My post-retirement career as a children’s author has been occasionally frustrating but has brought so many joyful moments. As a side-benefit, I know far more about unicorns, early flight, Titanic, the Paisley pattern and axolotls than I’d ever have known if I hadn’t become a children’s author.

As one of Dad’s executors, I’ve spent this year dealing with legal stuff, but lots of cheerier things have been happening too and I’ve really enjoyed all the opportunities to do creative writing projects for different age groups and in new genres.

The end of last year was busy, with lots of Book Week Scotland school visits and an exciting trip down to London to do two events for the St Andrew’s Book Festival with writer pals Barbara Henderson and Victoria Williamson.

In January I was thrilled when Scottish Book Trust named Linnet and the Periwinkle Flyer as their Junior Book of the Month. It was fabulous too to sign my books in Waterstones Piccadilly.

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Late last year, I pitched some ideas to Badger Learning, who I have worked with before and they asked me to write a non-fiction school reading book about axolotls, which was enormous fun. Axolotls have now been added to my very short list of possible Mastermind specialist subjects (the ony other subject on the list is Titanic) and my first non-fiction book comes out in September!

Thanks to the lovely producers, I was also given the opportunity to write a new story for BBC Scotland’s fantastic Time for A Story series. The story, Ruby’s Backpack, was recorded in January and is now available on their website. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0n3p578

I’ve completed four seasonal stories, set in Eglinton Park near Irvine,  for a lovely nature-inspired project with North Ayrshire Council. Shug’s Wood Story Trail is launching in September and I am so looking forward to working with local schools and to seeing the finished trail. The artwork created so far by two local artists is gorgeous and it is incredible to see my story characters brought to life.

One of my favourite-ever author events happened in March, thanks to Tidelines Book Festival and Scottish Book Trust.It took place in Vanilla Joe’s Ice Cream Factory in Irvine and the children attended all designed their own ice cream. The winning ice cream flavour was made by Vanilla Joe’s.

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This year, I also been lucky to attend two Titanic exhibitions, Aberdeen in April and Birmingham in May.  Visits to the London exhibition on 8th to 9th August and the Edinburgh one on the 12th and 13th of December are already arranged! It is such a pleasure to get the chance to speak to people whose eyes don’t glaze over when I start talking about my favourite Titanic facts.

In conclusion, this job is the best in the world and I feel incredibly lucky.

This was the final section of my last blog at the end of May:

To be honest, I think the answer to the question of “when will I get this book written?”  is the same as when I worked full-time as a primary teacher. The summer holidays will soon be here. School events will stop and I will get my head down and have a first draft written by the end of August. It WILL happen. 

Unfortunately, as Burns said in his famous poem,

The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men
Gang aft agley,

An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy.

Which is pretty much what has happened. My first draft hasn’t been touched this summer. When the holidays arrived my lovely dad, who hadn’t been in good health for months, began to deteriorate rapidly.  A scan showed that his colon cancer had returned. He died peacefully on the 24th of July.

My father was a special person, a genuinely lovely man. One of his greatest qualities was his ability to believe the best of people. He was a true gentleman; kindness personified and generous to a fault, who gave without expectation of praise or reward.

Dad had a firm moral compass, but he was also hugely compassionate. Whenever his kids or grandkids made mistakes or bad choices, he was always ready to forgive and keen to help us out of whatever pickle we were in.

A short poem by Robert Louis Stevenson sums up Bobby Gibson’s life.

That man is a success
who has lived well,
laughed often and loved much;
who has gained the respect of men and women
and the love of children;
who has filled his niche and accomplished his task;
who leaves the world better than he found it,
who looked for the best in others,
and gave the best he had.

My dad’s life was an unqualified success.

He was the best of men, the salt of the earth. He laughed often and loved much. He gave the best he had.

He has left the world better than he found it, and I will love and miss him forever.

Robert Gibson March 30th 1929-24th July 2025

I was incredibly busy from February to April; lots of school visits, World Book Day week events, four fab sessions at Paisley Book Festival and a lovely school assembly for Helensburgh Book Festival. As well as the school and festival events, I did six readings in the Great Hall at the wonderful Unicorn Weekend at Stirling Castle and  signed and chatted about Titanic all weekend at the Titanic Exhibition in Leeds

.Most thrilling of all, Ice Cream Boy was shortlisted for the Alexandra Palace Children’s Book Award and I had a whirlwind trip down to London for the award ceremony with the other shortlisted authors and 800 excited children.

I loved all of these happenings, but all the travelling was tiring and by the time the Easter holidays arrived I felt I’d lost my work/life/writing balance completely, and my overwhelming feelings were exhaustion and guilt. My dad’s dementia is worsening, his care needs are increasing and I felt I couldn’t continue being unavailable to help whenever I was needed.

So, I’ve made the decision that going forward, from June onwards, I’ll do school events on Wednesdays and Thursdays only, unless there are exceptional circumstances. On Tuesdays I’ll continue to look after my gorgeous granddaughter all day and on Fridays I’ll go to yoga (I missed nearly every class last term) and see friends for coffee and lunch. I’ll make Dad’s dinner and sit with him until his bedtime on Sunday and Wednesday evenings, plus take him out for lunch at the weekend and try and fit the gym in when I can. Last term was a total exercise fail and I need to do better!

You might have spotted a tiny issue by now. I’ve organised the events part and the family/friends part of my life. Where am I going to fit writing time into my life? It’s an excellent question, because I do need to prioritise writing.

Thankfully, Linnet and the Periwinkle Flyer is finished and is heading for the printers, and I am delighted with the way she looks. So grateful to Elise Carmichael who has created a stunning cover and to Tiny Tree Books for being so supportive.

Linnet and the Periwinkle Flyer is coming out on August the 21st this summer and I can’t wait to see it in print. I’ve been busy in May writing four short stories for a lovely environmental project with a local council…more about that soon hopefully!

So, some writing has been done.

But despite whizzing ahead with a brand new novel idea while on a writing retreat in Austria back in January, and getting mid-way through a first draft, I have been procrastinating since,  or maybe just genuinely haven’t had time!

To be honest, I think the answer to the question of “when will I get this book written?”  is the same as when I worked full-time as a primary teacher. The summer holidays will soon be here. School events will stop and I will get my head down and have a first draft written by the end of August. It WILL happen.

So, that’s me organised, in theory at least.

Happy New Year! Hope everyone had a lovely Christmas break. I overdid the decorations as usual, but loved having a twinkly house and really miss all the sparkly lights now that they are back in the cupboard.

The freezing weather and long dark nights mean I often succumb to the January Blues but not this year. I am skin cancer-free, at least for now, and I have so much to look forward in the first months of 2025.

My second school reading book, The Last Zeppelin, another real-life story of survival after Terror on Titanic, is coming out with Badger Learning in January.

My story for 6-8 year olds, The Stargazers, is coming out as part of BBC Scotland’s Time for a Story series early this year and I am so looking forward to seeing the illustrations and listening to the added sound effects! Recording the story at the BBC Studios in Glasgow was great fun.

Phoebe misses out on playing in the snow, but a cloudless night sky is perfect for stargazing. Phoebe and her Gran decide to try and see the stars from her dark garden.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07jntrp/episodes/guide

In March I’m going to London to take part in the Alexandra Palace Children’s Book Awards, as Ice Cream Boy has been shortlisted and I’ve been invited to the big award ceremony. Ice Cream Boy has also been shortlisted for Peters Books Children’s Book of the Year and longlisted for the James Reckitt Hull Children’s Book Award which is totally thrilling. The novel is now also available as an audiobook, narrated by Angus King and is currently being reprinted. I am so proud of how well the book has been received.

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I’m looking forward to taking part in a couple of lovely book festivals in the spring too so it is shaping up to be an excellent few months.

Writing-wise, I took procrastination very seriously in 2024 and know that I need to get my head down and write a first draft of a new novel between January and April 2025, so it is back to the serious business of daily word counts and Written? Kitten! (You can choose puppies if you prefer -whatever positive reinforcement works)

https://writtenkitten.co/

There is also some very exciting book news hopefully coming soon, which I am bursting to talk about.

On a final, personal note, I am loving looking after my little granddaughter every Tuesday. We visit the library in Kirkintilloch often and this week had a fab afternoon out to the Riverside Museum in Glasgow where we spotted the perfect transport to take us home. Looking forward to lots more days out this spring!

It has been a good summer, work-wise. I’ve been involved in some lovely bookish events, including Marr College’s first Book Festival and The Big Book Show at the Mitchell Library.

It was a real thrill to be invited to Arran’s Wee Mac Book Festival, Falkirk High’s Literacy Celebration event, Gryffe Valley Book Festival and the Summer Reading Challenge launch event at Paisley Central Library too!  I attended some lovely bookish social events, like the Children’s Publishing Picnic, and did lots of school events, both in-person and virtual. I even did my first zoom to Australia in June!

The new term has got off to an excellent start. I’ve been doing a six-week block of creative writing sessions with a brilliant group of young writers at the Ginger Cat Bookshop.  Joyously, in September I was invited to the opening of two gorgeous new school libraries, at King’s Park Primary in Glasgow and King’s Oak Primary in Greenock.

Being a children’s author  really is the best job in the world and it has also been a lovely distraction from some tricky real-life issues. My dad is struggling now with dementia, although he’s pretty upbeat most of the time and is very happy to chat about Morrison shelters and the Clydebank Blitz. And I’ve had my own health issue, as a tiny, innocuous looking mole under my lip turned out to be another melanoma. I had a wide local excision in August and went to Birmingham  NEC two days later to sign copies of The Titanic Detective Agency at White Star Heritage’s excellent Titanic exhibition.

I was at the exhibition for the whole weekend and while I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to chat about Titanic to other enthusiasts, I felt very self-conscious about the state of my face!  Thankfully, my lip is healing nicely now, I’m crossing my fingers I won’t need more surgery and feel enormously grateful to the NHS staff for their care and kindness.