, but that really did. And because I a) love people and b) love history, I wanted to see a place where those two things met. And where so gloriously stunning as the neolithic village Skara Brae, unearthed during a violent storm in 1850, it was last inhabited four thousand years before that. This glorious place set my imagination on fire, and I concocted this short story…

The corridors linking the houses are dark, black-dark, and yet the children run back and forth giggling and jostling as children have always done. They barely pause in their running as the corridors narrow or curve. They laugh in and out of the houses, running amongst the groups, tribes, families. Outside, beyond the house, the sea and the wind roar, and strange creatures prowl the earth. But not in here.

In the houses themselves, the central hearth is the main light and although bright enough to prepare the food by, the illumination doesn’t reach to the farthest parts of the room where the animals are safely housed against thick stone walls. But their soft noises and comfortable smells lull the elders who sit by the fire and prod the embers or stir the cooking-pot by turns.

Soon the eye becomes accustomed to the dimness and it is possible to see not just vague shapes but the shapes of the bodies of the cattle in their pens, or the shapes of the drawings in the sand of the fireside floor, the simple outlines that accompany the story that is being told. A half-grown child, listening to the stories with wide eyes is given instructions and items of interest, are brought from the dresser to the one who speaks, who holds each thing up for all to see and recounts all that is known, the history of the item, the way it happened to be found or created, all that makes it special is told now to those who are gathered. They’ve heard it before. Even last night but still they all look and a discussion takes place, even the child speaks. He will be a fine man one day soon. They look on him with pride. One day, he will be the teller of stories.

The food is passed round, grain and meat and fish and coarse bread, flat and hot from the stones by the fire. Everyone eats and there is a strange hush over those in the house for a time. There is a ritual about eating. There is a ritual about being in the safety of a warm and solid home with the cattle and the fire. This is what it means to be at home.

It is evening, the day draws to a close and everyone is gathered in the safe warmth of the roundhouse, and nearby, there are other houses, with other people gathered, and the children are the running link between them. More stories are told, more conversation and discussion over the nature of the stars and their brightness, of the tides of the sea, of the path of the moon who guides the hunters and blesses the crops.

And over the way, along the dark tunnel then out into the air, in another similar house, the ancestors listen and smile as the brightness of the moon creeps in.

*

Embracing the mess

/ Caron Allan

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about routine and how I think it’s essential to productive creativity. But what do you do if your routine goes to pot and everything is unsettled and out of sync?

Just go with it.

I’m thinking of that song by Scott Walker about a million years ago, ‘Make It Easy On Yourself.’ That’s just what you should do.

If you allow the stress of being disorganised to get to you, you will become depressed, anxious, feel guilty, and become increasingly non-productive, then get even more deeply depressed. So it’s important to allow yourself the room to just do what you can manage, and don’t sweat it. Do what you can and don’t beat yourself up if you feel you’re not achieving as much as you should, or planned to achieve.

Do what you can, and gradually normality will reassert itself. Even if you only write a small amount, remind yourself it’s a step forward from yesterday, and any progress, no matter how small, is good. You may even find, as I am beginning to realise, that it’s a normal part of your creative process.

I usually start strong, like most writers. I have a good idea of where the story is going, I know what it’s about. But for me, again like many writers, the problems arise about halfway or so into the story when suddenly I realise a) I’m useless at writing, b) my story sucks, and c) it’s never going to be ready in time.

The first couple of times this happened, I gave up on the story. That was a long time ago when I was a young writer. Then I realised I could work through the doubt and fear and finish a book. And for a long time, that’s what I did. But the last couple of years have been exceptionally stressful in my life, and pressures have taken their toll. And now, my old anxieties have resurfaced and this time it’s so much harder to push them away and carry on. But that’s what I’m going to do. Because what choice do I have? Do I want to give up writing? NO!

So now, I’m embracing the mess, and working with it, secure in the knowledge that, regardless of my feelings and the muddle that is my so-called WIP, I can do this. It might take a while, and it might be baby steps, but I will get there, and finish this book.

‘Mesdames et messieurs, allow me to reveal at last, the identity of the criminal’, said Birdcule Poirot

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