Oops.  Sorry to keep you waiting… The rest of the year galloped by and I’ve only just caught my breath.  I assure you I wasn’t so much neglecting my website…as simply prioritizing my 10th novel, which I finally finished in late August.  Now that my website-wizard (James Beechinor Collins Esq.) has taught me how to do my own updates, my intention is to do precisely that!  I hope you’ve been enjoying the new-look website and my blog but I intend to keep the Journal section going too because it gives me the opportunity to blether on at length.  JBC is very strict about keeping blogs pithy and short - but I’m having the final say on Journal length!  So…here am I, in cold-snap January, thinking back on the last twelve months.  Over the months, the Romantic Novel of the Year Award followed me like a dancing butterfly - with so many people continuing to congratulate me, even now!  Each time someone says ‘well done’, I re-live the thrill all over again!

The Spring and Summer I devoted to Secrets.  Do you like the title?  I know it doesn’t have my usual quirkiness, but I think it’ll be a hard-working title.  And it does what it says on the packet…because both hero (Joe the bridge-builder) and heroine (Tess the runaway) have more than a few secrets between them and the book charts their journey on whether to conceal…or reveal…!  I hasten to add, it all ends happily ever after.  Would you ever speak to me again if it didn’t?

Research trips back to North Yorkshire (for this book Saltburn-by-the-Sea…and deepest darkest Middlesbrough!) were a treat in March and June and it was a joy to follow in Tess, my heroine’s footsteps.  I remember getting the same buzz back in 1999 when I returned to the Tour de France having already written the bulk of Cat.  It becomes wonderfully confusing how life suddenly imitates art, instead of vice versa.  In Saltburn, seeing the Italian Gardens develop from precocious buds to a burst of petals a few months later was lovely.  The tide was in.  The tide was out.  Every inch of the beach was strolled along.  And of course I made my customary, ice-cream lickin’ walk, to the end of the pier.  We spent Christmas up there too - and we took some stunning pictures.  I’m very excited about the extra material I’ve supplied for the back of Secrets - I think you’re going to love it - value for money, I say!  I’ve written you a long essay about my love of the North East and my research up there for Secrets.  Added bonus: it is illustrated with lots of my own personal photos.  There’s also a larky Q&A too!  Well, Secrets will be in the shops early May - but if you’re going abroad before then, it’ll be available at the airports from March.  I hope you’ll love it - you will write to me with your response, won’t you?

Outside of work, all is well in the world of Freya.  My children are terrific.  Felix will be 8 this coming April.  He is now in Year 3 and really enjoying school - especially his guitar lessons which he takes very seriously.  I never have to tell him to practise - he’s strummin’ and tappin’ his toe first thing in the morning.  Lego continues to enthrall him at all other times.  I think I’ve just about managed to kill off Ben10 in my household, though I’m still tripping over those wretched GoGos.  Dreadful, dreadful.  Felix was very funny at breakfast time recently.  He asked if I’d pour him a glass of water.  Then he looked at me and said “Or shall I get it Mummy - to save your muscles?”.  Charming!

Georgia turns 6 in a couple of weeks.  She never fails to amaze me with the things she says.  The other night, tucking her in, she turned to me and proclaimed sorrowfully: “But Mummy!  There is someone my heart breathes into who is not here!”.  I hadn’t a clue what she was on about….until she rather huffily tutted and explained in plain English that “My Teddy is downstairs!” !

Nathan the horse is rising 8 and he and I continue to be thrilled, moved and utterly stimulated by Parelli Natural Horsemanship.  The marvellous Jackie Chant came over from New Zealand over the summer and it was profound to study under her again.  The Parelli conference at the NEC in August was a true celebration of natural horsemanship and it was great meeting so many like-minded people and hearing their tales.  Nathan is such a character.  I know people say “if only they could talk” - but I’m telling you, that horse doesn’t need to say a word - I know JUST what he’s saying…and sometimes he’s a cheeky bugger, I can tell you!

We have two new members of the household too - having lost Martha the cat last January at the ripe old age of 16.  Just after Christmas, Buddy and Flower came to live with us.  They are from our lovely local rescue home (North London Cat Rescue).  Buddy is a handsome ginger&white 18 month old tom, and Flower is 12 weeks, black&white.  They were so shy at first - now they spend most the days sleeping and most the nights engaged in an almighty hoolie going absolutely doo-lally up and down and round and round.  They adore the children - when term started last week, the cats did not budge from Georgia’s room until she was home again at tea time.  One morning, I heard Georgia say “Ooh Buddy, look, you’ve become a tabby!”.  It was true.  He was as grey as you like - not a glint of ginger anywhere… It transpired he’d spent the night in the fire place and was COVERED in soot (as was most the house….thankfully, I’m not one for cream sofas or pale carpets!).

We had beautiful and happy times in Spain again, in April, May-June, July-August and August-September.  We don’t have TV there - and none of us notice.  The kids are always out and about with their cronies (hi Jack!  hi Leila!), in and out of the pool, eating al fresco on the patio and being first in line for ‘The Croissant Lady’ when she brings her mobile shop in the morning!  I so love it there - not least because I really allow myself to unwind and an essential part of that is being able to read, read, read.  Catherine O’Flynn’s “What Was Lost” and Patricia Wood’s “Lottery” were my favourite books last year. Evenings are lovely - Andy and I just sit out on the terrace, listening to the iPod or the cicadas, and we chat and chat or have backgammon tournaments (which usually end in violence…) over a bottle or two of ice cold San Miguel (ok, or three or four).  Such a welcome change from the tendency to slump down in front of the TV, with supper on our laps, after work!

On a more rock and roll note, I danced away and sang myself hoarse at great gigs by the Charlatans (in Kentish Town in May) and the mighty Mr Springsteen (in Cardiff in June).

The autumn was spent industriously, putting Secrets to bed.  Editing.  Copy editing (you really can’t use the word ‘discombobulated’ more than twice in a 140,000 word novel, you know).  Proof reading (which makes me dizzy) and then meeting after meeting perfecting the cover design, the lettering, plans for the marketing campaign.  Very shortly, I’ll be posting up the brand new cover look - totally different to what I had before.  And very lovely!

So here I am in mid January and before I knuckle down to my 11th novel (title: “Between Two Women“) I’m going to have a breather for a month or two…and maybe a little foray into something completely different.  But that’s all I’ll say about that for now!

Tags | Cat, North Yorkshire, Romantic Novel of the Year Award, Secrets