From “Mucho Caliente!” to “Just Like a Movie”

And all the messy bits (aka life!) in between…

There are massive gaps in my writing career. Not because I periodically no longer enjoyed writing, but because things happened to me that caused me to stop. Trauma, both mental and physical, played a part in these interruptions, and depending on which variation of trauma I was dealing with, I channeled my creativity in other directions.

 I love making things. I love holding something that I’ve crafted from start to finish. I throw myself into new creative forays and become obsessed with whatever it is I’m currently involved in. My husband says I’m a little extreme. Fundamentally, I just think I’m interested in lots of different things, which is a blessing considering the number of times when circumstances have obliged me to reinvent myself.

 As a child, like most children, I drew and painted. Some of my paintings still exist, proudly exhibited in my parent’s house, and I even think that my uncle and aunt still have a pen and ink zebra I gifted them circa age 12, as well as an odd-looking clown (it’s amazing what good frames can do!!). Even I have a watercolour I painted in my mid-teens. It’s a naïf-style frozen lake ice-skating scene that I’m still rather proud of. It’s currently in my office, waiting for a decent frame. Come to think of it, it’s been waiting for a decent from for a long time.

 I loved to write. I wrote long letters to my grandmother, I wrote stories, and since I was born with horses and ponies on the brain, these often revolved around riding schools and wild ponies. I even wrote a couple of plays, one of which was produced in a town hall when I was about seven. I played the lead: a princess, of course. I kept a diary throughout my teenage years, detailed outpourings of anguish at not being cool enough, pretty enough, popular enough. Heartbroken tales of unrequited love, snippy accounts of feeling grossed out by poor boys who liked me but whom I had no interest in, chronicles of mini moments of acute happiness when a boy I’d fawned over for weeks finally smiled at me. I often wonder what happened to all those deep red, hardbound, A4 notebooks filled with raw emotion. I wish I still had them.

 Craft wise, I learnt to knit in primary school. My Italian grandmother taught me how to crochet. I dabbled in basic pottery, made collages with old magazines and photographs. I learnt to paint on silk, on velvet, on glass, on ceramics. My mother still has a full set of Christmas themed champagne glasses I painted back in the 90s. More recently, YouTube videos taught me how to sew. I’ve made more bags than fit in my cupboards!

 I started writing “seriously” in the mid-nineties, following a bad riding accident that could easily have been fatal. A friend of a friend had started a magazine for the local ex-pat community, and I offered to write a couple of articles. “Mrs Bean goes to Verbier”, recently uploaded onto my website, was one of them. It’s a personal favourite.

 But it was the very first one I wrote, a humorous piece about having once been a rock chick, that won me fan mail and encouraged me to write a novel. Eighteen months later, cheered on by a selection of girlfriends who read it chapter by chapter, night after night, and who invariably wanted to know what happened next, I had written and edited a romantic comedy called “Mucho Caliente!” that soon attracted the interest of a major literary agent in London who was certain the book was going to be a major success.

 For various, complicated reasons, this didn’t happen. I wrote another book, but the pressure of having to outdo myself after having written Mucho took me to a bad place. I struggled with anxiety, with self-doubt, and stopped writing altogether. Horses reappeared in my life, and I overcame my fear of riding. After a few quiet years on the writing front, my literary agent and I parted ways, and when e-publishers became popular, a friend of mine convinced me to submit my book to a company in Texas who also did print-on-demand. They immediately accepted it.

 “Mucho Caliente!” was published in 2008. It got some lovely reviews, made a handful of people giggle and smile. I’d been successful in what I’d set out to achieve, which was to see my book in print. But I lacked visibility. Social media wasn’t what it is now. Basically, my book soon sank without a trace. Occasionally, bubbles of laughter would float up from the depths of the Internet; someone somewhere had come across it and thoroughly enjoyed it. I even found a great review on Elle USA’s online edition!

 Which eventually got me thinking: maybe “Mucho Caliente!” deserved a second chance?

 Which is why, after years of mulling over what might have been if the stars had aligned properly from the onset, I asked my American publisher to give me my rights back. I intended to give the book a bit of a rewrite, possibly change the title, and republish it, quick as a flash.

 And then Covid hit. And then I got injured. And then I got injured again, far worse than the first time. Mentally, I hit rock bottom. Chronic pain is something I’ve had to learn to live with; there are things I loved doing that I can no longer do (for instance, no more riding or taking care of horses), and I need to pace myself when it comes to spending hours on the computer, or working on a crochet project, or sewing. I hardly read paperbacks anymore because holding a book up for long periods of time puts strain on my neck. Instead, I listen to audiobooks, which I’ve come to love. Dealing with recurring pain has required considerable mental, physical, even social adjustments, which at times I’ve found hard to accept.

 So, it’s only recently, in June 2023, almost twenty years after first appearing as “Mucho Caliente!”, that my book has finally been republished under the title “Just Like a Movie”. Featuring a gorgeous new cover designed by my daughter, this heartwarming story is finding its way towards new readers. I sparkle with pride every time someone tells me how they couldn’t put it down, how it made them laugh, how certain aspects of Gemma’s personality resonated with them. Of course, I especially love hearing that Emilio Caliente has become their favourite imaginary boyfriend!

 I’m writing another book. I’m filled with a mad mix of excitement and gratitude and fear of failure and impostor syndrome. I worry about the intense physical pain I experienced not so long ago coming back. But above all, I’m proud of what I’ve achieved.

 “Just Like a Movie” is a very funny book, engineered to make you happy. Set in Ibiza in summer 2000, it begins with recently divorced Gemma running away to Ibiza. She’s sitting on a plane waiting for takeoff when a handsome Spanish pop music superstar whom she’s admired for years sits down next to her. They exchange pleasantries during the flight, before accidentally walking off with each other’s duty-free bags. So, they have to meet again…

 And as I said to my girlfriends who read it chapter by chapter, night after night, all those years ago, I hope it makes you smile.

 My romantic comedy, Just Like a Movie , is available on all Amazon sites.