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Get ready for a great love story

The Life I Stole is almost here!

September has arrived in a flurry of freshly sharpened pencils and back-to-school grumbling; there’s the faintest chill in the air and the gentle patter of beechnuts dropping onto the lawn outside my office window, eventually to be swept up — not at all gently and with much muttering about child labour — by any young person standing still long enough to be presented with The Weekend Chores.

For the first time in months, I have the house to myself. Spurred on by this rare (and glorious) convergence of the creative fates, I’ve dusted off my keyboard, turned on my writing playlist, and — smattering of applause expected here — am back at my desk.

And not a moment too soon, because in just seven short sleeps, The Life I Stole will finally be among us. Get ready for some serious gushing in the next few months, because I really, really think you’ll like this one.

I will?

Yes! For one, it has all the fixings of a great love story. Our hero, Grey, is a young doctor at a big London teaching hospital. He’s your typical golden boy, all tousle-haired gorgeousness and big-grin upper-class privilege. But having sailed effortlessly through life so far, he cannot for the life of him understand why Agnes, training to become a doctor herself, refuses to be side-tracked from her career by shilly-shallying with him.

Tension mounts, as it always does when people fall in love despite their better judgment, particularly in a rather hostile environment determined to keep them apart. And for Agnes, it turns out, there’s a lot more at stake than just losing her heart. Hers is a complicated story, because her life is based on a lie so big and so dark that getting close to anyone, not just Grey, will put her carefully constructed future in jeopardy.

But as Agnes tries to stay the course at Thamesbury Hospital — a patriarchal old-boys situation, by the way, that desperately needs a woman to shake things up — she cannot help getting close to people. She makes friends, is guided by mentors and finds some wonderful mother figures (irresistible to a girl who lost her mother as a child). And yes, she does fall in love with Grey, and they could be so, so good together, if it weren’t for that darkest of secrets between them. So what will she choose: pursue her dream, come what may, or listen to her heart — and potentially lose everything?

Yep, this one’s got it all

Head, heart, and all the hospital romance, secrets, friendships and Sophie’s Choices you can cram in between.

Are we excited yet?? I know I am!

The Life I Stole
Love is in the air

Love is in the air

Writing love stories All writers have a weak spot. Some struggle with dialogue, others with group scenes, some write too much setting, others too sparsely. Mine is love. Rose-tinted-glasses, goofy-smiled, tender-hearted romance. And it's not as much a weak spot as a...

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The Life I Stole

The Life I Stole

New story, new title There are many pinch-me points in a story's journey: when you type the very first word and, better still, The End. When another human being first reads your draft (a nail-biter). When the text is set and looks like proper book pages...

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My favourite books about sisters and twins

My favourite books about sisters and twins

I grew up an only girl among brothers and I've always, always loved stories about sisters and twins. The way they can be best friends or worst enemies but are tied together nonetheless -- could there be more interesting heroines than sisters? Lucky for all of us,...

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Timeslip novels: Knitting together past and present

Timeslip novels: Knitting together past and present

Book 3, another timeslip novel, has reached the crucial point where the historical and the contemporary stories have to be tied together and this is a tricky stage. With My Mother's Shadow, I wrote Addie's contemporary strand first. Looking it over, I realised that I...

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We have a bestseller, people!

We have a bestseller, people!

I couldn't be prouder if I tried -- Summer of Secrets is a historical fiction bestseller! The last couple of months have been a whirlwind: Summer of Secrets was published amidst much squealing and glass-clinking in the Scott house. It went on an extensive two-week...

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Story seeds and new beginnings: Summer of Secrets

Story seeds and new beginnings: Summer of Secrets

My Mother's Shadow started with five words on a doorstep: I think I’m your sister. Summer of Secrets, on the other hand, was born in a place. It is set in Cornwall, which is such a jewel-bright, magical corner of the world that it’s impossible for your imagination to...

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One and a half books in and I’m taking stock

One and a half books in and I’m taking stock

I wish this was a serene Happy New Year post, written on one of those lovely, secret days ‘between the years’ where all you need to do is eat, read and make a resolution or two. Instead, bookended between the usual holiday frenzy and a variety of illnesses taking down...

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Is it difficult to write about raw emotion?

Is it difficult to write about raw emotion?

Raw emotional drama comes with writing novels about mothers, stories about sisters, talking about love and loss, secrets and choices, and everything in between. I do often find myself close to tears as I write but it is a cathartic kind of crying. You can allow...

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