September Beginnings

There's something about the month of September - the leaves changing colour and starting to fall, being able to see my breath first thing in the cool mornings, the start up of the school run - that always makes me feel like I'm  going back to school. It doesn't matter what age we are, I think we never quite lose that back to school feeling and sense of new beginnings that comes each September.  So here I am, on my sacred quiet thursday (kids with my ma), and my new challenge is stretching out ahead of me and I'm very, very excited about it.

I've talked before about my novel set in Granada during the Spanish Civil War - well, I've started the process of going back and editing the story I wrote pre-children. I've got a great big door stopper of a book about the civil war out from the library (a little light night reading?!) and am starting to listen to radio programmes and watch relevant films about that period. This is going to be a huge undertaking as I know now that this novel virtually needs re-writing from start to finish. When I wrote it originally, I was living in rural Suffolk and was utterly absorbed by it - I remember having conversations in my head with my characters whilst I was raking up the leaves in the garden - seriously! I can't quite imagine how it's going to work out this time around as I need to put my family first. However, I know I'm definitely not the first woman to write a novel with a swarm of little people around her legs and I am hoping to rise to the challenge. Can't wait!