The proofs for Headline Review's edition of A Secret Alchemy are sitting on my desk, and emails are flying to and fro about the cover, the blurb and all the rest of it. All being well it will be published in November, and meanwhile it will be a proud moment when I can post the cover and an extract here, and a link for anyone who'd like to order it in advance. I'm also very pleased that publication in the US is arranged: William Morrow will be bringing it out over there in the Summer of 2009. Once upon a time that would have seemed a long way away, but these days life fairly whizzes past, it seems.

Back home, I hope it's not tempting fate to say that I'm in the home straight of my PhD. I do feel as if I can see the end, though the tweaks and revisions that are needed to keep the examiners happy always take longer than I think they're going to. On the other hand I feel quite bereft at the thought that the days of my association with Goldsmiths College are numbered. I shan't be doing much teaching there next year, but I shall hope to spin out the excuses for dropping by nonetheless.

And then there's the new novel. Despite everything else it's been clamouring for attention for months. The only way to keep it quiet, while I deal with everything else, is to let myself read for it: as well as the piles of novels and literary criticism for the PhD the house is scattered with history books. These days I'm positively glad of a long train journey, or having to wait for someone in the car, because I can read a bit more. I tell myself that the longer I postpone actually starting Chapter One, the more I put into the pot, the more vigorously the pot will boil over when it's ready.

February 2008

Big news this week is thatThe Mathematics of Love has been longlisted for Le Prince Maurice Prize, which is an unusual and delightful beast: of the longlist, the three shortlistees, their partners and the judges, spend a week in Mauritius at the sponsoring hotel Le Prince Maurice, while the judging takes place. The company I'm in is distinguished, so I'm not buying my factor-50 suncream just yet, but it's a thrill just to be on the list.

In the US the paperback of The Mathematics of Love has been out for a couple of weeks. The cover is quite different from any it's had so far and looks great, and it's picked up some very nice reviews, which is particularly pleasing as paperbacks get so much less review coverage. Meanwhile, I'm waiting nervously to hear what Morrow think of A Secret Alchemy, while back home I'm wading through Headline Review's copy-edited version before it goes to be typeset.

I'm enjoying keeping my blog very much, and it's getting regular readers. Inadvertently, too, I discovered that writing a post or two about the so-called 'rules' of writing is like a choral society scheduling Handel's Messiah: guaranteed to pack the house. But there are lots of other things to talk about: recent posts have included how reviews feel from the writer's side of things, and what the publishing industry looks like from there, books that have made me think, and how learning and teaching writing interact. Do drop by sometime and have a look: it would be great to see you.

December 2007

The US paperback of The Mathematics of Love will be published in February next year, and it's not just me who's excited: my publishers are too. Like many of their Harper Perennial editions it will include a 'PS' section, including a bit of biography, a piece I've written specially for the book about the genesis of the novel, and a few of the books that I was thinking about when I wrote it. The booktrade over there seem to be really keen on it, too. The cover's quite different from everything we've had so far, and I love it!

I had a wonderful two days in Madrid, thanks to my Spanish publishers Alianza Editorial: a press conference with most of the national papers there, a photoshoot. I was so touched that they'd specially chosen to take me to a renowned Basque restaurant, to recall Stephen's past in La Aritmética del Amor. The other translations are beginning to arrive, too; it's very interesting seeing how different countries interpret the book, and I found I remember enough Russian from doing a year of it at school to be able to spell out some words!

Back home, I've delivered my new novel A Secret Alchemy to my editor at Headline Review, and its tentative publication date is November 2008. It's been a long haul - it's a big novel - and it hasn't always been easy, not least because all the time that I was trying to concentrate on it, exciting things were happening toThe Mathematics of Love. But I'm really, really happy with how it's come out. As I gave the manuscript a last read through, picking up the little slips and idiocies that always creep in (or - eek! - maybe were there from the beginning) I forgave it all the times it made me tear my hair out, and remembered just why I've had these people and worlds in my head for so long. More on that as we roll slowly towards publication.

And now A Secret Alchemy is delivered, my teaching term at Goldsmiths College is over, and the world outside the study window is sunny and frosty. I have a breathing space, before the copy-edit arrives and I start on the dissertation element of my PhD, in which to enjoy Christmas and New Year. I hope you, also, have a happy and peaceful holiday.

September 2007

The new novel's nearly written, and that's why the previous entry is looking decidedly yellow and dog-eared. Short of a blow-by-blow account of every word, written and re-written, there's very little to say about writing a novel, except that you're writing it. But now it really exists: I've told the stories I want to tell, researched, despaired, revised, re-arranged, rejoiced, and drunk far, far, far too much tea. There are always more last fiddles than I think there will be, but the light at the end of the tunnel gets bigger every day. And yet sometimes knowing the end is near is like knowing great friends are about to emigrate: soon will come the day when I wave them off at the airport for good, and no amount of telephoning and emailing will be the same, after having them living next door for all these years.

Talking of books which have already taken off, in May Les Mathématiques de l'Amour was published by Michel Lafon in Paris, and it looks very handsome. I have wondered what French readers will make of Stephen's attitude to his traditional enemy, but all seems to be well. Spain is an even more important element of the book, so I'm thrilled that La aritmética del amor will come out in October. The publishers, Alianza Editorial, have asked me to Madrid to help launch it. I don't speak Spanish, but my daughter studies it at school, and before I knew the Spanish title I asked her what the novel would be called. Sadly, after a year's lessons, she could tell me the Spanish for 'mathematics', but not for 'love'.

As you'll have realised if you've had a browse already, this site concentrates on my fiction and, except when I'm in the finishing straight of a novel, I try to keep the News up to date. But for a while now I've been thinking about finding a more personal and immediate place for thinking aloud about wider matters of writing and reading. So I've just set up a blog, This Itch of Writing, and it's being great fun. I do hope you'll you'll drop by sometime.

Reviews of the US edition have been pouring in: you can see a selection of them on the Reviews page. As you may have spotted, I've just added a Contact form too, and you can email me from there. The Internet's a wonderful thing: the first email I had from this site was from a fellow author, Rachael King, whom I met at the Christchurch Writers Festival. She sent me news of the UK launch of her novel The Sound of Butterflies, emailing from the sun on a beach in New Zealand. As it was a particularly grey, wet January day here my pleasure in hearing from her was tempered by several twinges of jealousy. Then there was the reader in the UK who'd sat by the warmth of his fire and devoured the book whole, and a US reader with a passion for the Peninsular War. I'm always slightly worried when people with specialist knowledge get in touch: are they going point out some obscure fact that I've got wrong? But he just said he loved the book, so that was all right

And the UK paperback is published on 8th March. It was a great moment when I got a big box of my author's copies last week. I think it looks gorgeous, and I know that lots of bookgroups are planning to read it, so I'm looking forward to hearing what they think.

Meanwhile, I've finished the first draft of the new novel. Now I have to pull everything together, make the characters live and breathe, plait the loose strands of ideas and events closely together, explore the images and metaphors that enrich the story, and make sure that story's clear to everyone, not just to me. There's a lot to do, but I do now believe there will be a book in the end, designed, typeset, and in the shops. There have been moments in the last few months when I've wondered, but not any more.

December 2006

The US edition of The Mathematics of Love will be published on 2nd January and the US reviews are beginning to come through, which is very exciting. The book trade is hugely enthusiastic too: Borders have chosen it for their 'Original Voices' programme, and Book Sense, the national group of independent booksellers, have made it a Pick of the Month for January.

The UK paperback edition of The Mathematics of Love will be published on 8th March. I've got an Advance Reading Copy in my hand, and I think it looks gorgeous. The book trade's certainly taking notice of it: The Bookseller called it 'quite extraordinarily accomplished, a powerful debut'. The audio book is available too, from Clipper Audio, and it's beautifully read.

Other than that, things have been relatively quiet, which is just as well as I'm on the home strait with the first draft of the new novel. First drafts are less than half the job, but for me they're much the hardest part because I'm creating something out of nothing, spinning a web from thin air. Once that's done, I've got something I can work on, and even if not a single word remains from that first draft by the end, it's still easier than conjuring words from space. And of course it's time I got on with the other part of my PhD, so I'm starting to read round that, exploring ideas of story telling and historical fiction.

I was so pleased that Mike Stocks won the Goss First Novel Award. White Man Falling is a terrific book, and he'd travelled all the way down from Edinburgh for the very enjoyable dinner. I also have huge respect for him, because he edits the poetry magazine Anon, which is unique in only accepting anonymous submissions. That levels the playing field for new and established poets in a way that's normally very unusual, and very welcome.

And - hurrah! - the study's finally gone upstairs, thanks to a crew of friends who organised a bucket-chain to deal with the books, so I'm sending this via my new wireless network. It only took a whole day for me to get it up and running...

September 2006

The Mathematics of Love has been shortlisted for the Goss First Novel Award. This is what used to be known as the Pendleton May First Novel Award: previous winners have included Hari Kunzru and Clare Clark, while the likes of Mark Haddon and Marina Lewycka have been shortlisted, so I'm in very remarkable company. It's awarded as part of the Guildford Book Festival, so I'm looking forward (nervously!) to the dinner on the 23rd October. I'd just heard this when I flew off to New Zealand for the Christchurch Writers' Festival, and then on to Brisbane for their Writers Festival. It's been the most amazing, whirlwind time. On the plane home yesterday (what else do you do for 22 hours plus re-fuelling stops?), I totted it up, and realised that in ten days I did;

9 live and pre-recorded radio interviews
2 live TV interviews
3 press interviews
2 bookshop signings
1 solo festival session, recorded for Australia's Radio National Book Show
6 festival panels
1 festival workshop on researching historical fiction
1 sponsor's literary dinner, as guest of honour
1 festival launch reading
54 hours of flying
and signed more books than I could begin to keep count of.

It's huge fun but incredibly tiring, so many, many thanks to my publishers, Headline, (operating there under the banner of Hachette Livre) who made it all as easy as was humanly possible. I met so many friendly and interesting people, and I just wish I could have taken the time to explore both countries a bit. Next time at least I hope to cuddle a koala, and see more of the South Island's mountains than I could from a plane. Other nice news is that The Mathematics of Love's Spanish translation rights have been sold for the whole world, so soon it should be available in Spanish from Barcelona to Bolivia! And in the US things are warming up for publication by William Morrow in January; it's had its first review, and the mighty Borders have chosen it for their 'Original Voices' February promotion.

So, guess whether I've moved the study yet? No, of course not!

August 2006

It's out there! The Mathematics of Love is published. I've signed books for close family and total strangers, done more interviews, and heard from excited friends who've seen it Singapore, Brecon and Oxford Street and on bookshop websites from Pakistan to South Africa. And, most nerve-racking of all, I've waited for the reviews: as I open each newspaper and magazine my heart lurches. But the reviews have been excellent. I'm thrilled that so many reviewers have loved The Mathematics of Love, understood what I was trying to do, and found it 'compelling', 'wonderfully perceptive', and 'a book that works on every conceivable level… a real achievement.'

But press coverage, however exciting and necessary, seems curiously unreal. What I'm really looking forward to in the months ahead is meeting real, ordinary readers. I'll be doing my first UK reading at the Poetry Café on 22nd September, at the Fourth Friday event. But for now I'm concentrating on getting ready for New Zealand and Australia. The Christchurch Writers' Festival is on 5th-8th September, and the Brisbane Writers Festival 13th-17th September. I'll be doing discussion panels and readings, and my itinerary includes press and broadcasting interviews and bookshop visits. I shan't have much time to see the sights, except from an aeroplane window, which is a shame as both are countries I've long wanted to visit. Nonetheless, it's all new, and exciting, and decidedly scary. I'm distracting myself by worrying instead about whether I'll be allowed to take books on board with me by the time I fly. And I'm afraid the next entry here may be rather badly jetlagged.

June 2006

The Mathematics of Love is published next week, on the 3rd July. In some ways it's hard to believe, after all the months of production and years of writing. But the book exists: pallet loads are trundling out of the warehouse to the shops as I type, and the export edition is flying off to Dubai and Hong Kong. Every time I trip over the box of my author's copies I think how gorgeous it looks. Yes, the books are still sitting in their box in the hall for want of any bookshelf space to put them on,  because no, I haven't managed to move the study yet.

On all fronts things are hotting up: Radio 2's The Weekender has already reviewed it, Tatler, Time Out, and Publishing News have interviews. Further afield, I've been invited to literary festivals in Brisbane and Christchurch, New Zealand in September, and with interviews for papers there and in Hong Kong. Last week I spent a day signing Ottakar's entire stock order, as The Mathematics of Love is their Bookseller's Choice for July. It took hours!

I'm signing books again - I hope more slowly and with more in the way of interaction with readers - at Dulwich Books, Croxted Road, London SE22 at 11am, on Saturday 15th July, and Review Bookshop in Bellenden Road, London SE5 who are holding a 'Meet the Author' session at 6-8pm on Wednesday 26th July. And finally, the furthest away date so far in my diary is 22nd September, when I'll be reading at the Fourth Friday event at the Poetry Café, Betterton Street in London's Covent Garden.

April 2006

The Mathematics of Love has had its first review. Publishing News called it 'A bravura and compelling feat of storytelling, enlivened by convincing detail and voices, as well as by serious reflection on the nature of memory, history and reportage.'

It's less than three months to publication, and suddenly it doesn't seem very far away. Like any novelist, I spend most of my working life alone, in as quiet a room as I can find. Now I'm having to emerge, blinking, into the daylight to meet booksellers and Headline's foreign partners. They've heard about The Mathematics of Love, and they want to know more. I could go on for hours, of course, but I have to try to convey what I think is special about it quickly. Besides, I'm interested in what they do too: how they sell books, and how their particular shop or patch of the world works. I'm still a very good customer for other people's books, after all. I've been interviewed by journalists, too. That's different; they want to know more about me, and how The Mathematics of Love came to be written.

Fish Publishing held the launch and prize giving for their historical fiction anthology All the King's Men to co-incide with the London Book Fair. My story Russian Tea turned out to have a twin in another story with the same title, but they couldn't have been more different. Now the Historical Novel Society who co-sponsored the prize have asked me to guest-edit the next edition of their magazine Solander.

Back at home, I've been talking to my editor at William Morrow about the cover for the US edition of The Mathematics of Love. And then there's the new novel. If you asked me how it's going, I couldn't really tell you, nor would all the material stacked around me tell you much either. I'm still feeling my way, but it's beginning to add up to something, or so Maura Dooley, my supervisor at Goldsmiths', tells me. There'll be a pause in a few weeks, while I move my study to a bigger room upstairs. I've completely run out of space down here, and I'm dreading shifting a thousand or so books, not to mention all the computer and its paraphernalia. If the next news you read here is a bit dusty and dishevelled, you'll know why.

February 2006

It’s less than five months till publication, and The Mathematics of Love is listed on the booksellers’ websites. On my desk are the hardback jacket, the trade paperback cover and copies of the trade weekly The Bookseller: the front and inside front cover were taken over last week by advertisements for what I find we’re all calling TMOL. Then there are pictures and ideas I’m assembling for The Mathematics of Love’s American editor, as Morrow’s designer begins to think about that cover. And just as it was listed in Time Out as one of their ‘Books to watch out for this spring’, I heard that the first translation rights have been sold, in Poland. I gather this is just a taste of things to come.

Meanwhile my study is filling up with material for the new novel. There are books and leaflets and pages of notes, maps, photographs and postcards, lists of revisions to keep in mind and scraps of paper with sudden, odd ideas scribbled on them. It’s another world, and one which couldn’t be more different, but each, somehow, seems to help me enjoy the other.

December 2005

Last July, I returned to Skyros. The Mathematics of Love had been sold to Headline Review as the first of a two-book deal, and I had the manuscript in my suitcase. It seemed so suitable to be putting the finishing touches to Stephen and Anna’s story on the island where Stephen was born.

In August I was in Suffolk. You can no longer smell burning stubble on a hot evening as you could in my childhood, but I could easily imagine seeing Anna sitting at the next table in the garden of The Angel in Lavenham. Now The Mathematics of Love has been sold to William Morrow in the US, and things have gone quiet after an exciting and confusing few months.

But it’s not quiet at all in my head, because I’m deep in the first draft of my new novel. After the initial research, I find I have to submerge completely, writing fast and furiously until I’ve told the story. Only then do I get back in touch with ordinary life, while I re-draft and re-write, do more research, and re-write again.

That’s my internal writing life, which is shaped by the needs of my new novel, and the PhD that it’s part of. My external writing life will get lively again around the launch of The Mathematics of Love in Britain next July, and in the US in the following winter. Meanwhile, I’ve got a novel to write…