Blog

Happy new year! I know, I know, we’re fourteen days in now and everyone’s already broken their resolutions and is counting down the days until summer. But today marks the real start of the new year for me, because it’s the first day I’m alone. My kids were off school until the 8th, and my… Continue reading The sound of silence

Forgive me, content marketing gurus, for I have sinned. It’s been 23 days since my last blog post. And I can’t promise that this one’s going to be any good, because I’ve just returned my last piece of paid work of the year, and I suspect that my brain has raced ahead and is already… Continue reading It’s Chriiiiiiiiiistmas!

My husband made the mistake of walking into my office the other day when I was trying to figure out a delicate author query. So along with my usual request for a cup of tea (he makes the best tea in the entire world), he also got asked a very strange and personal question about… Continue reading All in the name of research…

Here is the second of my posts on styles. See, I promised I wouldn’t leave you with funkily formatted headings forever. (If you missed the first one, it’s here.) You’ll need to pay a bit more attention and click on more things for this one, but only a little bit. Don’t run away! It’s easy!… Continue reading The second-least technical Microsoft Word Styles tip you will probably ever see

For many years, I had no idea what Word styles were. All I knew was that if you happened to move your mouse over those funny little boxes at the top of the screen, your text went weird until you moved your mouse back to the page. But that was fine – all I was… Continue reading The least technical Microsoft Word Styles tip you will probably ever see

Once upon a time, there was a girl. She always got picked for the big parts in school assemblies and plays: always the narrator, never the lead with an actual good costume. She always spoke eloquently and confidently, and everybody said she would do great things. She was probably really bloody annoying, to be perfectly… Continue reading Conferences, confidence and comfort zones

(Sorry, I get overexcited by these things.) September, as I’ve said before on this blog, is a time of new beginnings for me. And what better way to start this new year than by attending my second Society for Editors and Proofreaders conference? When at the very beginning of last year’s conference I saw that… Continue reading Conference!!!

Hi, everyone! It’s back-to-school time already. If you need me, I’ll be trying to figure out what happened to 2018. One of the many things I did over the summer was sort out my garden. My garden isn’t the greatest. A combination of terrible soil, lack of sunlight in key areas, and an owner who… Continue reading Gardening

I’ll tell you a secret: I am in awe of anyone who writes a novel. Anyone. Even if the book is terrible. Even if it’s barely readable. I’m still in awe. Because they sat down and they wrote a damn book. I’ve been trying to do that for years, but the longest thing I’ve managed… Continue reading My foray into self-publishing

Because, apparently, when your kids are off school, you're supposed to, like, look after them and stuff. Who knew? Your regular high-quality, life-improving content will return at a later date...