Somewhat late but here nonetheless, here’s the sketch re what I read and wrote in September. HOLD ONTO YOUR HATS.

Reading Life

I finished up for maternity leave at the start of the month and managed to read 6 books before the onslaught of being a new parent left me unable to focus on words for more than about ten minutes at a time. That makes the total for the year 53 (45 if you exclude the re-reads) which isn’t a bad innings. I suspect my pace will be pretty slow for the rest of the year though…

5 of my September reads were by women, and 1 by a man. All were fiction – 2 modern fairytales, 1 sweeping literary saga, 1 Gothic classic, 1 comedy alt-history and 1 Science Fiction. 5 were for grown-ups and 1 was written for kids. 1 was by a Black British author, 1 by a Canadian-Chinese author and the other 4 were by caucasian authors.

Writing Life

This did not happen so much last month. Reasons are outlined in this blog post, which I wrote most of in September but finalised and published in October… I did begin notes for a new children’s book idea, and the optimistic part of my brain reckons I might try and NaNoWriMo a first draft of it when the baby is napping and such, but November is very far away at the moment and who knows what it might bring in terms of sleep deprivation and other tests of focus!

Writer Life

As discussed I started maternity leave in September. I also missed two weddings and a birthday party, spent 6 nights in hospital, met approximately 9 million midwives, and gave birth to an actual human baby. I exercised less than perhaps I should have, but whatevs.

Books I listened to on Audible

Rebecca – Daphne DuMaurier

Do Not Say We Have Nothing – Madeline Thien

Books I read with my eyes

Boy, Snow, Bird – Helen Oyeyemi

The Gloaming – Kirsty Logan

Natboff! One Million Years of Stupidity – Andy Stanton

The Left Hand of Darkness – Ursula K LeGuin