Sir Thomas More by Hals Holbein (Accessed via Wikipedia ) During lockdown, we had Time. Remember that? I was in my probationary year of teaching: almost certainly among the most exhausting years for any profession. All my time had been taken up with school work, and I regularly stayed at school until after 6pm, having arrived there at eight in the morning. Now, children, this is not sustainable and, very soon, I decided I didn’t like working where I was. Then I realised that I didn’t like teaching at all. But, in fact, neither was particularly true: I just needed to be true to myself and to say no, which would give me the ability to manage my work/life balance in a more appropriate way. What does this have to do with historical fiction, I hear you say? Well, during March 2020, we went into lockdown and suddenly I went from working ten-hour-days to ten-hour-weeks. I met up with my class on Google Meet, I put work up for them on a meticulously designed Google Classroom, but I just h...
Virginia Crow (author of Day's Dying Glory) at Innerpeffray Library I’m not sure what it was about my last holiday that made it so special. Whether it was because it was intertwined with the Day’s Dying Glory book launch event at Innerpeffray Library, or because I needed a rest from all my responsibilities, or that it was just an amazing place to stay…I really loved last week’s holiday! The cottage was The Old Post Office on Dunalistair Estate and we had booked it from Saturday to Saturday. The road to the cottage was bumpy and bendy which, being a non-driver, I didn’t mind a bit. In fact, it seemed to add to the whole experience. Once at the cottage, I realised what an astonishing view we would have for the next 7 days. The cottage looked out across an open field, over Dunalistair Water and to Schiehallion beyond. On clear days, you could see the whole mountain which stood quite close to the cottage. Once every day, however, the mountain top would be covered by mi...