What are your sources of inspiration? Having spent the last month down under, you would have thought I would have returned brimming with ideas and enthusiasm to write. Sadly, not so. Neither the friends we stayed with nor the tourist attractions stirred any sparkle. Well over 30000 miles of travel did evoke a sense of God’s care for me, like the time in Hong Kong, trying to order a meal through a non-English-speaking waiter. British rule is now just a blip on a fading horizon. Well anyway, a young woman hurried over and explained the menu to us in English, pickled cucumber in spiced v ..read more

  I like making plans. Maybe it’s having a lively imagination, so I can just imagine what the day might look like, or what would make the perfect holiday for a husband, four kids and a dog... Of course, I hold those plans loosely, at least at those moments when I think of the Letter from James in the Bible, but once plans are scuppered, it’s amazing to find how firm they had grown to be. My plan to write the third Elabi book in just a few months has been dragged out into almost two years. The end is in sight, but the excited (not-shared-with-anyone)plan of having it published the first ..read more

 'We always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others.' Oscar Wilde That quote could have been written for me, and perhaps for some of the blog readers here today. I suddenly feel the need to tell my story.  I was born a very long time ago, right at the end of World War 2. My father was in the Signals Corps and was one of the message-senders using morse code in Dover on D Day. After the war ended in Europe, he was sent out to the Far East to fight there. Years later I realised how much he had been damaged by his experiences - a childhood with a violent father, and as a ..read more

What do you do when you’ve run out of ideas, hit the wall and arrive at the unwelcome barricade we know as writer’s block? I’ve heard all manner of approaches to this: go for a walk, take a bath, do a jigsaw puzzle, make a cake, run away and join the circus, take up plumbing instead and enjoy a steady income at last etc.  In other words, do any number of things which are definitely not writing in order to allow your subconscious to chunter along on it’s merry way for a while until some inspiration leaks out into your consciousness again.  At that point you can shout, ‘Halleluj ..read more

  I love jewellery! In particular, rings. There’s a part of me that wants to give myself the freedom to wear more than one on each hand, but I know my mother would not approve! I hear her now - "less is more, Christina." Looking at a couple of particular rings that I have which I am especially grateful to own, it struck me that the gems which make jewellery so beautiful are usually hidden underground, have been subject to pressure and/or heat, are difficult to extract, and need careful, precise work on them to bring out their best. That very process is a joint venture between The Creator ..read more

Running and writing have similarities: it’s a delirious dream when it’s going well, a nightmare to start up again and a dilemma, when midway, you run out of steam; wondering why on earth you ever thought this was a good idea? My writing practice is increasingly informed by my running one, because I am learning to be kinder to myself! On running days I anticipate my reluctance to exercise. Getting up, I don the neon Lycra kit and spongy shoes uniform. It consolidates my focus. An alarm goes off 15 mins before departure labelled; ‘Nicky: Go Run!’ It’s that irrefutable instruction to act that ..read more

 “God bless you and your writing in 2024. Love, Melanie” That is the concluding part of the first email I received from my Association of Christian Writers (ACW) group leader this year. While I cannot share the full content to respect my group leader’s privacy, it was a heartfelt encouragement for my blog post in 2023. Reflecting on the support I've received since joining the group five years ago, what stood out was my leader's foreword to my book, "The Bunch: An Anthology on the Fruit of the Spirit." It beautifully captured the essence of collaboration, which is central to this blog. W ..read more

Image by falco from Pixabay It’s a question that comes up every Easter, strangely enough. Why, how, could someone who had seen what Judas had seen – miracles performed, demons cast out – betray the son of God? There’s a popular theory that Judas wanted to push Jesus, to force him into revealing his glory. That’s essentially the plot of Jesus Christ, Superstar (great tunes, theological depth of a wet pavement). Humans like to have satisfying explanations. Even a villain must have a bit of grand nobility. We don’t live evil to be pointless or banal. But that’s not how Matthew describes it ..read more

  Photo by Crawford Jolly on Unsplash  "It is perfectly okay to write garbage — as long as you edit brilliantly." - C. J. Cherryh So, my grand total at the moment is ..... 29050 words - I'm aiming for 80,000 words total, unless the story asks me to go longer.  That's what someone asked me the other day, was I going for word count or being led by the story. Some days, the writing goes well and the words flood out, others, I feel good if I manged to get 187 words down. But that's the life of a writer. As I said in my previous post, right now, I'm just s ..read more

  Hemswell Antique Centre Hemswell, home to an enormous and popular antique centre, is a hop, skip, and jump from where I live. A few weeks ago, shopping list in hand - short as Hemswell is not cheap, we set out hoping to find a stunning bargain. If you ever visit  Hemswell Antique Centre, you will be tempted by all sorts of ‘bargains” that you never realised you needed. We had to staunchly walk past grandfather clocks, a rather expensive George II dresser, a vintage Ewbank carpet sweeper, and many more fabulous finds! We ambled through the many units, blinkered, and determ ..read more