Pancakes for Pub Day

Today The Book of Summers is published in the USA and Canada. I can remember talking to my editor at MIRA, Erika, very early on in the process; they were interested in publishing but an offer hadn't been made yet. I slipped out of work and took the call from New York sitting on a park bench. Erika told me how she was married to a Hungarian man, and how so much of the book resonated with her - that very weekend she had even been to a Szalonna Party (American readers, if you'd like to turn to page 49 in the book, all will be explained). The stars - and stripes - were surely aligned in my favour that day, and with the brilliant support of Erika & the team at MIRA, they have been ever since. 


This morning there was only one way to celebrate; American-style blueberry pancakes, with lashings of maple syrup. I threw in some strawberries for good measure, brewed a cup of coffee (served in my lucky Santa Fe mug, a souvenir from my New Mexican honeymoon), and sat down in the garden. It's amazing to think that across the Atlantic over the coming days, weeks, months, perhaps a reader will perform much the same ritual; a short stack, bottomless coffee, and The Book of Summers. Now that's my American Dream, right there. 

Richard & Judy Summer Book Club

Today is paperback publication day for The Book of Summers in the UK, and just yesterday it was announced that my book has been chosen by Richard and Judy for their Summer Book Club. I've known about it for a little while and I've been bursting to tell - it's quite overwhelming that I can now shout about it. 

I've always been a fan of Richard and Judy's selections - some of my favourite contemporary novels have been past picks, Eve Green by Susan Fletcher, The Outcast by Sadie Jones, The Paris Wife by Paula McLain, and I'm honoured to be in such company. (American readers - if you're unfamiliar with the legends that are Richard and Judy, my US editor Erika brilliantly described them as 'think Oprah, with charming accents').

You can read both Richard and Judy's reviews of The Book of Summers in full HERE. Richard said "A delicate, atmospheric, regretful tale but full of redemption too. I absolutely loved it" and Judy, "A lovely story of a mother's love and shattered dreams. And the power of simple photographs and forgotten trinkets to mend broken hearts." A video interview will appear on the same site in the near future (we filmed yesterday) and in July a dedicated podcast will run, as well as a live web chat - I'll keep you posted.

The Book Club will be in all WHSmith stores throughout the summer, and also online, with regular Facebook updates. Wowzer. What more can I say? Only that I'm incredibly grateful to Richard and Judy for choosing The Book of Summers. I couldn't wish for a better start to my book's life as a paperback. 

A special commission

May is an exciting month for The Book of Summers, what with the UK paperback release and publication in the USA. To celebrate, I'd like to unveil a painting that I've specially commissioned. Lake Balaton is by the artist Alwyn Hall - aka my dad. 

Lake Balaton by Alwyn Hall

Detail

In The Book of Summers, Villa Serena is pervaded by the spirit of creativity - Zoltán's art, Marika's bohemia, Erzsi's freedoms - and in Erzsi's bedroom hangs Zoltán's painting of the lake. Originally my dad planned to recreate the 'brightly splashed canvases' of the Hungarian artist, but in the end favoured a more precise, detailed interpretation that is closer to his own work. The painting perfectly captures Lake Balaton - the endless blues of sky and water, the quality of light, and all the serenity of a perfect summer day. 

The lives of others - a Book Slam blog

There are so many books about the craft of writing, but what about the craftiness? Over on the Book Slam website I ask whether you've read How I Write - The Secret Lives of Authors, and explain why if you haven't, you really should... 

Read it HERE (the blog, not the book... although hopefully you'll be tempted to soon after).

American May

My wedding anniversary falls in May, making it two years since my husband and I wed in Las Vegas. It was my first time in America and the trip was every bit the dream I hoped. We hit the road to New Mexico and wound up in Santa Fe, a city I now pine for from my own South Western corner. The month of May will always make me think of my happy American days, and now I've another reason for that to be so... The Book of Summers is published in the US on the 29th May.  The other day I received my copies of the book, have a look... 

The edges of the pages have a ragged effect, to lend a little romance of times gone by, and I particularly love the specially created font for The Book of Summers, accents of which are taken through the chapter headings. My publisher, MIRA, have done me proud. Roll on Summer, Stateside! 

A book club podcast

I was slow to adopt Twitter, but one of the things I now love about the medium are the people it's brought me into contact with, including some very lovely book bloggers and book lovers. One such was Kim Nash (@KimTheBookworm), who's the 'resident bookworm' for Stafford FM. I've Kim to thank for choosing The Book of Summers as the station's 'book of the week' last week, with an extract read out on air by DJ and Book Club host Lee Middleton. Last sunday I was interviewed by Lee and you can hear it HERE. I talk about how I started writing, what kept me at it, and why so long as I keep writing stories I believe in I'll never stop loving the process. Thank you Kim, Lee and Stafford! 

Summers in Europe

Thanks to the international allure of the London Book Fair, this week six of my foreign publishers were in London and I got the chance to meet them for the first time. In a lovely pub on Old Brompton Road I was delighted to chat to Ursula from btb Verlag (Germany), Gonzalo from Santillana (Spain), Chiara and Joy from Mondadori (Italy), Jacqueline from Orlando (Holland), Viveca from Forum (Sweden) and Simona from DK Civilicacao (Portugal). It was wonderful to put faces to names, to talk about cover designs and translated titles, extra material for reading groups and publicity possibilities. I tried out my extensive Swedish as gleaned from Wallander (tack! tack!), learned that Sicilian food is the best in Italy, and that my Spanish editor is a frequent visitor to the miniscule Devon village I went to primary school in. A small world, indeed. By the end of the evening I was all of a flutter, and hugely grateful to Rachel & Alexandra at PFD for bringing us together. The Book of Summers will be published first in translation in Portugal, in June. Recently I came across some pictures of the world's most beautiful bookshops, among them Livraria Lello in Porto, Portugal. I wonder if The Book of Summers will appear on these crazy-lovely shelves...?

The story of a chair

The last time I was at my parents' house, I was looking through some old photographs and 
found this one...





It shows my mother, sister and I sitting under the apple tree in our garden. I am the smallest person in the picture, probably three or four years old, with no idea of the photographer behind me. Perhaps we had no garden furniture then, for the chairs we are sitting on are from the dining room of our cottage. We would have seen the sunshine and carried them out onto the lawn. I have no memory of this day, but there have been plenty of similar ones since. When I saw this photograph - nearly thirty years after it was taken - my eye was drawn to the chair my sister is sitting on. I hadn't seen it in ages. My dad, at heart, is both a hoarder and a restorer. He revealed that the chair was somewhere in the depths of the garden shed, likely riddled with woodworm and laced with spiders' webs, but he'd dig it out and brush it off if I wanted. And I did want. I'd been on the look out for a new chair for my writing room for some time. I've never been a fan of 'office furniture' - ergonomics and lumbar support are always so.... ugly - I'd rather a less comfortable seat with a touch of romance about it. 


A month or so later, my dad came up trumps. The chair was just where he thought it'd be, at the back of the shed among our old bicycles and abandoned easels, trapped by a pair of oars. He spruced it up, banishing the sprinklings of woodworm, scrubbing and treating and varnishing. He re-upholstered it using some fabric I'd brought back from Rwanda, purchased by the piece in Kimironko market. As well as giving me the chair, my dad gave me the history behind it. He'd liberated it from a skip at the Manchester school where he was an art teacher in the 70s. It was an old teacher's chair, probably dating from the 50s. For years we'd had it in our dining room at home, until his parents died and we inherited their furniture. If I'd hadn't seen the photograph, it'd still be in the shed. And now it's here, in another photograph... 

My writing room in Bristol. Sharp eyes might glimpse the mood board for my second novel, and a copy of my first in my bookcase, beside some of my favourite authors. The chair appears black and shining and perfectly at home. It presides over my desk - another reclaimed piece of furniture - and seems to know its place. Abandoned and rescued twice, it's something new born of something old, and made with love. It might not be the comfiest seat in the world, and the height is a little off for typing, but for me it's the perfect writing chair. We have history; one summer's day we both sat under an apple tree in a sunny garden, the Devon hillsides rolling away behind us. 

Home to Waterstones

When I think about writing The Book of Summers, a couple of decisions stand out as having particularly helped its progress; one was taking my self-styled writing sabbatical in 2010, and the other was to extend it. At the start of that year I resigned from my job in a marketing agency and lived on a shoestring for six months, my sole ambition to finish writing The Book of Summers. I'd already been working on the manuscript for two and a half years, but I knew that if I wanted it to be as good as I thought it could be, I needed to give it more time. All writers work differently, and many under far greater life pressures than I was enduring, but I felt I needed to free myself up in order to write the way I wanted to. I feared I wasn't being self-critical enough and with six months off, I knew I could give myself a clear run at it, reshaping the narrative, asking all the tough questions I knew I needed to and not be afraid of the answers. My husband is a comic book writer, used to up and down incomes of his own, but he was wholly supportive of my choice to chuck in my steady job and so we began 2010 on a tight budget, saying 'no' to a lot of things, and working away in our little Bristol flat, heads and hearts full of dreams. 


In those six months The Book of Summers began to take on a new shape and I liked the look of it. I knew if I took another six months and carried on at the same pace then by the end of the year my manuscript would be ready to send out to agents. But my funds were dwindling fast and I needed a part-time job. It was too soon to go back to my old world as I knew it would swallow me up again. I wanted something I could pick up and put down again at the end of the day and pay me just enough to get by. I flirted with the idea of waitressing - I'd always liked it as a student, getting by on a wing and a smile - so I did a couple of trial shifts at local restaurants. One was an upmarket fish place and they were looking for someone who could open wine at table deftly (nope) and carry three or more plates at a time (also nope), so I failed dismally. The other wanted me to work several unpaid shifts, the first mostly consisting of me folding napkins. I think after I'd folded the first few they could assess my capabilities, so I said thanks but no thanks. I also applied for three part-time admin jobs at the university, imagining myself cycling to campus in the september sun, scarf flying behind me, Ali MacGraw style. I didn't even get an interview - all my years of advertising and marketing meant nothing when more than 300 people had applied for each position. I began to worry I'd been rash. I'd burnt through my savings. I was ill-qualified for the kind of jobs I thought I wanted, and self-aware enough to know that I harboured distinctly romantic notions about them, anyway. I spent most of the summer worrying about what my next move should be, my day's writing interspersed with lists of pros & cons and scouring job sites. I began to wonder if my best option was, after all, to go back to the marketing world that I knew inside out. Then I saw that my local Waterstones were looking for Christmas temps. I applied in a flash. My only retail experience was a six-month stint in a French snowboard shop but I loved books, boy, did I love books. As I was waiting to hear I went for a long walk through the grounds of Ashton Court Manor. The estate overlooks the whole of Bristol, and the trees were just turning to Autumn gold. I caught a falling leaf and made a wish - an old habit. 


At the end of September I started working part-time at Waterstones Bristol Galleries as one of the first batch of Christmas temps, and it was to Waterstones Bristol Galleries that I returned on saturday, for my first instore signing. It was wonderful to see so many familiar faces, and receive such a warm welcome. I hung my coat and bag on a peg in the staff-room (where I'd eaten many a peanut butter sandwich, leafed through many a dog-eared Bookseller, chatted many a bookish chat) and sat down at the table that was waiting for me. A stack of The Book of Summers to one side, and a Sharpie at the ready. I smiled and I felt at home. I owe a big thank you to Waterstones, not just for having me on saturday and supporting The Book of Summers so thoroughly, but also for employing me in 2010. For it was that part-time job which allowed me to maintain the momentum of my sabbatical - keeping my head down, my spirits up and my funds level - I'll always think of it with a mix of gratitude, relief and a terrific sense of freedom. It was the home stretch to The Book of Summers, an appropriate end to my year of writing and the beginning of so much more.

Busy, busy

The Book of Summers has now been out in the world for one month and a day... In all the excitement of publication I've missed posting a few things, so here's something of a round-up of what's been going on at Camp Summer.

I've been speaking to some lovely book bloggers and doing interviews with Lloyd Paige, The Unlikely Bookworm and Jaffa Reads Too as well as a Publication Day guest blog over at Our Book Reviews. The Book of Summers has also been reviewed by plenty of book bloggers, and here are some of my recent favourites: Lovely Lovely Books ('evocative, accomplished and just gorgeous'), Fleur Fisher In Her World ('wonderful descriptions, well drawn characters, real emotions'), Something Booky ('absolutely stunning'), The Unlikely Bookworm ('poignant and utterly captivating'). I've been lucky to be getting some really lovely reviews over on Waterstones, Amazon and Good Reads, and a couple of particular write-ups made my day - this from Fictions Online ('an astoundingly beautiful tale') and from Marleen ('unexpected treasures'). 

March has turned out to be the month where I've bought more magazines than ever before and across the broadest spectrum - from Heat to The Spectator - and I've been chuffed to find great reviews and mentions for The Book of Summers in all of them. I've added choice quotes to my website HERE. Several of my favourite write-ups are in full online, in Cosmopolitan, The Spectator and The Big Issue. I wrote a short story celebrating Mother's Day for My Weekly - sadly it isn't available on the web, but I loved writing it. Like The Book of Summers it's about the poignancy of memory and mother and daughter ties. I was chuffed to bits that the super stylish Stylist Magazine also picked The Book of Summers as one of the 'hottest debuts of 2012', calling it 'fantastically evocative and sun-drenched.' But the magazine entry that elicited the biggest gasp from me was probably the shot in Grazia, where a quite humungous pic of The Book of Summers appeared in the 'Hot things to do now' listing...

Two summers ago I attended Marie Claire's How To Get Published workshop at the Bristol Hotel du Vin - the magazine interviewed me just before Publication Day and the write-up appeared in the Inspire & Mentor section of their website - you can see it here. I wrote about how memories of sun-kissed childhood holidays inspired my writing over on the We Love This Book site. And I was also interviewed by The Western Morning News - for a Devon gal, that was quite something - you can read the piece in full here. The spread in the paper made use of some of my dad's holiday snaps, including this rather beautiful image of Lake Balaton at sunset.

I've had an incredible first month as a published author and the generosity of feeling towards The Book of Summers has been astounding. In the week before Mother's Day I met a couple of old work pals in a bar by the waterside and signed six books, writing the names of their mothers and girlfriends. I received an email from a friend in Shanghai, passing on a family review, with such a glowing report from her mum that my cheeks ached from beaming. I've had excited phone calls and text messages from friends who've spotted the book in stores all over, and been sent snaps of it in Auckland, Kilkenny and Dublin. As well as the brilliant press coverage, it's these kind of things that have made this first month so special. It's often quoted that once your book is out there in the world then it's no longer yours. Two weeks before I was published I blogged about this over at Book Slam, and vowed to stay sanguine in the face of reviews. All reviews. For amidst the rave there have, of course, been a handful that proved less enjoyable to read - and against all reason it's always one negative remark that lingers longer than ten positive comments. It's a truth universally acknowledged that by writing and publishing you're opening yourself to inevitable criticism. But also generosity and warmth, often from unexpected quarters. If The Book of Summers doesn't belong to me anymore then that's just fine - I'm only too happy to share it. And I'll never stop feeling lucky that I can.     

Writing about Arvon

In November 2008 I took an Arvon Foundation course at Totleigh Barton in Devon, and it turned out to be a real milestone in my life as an aspiring writer. That week - with tutors Louise Dean, Patrick Neate and Bidisha as guest - was the first time I ever called myself the 'W' word. It turned out to be a lot of other firsts too.  I was, therefore, delighted to get the chance to tell Arvon how much I love them in a guest blog over on their website. You can read my account of the tip-top tutors, acapella disco and a touch of rock and roll here. 


At my launch party last week I was thrilled that three of my dear Arvon friends - Jen, Polly and Nessy - were able to come and celebrate with me. Just before we met again, Jen sent me a picture. She'd taken it quietly, without me realising, on one of the free afternoons at Totleigh where we'd each sought our own corners of the house to work in. 

Photo credit: Jennifer McDerra

I can't remember the precise day, but I recall the feeling of sitting at that ancient table, its oak smoothed by the elbows of so many good and great writers down the years. There's a woodburner just out of shot that would have been omitting a delicious hiss and crackle, a comforting accompaniment to the hunt for words. Behind me is the kitchen, and it would have been full of the alloted chefs for the night - fellow student-writers rolling up their sleeves and attempting to follow recipe cards, feeling the weight of responsibility of cooking for the group but already giggling with too much wine. You can see from the picture that it's dark outside; it was November so it could have been as early as five o'clock, but soon I would have had to shut down my laptop, and take my books upstairs. And I'd have come back down to find the room filled with chatter. There'd have been candles lit, delicious wafts coming from the kitchen, and the pop and glug of pouring wine. And all around me there'd have been people blinking and stretching and feeling the hair on the tops of their heads as they emerged from their afternoon's solitary writing and rejoined the world; not the ordinary world, the humdrum world, but the Arvon world. Which is a very special place indeed.  

Summer's on its way

It's official. The Book of Summers is now out in the big, wide world, sent off in style at a wonderful launch party at Daunt in Hampstead. The shop was bursting at the seams with well-wishers and dear friends - as was the pub afterwards - making it a very special night indeed. I couldn't have felt luckier. 


I owe a big, big, BIG thanks to all - especially those who came from far-flung climes (Rwanda! France! Derbyshire! Brizzle! South London!), the ever wonderful Headline for organising, and Daunt for hosting. Best. Monday. Ever.

The lovely Daunt Hampstead, with bunting and everything (think that's always there, mind).

Endless Summers...

Signing... I was even allowed to keep the inaugural Sharpie.

The word on the street? Cool kids read The Book of Summers.

Prescription for the morning after the night before? The Breakfast Club special of Chorizo & Hash Browns. Dreamy.

Kitchen poetry - a Book Slam blog

Here's a picture of my kitchen shelf, home to all of my recipe books... take out your magnifying glass and you might spot some not-so-culinary names besides the likes of Nigel and Nigella.

You can read more about sauce-splattered poetry books and overcooked chickens here - chez Book Slam.

Win a luxury cruise! Yes, really...

To celebrate the launch of The Book of Summers, Waterstones are running a cardholder competition, to win a luxury cruise through Hungary. It's an amazing prize, the trip starting in Vienna, taking you through Budapest and on into Romania. Go here to find out how to enter. And it's 'no purchase necessary.' Wait a minute, what am I saying? It's purchase very necessary, obviously...


I'll leave you with a picture of my sister and I on the banks of the Danube in 1990, with the Liberty Bridge - Szabadság hid - behind us. I'm the little one with the ropey fringe. 

Walking on sunshine

I'll tell the story of my first Publication Day in six pictures. 


Thursday 1st March was a beautiful blue-sky day. It seemed like the first burst of spring sunshine after a bitterly cold winter. There's a nice poetry to that idea, but I'm pretty sure it's true anyway...

That evening I was bound for The Gay Hussar - a long standing institution and brilliant Hungarian restaurant in Soho - for a celebratory dinner, organised by the loveliest of all publishers, Headline. There was the dream team of Leah, Vicky and Ben from Headline and my agent Rowan, and some lovely journalists (Cortina from Book Brunch, Debs from Heat, Charlotte from The Sunday Express, and Suzi who reviews for the Indy on Sunday, FT and Time Out). It was a night filled with chatter, laughter, and that wonderful Magyar speciality, cold cherry soup. Here we all are...

Rowan and I, almost a year to the day that we first met...

The next morning - ever so slightly woozy-headed - I braved a book shop, to see if I could spot The Book of Summers. Once upon a time I used to work just off Oxford Street, so it seemed fitting that it was Oxford Street that I returned to, on an altogether different kind of business. This was the sight that greeted me... wholly unexpected and all the better for it...

  
Move closer...

Closer still...

There it is. Great, great joy.


I wound my way back to Bristol, my arms full of flowers from the night before, and the broadest of smiles on my face. It was a pretty perfect first publication day, and launch parties with friends and family still await... I'll be walking on sunshine for a while yet.  

A thing of beauty

When Julian Barnes won the Booker prize, The Guardian told how in his speech he thanked the designer of his book's cover, Suzanne Dean. And this was noted as unusual, amidst the traditional agent and editor thanks. The piece went on to talk about how in our increasingly digitally-driven world, making tangible books look beautiful, as desirable items to have and to hold and to keep on a bookshelf reminding us who we are and what we love, is more vital than ever.


Thanks to my publisher Headline, The Book of Summers is a visual and material treat. For starters it's in hardback, something I never presumed as a given. It has proper weight to it, and the pages are a deliciously creamy hue. When I run my fingers over the cover the finish is beautifully matt. All in all, there's nothing flimsy about its presence; it proclaims itself as a book to keep. The cover and endpapers, designed by the very talented Yeti Lambregts, are gorgeous. Morning Glory flowers, picked out in gold, trail across a perfect sky blue background, twining the letters of the title, creeping on to the spine. Look closely and there's a smudgey, painterly touch to this same blue. The effect is elegant, refined, and evocative of summer days, while not sending our minds in too particular a direction. Inside, the flowers continue in antiqued styling, and the page appears pre-loved, with the creases and blemishes of time. Polaroids are taped in, just like in The Book of Summers of the story. It's a delicate and lovely piece of design.

Here, Yeti explains the different stages the book went through on its design journey:

Many of us judge a book by its cover - or form a first impression, at least. I was delighted to see the cover art celebrated on the 'creative living' site Jackie Magpie, as one of 'a treasure trove of fictional gems.' Elsewhere online, it was interesting to see some debate (and a lovely review) on the blog Dog Ear Discs, suggesting that some male readers might be turned off by the outward prettiness of The Book of Summers. Perhaps idealistically, I always hope that would-be readers will stick around long enough to browse the opening lines, or jump-flick to random pages, maybe not getting the full story but at least enough of it to decide whether they think a book's for them or not. All I know is that on the eve of Publication Day, I couldn't be happier with how my novel looks. On this last day of February, the sun showed its face for a while this afternoon and finally it felt like spring. But it's cold again now, and we're heading towards the bleary evening. Yet here I am, holding The Book of Summers in my hand, admiring the beauty of its cover design, the care with which it's been printed and made, and I'm basking. It's as if we're skipping seasons, as if summer has arrived and for a while at least, is here to stay.

Deep thought, deep Devon

The other week I took myself off to the seaside for a few days, to bury myself in the writing of my second novel. Since September I've been edging my way into it, ticking along with my daily wordcount, feeling it start to slowly take shape. But I hadn't yet been consumed by it. And the manuscript was throwing up difficult questions that I needed time away to answer. The Devon air proved just the thing.

I tucked myself away in a little hotel for a few days, and wrote from dawn until dusk and into the night. All of the usual distractions were entirely absent and although I felt a shade lonely at times, this feeling never lasted long. As soon as I let them breathe a little, I found the new characters I'm creating to be excellent company. And the story I've been working on for several months caught a hold of me at last, and refused to let me go. Happily trapped and writing feverishly, I stayed in my Devon hideaway just long enough to get over that awkward mid-point in a novel's progress. And whenever I sought diversion I could stare out of my window and see a view like this... comforting in its abstraction.

The village I'd chosen was devoid of most of the usual seaside trappings, the shops stuffed with lurid paraphernalia, cutesy 'gone surfing' signs and the like, but one souvenir did catch my eye. Its motto was peculiarly fitting. For much as I was intent at shutting the world out for those few days, I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that when I got back to Bristol the first finished copies of The Book of Summers would be waiting for me, and that publication day is just around the corner. And so, like a grockel (def: a tourist but, really, anyone who doesn't hail from Devon), I went home with a reminder of happy days spent working by the water. And even happier days still to come.

Ten terrifying questions

... only they weren't. They were actually a lot of fun. 


The Australian-based Booktopia is rapidly becoming one of my favourite books sites, for entirely narcissistic reasons. Not only is it offering very cool sounding tote bags with every order of The Book of Summers (while stocks last!), it was also one of the first sites to review my novel, and it now features what is my first online interview.  A lot of love coming from Down Under. You can read my responses to Booktopia's Ten Terrifying Questions here, and find out why ditching class, crazy-good artists, and heroic husbands maketh this writer.

The joy of criticism - a Book Slam blog

With publication just under two weeks away, my mind can't help turning to... reviews. I wandered across to the Book Slam site and decided to chew it over some more there. Click here to read about a boy called Holden, how we all love to criticise and my best keep-it-sanguine (as a wise man once said) pep talk...

A new home

So... I've a new online home, at emyliahall.com. And rather lovely it is too, don't you think?

As with all the best things, it was a collaborative effort. My father hand-painted my name (disobeying all his inclinations for a perfectly executed classical script), my husband came up with the questions that form the Q&A section (equally resisting his natural impulses for slightly sillier inquisitions), and friend and former colleague Dan Hunt thankfully did everything just as he always does, and put the whole thing together, designing and building me a truly lovely site. I'm indebted to all, but especially to him. Thanks also to Vicky Cowell at Headline and Erika Imranyi at MIRA for much valued advice, along the way. 

The creation of my website has also given me the chance to show off, for the first time, the gorgeous cover for the US edition of The Book of Summers. The artwork includes very lovely quotes from best-selling author Marisa de los Santos, 'Elegantly written and intensely intimate... a moving, poetic debut', and Rebecca Rasmussen, 'So tender and lovely, this is a novel I will keep on my bookshelf forever.' I'm enormously grateful to both for reading my novel in proof form, and being so very kind about it.

This gorgeous thing will be on US shelves in June - I can hardly wait. But for now, it's all about the UK countdown.... after all, it's only nineteen days until Summer's here, hadn't you heard?