Winter writing

It's funny how seasons wrap their arms around you isn't it. I'm reading Robert Harris's splendid new book, 'An Officer and a Spy,' and he writes about seasons so well, easily transporting you to another time and place, your nostrils fairly smarting at the descriptive work he lays at your door. Genius is such.

For me January is a month that creaks on the edge of despair. The bright lights of Christmas are a distant glow and the prospect of another cold and dark month to come hardly manages to lift the spirits. And yet we fill ourselves with busy joys, ever hopeful that we can turn this tide of woe to our undeniable advantage.

Writing, for me , helps. All year round of course but here, on a wet and cold and dark East Midlands day, well never have I felt its warmth more precious at my side.

A X