My husband and I live along a West Cork boreen. Heather and gorse brocade the fields, and the hedges are heavy with hawthorn and blackthorn. Some evenings, this landscape seems to exhale an almost uncanny light. We are both in our forties, and work from home. We collaborate on ‘historical rom
Read MoreI first saw the green fairy on a Tuesday in April. The day had started, like most others, with the beginnings of a story. As I went about my early morning chores – taking Branwell for a walk; feeding Richard’s cat, Satine; making breakfast – I thought about my protagonists, Romina and Santiago
Read MoreThe composer prefers to address the choir with the manuscript laid out before her, as if she were a priest. She bends over the sheaf of papers, examining the first page. She must have done this a thousand times, but she still worries that one day she’ll turn up and be unable to read what’s in fr
Read MoreMONDAY Carol is so sad. She hasn’t gone downstairs to make the pasta bake and she hasn’t put her trousers on and she hasn’t replied to her boyfriend and she hasn’t called her brother and she hasn’t made a doctor’s appointment and she hasn’t fixed her skin and she hasn’t started he
Read More‘I’m writing a play for my end of year exam,’ Chloe announces. I throw my coat and bag on a chair. I got caught in an almighty shower on the way home from the office; me, the coat and my oversized bag create a little puddle on the floor. ‘Do you have to write in the kitchen? I’ve got
Read More‘Everything you can imagine is real.’ – Pablo Picasso It must be Paris outside; I can smell the rain in the dirt between the cobbles. ‘When are you going to write a story about me?’ you ask, rising from the sofa. Your perfume mixes with the wet-grass scent of the room. I l
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