RT @RachelGenn: ✨ A fittingly unique insight into a scintillating life and mind. Go Jay-Bay🐈🐤.

I should explain the choice of title. Spark was once asked whether she hated her characters. This is a reasonable thing to assume; terrible things happen to many of them. But Spark disagreed: “Oh no, I love them most intensely", she replied, “like a cat loves a bird. "

What do you want to know?.

Anyway, here are two photos that sum the whole thing up. My favourite is the one where you can see me working through some of the worst book titles the world has ever known, before finding what l'd been looking for.

I was probably doing something quite similar - some mornings I'd retrieve something worthwhile, and on others I'd end up finding an empty tube of Pringles and wonder if I was wasting my time. This is a grubby analogy, but writing can feel grubby - we should talk about this more!.

I wrote this book while working two jobs. While finishing the first draft, l'd set my alarm for 4am and plonk myself at the kitchen table. I'd listen to the same album on repeat (Treasure by Cocteau Twins, which I've now ruined for myself), and watch foxes going through the bins.

This book is about restlessness, I think. As a person and as a writer, Spark was fidgety. Time and again, she responded to periods of crisis and creative stagnancy by gathering her life into a new shape and beginning again. It's that lifelong slipperiness l've tried to capture.

I loved writing this. It was also terrifying. Spark was a genius, and I am someone who once became very ill after thinking a piece of potpourri was a biscuit. She and I are not the same, and writing about her life and work kept me on my toes.

Here's a pic of me looking sleep-deprived as I clutch a very early copy of my book, LIKE A CAT LOVES A BIRD: THE NINE LIVES OF MURIEL SPARK. It’s not out until April, but a few of these bind-ups are making their way through the world, and I wanted one as a memento. It’s written!

Mrs Merton, on learning that Joanna Lumley’s husband is a conductor: “How interesting. Which bus?”.

Mrs Merton to Boy George: “What makes you happy? Bearing in mind decent folk are watching”.

I miss Caroline Aherne - watching an old episode of The Mrs Merton Show, and she’s just asked whether “we should save the environment, or can we live without it?”.

RT @juxtaposedwitu: That don't impress me much

RT @SarahjevsEvans: When I showed Walter Kevin Evans his portrait 😅😆💖

RT @MichaelRosenYes: Goodbye Allan. You were a pioneer of great children's literature, both in picture books and poetry. You were clever, f….

Very embarrassing that it’s taken me over a week to come up with this, but… Border-LNER? Is this anything?.

Greetings from Pascal the Puppy

RT @melostrom: New vase in pink shadow and sour apple. Loving this combination. #pottery🌸

Also, it pains me that Pulp never covered this song, ‘Acrylic Afternoons’-style. I can just imagine Jarvis ad-libbing about wanting something from the trolley.

I like how, when Madonna delivers the line “I wanna make love on a train…” in 'Justify My Love', she adds “…cross-country”. Lest anyone suspect that her lover could only last the length of the 0.8-mile trip from Stourbridge Town to Stourbridge Junction.

RT @RachelGenn: Spotted in the wilds of @WaterstonesPicc @andothertweets (thanks @james_j_bailey 🍩 🍩 🍩).If it's seething Greek heat, sweat….