ok so: feverfew, love-in-a-mist, borage and columbines. Hopefully some of them will make it and fend off the prowling slugs etc.

😍😍😍 spring doing its thing

I am not much cop as a gardener (oh hello, ghosts of lilac and ceanothus I did in), but I do like how things that appear to be dead may turn out not to be.

there is something ultimately reassuring about the dynamic of being schooled by Gen Z

For those who don’t know - Hacks is SO GOOD and Christina Hendricks is even more of a goddess than I realised (just got to her cameo)

though my housemaid ancestor did not mess with the aristo sons (bound not to turn out well), but sensibly waited and saved up until she and the coachman could afford to get married. My grasp on the history of all this is hazy, but I think it was at Painshill in Surrey (which is pretty fancy).

started watching new adaptation of quintessential rags-to-riches revenge drama A Woman of Substance (Emma Harte: 'The secret of life is to endure') & was put in mind of the little brass bell we have somewhere that was once used to summon housemaid ancestor by her bosses

I have been told that in novels by women my age (70s-born, 20s in the 90s) the ex-boyfriends are often called Simon.

Rule no 1 of writing is that if you call someone Will and change your mind, beware of ‘replace all’.

One thing I really, really like about what I do for a living is the luxury of sitting round inventing family trees. Especially the names. Though as I start on my tenth book I’ve totally forgotten which names I’ve already used. (No Alisons, I know for sure.)

At the point in writing where it’s a rush of names like people at a party who you haven’t got to know yet

It's World Autism Acceptance Day. Cuts coming in to the health element of universal credit will slash support available to #autistic people with #learningdisability who are unable to work, leaving many of the most vulnerable in penury. Which makes me think we have accepted nothing #WAAD

When generative AI was but a twinkle in a tech bro’s eye.

Just found (not quite at the bottom of a desk drawer) the Jiffy bag containing the long-ago printed-out MS of what later became my first published novel, which had been returned by an agent who’d rejected it. (And who through zeal or error or both, actually wrote to reject it another 2 times.)

Fantastic news in the UK today - the government has apparently ditched its plan to force creatives to 'opt out' if they don't want AI companies training on their life's work. www.thetimes.com/uk/technolog... 🧵 1/4

'Enshittification' is not a word recognised by autocorrect [have just introduced it to an 80something having tech headaches]

It is one of the pleasanter rules of life that a man carrying flowers must be smiled at.

this suggests the collapse in mental health care is one factor behind these horrifying statistics. The collapse affects children's MH services too, where young ppl wait years to be seen, & over-16s who are violent towards their parents wait too. Will govt now act? www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

I just registered 😊

today I met someone very nice who vividly remembered a book I published 12 years ago (and who I haven’t seen in about as long.) which was an out of the blue reminder that books have strange secret lives of their own.

You're not going to make any money doing this and no one is going to read it, so you must hope for a secret third thing to happen

Oooh A Woman of Substance is back, Edwin Fairley watch out!

May (or may not) contain me.

I'm in excellent company between these pages standing up for UK copyright protections for authors..

ps You can see the full list of authors involved at dontstealthisbook.com

The UK government is considering upending copyright law to benefit AI companies. Don’t Steal This Book urges them not to. Apart from the list of authors involved, the book is empty, representing the effect the government’s plans would have on authors' livelihoods. 2/3

We urge the government in the strongest possible terms to rule out legalising this large-scale theft. And to AI companies we say: stop stealing our books! buff.ly/cYnU2Mw #DontStealThisBook

...and represents the impact on authors’ livelihoods and the publishing industry that is expected if the government proceeds with plans it has floated that would make it easier to train AI models on copyrighted work without a licence. 🧵

Almost 10,000 authors have come together to publish an empty book protesting the theft of books by tech companies to train AI models. Titled Don’t Steal This Book, it is empty of text except the names of the authors involved.. 🧵

I WROTE A TIMESLIP! V excited to have signed with @bookouture.bsky.social for two more books and v happy to have written a dark twisty multigenerational family drama with secrets, lies, betrayal, heartbreak and a dash of time travel… Here’s the book deal announcement: bookouture.com/bookouture-a...

also a load of wine just arrived In a parallel universe I would definitely be tempted to

Ok that’s it, am gonna stuff face with Christmas cake, it is currently only viable way forward

v enjoyed listening to Mick Herron's @bodleian.ox.ac.uk talk on John le Carre a few quotes scribbled in my scruffy notebook: JLC, asked where one should start a story: 'Begin as near the end as possible' 'We fight the wars we inherit' - not sure if that was JLC himself, or someone else...

the weird crux magic of Chapter 17 strikes again! Somehow it always seems to be the one where the really bad thing happens

on the bus in Christmas jumper (actually my son’s, outgrown two seasons ago) and the bus driver has a Christmas jumper too and maybe my Scroogelike heart is beginning to feel the teensiest bit tinselly

(have always slightly envied Jocasta’s Christmas in the bedsit in Pick of Posy)

hey-ho, hey-ho, it’s off to Winter Funland I go. Time to dig out my moderately tasteful Xmas jumper. Or maybe borrow the one that, if you look closely enough, features a dinosaur chomping on a reindeer. Bah humbug, one and all. Love Mrs Scrooge 🦖🧑‍🎄🙄😒🤷‍♀️

btw human authors can sign up to find out more about the UK human authored mark (due to launch 2026) @societyofauthors.bsky.social here: humanauthored.co.uk bot authors can go embrace an eternity of writer’s block (… but can’t, as ‘they’ aren’t ‘authors’ at all but scam content pushed by chancers)

also I made the mistake of reading one of those articles on limerence and now my feeds are as full of dewy-eyed heartbreak as a round table full of courtly-loving knights mixed in with content on safeguarding and The Summer I Turned Pretty, which is as headache-inducing a blend as an AI image

it is not a good harbinger for the day when the kettle is broken for morning coffee

(in 2025, I have quite often found myself thinking about that very good Raymond Carver short story about the birthday cake)

for the first end-of-November in many years, not putting the Playmobil advent calendar out tonight

Creeping back on here for the first time in ooh a long while with a #Jillystack which I am about to lend out to someone, and which will hopefully bring some pre-festive-season joy… (or maybe it is now the actual festive season already…)

I was taught to always avoid the Oxford comma by Mrs Nelson, my year 4 primary school teacher and a formidable dominatrix. But seriously, I love the Oxford Comma. So I made a starter pack of other serial comma aficionados. And I'll keep adding to it as I find more members of Team Oxford Comma . . .

Having filled one starter pack for book lovers with animals, I've started another of book publishers. If you are a publisher or have a favourite publisher that you think should be included, please let me know. Re posts would be awesome! 💙 go.bsky.app/HHdzkXR

Looking to connect with the bookish community? 📚 I’ve put together a starter pack of authors, bloggers, bookstores, librarians, reviewers, & all-around great people! It’s not exhaustive—so many amazing folks on BlueSky. Drop your recs for who else should be included! #BookSky 💙📚 go.bsky.app/KQrxmsW

*Useful Starter Pack Alert*

today I have been sitting next to a radiator and a window in the sun, which is going down now, and I am soaking in the very last of its lemon-yellow glow and it feels like such luxury.