So it’s out!  Anyone for Seconds, now available in all good book shops and perhaps in some not so good ones. It’s my seventeenth novel  –  at least, the seventeenth I’ll admit to  – and I’m sorry to say that for me publication days aren’t what they used to be. They used to be a reason for a party and indeed I’ve had some great launches, a few of them hosted by kind and generous friends. But by number 17 it’s all a bit ho-hum. Sense of achievement? Not really. Optimism? I wouldn’t be so foolish.

However…. A f S has already had some super reviews from advance readers and when I opened a copy at a random page yesterday it actually made me laugh so I certainly have grounds for a wee celebration this evening. A glass of fizz and the last scrapings of my Russian caviar.

I used not to work on pub day but given the currently dire straits of my career I will put in a couple of hours. Other projects for the day: salting runner beans and turning up the sleeves on my latest acquisition from the second-hand clothes rail. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a 1950s housewife? No, it’s Laurie Graham on publication day.