Last summer my life fell apart in various different ways: relationship woes, health worries, the realisation that I needed to redirect my career, with a few other bits and bobs added in. This coincided with a huge loss of confidence in my writing ability, partly because of lack of progress and success, and partly because I truly did find it harder to write when I had so much else to deal with and think about.

Since then much has changed. I have a plan for career change, my health worries have been resolved, and I’ve relocated to West Yorkshire, partly to be closer to my lovely family and partly to save money. I am also living alone again, for the first time in ten years.

And with the additional headspace and physical space has come…writing. Not that I’d ever stopped, but for almost a year, I felt as if I was progressing at snail’s pace. For the past couple of months, I’ve been making more time to work on both my novels, with the predictable result that the momentum is gathering. I’m thinking about them, or about writing, all the time, and the stories I thought were so awful, dull or silly are taking shape.

I’m also finding that I want to talk about writing, and I’m not comfortable doing it to just anyone. So here I am, in a space that I guess people can find if they want, but which I don’t have to publicise anywhere I don’t want to.

It’s writing time again.