Great chemistry has little to do with compatibility, but when you’re feeling all the feels, you don’t think about boring old things like compatibility, whether you actually like how they treat people, whether you actually like them. You see the red flags waving merrily in the wind, and you deliberately turn a blind eye, your willful wounded child refusing to listen to your wise adult self. Because nine times out of ten, when you are swept up in a giddy romance that feels like it’s out of a movie, the minute you fall into bed with them, just like the rom-coms, is when the curtain falls.

Because I’ve changed my approach, I have had a handful of lovely dates recently, lovely because they were none of those things. Instead, the dates were with entirely appropriate men - clever, curious, attractive, successful, solvent, age-appropriate - and lovelier still they weren’t giddy, or love-bomb-y. There was no talk of wanting to take me to bed, no one leaned over the table and tried to kiss me (thank the LORD). There was no behaviour that was disrespectful or inappropriate, just good conversation and a few shared stories, an agreement that perhaps we should do this again.

I was also struck by the realisation of how often I go into performative mode on dates. Even if I am not the slightest bit interested in them, I still want them to want me. I give them the full Janey G song-and-dance routine. I am impeccably made-up, with perfect hair. I sparkle and tell great stories; I perform. But three months of dating has taken it out of me. I’m exhausted. Now, I show up more naturally, with no expectations, merely a hope that we will have something to talk about. There is no Janey G show, and I think, I hope, I am finally able to show the real me to potential suitors, enjoy the time for what it is, rather than wondering whether this might be my person.

I write a lot about being chosen in Rewilding. How so many women are trained to be chosen, to do everything we can to make people choose us, consequently spending years moulding ourselves into all kinds of shapes and moulds in which we don’t quite fit in order to make ourselves more attractive, or more palatable. We do it with friends, we do it with colleagues, we do it with lovers. I have conquered doing it with friends and colleagues, but this summer showed me I still had work to do when it comes to romance.

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At Kings Cross tube I stepped out into a bright sunny day, with scores of people looking up at the sky. Some with paper glasses, others squinting, trying to see the eclipse.

Ah! The eclipse. My friend was late, and I sat for a while on a bench under the shade of a large Linden tree, watching everyone look up. A young man put the glasses on, looked at the sky, as his face broke out in a disbelieving smile. I tried to look up, but just saw blinding light. I walked over to a woman who had just taken her glasses off, and asked if she could actually see anything.

“Want to try?” She said, handing me her glasses. I put them on, and saw the crisp crescent across the sun where the moon was slowly moving across. It felt surreal, and magical. I didn’t expect to see it so clearly, and my own mouth dropped open. “I didn’t expect this!”

“I know!” The woman laughed in delight. It felt magical, and as we stood talking, people stopped by us, with her handing her glasses around. We all laughed in stunned delight, as our crowd grew bigger. It felt like magic, like a once-in-a-lifetime moment, and, it felt like community.

I love people, I thought, as I stood, making delighted conversation with strangers. To feel so connected to so many strangers was a magical thing indeed, particularly at a time when so many of us feel increasingly isolated, increasingly alone.

London inevitably starts to become deeply lonely by the end of summer. I usually stay in a lovely borrowed flat in Covent Garden, surrounded by people (although granted, mostly tourists), but everyone’s away, or busy with their lives, and I float around the flat wondering what to do, visit galleries on my own, sometimes theatre, feeling more alone than I would like.

Unlike Marrakech, which thrives on spontaneity - I can call any number of people and say, drinks later? Dinner? Coffee, knowing they’ll be free, London requires booking in advance. I’m much better at spontaneity, deciding on the day what kind of mood I’m in, whether it’s a peopling day, or a solitary one.

Once the social whirl of the first few weeks being back passes, London always seems to force isolation upon me. This year, however, I’ve taken a flat, with Twin B, the youngest son. We have our own spaces in the flat, can give each other room, but we have each other to run across the road to the pub for a drink, or to make dinner together, curling up to watch Line of Duty together.

My loneliness has been assuaged this summer, and I have found myself thinking about a new study published in the journal Science, proving that people working from home (of which I am one) are more socially isolated, anxious and depressed.

I have long said that we are living through a crisis of loneliness and isolation. We are busy hiding behind screens, fooling ourselves that we are more connected than ever before, when in fact we may be communicating more, may have access to everything we think we need at the end of our fingertips, but we are not more connected.

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I talked to another friend, married for the past ten years. She loves her husband, but is going through menopause, and lately they have started to feel like ships that pass in the night. They both travel for work, and of late it has started to feel like they have less and less in common. They recently sold their big family house in Hampshire, and have downsized to a flat in London, the idea being they would be closer to friends, to culture, to restaurants and art; to life. But in fact, the rhythm of their life has changed, and she is lonely, and when the two of them are together in their much smaller flat, in the heart of Marylebone where she knows none of her neighbours, she feels as if she can’t breathe.

Three of her friends have got divorced in the past couple of years (me being one). They tell her that life alone is so much better, that they have never been happier. As a consequence, Instagram has been listening, and her feed is now filled with middle-aged women celebrating their new-found independence, all of them saying life is better.

As a woman who left her marriage two and a half years ago, I want to say this: life is indeed often wonderful, and certainly less hard than being in a marriage where I felt consistently diminished and controlled (even though I recognize I gave up that control myself, did not know how to keep my voice, or my boundaries. This is not my former husband’s fault. This is mine - I did not know how do anything other than lose myself in a marriage). I needed to spend the last two and a half years on my own. Yes, they have occasionally been peppered with the odd adventure, but I have been happily single, knowing I had to heal my own childhood wounds in order not to repeat the same mistake in the next relationship.

And, eternal romantic that I am, I do believe that there will be a next relationship, even though I love being single. My life is very wonderful, rarely feels as if there is anything missing. I love having autonomy over my choices, my money, and my life. I love that I don’t have to ask permission of anyone to do anything. I can hop on a flight to visit friends at the last minute, have many nights where I eat a piece of cheese for dinner, then crawl into bed at 7.30, with cats, books, and a phone. I have other nights where I dance all night, joyous at this newfound freedom.

But over the last couple of months, a longing has crept in. Everywhere I go I see couples, and I watch them in fascination, having completely forgotten how you do that. Coupling. I don’t remember how it happens, what it feels like, and am astonished that so many seem to have figured it out.

I can’t quite imagine doing it again myself, and yet, there is a part of me that longs for it. Not enough to ever settle, not enough to entertain the idea of good enough, certainly not enough to waste time with anyone who doesn’t treat me well, but this newfound longing is unexpected, this wish for companionship perhaps.

Even though I adore my independence and alone time. I have no wish to dive into a full-time relationship, to live with anyone, to merge lives, not at this stage, but the aloneness is sometimes hard. And, the aloneness sometimes veers into loneliness, which is not as lonely as being lonely in a marriage, but at this age and stage of life, can feel overwhelming. Especially on weekends. There is no-one to talk nonsense with at the end of the day, no-one to help navigate things I am very bad at like taxes, and admin, and the logistics of life. There is no-one to take out the rubbish, or help put the mattress cover on. There is no-one to do nothing with. Except the cats, who are pretty good company, but it isn’t quite the same (although granted, they are perhaps less irritating).

None of which is a reason to keep a husband, but there is no such thing as a perfect life, with or without a husband. I am very aware that the inter web is currently celebrating women leaving at midlife, and whilst I am a woman who left in midlife, and whilst I have never had a moment’s regret in leaving the particular marriage I left, it hasn’t put me off romance; it hasn’t closed my heart to possibility, to a healthy relationship, to finding a partner. Breaking up a marriage is a seismic thing, but life isn’t always what the algorithm tells you it will be when you leave.

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The launch of Rewilding, a book party that marked coming home, with many of the guests friends who were there for the very first book launch party, in London, for Straight Talking, almost thirty years ago.

My first book tour in the UK in almost a decade, seeing new faces and old, a gorgeous reminder that I am not as forgotten here as I thought I was, seeing how Rewilding is touching people, resonating with women who are finding themselves similarly lost in midlife.

Settling into life back in the neighbourhood where I grew up, where everything feels like home. I’m shuttling between two places this summer before I make a decision. One is in my ‘hood, one is in town, but may not be available for long, so I’m keeping both options open for the summer.

Having my best friend down the road, easy to lime bike to, easy to show up on her doorstep for cups of tea, and the kind of laughter that I have rarely found in friendships since. We’ve been practicing for almost forty years, somewhere along the line becoming sisters. And it shows.

Discovering a new tribe of women friends, particularly women writer friends. I adore my life in Marrakech, but it is very removed from everything to do with work. It is a perfect place to retreat, recharge, regenerate and write. But not a place where work opportunities raise their head. Every work opportunity I’ve ever had has come from someone I’ve met at a lunch, or a party, or an event, someone who has messaged me a week or two later saying, ‘hey, are you interested in…’ I have been to book parties, seen old editors, old agents, and it feels very good to be back in the game.

Harry Styles. The most glorious concert I have ever been to, with my best friends in the world, aided perhaps by some chocolate handed to me that morning by one of my new writer friends. All I will say is I felt a deep and profound love for not only Harry Styles, but all 90,000 people dancing in Wembley Stadium that night.

Watching the last of my babies graduate, this time from a British university, with all the pomp and tradition graduating from St. Andrew’s entails. Meeting his friends, their parents, seeing how he has surrounded himself with all the right people, friends who will likely be friends for life.

A car scrape in Scotland because I haven’t driven on this side of the road in twenty years, and my spatial awareness has changed. I drove too close to the left, and scraped another rental car badly, making it the most expensive graduation of all four kids. Lesson learned? Always take out full insurance when you hire a car.

A brief and intense romance, that was lovely, until it wasn’t. The last lesson from the universe in what is bad for me, what not to fall for, why it is imperative to take things slowly, to get to know each other over time rather than fall for a fantasy that is utterly intoxicating, but will always change once reality intervenes. I am also fascinated by how different people bring out different parts of us. With this man, I was not the light, fun, funny version of myself I so often am with the people I call home. There was an intensity from the start, that felt deep and real, and also, exhausting.

And now we are into July. My diary is as full as it has ever been. There are friends both old and new, parties, a forthcoming trip to Capri, and yes, dates, because I refuse to let one bad experience close this open heart. Part of me would love to be like so many of the women I meet, post-divorce, post child-rearing, who are completely disinterested in ever having another relationship. My life is wonderful, I am very happy, and, the romantic in me still believes in love, still believes that there is nothing lovelier than knowing there is one person out there in the world who absolutely has your back, as you have theirs.

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“Ah,I thought, as I lay in bed that night, feeling my body activated once again, checking my phone every few minutes to see if he had got in touch with (he hadn’t). It’s another love-bomber.

Love bombing is constant texting and calling, over-the-top compliments, big gestures that feel disproportionate to the amount of time you have known each other. It’s seductive and intoxicating, particularly when you have been on your own for a while, but it always, always leads to disappointment.

A man who love bombs is in love with the idea of love, rather than you. They’re chasing the feeling of love, the dopamine hit that comes from attraction, chemistry, possibility. They escalate quickly because it feels so good to them, but they are never emotionally mature enough, anchored enough, to sustain it.”

I walked away from this man, the suspected love-bomber, at the beginning of May, but found myself still thinking about the delight of our texts, our phone calls. On the advice of a friend, I got back in touch. I was ready for adventure, ready for a summer of love, and indeed, that’s how it felt as I found myself swept up in another whirlwind.

He booked our first date, at the Chancery Rosewood, a beautiful hotel in Grosvenor Square. This was a firm tick. I have lost count of the number of shitty wine bars and touristy hell-holes I have been to for dates - they are never the kind of places I would go to. Finally it felt that I was seen, that he understood the kind of woman he was taking out. He was cute, rather than handsome, with a lovely open energy. We had fun, and flirted, and revealed, and when I went on to the terrace for a cigarette, he leant on the railing beside me, before leaning over and kissing me.

Most of my dates try and kiss me. I always recoil, shrinking back, telling them I don’t kiss on the first date. This time, I leaned in. And it was lovely.

He sent endless texts afterwards, about how special it was, which then became more sexual than I am comfortable with. He backed down. But I was…uncomfortable. I told him so, and thought he understood.

We then moved at a clip. Many texts, daily phone calls, he couldn’t wait to see me again. It felt too fast, and also, lovely. Sex always seemed to be on his mind. I’m a fifty eight year old woman. Sex is rarely on mine. He took me to a lovely restaurant, and said he had removed himself from the dating apps, wanted to give this a go, see what this could be.

Reader, I hardly knew him.

By the time he took me to the Cotswolds, I believed it; I believed him. I hardly knew him, but it was a fantasy I was ready for, and I dived in, meeting him in his intensity, glorying in this feeling of being swept off my feet. He made grand gestures, driving two and a half hours to pick me up in Ipswich rather than letting me do the more sensible option of taking the train. He said it was because I was clearly exhausted and he wanted to look after me. I didn’t think it was love-bomb-y. It felt glorious, to have someone take care of me.

More dates. More loveliness. And then, out of nowhere, it started to get weird. He was re-evaluating what relationships meant for him, he said. He hadn’t had this sort of emotional, mental connection, it had always been purely physical, and he had to figure out what this meant. I was delighted. I thought he was on board, that this sounded sensible, because whilst intimacy is important, it has never been the driving force of my relationships. I crave mental connection, and safety, and peace, and out of that, comes intimacy. His relationships had been the other way around, and yet, he had never found peace. He spoke of finding it with me.

Reader, I hardly knew him.

But I knew I wasn’t up for the kind of sex-driven relationship he was used to.

The weirdness gave way to more loveliness, but with less intensity. Just as I was fully investing, relaxing into the fantasy, he was removing some part of himself. Still present, he was also distant. No more talk of meeting his kids, joining him at things, discussing exhibitions we would visit together.

We had a bad day, when once again he talked about re-evaluating relationships, and this time I heard rejection. I withdrew, wishing I could be alone, but we were stuck in a car in the English countryside, and there was no way to get away.

The days after the bad day were a rollercoaster. The multiple daily phone calls and fun texts disappeared, replaced by perfunctory, sporadic check-ins. They left me feeling anxious and uncertain. He finally confessed he was feeling uneven but looked forward to talking to me as it always helped.

Reader, I had become his therapist.

One last night together. Too much gin, lots of laughter, little affection. A growing awareness on my part that not only could I not put up with this inconsistency, I also couldn’t see how we would fit in one another’s lives. He is clever, curious, we have a shared love of the same books, art, culture, and yet, the way we live is very different. I suddenly understood that he would not fit in my world, and I would not fit in his.

He admitted of late that our “relationship” had felt like something of a rollercoaster, but it was mild, far more mild than he is used to in relationships, not that big a deal. I stared at him, for any kind of rollercoaster is destabilising for me. I don’t want the tiniest bit of a rollercoaster. I want calm. I could not be with someone who needs the drama or intensity of a rollercoaster to stay invested.

I stayed awake all night looking at his sleeping back, wondering what was happening, what I should do, knowing that my body did not feel right, that I couldn’t take much more of this push-pull. And, he had told me something the night before about a previous relationship ending, a thing I hadn’t known, a thing I would never have guessed, that had me questioning everything he had ever told me about himself.

Reader, I didn’t know him.

I didn’t know him at all.

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It isn’t just that I’m talking about Rewilding, a memoir, my own life, but that I am a seismically different person to the woman who last sat in front of a crowd and talked about her latest book.

I write about the persona in Rewilding. About how I inhabited the persona of a glamorous, confident bestselling author for years, that the persona felt not only safe, but essential. It was easy to hide inside that sparkly persona, and the woman who was hiding was desperate to be loved. I stepped into the spotlight, sparkling, wanting so badly to be loved. Everything was a performance, and I did it well.

Last night was the first time I have appeared in front of a crowd without the persona. It wasn’t frightening, but did feel different. Rather than amuse, tell funny stories, try and be loved, I was entirely real. I was lucky in that I had a wonderful interviewer, the novelist Caroline Corcoran. We worked on the same magazine thirty years ago - More - and her journalism background showed. She hadn’t just read Rewilding, she had put real thought into the questions, into the small nuances that struck her, that had her thinking about it for days afterwards (you would be astonished at how many interviewers, whether in real life or for a podcast, don’t read the book. They read the publicity, watch a few interviews, then ask questions that are pertinent, but a little generic).

I was as honest as I have ever been, although in truth, I’ve always been honest, it has just always gone hand-in-hand with needing to be loved, and because I didn’t think the real me was loveable, I told those truths behind the sparkling persona.

There are other unexpected delights that come from dropping the constructs and being absolutely authentic. I have had a few dates recently with someone very lovely. I don’t know what will happen, but do know that right from the get-go, our conversations felt different, marked by honesty. I was past the flings and situationships, I told him; I was holding out for the big magic. It’s a little scary to be quite so revealing, to tell the truth to a romantic prospect, but, it very quickly gets rid of the ones who are not looking for the same thing.

He did not, in fact, run. Each time I told the truth, he asked more questions, revealed more of himself, both of us adjusting to what it’s like to be completely honest. And then he sent me a picture of his Saturday morning - he was stretched out on a sofa, a copy of Rewilding on his lap, which was ever so slightly terrifying. I wondered if he might disappear after discovering everything about me, and found myself slightly anxious all day, wondering what he would think. His response came that evening, having read the entire book in a day.

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Now that I am based in Marrakech, when I do come home to London, I have been staying with friends. For the past two and a half years, I have been mostly with Julian and Xav, in their gorgeous duplex apartment in the heart of Covent Garden. Often, they are away, and I have the flat to myself, but this summer I’m not able to stay there, and given how much Blighty has been calling, I have been trying to find something a little more permanent.

Until I get the riad in Marrakech, until the riad is sold, I’m a little cash-poor, so a place of my own in London is still a little while in the future. I’ve spent hours scouring online websites for rooms to rent, peering at pictures of grotty bedrooms in pretty grotty flats, knowing I could never do it.

Even if only for a few days, I need to be in beautiful surroundings, a place that feels like home. None of them felt like home. Last week I stumbled upon a little artists’s studio, close to where I grew up, owned by a single woman who works in media, and is looking for a part-time lodger. I had a suspicion, on seeing the French doors everywhere, the skylights, rooms filled with light, that this would be a place where I could be happy. We chatted on the phone, and it seemed that we would like each other.

Yesterday I went round for a cup of tea to see if we might be a fit. As I stood on the doorstep, two fat tabby cats wound their way around my legs. If ever the universe was providing a sign, this surely was it.

The house was even lovelier than expected. Not large, but bright and sunny, with a pretty courtyard garden. We chatted over a cup of tea and pistachio almond biscuits, and both agreed that this felt like a match.

And so, from the end of June, I now have a place to lay my head when I come to London. In the meantime, I am staying with other friends, and realize that there are certain rules to being a good guest, the kind of guest that doesn’t impose, the kind of guest who is so low-maintenance as to be almost invisible.

Of course, this isn’t right for everyone, but I have a lot of people staying with me in Marrakech, and my favourite kind are the ones just like this. They do their own thing, never make a mess, and don’t expect anything of me. I hand them the keys, a list of suggestions of where to go, and, because I am in the country, on the outskirts of Marrakech, the numbers of drivers who can take them back and forth.

Being a good guest is about consideration. Recognizing that you are not in your own home, and ensuring that your presence in someone else’s house feels light, rather than heavy.

So, these are my rules for being a good guest:

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When all of it came crashing down, I would have given anything, anything, to get it back.

I had no idea who I was if I wasn’t a bestselling novelist. A failure, was the only thing I could come up with. For years I tried to claw my career back, hoping against hope that the next book would hit big again, that this time, next time, I would hit it out of the ballpark, get my career, and my confidence back.

It was the first time in my adult life I had ever operated from a place of scarcity and fear. I didn’t then understand the truism that life is where you look, that when you come from a place of scarcity and fear, you will only ever attract more scarcity and fear.

I didn’t know then that everything had to break in order to be rebuilt. That all of the constructs and roles I had hidden behind had to crumble in exactly the way they did, that being forced to feel all the pain, shame, humiliation, and loss, would be the only way to emerge from the ashes and start to construct a new life.

And, I didn’t know then that the new life was not going to be the same as the old one. The old one was driven by ego, felt validated only by success and large financial rewards - those were the metrics that told me I was good enough. Only when it was all taken away, when I set about the very hard work of learning to love the inner child, the little girl who never felt good enough, would a new path emerge.

It wouldn’t look like my old life, for the ego had been destroyed, and it is no longer about success. I may have more novels in me, but I’m not writing them, or indeed anything else, in the desperate hope that it will become a bestseller.

At my lowest, my loneliest, I started writing about my life honestly on social media, all the insecurities, the shame, the loneliness, the fear, and in doing so, unexpectedly ended up with a book deal to write a memoir about all of it.

It led to hundreds of messages from women who were reading what I was writing, the messy, painful truth of midlife, of being in a marriage where you no longer feel valued or loved, where you lose yourself entirely, no longer remember who you are, of finding the courage and the strength to break free, to architect a new life for yourself, on no-one’s terms but your own.

It led to starting to hold retreats in Marrakech, initially writing retreats, and for the first time in October, a Rewilding retreat. It led to personally reaching out to so many of the women who have messaged me, sharing my story in the hope that it may help them find themselves again, at a time when they feel, as I did, both untethered, and lost.

It led to a much smaller circle of friends. I am astonished at how many people disappeared when I started telling the truth, when I stopped being a “person to know”. Some were people I genuinely believed friends, others book influencers, fellow authors, who called themselves friends, before unfollowing me once I left Connecticut. I have come to terms with it - they were never my people in the first place, were never attracted to the woman, perhaps, but to the glittery persona.

There is a story in the memoir about an author, a big author, an author I thought a friend, who had a new book coming out. I messaged her and asked if I could get a galley, after I saw all our mutual friends reading it online, their faces glowing as they held the ARC up for the photograph, all of them excited, delighted, at getting their hands on this new, prized prize. Her response showed me just how low I had fallen:

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Not in an obsessive way, just in a way that made me feel sad I had jumped ship quite so quickly. I had presumed he wasn’t interested, had met someone else, but what if I was wrong?

I showed some of our text exchange to an old friend this past weekend and he looked at me in exasperation. “Janey! You fucked this up! You dumped the poor man when he was probably just busy.”

I frowned. “Do you think so?”

“I know so. This is all on you.”

The bestie has long been saying she doesn’t understand why I keep doing this. Matching with people, texting furiously for a bit, then effectively dumping them when they go quiet.

“You mustn’t text!” She kept saying. “Why do you do all this texting?”

“You don’t understand today’s dating culture,” I kept responding. “This is how it is today.”

We went back and forth for ages, neither of us willing to see the other’s point of view. I was convinced that she, as a long-term married, couldn’t possibly understand how the dating apps work, how you have to be super discerning, how any hint of a red flag means you have to walk away, how you get to know each other through text messaging (particularly given that I am in Marrakech and they are invariably in the UK).

She didn’t understand why we were texting in the first place, even though I tried to explain it’s how you get to know each other, decide whether or not you even want to meet.

In the midst of yet another argument about this, I asked if she had any other single female friends on the dating apps, and she did. What did they do, I asked. She thought for a second. They don’t text, they just go out and meet people for a drink or a coffee, she said.

It finally dawned on me that she was right. That I have been engaging in this texting, these phone calls, precisely because I can’t just run out and meet them. I’m trying to date them virtually without ever having met them. The entire problem is the construct. Because texting incessantly before you’ve even met someone may feel like you’re building a connection, getting to know each other, having virtual dates, but it’s all a false intimacy. Plus, chemistry is completely indefinable.

I once spent six weeks video-calling and texting with a wonderful man. Clever, curious, handsome, emotionally astute. We finally agreed to meet in Madrid for the weekend, both booking our own hotels. He came to my hotel to pick me up, and reader, the minute I walked out the door and laid eyes on him, even though I had been video-chatting with him for six weeks, I knew it was not going to happen. There was no chemistry whatsoever. Because chemistry isn’t about someone’s looks, or even personality. It’s a mysterious spark, their physicality, their smell, the way they move, the way they move through the world. And you cannot tell any of this until you are face-to-face.

But despite the disaster of Madrid (he was as lovely a man as expected, and it was still a fun weekend, albeit very weird. I did, however, get to do the Thyssen-Bornemisza AND the Prado by MYSELF, which was heaven) I hadn’t learned my lesson. I have continued to text with people throughout the last year, continued to walk away at the first sign of what I perceive to be inconsistency. Despite knowing that life is busy, people have work, and someone disappearing for a bit, particularly someone you haven’t yet met, is not a sign that you’ve been rejected, but might be a sign that someone is just…busy, I cannot deal with my own discomfort at thinking that I have been ghosted.

I finally realize that texting is terrible for me. Each time I have started texting with someone in a way that leads to something that feels like a real connection, there always comes a point where things go quiet, leading to me going straight into self-protection mode: I’m going to reject them before they reject me. Or, I form the connection, get excited, show up, and know there is no way in hell this is ever going to happen.

We all complain about the dating apps, and certainly, they have their flaws, but if you use huge discernment I’ve found it pretty easy to spot the duds. Granted, the good ones seem to be few and far between, but they are there. Despite not having had any romance in my life for about a year, I’ve had a handful of dates, and whilst none of them have been for me, all of them have been good men, men I would introduce to girlfriends.

My God, it’s hard to be vulnerable in today’s dating world. To speak the truth. To be authentic and open. The dating apps are filled with people who are non-committal, vaguely ironic, permanently half-engaged, afraid of enthusiasm, afraid of sincerity. We’re terrified that if we lay our cards on the table, we’ll scare them away, because they already feel as if they’re halfway out the door, with six other women they’re probably flirting with via text at the same time.

But the texting isn’t real. Half the time it’s someone who’s at home, bored, a little lonely, who just wants to kill some time with a bit of flirtatious banter. Which is why texting (beyond the initial, hi, do you give off the right vibe, should we meet?) is such a fool’s game.

Texting incessantly creates a false intimacy. With someone you don’t even know. It’s easy to feel attached, to create a fantasy version of this stranger, to get caught up in the delicious thrill of the dopamine hit every time a text comes in.

But it isn’t real.

And when they go quiet for a bit, it activates our nervous system, and has us filling in the blanks. He’s met someone else. He’s no longer interested. He’s ghosted me. And, in my case, my desire for self-protection was so great, I always ended it there and then.

Once I realized that I must never engage in this kind of texting again, I also realized how much I had enjoyed the phone calls with this man. Even if there is no chemistry whatsoever, I really liked what he had to say, I liked his curiosity, his creativity, his emotional intelligence. So I did the brave and the scary. I texted the man I had unceremoniously dumped a couple of weeks ago, the man I hadn’t met, but the man I had really enjoyed talking to. I texted him to say I found myself thinking of him that day, and that I really would actually love to meet him when I’m in London.

What’s the worst that could happen, I thought? Perhaps he’s met someone else. Perhaps he’s not interested. Either of those would be disappointing, but at least I would know that I had finally been honest. If he came back with a thanks but no thanks, then I would never give him a second thought again. It was time to be honest, and real.

I pressed send, and waited. And then, a few minutes later, the dots appeared…

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I am wrong.

During the summer, I go back to Hastings to stay with Sam. It’s a town that hasn’t changed much since the fifties, still filled with kiss-me-quick hats and sticks of rock, a miniature railway that chuffs around, stuffed with eager-eyed children, fish and chips on every corner.

It is a town that I have come to love, even though it is probably not where I fully belong. And yet, the newspapers say it’s the new hotspot, that tons of media people are now moving out there.

I know a bunch of media people who live in that town, all of them great, which is probably the thing that constantly has me wondering whether I ought to move there. I would get so much more for my money! A house, even, one where I could start to build memories again.

We are invited to a party at the beach. I have met a handful of people who will be at the party; when we show up, it very quickly feels as if everyone there is someone who ought to be in my life.

It is a blustery day. The sun is shining when we arrive to help set up folding chairs around a beach hut. It is September so most of the huts are shuttered up, but ours is opened up as chairs and folding tables are carried out, glasses borrowed from the hut next door, the only other one open. Musicians arrive – it turns out Hastings is filled with musicians – carrying guitars.

Everyone is in a creative field – media publishing, music – most having relocated to Hastings or St Leonards years ago, all of them loving it, none with a hint of regret at leaving London.

I catch sight of a man chatting with someone. He is attractive, my height (perhaps a tad smaller), fair-haired, with a goatee and an air of intensity. I note all this with no attachment. I am not in a place where I am looking. I have spent over a year on dating apps, with little regularity given that I have been mostly in Marrakech, and the only thing that has become clear is that it is highly unlikely I will meet anyone via an app. Frankly, I am exhausted.

I am no longer looking. Even if I am open to receiving.

I am sitting on the beachfront with two friends, glass of prosecco in hand, a couple of empty chairs next to us, when he comes over, takes the empty chair next to mine and introduces himself. We find ourselves chatting, laughing.

I think he is younger than me. Much younger.

He is fifty-six.

‘How old are you?’ He scans my face.

‘Fifty-seven.’

‘Oh fuck you!’ he laughs. I think this is a compliment.

Before long the rest of the party falls away and the two of us share our stories, start to reveal the truth, the vulnerabilities, the insecurities, the fears, the hopes.

I don’t notice anyone else at the party. We move to separate ourselves, sitting by the edge of the beach, talking, talking, talking. It is intense and a little giddying. I have not had this kind of real chat with a man to whom I am starting to think I might be attracted in months, maybe years. I had it with Juan, but I wasn’t attracted to him. As we talk, it dawns on me that I feel a connection, an attraction, even though he is not what I would ever call my type. And yet he is sensitive, thoughtful, humble and clever, so perhaps he is.

Every now and then the rest of the party call for us to come back, but neither of us are willing to leave this conversation. He has a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red Label, and we sit quietly talking, heads close together in the darkness, downing whisky, sharing cigarettes, revealing and revealing.

We skip small talk. I am not used to talking to single men I meet at parties at this age and stage of life. When younger I knew how to flirt, but this is not flirting. But there is, for me at least, a growing . . . something. I feel seen and heard.

The topics get deeper, more real, more private. I find myself telling him things I do not tell people.

Perhaps he is doing the same – it certainly feels that way.

I am not thinking about sex. I am not wondering if he is the sort of man I could be with. Maybe . . . maybe . . . I am wondering what it would be like to kiss him. But that comes later, as we drain the bottle of whisky.

We are called back to the party. Someone picks up a guitar and plays, with everyone standing around singing, and we join them. I so like every single person I meet, but all I want to do is keep talking to this man.

The wind picks up. It is late and the party is packing up.

‘Do you want to go somewhere and keep talking?’ I ask, by now quite drunk. I hate whisky, particularly lukewarm whisky with no ice and no mixers, but I have somehow managed to polish off a significant amount of it, and I am less inhibited, and possibly . . . possibly . . . more flirty.

He shakes his head. ‘I’m staying with friends. You’re staying with friends. It’s too . . . complicated.’

‘I’m glad someone’s being the grown-up,’ I say, but that isn’t true. I don’t want to jump into bed with him. I just want to keep talking.

‘Can I give you my number?’ I ask confidently, assuming he will want it, assuming he feels the same connection, not really thinking about the fact that he is a man, is single and has declined the opportunity to keep talking. Or start kissing. Or whatever else might have happened had we continued to sit together on the beach.

We exchange numbers and I text myself from his phone: ‘I loved meeting you tonight.’ Perhaps I am attempting to lay the groundwork for . . . more.

He texts me an hour later: ‘I loved meeting you . . . it felt like a special evening . . . it was great to skip the small talk.’

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But, when you write a book, any book, you’re writing in a solitary vacuum, and none of it quite feels real. With memoir, or certainly with a memoir like this, you reveal your most hidden truths, hold all that shame up to the light, thinking that you’re not only healing yourself, but maybe, maybe, if you’re very lucky, you’ll help other women who are on the same journey.

I don’t have a huge amount of publishing weight behind me. My career took a dive some years ago, and despite being seen as a bestselling author, the truth is that these days my deals are small - my time as a career novelist appears to be long gone. I fought for years to get it back, sank into an enormous depression, felt like an abject failure, before understanding that perhaps I wasn’t supposed to get it back; perhaps there are other routes - memoir, retreats, columns, essays - that fulfil me in different ways, and that I don’t need to earn fortunes anymore - I am no longer supporting two adults and six children - I need just enough to get by.

So, there aren’t vast amounts of money being poured into publicity and marketing ensuring coverage, ensuring the book falls into the hands of the most powerful influencers. I have a small team, who are great, and, am mostly relying on my own contacts, my own hard work, and the book itself. I’m hoping against hope that this little memoir may be one of those grass roots successes, hoping that there will be women who read it, and love it, and tell all their friends, that it might somehow capture the zeitgeist and end up doing well.

But now, just under two weeks before publication, I am finding myself completely overwhelmed, and terrified. Partly because my publishers phoned a few weeks ago with amazing news - the Daily Mail had bought the serialisation rights. I’m already the columnist Dear Jane for the Daily Mail, but this wasn’t about Dear Jane. This was an editor who had been sent the book, who loved it, who thought the readers might like it too.

Yesterday I was sent the excerpts from the book that they are running, and I spent all of yesterday evening trying to deal with a wave of anxiety that left me, at times, struggling to breathe.

Of course they have done what I would doubtless do in their shoes. Picked out all the most salacious bits, chosen the parts that are about the hardest parts of my marriage (even though, if I’m honest, the truly hardest parts of my marriage were - deliberately - kept off the page).

Excerpt one is about my marriage. The second excerpt deals with the secret shame I have carried all my life, the thing I had never told anyone, the one secret that I planned to take to my grave: the suspicion that I was also, sometimes, attracted to women.

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Because I loved my husband, because I am aware that I have a platform that he does not, because his story is not my story to tell, I tried to keep the focus on me, I chose to keep much off the page, assuming that people would read between the lines, would understand that at its bare bones, no woman in her mid-fifties leaves a marriage where she feels valued, seen, and loved.

Last weekend I flew to Annapolis for my son’s graduation. It was both glorious - three of my four children were there - and exhausting. Not least because I flew from Marrakech on a Friday night, and flew home on the Sunday night redeye. I discovered I am much too old to make that kind of trip these days. Plus, both ex-husbands were there. I was looking forward to seeing my (most recent) ex. He looked wonderful, and initially, I was thrilled to see him.

I took everyone out for lunch, and as we were sitting at the bar, he leaned forward. “Wow,” he said. “Your skin!”

I’m very lazy when it comes to beauty products and looking after my skin. I’ve long been a soap and water girl, using any old moisturiser I can find. I don’t have facials, unless I’ve been given a face mask, where I’ll do the occasional home spa treatment. But in my late fifties, I’ve decided to take my skin more seriously. I now have swanky lotions and potions, and regularly use a red light mask. I also discovered Dior Forever Glow, and whenever I wear it people tell me how good my skin looks.

“Thanks,” I said. “I think it’s this Dior glow stuff I use.”

He paused and smiled lightly. “You look like you’ve been embalmed.”

I felt a slight shiver of shock on the inside. On the outside, I laughed, which is what I have been trained to do when someone delivers an insult disguised as a compliment. Particularly this someone. I believe it’s what the kids call “negging” - a backhanded compliment, a subtle insult disguised as humour, a deliberate way to undermine your self-confidence.

And then his voice dropped, dripping with concern. “Are you okay?” He asked.

“I’m great,” I said.

“No, I mean, is your health okay?”

I stared at him, not knowing what he was talking about, where he was going, but also on slightly high-alert, given that he had just told me I looked embalmed.

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There is a chapter in Rewilding called The Love Bomber. Last summer I matched with a tall, handsome Dutch man. He was a lawyer in Amsterdam, and immediately offered to fly over to Marrakech that weekend to meet me. This was such unusual behaviour, so refreshing, I welcomed it, delighted at the lack of game-playing, at the enthusiasm, at someone not just talking the talk, but flying the walk.

What followed were a few weeks of what felt much like falling in love, even though it was all a little fast. (I was “the one”, he could see us building a retreat together, I was the woman he had been waiting for), that was initially unnerving, but also, completely seductive. It had been so long since I felt valued, or loved. Not that this was love - even I knew that would have been ridiculous - but he made me feel beautiful, desirable, seen.

We had an idyllic few days in Marrakech when he came, filled with scenarios and scenes that could have come right out of a movie. We walked the Medina hand-in-hand, had long, lazy lunches at Berber Lodge, as I felt my entire body exhale. He paid for everything, which might not be a big deal for some, but as a woman who single-handedly supported her family for twenty five years, it felt like a gift. It felt like being taken care of. I started to relax, to think that this was the real thing.

What if the Hollywood love stories were right? What if, finally, this was my turn? What if I had finally found my person.

He flew back to Amsterdam, and I woke every morning to “Good morning, Beautiful.” I didn’t know then that this was a red flag. I didn’t know then what I know now, that anyone who calls you “Beautiful”, or “Sexy”, isn’t complimenting you, but rather, objectifying you. That it assumes too much intimacy with someone who doesn’t yet know you well enough to say that, not to mention how generic it is. It skips over the specifics, your personality, the conversations you’ve shared.

He phoned, or video-called most days. Those calls felt ridiculously romantic. He was communicative, and consistent, and I basked in the glow of all of it.

He flew back to Marrakech for my birthday, but this time, something felt…off. The organizing of my party was stressful, and tiring, and I had other friends staying. It was no longer a romantic fantasy, but the nuts and bolts of life. He was not the centre of attention, and I felt a slight distance, but presumed it was just the party, having other friends around, that we would get back to our regular programming soon, that this was just a blip.

Except it wasn’t. Those few weeks of joy gave way to what is popularly known as the “discard”. He flew back to the Netherlands after my birthday, and dumped me by text, the day after getting back in touch to say he had made a terrible mistake.

It was behaviour I had never encountered before. The push-pull, the hot-cold. I gave him another chance, thinking that communicating openly would right the ship, but it did not. Suddenly he was blowing cold where he once blew hot, making plans, cancelling them, responding with one-line texts, not calling when he said he would, disappearing for 24 hours.

I put up with it for two weeks, desperate to get back to how it had been, before finally realizing I had to listen to my body, which was on high alert, permanently activated. The crunch came when he said he was at a sailing regatta, hence his disappearing. And then, a picture landed in my inbox, a picture that made my blood run cold.

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A few months ago I received an intriguing invitation from one of my friends. A four day rave that was happening in Marrakech, moving from the desert to the Palmeraie, with breath work, workshops, and DJ’s flying in from all over the world to keep everyone dancing all night.

There is nothing I love more in the world than dancing, and - shocker - despite never having been to Ibiza, my friend lives there for part of the time, and tons of her friends were going to be there. It was too good an opportunity to pass up.

After I bought a ticket, I received mood boards for the dress code, each night with a different theme. The first night suggested earth tones, desert sands, flowing caftans in cotton and linens, beads, everything natural and organic. Night two suggested colour, glitter, sequins and sparkles, night three sun-kissed.

I take a mood board very seriously. As a natural rule-follower, send me a mood board and I will do my damnedest to replicate the look exactly. I will happily spend hours shopping, whether online or in the Medina, to come up with the perfect outfit to do the mood board proud.

As it was with these mood boards. I bought a beautiful sand-coloured caftan, edged with cream Berber-style patterns. I paired it with flat sandals, my usual long beads, and a beautiful gold and mesh woven necklace that I bought two weeks ago, and might be the ultimate statement necklace.

For colour and glitter, I bought hot pink and gold embroidered sari fabric, and had it made into flared trousers. A feathered top, and a silk jacket with bell sleeves and a tied waist.

All of my energy and thought went into the preparation of the costume, but when the first night arrived, as I drove my little souped-up Fiat 500 to the desert for the party, feeling excellent in my new caftan, I felt a little uneasy.

Perhaps because I have been running on all four cylinders, perhaps because I’m tired, perhaps because I would only know one person there, I started to wonder if I was in the right mood for a desert rave.

I will be fine, I told myself. I couldn’t wait to see my friend - it has been a year since we last saw each other - and this would be great. It will definitely be great, I told myself. I’ve got this.

The first hour or so was indeed lovely. I reached the bedroom of the desert camp, which I was sharing with two women, and we caught up, before sitting on the patio, chatting with friendly passers-by, who had flown in from all over the world.

A couple of hours later we made our way through the desert to the main event, a giant tent, lanterns and candles everywhere, and three hundred people bedazzled in sequins, feathers, sparkles, saris, most in chunky desert boots, often with elaborate headwear.

Oh my God, I thought to myself. This is Burning Man, brought to Morocco.

I have never been to Burning Man. Nor am I a festival-goer. I love dancing, and music, and partying, but outdoor loos and lack of comfort are not my jam. And truth be told, as the evening wore on, it was clear to me that I was not in the right head space for this at all, and these were possibly not my people. And when I say “possibly”, you know what I mean…

I found conversation, connection, hard. I ended up sitting on a kilim ottoman by myself, surrounded by flickering lanterns, people-watching. It was fun for about an hour, but suddenly I realized that all my energy had gone, as often happens when we are not in the right place, nor with the right people. The only place I wanted to be, was home.

I found myself doing what I have always done, pretending to be fine, to be having a good time. The old me would indeed have toughed it out. I wouldn’t have wanted to let my friend down - she had, after all, flown in from Goa for this event. The people-pleaser in me would have plastered a false smile on my face and endured.

So many women of my generation were raised to put other people’s needs before our own. Perhaps we learned to tiptoe on eggshells around difficult parents, perhaps we learned that in order to be seen as a ‘good girl’, we had to be agreeable, accommodating, stay quiet.

If we learned that disagreeing or saying no might lead to disapproval, tension or anger, we learned to keep quiet, to acquiesce, to push our own wants and needs down in order to keep the peace.

What we don’t realize is that every time we keep quiet, say yes instead of no, we are programming ourselves to do that our whole lives, to do that in friendships, in relationships, in marriages; suppress our wants and needs in order to keep the peace.

We endure. We endure not realizing that every time we give up the fight, or keep quiet instead of holding firm to our needs being met, resentment builds, together with loss of identity, and ultimately burnout.

We start to change when we learn to look after ourselves, when we stop caring how fulfilling our needs impacts other people. We start to change when we stop caring what other people think of us. We change when we get comfortable with the discomfort of saying no, when we realize that real kindness starts with being kind to ourselves, which means honesty, and setting boundaries.

I was desperate to leave, but worried I would upset my friend. I could have gone back to our room, tried to sleep, knowing that I would probably be woken up multiple times by people making their way back to their own rooms at various points throughout the night. Could I manage that? Find a way to keep everyone happy?

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He was creative, clever, clearly eccentric, and slightly ridiculous, like a throwback to another time. Sid James but taller, with better hair. The sort of man who thinks it fine to pinch your bottom as you walk up the stairs (he did, on the way out. I was a little startled, but did not take huge offence as my bottom long ago slid down my legs and disappeared. There is - sadly - no bottom left to pinch, merely skin and bone). He was also enormous fun, with no emotional depth whatsoever, and had a tendency to diminish anything I said that might have been construed as emotionally resonant. It was all jokes, and banter. Fun, but I looked at him wondering how we would ever have a real conversation.

I had two drinks. He had none. Towards the end of the evening he took my hand and stroked it, and I watched him do it, thinking how much I have missed being touched, the feeling of skin on skin. When we left, he ran into M&S to buy food for breakfast, then told me to pay for it. Which I did.

Oh yes. I know. Red flags galore.

We said goodbye outside M&S, as he went in for a snog, despite me telling him not to. It was very clear to me that he is the sort of man who always goes in for a snog on a first date. Call me a prude, but there’s nothing I like less than seeing middle-aged people standing on a street corner locked into a passionate kiss. No PDA’s for me. There was no snog, only an attempt.

The red flags were flying, and still, he was kind of sexy, and I found myself smiling as I walked home. He exuded a certain kind of confident masculinity, and my thoughts returned to him a few times the next day, wondering what if? But no. There would be no what if. This is not the sort of man I would want to be with. It might be the sort of man I would jump into bed with for a fling, if I were the sort of women who needed that in my life right now, but honestly, at this stage of the game intimacy without an emotional connection feels deeply unsatisfying and empty. I would rather do without, and I decided I would not be seeing him again.

A man like that would swallow me whole, and not in a good way. I could feel myself shrinking when I was with him, dancing on eggshells, muting myself to make room for his huge energy. A man like that wouldn’t fit into my life in any way, shape or form. My friends would be horrified. I was slightly horrified.

Sexy, though. Just not for me.

My girlfriends disagreed. They have been married for decades, have no idea what it is to be single today, how the dating apps work, how men behave on these dating apps; they have no idea how necessary it is to be both intentional, and discerning. They think finding someone slightly sexy is reason enough to give them another chance.

I tried explaining why I wouldn’t be giving him another chance, but they protested. Just text him, they said. Try it. What’s the worst that could happen? You have way too many rules and regulations, Janey. Relax. Try someone different.

Against my better judgment, I texted him. He responded with a chatty, funny message. He called me Fruitcake, then Toots, which I found amusing.

And then, out of nowhere, he sent me this picture:

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Years ago, when I used to do book events regularly, people always used to tell me, after the reading, that I should narrate my own novels.

When I asked my publisher, they scoffed. “Every author wants to read their own novels and they are always terrible,” they said. “No.”

“I don’t know that I would be terrible,” I pushed back. “May I, at least, audition?”

Reluctantly they agreed, and, much to everyone’s surprise, I got the job! I narrated the next nine novels, many of them with my terrible American accent, but I loved it. The new publisher refused, wouldn’t even let me audition, so I turned the novels over to professional narrators, but now that Rewilding, my memoir, is coming out, I was back to reading again.

Last week I flew to London and spent three days in a tiny recording studio, reading the memoir, which was a completely different experience to reading novels.

Because reading something, whether fiction or non-fiction, is never about “acting”, it’s about becoming, and in the case of reading a memoir, it’s about placing yourself back in every scene, reliving it, feeling every emotion you were going through at the time.

It was exhilarating - I am so bloody proud of this book, of the journey I’ve been on, and of how I’ve captured all of it - and exhausting. Emotionally, I felt so drained after the first day, I could barely move. I stumbled up the stairs, wanting nothing other than to crawl into bed and collapse for days.

But I couldn’t collapse. I went to see my friend Doon in Summerfolk at the National (which was wonderful), had drinks with a crowd of people afterwards, and didn’t manage to crawl into bed until midnight.

The next day was easier, and day three, easier still. The beginning of the memoir captures the end of my marriage, and reliving those painful times was brutally hard, but reading my own journey out loud gave way to the joy of finding myself in Marrakech, the adventures I had, the life lessons I learned. Some of it filled with grief, much of it filled with joy. I relived the wild fling with Horrible Hugo, the lessons learned with the Love Bomber, the explorations into things I had always wanted to try, but never had…

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For years and years people have been telling me I ought to write a memoir. “Me?” I’d say. “But I’ve got nothing to say.”

Also, it slightly terrified me. How would the people around me react, what would I talk about, how would I write about my childhood, because of course I didn’t fully understand what a memoir is. When I heard the word “memoir”, I thought, autobiography, which is the full, chronological story of a life. Who the hell was I to even think about writing a memoir?

Except of course, it turns out a memoir isn’t a full life. Rather, it’s selective, thematic, often with a strong, emotional bent. It tells the story of a part of life, not necessarily chronologically, filled with emotional truth.

To be fair, back in the day when people kept telling me to write a memoir, I didn’t have an awful lot to talk about. That’s the problem with being happy and settled - it just doesn’t give enough material.

But when things grow hard, when you are forced to regroup, to transform your life, that’s when inspiration and creativity are at their most fertile.

Years ago, when I wrote my first novel, Straight Talking, I was furious. In my late twenties, I was fed up with dating terrible men, fed up with being dumped, with having my heart broken over and over. I poured all of that angst, and sadness, and anger into Straight Talking, and continued for a while, writing about relationships and all the pain they can bring.

And then, for a while, life eased. I grew content, and happy. My writing shifted from being sharp and edgy, to being a little…mumsy, perhaps? A little dull. A little not very much is happening here. Which doesn’t necessarily matter for all novelists, but when you are a novelist who draws from the themes in her life, inspiration was definitely a bit thin on the ground.

There were moments when it came back, and honestly, it shows in the writing. When I showed up to a Librarian Association event, speaking on a panel of five, and found myself intrigued by a young, handsome author who was also on the panel, who started emailing me immediately, the affair I didn’t have led to the novel Tempting Fate. It was about how you can be happily married (although truth be told, in hindsight I was very not happily married at the time), how all marriages become pots and pans after a while, and should someone come along (in this case a young, handsome author) who pays you attention, makes you feel beautiful, makes you feel desirable, at a time in your life when you feel completely invisible, it’s very easy to become addicted to the dopamine hit. Of course you’re not the sort of woman who would have an affair, but you just want one more text, one more flirtatious email, just to feel alive, often for the first time in years. Of course, in the book, it didn’t stop with the almost-affair, but descended into a one-off mistake, which had huge repercussions on every part of my character’s life.

Back to memoir, which prioritises meaning and reflection during a specific slice of life. It’s not a map of your life, it’s the story of a transformation, usually during, or after, a difficult time.

And now that memoir, Rewilding, is coming out June 4th (the links to pre-order the US copy of the book should be up within the next couple of weeks), and it is simultaneously the most exciting book I have ever written, and the most terrifying.

I am now committed to telling the truth. For years I felt I had been spinning both plates, and stories, creating an Instagram-perfect version of a life which was actually crumbling behind the scenes. I knew what people thought of my life, how sparkling and successful I appeared to be, but I knew the truth. And I was completely terrified that anyone might also discover that truth.

Until I started writing. I understood that the only way to freedom is to hold all the shame that holds us back, that cripples us, to the light, for shame cannot survive in sunlight, it only thrives in darkness and secrecy.

But, I also knew that just as I have my story to tell, I also have people to protect. There is a very delicate balance between telling enough of the truth, whilst also protecting the people who are part of your story.

My first draft was filled with anger. I wanted to spell it all out, spill it all out, let everyone know the precise awfulness and pain of what was.

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It’s beyond boring. I’m beyond excited. It’s beyond irritating.

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A lot of my food-related pieces these days seem to start with Annie, which is not surprising given that we have been giving each other a daily run down on what we have eaten, what we are going to eat, what we want to actually be eating, for almost forty years.

Once upon a time Annie and I shared a flat, a terrible flat, in Maida Vale. It had the ugliest swirly carpets you’ve ever seen, even in the kitchen and bathrooms. Our time living together was the only time we never talked about food. She had a boyfriend, and seemed to be always out, and for a while, despite ostensibly living under the same roof, we went from being best friends to ships that pass in the night.

Now that I am back on the same time zone, now that she is an empty-nester, we speak every day, occasionally multiple times. Sometimes (usually), we have nothing to talk about, and there are times when we both set up our computers as we potter around, cleaning the kitchen, or getting dressed, blurting out whatever’s on our minds.

Sometimes (occasionally) we veer off into madcap schemes, which this week, is our joint decision to learn Harry Styles’s dance routine from The Brits. Annie is doing far better than me. It turns out I have terrible co-ordination, and just can’t seem to grasp it.

Last week Annie was off to work, and as we were face-timing, as she opened up her fridge, not knowing what she should bring for lunch, considering making a quick sandwich, but not feeling very inspired, I was struck with a thought.

“You should make egg bites!” I said. “They’re perfect. You can make a batch and grab a couple to take to work.”

“Egg bites?” Said she. “What is this thing called egg bites?”

I think they originated at Starbucks, although I am not a big Starbucks girl - I have found neither their coffee, nor their food terribly appealing, but somehow I know all about the egg bites. Some years ago neighbours bought a sous vide machine, and suddenly they were making egg bites all the time, inviting us round to try them.

“High protein snacks, super-healthy if you fill them with veggies. You can make them with egg whites or whole eggs, and stick them in the freezer so just defrost when you. need.”

The other thing you ought to know, is that Annie is a terrible cook. She doesn’t cook, although over the years she has developed a small repertoire of things that work for the kids, and now, the husband. Once upon a time I borrowed her house to cook lunch for Hugh Grant. When I arrived, laden down with Waitrose shopping bags, I realized that she had no cooking equipment whatsoever. Not even a knife. If memory serves, her oven was being used to store excess cashmere jumpers. I covered the bicycle pump I found in the coat closet with clingfilm, and used it to roll out the pastry, then ran next door to the Portobello Hotel and begged for knives, pots and pans.

(As you can see, Hugh was happy, nonetheless).

I am determined to improve Annie’s cooking skills, so I sent her a recipe, and this week, after Annie has pronounced the egg bite life-changing, I made a batch myself. The real key to a successful egg bite (if you do not have a sous-vide, which I do not) is to cook them in a bain-marie. Fill a roasting tin with boiling water, and set the muffin tin (you need a muffin tin) into the water to cook. This makes the egg bite creamy, rather than rubbery.

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It has been a while since I’ve had a book out - three years in the US, almost ten years in the UK, and I am completely thrilled to announce that my first memoir, Rewilding, is coming out on June 4th, and is available to pre-order now.

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