I am busily re-writing novel #4 after another convo with my agent about it. I love how intimate she gets with the book and her suggestions are always sensible. Love it. Sometimes I feel impatient with editing and restructuring because I just want to be DONE, but I am enjoying this work at the moment. It all makes sense and I can see how it's improving the book. And I needed to be back writing. Yes, I am trying to have a quieter year but if I don't write, I go a bit bonkers. And I love my heroine - I'm not quite ready to say goodbye to her yet.
I am reading Gavin McCrea's Mrs Engels at the moment (ahead of meeting him next week) and just WOW. This is a seriously addictive, beautifully written and funny novel. Fab. It will take its place beside other hist fic faves like Andrew Miller's Pure, Cormac James's The Surfacing (appearing at Ennis Book Club Festival soon!) and Michel Faber's glorious The Crimson Petal and the White. Oh, and Longbourn by Jo Baker, I loved that one.
I actually need to read more hist fic, defo more by women. But I have some other tasks in the meantime (reading for upcoming author interviews, for example.). If you have any suggestions for hist fic by women, let me have them.
