If you were wondering why the blog has been a bit quiet this last week or three, I’ve been busy moving house. In fact the Powells have been busy moving from Germany back to the U.K. It feels great to be back home after seven years abroad. Highlights so far have been, visiting the local secondhand bookshops (there are three of them only five minutes up the road), eating decent fish and chips, and meeting a Stormtrooper (he was the security at the town fete at the weekend).

It’s taken a week since moving in but I have finally, over the last two days, managed to get my study sorted out. Yes. I finally have a room of one’s own. It looks like this:

And the view from the window looks like this:

We have housemartins nesting in the eaves of the house, their darting and diving outside my study window is inspiring and distracting in equal measure:

It feels a little weird (and wonderful) to think that this will be the room in which (all being well) I will finish the novel (in time for the Autumn 2014 MA deadline). I’ve already started a new story since unpacking my stuff yesterday. The paper sticking out of my trusty Bluebird typewriter has the first paragraph which I hammered onto it during a coffee break yesterday. I’m leaving it there ready for the moment when the rest of the jobs around the house dry up and I have a bit of time to dig in and find out what this one is all about. Unusually for me, I don’t have an ending in my head yet, just a start. I’ll sleep on it tonight and see what the boys in the basement come up with.

In other news, while I’ve been AFK, the following has happened:

• I’ve been invited to attend my first literary festival (to appear on a panel discussing the short story form and lead a writing workshop) – more details on this as I have them.
• The Salt Anthology of New Writing 2013 was published – it’s packed with loads of great writing, including my story ‘Storm in a Teacup.’

So, exciting times. Hope your summer is treating you as well as mine has so far.