The One-Bag Wonder

Decluttering features in my next novel, Death at the Little Curiosity Shop, the start of my new cosy mystery trilogy – and it’s been front of mind lately for other reasons too, as I explain in my June column for the Tetbury Advertiser.

***You’ll find a sneak preview of Death at the Little Curiosity Shop – and a link to preorder it – at the foot of this post. ***

On return from a few days in Suffolk, where I’ve been helping my 93-year-old aunt declutter her house, my cottage seems terribly crowded. Having lived here for 33 years, I’ve allowed far too much stuff to accumulate.

Conscientious about recycling things like packaging and kitchen waste, I’m not so hot at disposing of items of purely sentimental value. I hoard amusing scribbles by my  toddler daughter who has just turned 21. Ornaments from my childhood home lie tucked away in a storage box. A long-empty bottle of my late grandmother’s perfume lurks in my dressing-table drawer.

 

Even though this little donkey has lost a leg since it used to stand on the mantlepiece in my childhood bedroom, I can’t bear to get rid of it

Inspired by my less sentimental aunt, I decide to start decluttering my house this summer. I’m always more energetic and optimistic when the days are long, so now is the perfect time to tackle the task.

I resist the temptation to buy another book about decluttering. Ironically, I got shot of my Marie Kondo book years ago. Well, it didn’t spark joy.

Instead, I devise my own simple system. I pledge to drop off one full carrier bag every time I pass the charity shop on the way to my parents’ house. As I visit them two or three times a week, the total will soon mount up.

An appropriate slogan for my decluttering mission

There are no rules as to how I fill each bag: no systematic sorting by room or by product type. My only proviso is that everything I  donate must be saleable.

I realise I’m playing a scaled-up version of Kim’s Game in which players try to remember items removed from a tray of random objects. If I discard only a few things at a time from my jam-packed household, I may even forget what’s gone. Stay in the game for long enough and I’ll ditch a significant quantity of surplus stuff without any sense of loss –  perhaps a skip load in a year – and  at the same time I’ll raise hundreds of pounds for charity.

Provided I don’t buy more than I dispose of, I’ll be onto a winner. As there’s nothing I need to buy apart from groceries, I’m confident of achieving my objective.

A week later, I’m smug about my progress. I’ve delivered my first three bags to the charity shop. My enthusiasm bolstered by this achievement, I’ve also taken a carload of books to the British Book Rescue, which accepts any number of books in any condition.

This means I’ve created just enough space to accommodate all the good things my aunt gave me from her house: my grandmother’s old French primer…

I remember sitting on the floor by her bookshelf poring over this book from when I was very young, years before I started learning French in school. It seemed like a fascinating secret code, none of which I knew how to pronounce.Extra special because it contains evidence of my grandmother’s own study

my  grandfather’s confirmation prayer book…

A timely find for me, as I shall be attending confirmation classes myself this autumnThis little book also has a very special inscription on the flyleaf

pots my aunt made in her kiln…

A lovely collection of my aunt’s pottery – all the right size for small bunches of wildflowers from my cottage garden

… and very much more. Ah. I may have spotted a flaw in my plan.

Sneak preview of the first in my BRAND NEW cosy mystery series
(launching on 11th October 2024) I’ll share the cover image with you as soon as it’s released

When Alice Carroll steps into Curiosity Cottage, a picture-perfect former bric-a-brac shop in the Cotswold Village of Little Pride, she thinks she’s found the perfect place to start the new phase of her life. Freshly separated from her collector long-term boyfriend, she’s excited to embrace her new, minimalist existence.

All Alice needs to do is sell off the left-behind stock, and settle in. But the villagers of Little Pride have other ideas, and Alice quickly realises they won’t give up their beloved shop without a fight.

Then a dead body is found buried in her neighbour’s compost heap, and Alice realises there’s much more to Little Pride, and its residents, than meets the eye.

What bestselling authors have said about my previous books:

“A cracking example of cozy crime!” Katie Fforde

“An affectionate glimpse of traditional rural English life. The sun shines, the locals gossip, the villagers all come together for the fair. The only problem is a murder. Luckily Sophie is there to solve it. A warm page turner that puts the cosy into cosy mystery. Well worth a read!” T.A. Williams

“Warm and cosy, the Sophie Sayers mysteries are full of likeable and eccentric characters inhabiting the idyllic Cotswold village of Wendlebury Barrow, where gossip, intrigue and murder are rife!” Michelle Salter

Death at the Little Curiosity Shop will be published in all formats and on all the popular platforms on 11th October 2024.

CLICK HERE TO PRE-ORDER YOUR COPY NOW.