The Stolen Saint

September seems to have disappeared in a frenzy of writing, finishing the first draft of The Stolen Saint and then knuckling down to the much harder graft of the second, resolving any issues of chronology and continuity. The simple day to day calendar coherence has been amazingly hard - I don't remember any of this sort of problem in my first two novels, although that was rather a long time ago and perhaps I just ignored such things in those days. There are two visits to a market by main characters and in the first it is established that the day is Thursday. All the narrative fits around that, except that the second visit was written as if it was a Monday, with lots of knock-on effects that are difficult to resolve. That is one tiny example of the myriad of complexities I've been struggling with. My calculator has been much in play for dates of births, marriages and deaths, from 1917 onwards, rationalising the ages of characters in relation to others. It has not been easy with four generations to contend with and some of the most important characters long dead.

So what is the book about? There is a main character and her progress in coming to live in a village in Brittany is the basic storyline. She is Breton by birth, but has been living in London, and most of the characters are Breton or French or both, with a few British exceptions. There is a strong historical side with Breton culture and popular traditions underpinning the 'plot', such as it is, which concerns two rival saints from the Dark Ages. However, this is a novel about people and place primarily, even if magic and mystery going back to the neolithic sneak in. To sum up, it's a hymn to Brittany, like all my books.

Out in December, it will make the perfect Christmas present......