Genda benda agenda

Wow! here I am in the beautiful Test Valley. My wonderful friend and literary agent Rosina  picked me up from Southampton airport and I find myself in the green green grass of Hampshire. They say there's a drought here - but believe me, they know nothing. Gilles dashed me to the airport for 12.30. Lunch was a Flybe sandwich. No time for baguette this morning and no writing done! Ah well - it's a day off. Her cottage (she says its haunted),  is close to the country town of Romsey and the gorgeous gardens of Mottisfont Abbey and House. I might just give you a little hint that my latest novel could involve unsuitable and forbidden love in an English period house.


It was at Mottisfont house a few years ago that I chanced to find a real treasure of a book in a second hand sale. The book is called "Indian Love" by Laurence Hope. I had never heard of her before. She had to pretend to be a man and also pretend that her poems were translations of Indian love songs since they were so passionate,(perhaps slightly sexually ambiguous ladies) and therefore quite unsuitable for a respectable gal. Won't drone on about her cos you can look her up on Wiki and her poetry speaks for itself.If she needs any other endorsement let me say that Thomas Hardy was a fan.  She took her own life soon after the death of her husband in 1904.


I'm missing my lovely man....he'll have a sweet little bunny rabbit in the pot by now. I just know her will!