Where I Write by Lynne Hackles

An Extract From The Venice Secret by ... Why I Wrote My Novel A Deadly Inherit...

Where I Write by Lynne Hackles

I’m delighted to welcome Lynne Hackles to my blog. I’ve actually known Lynne for quite a few years, as I met her when I used to attend a writing class in Pershore run by author, Sue Johnson. If I remember right Lynne was a guest speaker.

Lynne has been a writer for many years and has published non-fiction titles, short stories, articles and more, but this blog is to celebrate her debut novel Gail Lockwood and Her Imaginary Agony Aunt, which is published by Cahill Davis.

Well, this is fun. Once upon a time I interviewed Morton and now she’s returning the favour by asking me about my debut novel, Gail Lockwood and Her Imaginary Agony Aunt (published by Cahill Davis). Thanks, Morton. This is something I’m really good at – talking about myself. It’s how I passed the audition to get onto Deal Or No Deal back in 2006. ‘Talk about yourself for a bit,’ the sound technician said and off I went with ‘I was a child bride and a teenage mother.’ They almost had to beg me to stop. Now I shall write pages and pages about Where I Write. Don’t panic. I’ve edited them down to a sensible length.

From December 2016 until March 23rd 2020, we, that’s the LSO (Long Suffering One) and I lived in a motorhome. We’d decided to have an adventure, and travelling all over England, Scotland and Wales sounded like a good idea. We set off in the winter, thinking if we got fed up we’d go home. We called the motorhome Sid because it was an Elddis which was the maker’s name spelled backwards. Each evening I would sit at the table and write about that day’s adventure on my laptop. During the day I would find time to write my regular columns for Writing Magazine and critique my students’ assignments. I’d also write short stories.

Every night the two sofas in Sid had to be rearranged to make up a bed. It was a pain we could do without so we traded in Sid for Bill, named that because it was a Bailey. Bill Bailey, get it? Bill was 7.4 metres long and had the luxury of a decent sized shower room and separate bedroom so I would sit on the bed propped up by pillows and write. It was a much better arrangement and all the extra storage Bill had meant there was space for books. Many campsites had books where you could take a few and leave others in exchange. It was a good life until…

March 23rd 2020. We were on a site in Malvern, Worcestershire. Malvern had been our home for many years. The chief warden knocked on our door and told us we needed to evacuate the site by noon. It was lockdown and all the campsites were closing. We had nowhere to go. Our house was in the process of being sold. Some friends offered us a space on their drive and we spent seventeen weeks there. Being unable to find a place to buy we ended up renting a barn conversion and my writing room here is huge. Much bigger than the whole of Bill. I only use a third of it. I sit at my desk – three polished scaffolding planks attached to sewing machine treadles – with a wall filled with bookshelves behind me. I try not to look ahead as there are a couple of bits of furniture that don’t fit anywhere else.

There’s also a pile of boxes – some filled, others empty. I call them my Boxes Of Hope as they’re ready for our move. This place was supposed to be temporary but we’ve been here three years now. I live in hope that we will be moving to a permanent home very soon.

Barn conversions have high ceilings which mean in winter, when the heating is on, I could roast chestnuts on the ceiling but my feet are frozen. Luckily, I have Little Sid. He’s a back-up heater. A tiny Dalek shaped machine that turns in a half circle when switched on. He came on all our travels with us.

Noise is not a problem as the barn conversion is on a 650 acre country estate where the only sound is of birdsong. There are three houses here and one of those is currently empty. We have woods, fields and lakes to roam but that’s for the afternoons. Mornings are for writing. It sounds idyllic but it can be lonely. There are no people around and no traffic passing by. It’s half a mile to the gate and three miles to Tenbury Wells, the nearest town.

The neighbour who moved away didn’t take his cat. He said it was feral and could look after itself. ‘It’s as feral as a budgie,’ I said, and that became the cat’s new name when he moved in with us. Now I have some company in my writing room as Budgie sleeps on the daybed all morning while I work. Neither of us is disturbed when the LSO creeps in to place a big mug of tea on my desk.

About Lynne Hackles

Lynne has had over 700 short stories accepted by women’s magazines. She’s written advertisements, greeting cards, articles, non-fiction books … It’s easier to tell you what she hasn’t done. Three things. Up until lockdown she had never written a novel but that’s been achieved now and she has sent off the sequel to her publisher. She says she won’t ever be doing the other two – poetry and pornography.

You can find Lynne on Facebook or take a look at her website. www.lynnehackles.com

About Gail Lockwood and Her Imaginary Agony Aunt

Gail Lockwood and Her Imaginary Agony Aunt is more com than rom. It really doesn’t fit into a genre. Gail and her best friend, Dilys, are in their fifties, and some characters are even older and still manage a bit of romance. Who’d have thought it?

For fifty-something Gail Lockwood the new millennium starts with redundancy. Her To Do list reads, ‘Get a job. Pay off the suite. Do roots and nails. Get a man and get laid.’ Not easy when her boss, the flamboyant Bradley Jones, has jetted off to Spain, and the job centre has nothing for a woman whose only qualification is a Brownie badge.

Unemployed and firmly sandwiched between her eccentric mother and problem daughter, a single mother who always seems to need last minute baby-sitting, Gail needs help so invents her own imaginary agony aunt to help guide her. But as she navigates through the job market, her mother’s new boyfriend and an accident that brings her old boss back into her life, Gail starts to realize that sometimes the most important things can’t be put on a to-do list. Will Gail’s agony aunt help her navigate the ups and downs of life whilst still achieving everything on her list?

Buying Links:-

Waterstones – https://www.waterstones.com/book/gail-lockwood-and-her-imaginary-agony-aunt/lynne-hackles/9781915307019

Foyles – https://www.foyles.co.uk/book/gail-lockwood-and-her-imaginary-agony-aunt/lynne-hackles/9781915307019

Amazon – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gail-Lockwood-Imaginary-Agony-Aunt/dp/1915307015

Tha nk you for visiting my blog – Morton S. Gray – Author. I hope you enjoyed this post. You can also find me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Morton S. Gray news – all of my six Borteen Novels are now available on Kindle Unlimited! Details here