8.20am My boyfriend’s alarm goes off. I ignore it and I hope my boyfriend will too. After years of having to be the one who’s had to get up first, I now luxuriate in the fact that I have no boss to tell me off if I’m late.
8.30am My kittens wake me up. Arty licks my nose and then gets under the duvet to spoon. Torry squeaks at me like a sea-lion cub until I tickle her behind her ears. I’ve mastered stroking the kittens while remaining 3/4 asleep. It’s a talent.
9.30am My boyfriend says goodbye (which I hate, he never calls in sick when I ask him to, such is his dedication) and goes to work at The Sun. I get up, have breakfast, have a shower. You know, the usual things. Or I get up, have a quick breakfast, go to the gym for 45 minutes, then come home. It depends what day it is.
10.30am Start working. I always check my emails first, and save ones from readers until later in the day when I can spend a bit of time on my replies. I always go through Twitter, Facebook, check the Daily Mail and The Sun websites (having worked for both it’s a hard, nasty habit to break), and organise my day into to-do lists.
11am Edit my work from the day before. I tend to write new chapters in the afternoon and early evening, and then the next day I edit them until they’re right. I don’t move on until I like what I’ve got, and I could never start a new chapter if I wasn’t happy with the previous one. I don’t think I could ever be one of those writers that bashes out 100,000 words before editing them. The thought of it!
1.30pm Lunch. My favourite thing to do is to meet friends, but then my day kind of gets unproductive. If I’m in the middle of a chapter I’ll make something quite quick like fish and brown rice, then get back to it.
2.30pm Work, work, work. If I’m having a good day I’m in the zone and writing thousands of words … if I’m not I’ll be fiddling with my website or sending emails or doing other bits and pieces. If I’m really not feeling it I’ll go out and go shopping or for a long walk or something.
7pm Finish working! Yey! Although I’m always thinking about what I’ve just written, and what I’ll do the next day …
