As many of you know, it hasn’t been a smooth start to 2026 on the writing front. To keep busy, I polished a 70,000 word project – Maud & Caelan – which I submitted to the ASA/HQ competition today. If you like magic realism and want to learn more about intergenerational trauma, this is the book for you – and who better to show what that is than a ghost.

But in the evenings, when I’m not so busy, I haven’t been able to digest the usual crime dramas or suspense, hubby and I usually watch on TV. So, we have been watching All Creatures Great and Small. Such a heartwarming show, and at the end of the first series,

I realised I’m no longer squeamish with pus.

Yes, pus. Fortunately, I haven’t had a lot to do with it – when I was very young, I was accepted into an in-hospital training course to become a registered nurse, but I soon discovered I couldn’t deal with bodily fluids. I generally pass out at the sight of blood from loved ones, leaving whoever else is present to mop up the mess. But back to the show. I pondered how, by the end of an episode, I was praying to see pus! It was about a cow that had a growth inside its neck, slowly reducing the air intake for the poor creature. Everything they tried (don’t forget it’s set in the late 1930s) was ineffective until they attempted a risky operation. Of course, the music added to the drama, but despite the sight of open wounds, my heart pounded until the gooey yellow fluid was exposed, and I could breathe again.

Art. That’s all I can say. Art moves people, but it also changes us.

If I’d watched a similar procedure on, say, one of Attenborough’s documentaries, I would have covered my head with the nearest cushion and asked hubby to let me know when it was over. But not with All Creatures Great and Small. No, the writer and the actors (and the directors) all worked together to show urgency, the importance and the heart in the telling. It’s not easily done, but here I am, no longer averse to pus – not that I’m going out of my way to find it.

But here is the conundrum. Art can’t be produced by everyone. And those who create art create it uniquely. Sharing with their audience their view of the world and opening minds to a different vision. A documentary or a journalistic reportage is very different from an art movie or a novel, despite discussing similar themes or even stories.

And art is individual and unique.

It cannot be replicated with the same depth and feeling as the original creator had. Even so, there are people who attempt to steal from creators, lying to themselves and others about the origin of the art. Claiming the work as theirs. I find that stupefying, but perhaps I’m not being compassionate enough. If I were unable to create, perhaps I would long for something so badly I would try to steal it and claim it as mine. I did that with a pen once when I was 10. Of course, I was made to return it and apologise. The teacher, who had never seen me do a bad thing, kept asking why I took it, and I honestly couldn’t say why. There were so many reasons I didn’t know where to start.

I was a child, and some leeway had to be made for that. I learnt my lesson and haven’t repeated the mistake.

As I writer, I’m constantly curious about people’s motivations for the actions they take.

And if the book in question is ever released, you will read some reasons I believe this has occurred. I’m sad it happened to me, but it is understandable. When so much has been taken from you, the desire to take from others in return must be strong. Or perhaps they long so much to have that same quality that they think by renaming it theirs, they have magically gained that ability.

In the meantime, I’m turning my hand to Own My Mistakes, which started life as Living in London back in 2015! This manuscript is over ten years old now, and I am so stubborn, I refuse to put it aside. It has merit, but it continues to elude the final ‘The End’. I’ll keep you informed on its progress – it may be another decade before I can write those two words at the end of this one.