Showing Off

This week, I had a lovely message from a happy reader which she was kind enough to let me share. It is always good to hear from people who have read your work because otherwise writers have no way of knowing how it has been received. Thank you, reader.

"Just wanted to say how much I have enjoyed reading your book 'Writing on the Road'. I finished it yesterday, sadly, as I didn't really want it to end. It was completely absorbing, and I could not put it down at times. Even though I live in the beautiful Lake District, I have fallen in love with the Western Isles. I usually stay in self catering accommodation, in Scotland, but I have now purchased a vehicle that will enable me to go camping more. So, after reading your book, it has now given me the confidence, to hit the road on my own. This will enable me to have more trips to the places I love, without having to find holiday companions all the time. I can't wait! Thank you for being an inspiration Sue."

Update - Upgrade - Upended world.

This little beaut is Hot Water Tracy, so named for her number plate, which I guess I’d better not tell you. HWT has not caused any hot water situations so far unless you count the trial first night in March this year when I discovered how easily duvets fall off narrow benches in the middle of very cold nights. Otherwise all is spectacularly well.

For those of you who’ve read Writing on the Road and seen the pictures or were lucky enough to climb aboard at events or by the roadside, HWT has the same basic layout of two benches and a kitchen area as Vanessa Hotplate, my thus far most beloved campervan, another Romahome. But HWT’s interior feels more spacious because it is open to the cab. No more fumbling along the outer flanks to reach the back door. Just hop between the seats and keep the heat in.

I have opted for luxury now and routinely turn the benches into a bed the width of a kingsize and the length of the width of a kingsize. Such comfort, as long as I sleep diagonally. (There is a foot extension thing stored at home for insisters on parallel lives.)

And it turns out dearest Tracy is made of magic. In the four months since my first proper trip at the beginning of April, I have been on nine writing trips. This is extraordinary. To put you in the picture, the last van was simply not suitable, not an office on wheels with a convenient scullery kitchen, but a cramped space in which something always had to be moved before you could get at something else. It even had bars at eye level between windows and no toilet (gasp). Consequently, there were few trips and even less satisfying, writing-focussed ones. Add to that a temporary but extremely demanding day job and you can see why a psychological thriller full of human atrocities was not getting written. But bless my previous employers, they fired me (for all the right reasons). So I was left with lots of time on my hands, a perfect van and a novel to write.

Nine trips later and I finished the first draft, then the second draft. And lo, I looked and much of it was good. There have been poems, several, often written while writing the novel. Simultaneous writing. There’s a new thing. Weird. Perhaps I have two brains after all. Some of it was good. Some not so good. Often hard to tell which was which. More on these later. Phew!

But boy does this writing on the road malarkey work.

16 in a Campervan

Earlier this year I attended a wedding in a remote part of Scotland. It was a second time around for both parties. The bride has four daughters, the groom four sons. The wedding took place amidst much hilarity in Kilfinnan Church and Kilfinnan Hotel. The blended, merged, and by all appearances delighted and newly formed family stayed in the giant (obviously) Kilfinnan House (replete with spa bath, sauna, table tennis, table football and pool table) where they all remained for the duration of the holiday/honeymoon.

Another couple and their son also stayed, and two daughters’ boyfriends, and I was invited to park my little campervan beside the house. Sadly, circumstances conspired against me so I only managed the nights before and of the wedding.

(The warmth of this family would make you weep). (Made me weep.)

Being the type of opportunist I am, I decided to break the record for the number of people I’ve had in that Romahome campervan. All eleven children of Applecross Primary once sat in there with ease, and on another occasion but with slightly less comfort, eleven slightly drunk adults from a Paisley book group crammed in there too.

Post wedding, we managed all sixteen of us.

Here are the other fifteen (without me) including the tops only of two heads. In case you don’t believe me, go to this link and you’ll see the bride, then the groom, then the rest of the party leaving the van.

Sadly, Paddy the Irish Wolfhound declined to join in.

Later the pet duck was persuaded to leave her paddling pool and join me in the cab.

How many people can you get into a Romahome or other tiny campervan?

Teeny Weeny Campervan

Writing on the Road: Campervan Love and the Joy of Solitude will be at the Aye Write! book festival in Glasgow on Tuesday 15th March at 6pm in the Mitchell Library. Books will be available for sale even though the official publication date isn't until 7th April. The description of the event doesn't cover the multitude of sins and blessings within the book, so come along and get the full flavour of my regular escape route to sanity and writing (arguably the same thing) in a tiny Romahome campervan.

Tickets are available here. You'll also find information about my accomplice, Lorraine Wilson. She too needed to escape from her daily life. Instead of campervans, she chose trains and spent three months travelling solo round Europe. It promises to be an interesting event.

The picture above shows my little Romahome in the foreground, my neighbours' copycat van to the left, and a removal lorry at the back which mine is trying to dwarf.

Writing on the Road: Campervan Love and the Joy of Solitude

While writing two novels, ghosting two memoirs for other people and working on various other bits and pieces, I needed to escape my hectic household and create some space to do it. As a mother of two and sometime step-mum of four, I realised my only option was to get into a campervan and have it function as a mobile office. It wasn’t long before this had become a habit.

Whether I’m by a beach with buzzards, golden eagles, deer, seals, surfers, other campervanners and dead fish for company, or in the hills around Glasgow, or France, my aim is to switch off the phone, get out the laptop and write.

Writing on the Road is not just funny (or sad) stories of campervan trips in Scotland; it is not just ‘Zen and the art of campervan maintenance’ (with stories of sweetness and light that will entertain or make you cry); and it is not just nature writing (with observations of wildlife in Kintyre, Assynt and other places on the western seaboard of Scotland). But if you enjoy reading about how books are written and about recovery stories from relationship breakdown, or about women travelling alone and all the things that can go wrong (and right), about strategies for facing fear, dealing with creepy crawlies and noises in the night, and about surviving all that life throws at you, then you will probably enjoy this book.

As well as chapters on writing, procrastination, meditation and creativity, there’s information on how (not) to buy a campervan, how to maintain it and what to do if you lock yourself out in the middle of nowhere just before bedtime.

I hope this book will inspire and encourage any would-be campervanners to get out there, get creative and enjoy the campervan life.

I'll be appearing at the Aye Write! book festival in Glasgow in March. Meanwhile watch out for my little van around town.