A writer's life for me

In Her Wake is the recently published novel from Amanda Jennings, released a little earlier this year by the friendly folks over at Orenda Books, and it has been collecting glowing reviews – all of which I have tried to avoid – for weeks on end. Now, having dipped into the book myself, it’s clear to me why. I was around three pages in to this read, in fact, when I turned to my friend next to me and said: ‘Bloody hell, this is going to be a good one.’ The novel follows the story of Bella. A young woman who returns to her family home following the unexpected death of her mother, only to be greeted by a father who is so overcome with guilt and anxiety – perhaps what you’d expect following the loss of a spouse, but certainly not how you’d expect it – that their already strained relationship only worsens in the opening chapters of this book. When Bella’s father, Henry, finally reveals what he’d been holding in for so long, Bella’s world promptly falls apart – and the reader’s heart pr...

I’m on the precipice of panic, I’ve said something and I can’t retract it and worse still you won’t let me. I’m on the cusp of begging you to forget me but you’ve already made it uncomfortably clear that no matter how near to the cliff face I feel, you’re not letting me go anywhere. And so I run. Wind in hair, feet pounding ground, I’m endeavouring to outrun light and sound but then you catch me by the collar just as my feet are about to become unbound. I’m on the edge of something now, inhaling sea air and as my lungs contract you try to pull me back in tact but I’m still wriggling against you. You can’t understand what I’m hiding from on the cliff top, why a long drop and a slow stop might seem more appealing that whatever these emotions are that I’m feeling, which should give you an idea of how itchy they make me, or maybe an idea of how few I’m showing and how many I’m really concealing. I can feel a world of love inside my che...