Talking at the new Sheperds Bush Library

Last week, my friend Josa, me, and a friend of hers, did an event at Nottinghill Waterstones. I couldn't sleep the night before as I had never done anything like it and was SO nervous that I could feel my heart jumping out of my chest. I invited my mother, brother, sister and two friends from school to come along, incase no one else turned up. Josa did an introduction linking us together as apparently we all write about "modern heroines." When it came to my turn to talk, I tried to concentrate on the Waterstones subtext: Feminism meets Chicklit, and I'm still not sure if I was making sense. I was trying to say its still hard for a woman, because half of her wants to stay at home with the children, and half of her is frustrated that she can't get on with her career, (I know alot of women actually like staying at home and being with their children and actually I really approve of that) because in most cases its not going to be the Daddy who stays home and worries about sports day and the costume for assembly,and so if you don't stay home, you will have to hire someone else to do it.

I read out a paragraph from one of Potty Mummy's blogs posts on being a stay at home mother, in which she tells us how hard it is after being a career girl to then be at home, but how she has come to accept it, and be good at it. It is a really interesting read, as are the comments underneath. And of course being a mummy at home won't be for ever. Ellie the character in my book, The Seven Year Itch is shocked when she hears herself walk into Gap and say, "It's a shame you don't do those shirts with the teddy logo any more." It is at that moment that she thinks her life must change, as it can no longer be all about teddy bear logos. She is also motivated by the fact that her husband, the irrepressibly selfish Jack, has lost his job starring in TV soap. She reflects about her time at home that no one praised her for being a good mother and no one reprimanded her for being a bad one, which made her feel truly invisible.

On Thursday (tomorrow) Josa and I will be appearing at the new Sheperds Bush Library at Westfield in London. We are starting at 630 so if any of you can make it, please do. It will be so excruciating if only three people turn up!! Yikes. A weird single man came up to me at the end of the last one, and said you won't like me saying this but it's very Desperate Housewives. I was thrilled.

My 8 year old son was really rude to me yesterday. He was tired and moaning, and walking at 0 miles an hour to school, so I lost it, and was really mean and said "I can't wait for you to be at school," and he retorted, "I can't wait for you to die!" which really shocked me, but later when I regaled the sad little story to my reading book girls, they all laughed, including me, and the wise Denize, mother of two teenagers said, "you have to learn that they will always come back at you with something more hurtful, than what you've said to them" and later when the conversation had moved on and we were talking about parents and children Rebecca said she had read somewhere that "All parents are destined to love their children more than they love them!" Makes you think!