I didn’t react when my mother’s solicitor wrote to inform me of her death – hadn’t known how to react, if I’m honest. I’d presumed she had died many years ago. I lost my father when he was sixty seven, back in 1959. Not racing, as I’d always feared, but as a spectator. It was…
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There was a solitary bench under another tree, a simple affair made from a single plank resting on two stumps. On that plank sat a girl, her hands tucked inwards under her thighs, head leaning forwards, face hidden behind a curtain of hair. Isambard stopped at a respectful distance and dropped his flank, waiting to…
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With only three weeks to go until I return to the Lake District (can’t wait!), reading firstly The Lighthouse and then The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Pye has reminded me of how long-distance walking unclutters the mind. Both novels feature men – one in middle age and one in his retirement – who, the further they…
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I have received a review on Amazon for I Stopped Time which I’m not sure I quite deserve: “What I like about her (Jane’s) books is that there is no bad or offensive language – something that you cannot say about a lot of books these days.” This raises an uncomfortable question: should writers allow…
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Jane reads from her new novel, These Fragile Things. Return to the homepage to buy now.

There is a poem doing the rounds on the internet. When an old man died in the geriatric ward of a nursing home in an Australian country town, it was believed that he had nothing left of any value. Later, going through his meagre possessions, the nurses found this poem. Its quality and content so…
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Listen to Jane read Chapter One of her new novel, I Stopped Time.  

God bless, Granma Linda, my first US reviewer for ‘I Stopped Time.’ “This is one of the best books I have read lately and I read a lot of books. Not an easy read, but really different and fascinating. This would make a great movie if they did it right. The characters seem like real…
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Still making my way through the Booker short-list, something that forces me to read outside my comfort zone, I have been delighted to discover find two beautifully-crafted gems that fit the tone of my rejection letters perfectly, even if I do say it myself. And by that I mean those that say, ‘We love your writing but the story…
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This week is kicking off to a somewhat faltering start. There are no trains to take me to work in Wimbledon, but I am delighted with my first review on Amazon for These Fragile Things – from a Top 500 reviewer, no less.  “Having read both Half-truths & White Lies and I Stopped Time, two very…
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