Step by Steppe ...

Well it's been a month since my last blog, and what with half of it being more or less a write-off due to a horrible sinus infection messing with my mental capacities, I don't have much to report as regards progress on the new edition of The Coward Does it with a Kiss. I'm back in harness now and have just spent the weekend trying to incorporate new material into a particularly convoluted series of (fictional) diary entries – but progress is slow, and rather than aiming to publish on the anniversary of Oscar's death (30th November), I thinking that Constance's Birthday (2nd January) might be both more realistic and more appropriate. As my grandmother used to say (pointing at the framed text enshrined on the wall) - 'Step By Step As Thou Goest, The Way Will Open Up Before Thee'... I haven't yet seen Rupert Everett's film 'The Happy Prince', which follows Oscar into exile after his release from prison, but I gather it's now premiered in the US and will be interested to hear what kind of a reception it gets across the pond – the reviews over here have been positive, but not overly ecstatic. What I'm hoping, of course, is that renewed curiosity about Oscar's final years will pave the way for the question 'But what happened to Constance??' - a question that The Coward does its best to answer. Step by step as thou goest …

Anyway, it's been an interesting month in other ways ... for one thing, I've acquired a whole new cousin (well, not newborn, I mean newly discovered) via DNA matching. It was Mr B's idea to order DNA kits in a bid to explore our respective ancestral origins; to be honest they didn't reveal anything particularly exciting about either of us – we're both solidly Southern English, him practically all West Country, me with a bit of Welsh and a soupcon of Scandinavian/French – the latter being from the Piercy side as it's a Norman name that came over with William the Conqueror. But it was from my mother's side, the Rose side, that this new connection came. I wasn't sure whether to tick the box giving permission for any relatives to get in touch, but I'm so glad I did because now I've made the acquaintance of a lovely lady whose grandfather was my great-grandfather's half brother! And the fact that we're definitely related solves a family mystery: there's been an ongoing debate for years as to whether said great-grandfather, surnamed Rose, might not actually be the son of a Mr Hand who registered the birth, and the DNA connection proves that he was, and that the rumour that we are all 'Roses by name, but Hands by blood' is absolutely true! In my weakened, semi-delirious state (before I finally resorted to antibiotics), I got so excited about all this that tribes of Hands and Roses rode through my dreams, across the windy Mongolian Steppe..

No, there's no Mongolian DNA connection whatsoever (see boring DNA info above) - the reason for this particular backdrop, which admittedly tended to sprout features transported directly from South London, is my current reading material: Against Walls by Bryn Hammond. It's an extraordinary book, first of a trilogy, and I'll to do a review when I've finished so I won't say too much about it here - except to state that the author has immersed herself in the life and times of Ghengis Khan to such an extent as to conjure (I used the word advisedly!) the characters, the customs and the culture from which he sprang with a vividness that makes an entirely alien place and time seem familiar and intimate. I don't usually tackle long books (unless they're Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke) and I fully expected to be giving up less than halfway through this one - but step by step as I went, the world of twelfth-century High Asia opened up before me, and here I am feeling sorry to reach the end, and contemplating tackling the second volume. Do give it a go! You don't have to be running a temperature to be drawn in and amazed ...