Bad weeks and good days

You know it's a bad week when the courier loses your corrected page proofs two days from final sign-off, when material for a magazine you edit is yet to arrive and it's ten days after deadline, and when the news from the vet involves cardboard boxes and tears.

But it's also a good day when you finally sign off that novel, when your characters are out of your hands and ready to make their own way, when your mind is cleared - as much as a mind ever is - for the next story to arrive, to expand, to reveal its surprises.

Evie is off. You won't see her for a few months, but she's on her way toward you. ('Evie's War' officially arrives in-store on 4 July.) And I am ready to explore another story, also with its roots in my 2013 writing residency in Belgium, though its true origins lie much earlier. And... much later. I'll tell you all about it, just as soon as I have it firmly within my grasp.