When I was reading recently, the words tugged at my heartstrings, popped with new ideas, blasted away the protective coating on my emotions, soothed the hurt, tore the skin off old wounds, then cleansed everything with fresh tears. That’s the pleasure of reading a good book by a skilful writer (The book was Away in Montana by Jane Porter whom I’ve had the great pleasure of meeting several times over the past 11 years).

But, that’s not what the quote talks about. How does writing make me feel? A whole range of emotions including the above. I remember writing my first novel for NaNoWriMo in 2005, sitting at my desk at 11pm when my tradesman husband had been in bed for hours and gotten up again. He said, “Are you coming to bed yet?” My response? “But I want to know what happens!” No, I hadn’t plotted that one! Some things have changed but not all.

‘No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader.
No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.’
Robert Frost