'A Truly Madly Deeply for the twenty first century' Christina Hopkinson

'A funny, incredibly touching and beautifully written story' Jenny Colgan 

'Funny, smart, incredibly moving. A glorious emotional rollercoaster of a read’  Tasmina Perry

'Bittersweet, earthy and poignant'  Jojo Moyes

'Funny and smart but never insubstantial...A terrific read'  Elizabeth Buchan 

You can pre-order it from Amazon now. Thanks, Polly xx

The golden leaves and sunshine in London. Like being in New England this autumn. Much more beautiful than the summer. 

Dancing to Dolly Parton at 2am. The less said about this the better. 

Ile de Re in France. A dreamy combination of dunes and amazing food and bicycles. Thinking of it now more than ever because it's getting cold. 

Opaque tights, preferably in black or plum, preferably by Falke.

Primelocation.com The ultimate writing displacement activity. I reckon it’s stolen at least one novel from me. Do you know what you can get in deepest dreamiest Somerset for the price of a crappy London terrace? I’ve renamed it pollylocation.com

My Ally Cappellino satchel. Been strapped over my body for an age! No other handbag comes close. Plus, when the clasp broke, they mended it and put on a dangly leather ‘Polly’ tab on the side. Still going strong. 

Borough Market on a Thursday morning. One of my favourite trips with my eight year old, during the school holidays. We stall hop and stuff ourselves silly. Love that bit of London too. More London than anywhere else. http://www.boroughmarket.org.uk/

Nigella’s ham cooked in Coke. So, so good. Made it many times and it’s always worked brilliantly. http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/ham-in-coca-cola-2473

Adding sliced stem ginger to my rhubarb crumble. (In the rhubarb bit.) Amazing. Try it. You need to add a bit of plain flour in the rhubarb too, stops it going too juicy.

Ugg Boots, sorry, but it's that time of year again. I can't write with cold feet. 

Hennes online. Cheap and cheerful, now delivered to my door. 

Mary Oliver's poetry. A wonderful American poet who changes the way you see things. 

Frieze art fair in Regents Park. A whole tent of fun, madness and fantastic for people watching. The best dressed crowd in London here. Some of the art is quite good too. 

The Playdate by Louise Miller - a what-if page turning pyschological thriller, due to be published next year. I've got a sneaky preview copy. 

Best bits of the festival - Kate Winslet reading Mr Gum, Andy Weatherall banging out tunes at Caught by The River, Louis Eliot and the Embers, Caitlin Moran, pancakes, Tom Hodgkinson singing Anarchy in the UK in Idler tent, churros...

Worst bits of fest - moving a tent in the rain at midnight, earwigs, midges, the impossibility of finding coffee without a queue, the cost of the coffee, no sleep. 

http://www.qpark.org.uk/bookfestival/

This was fantastic. Highlights for me included discussing house prices with Sebastian Faulks - yes, really - in the hospitality tent. Makes me laugh to think that we're ALL at it, irrespective  of whether one's written Birdsong, meeting Robert Webb - big crush - and listening to him talk about comedy with the Peep Show crew, Sam Bain and Robert Popper. New thriller writer Ali Knight gave a chilling reading. Geraint Anderson, aka Cityboy, made us laugh. While myself, Tasmina Perry, Christina Hopkinson and Amy Jenkins chewed the fat about women's fiction and the zeitgeist. Had to be said, I felt rough as you like but being rather stagey and 'show must go on' about it all carried on anyway, only to be hospitalised shortly afterwards with acute appendicitis. The glamour. 

My four year old son Jago has a potentially life-threatening nut allergy – he can’t eat egg either - so The Anaphylaxis Campaign is a charity close to my heart. It’s a lifeline for families like us, for whom daily life carries real threat.

We’re not alone – one in fifty kids in this country now have a peanut allergy and there’s been a huge surge of cases of all kinds of severe food allergies in the younger generation.

This picture shows  my husband and my son Oscar - the pictured prem baby grown up! - after the London Marathon which Ben ran to raise funds. Oh yes, he'd like you to know he did it in three hours twenty eight minutes. Move over Mutai! 

http://www.justgiving.com/Ben-ChaseYou can sponsor Ben and donate to the charity here. Every little helps! 

And you can read the article I wrote about allergies, for You mag, Mail on Sunday, here. http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/home/you/article-1388061/Polly-Williams-talks-sons-potentially-life-threatening-allergy.html

How To Cook For Allergies by Lucinda Bruce-Gardyne is a brilliant standby in my kitchen. (You can get it on Amazon.)

I’m always looking for good kids’ fiction that addresses the allergy issue in a funny, wise way. Haven’t yet discovered any. If you do, let me know!

http://www.anaphylaxis.org.uk/

Isn't the world just too full of displacement activities? I have noticed that the more I Tweet the less I write. The less I write the more I shop online. The more I shop online the more journalism I have to write to pay for the rubbish I buy. It's a flickering downward spiral of words, Adobe Flash and neon yellow shoes. (Hated neon yellow all my life, now, oddly, love it. Why is that?)

I will also blame the unfinished book on the fact that I've been helping pull together the debut Queen's Park literary festival - Sat June 11, in the park. Put it in your diaries. I'll be there. More enticingly so will Sebastian Faulks, Tasmina Perry, Christina Hopkinson, Geraint Anderson, the brilliant Peep Show writers and many others.

Ooo. Shall I Tweet that?

Moving on, the paperback launch of my new book It Happened One Summer is slated for the 26th May, which is very exciting. Set in Cornwall during one long sexy summer, I hope it offers you a good few hours of page turning pleasure. It's probably my most sweeping novel to date. It's meant to immerse you like an Atlantic breaker. Oh yes.

That's the best bit about books isn't it? Total immersion from all the other stuff going on in the world right now. (Have just finished reading the brilliantly chilling Room by Emma Donaghue, like everyone else, and am still to come to the surface.)

Other good news - the days are getting longer again! Raise a glass to that!

Polly xxx

I hope you had a fabulous Christmas and new year. It's all back to work here now, along with a houseful of sick children, boiler on the blink, tax returns and all those other things that life throws at you the moment you try to knuckle down to write. But having made a resolution not to make any new year's resolutions - watch alcohol units, run more, write faster, spend less, being old favourites - I'm feeling quite chipper. There are no high expectations to dash, no diets to dread. Recommend it.

And the hardback of my new book, It Happened One Summer, is out this month, which I really hope you'll enjoy. (Paperback out May 12.) It's a tangled sexy love story set in Cornwall, a sunny shot of summer in these dark months. Do let me know what you think. I love to hear from you.

Best wishes,

Polly

Hope you're enjoying the icy mornings and the chance to snuggle under the duvet with a good book. So nice to sink into a 12 tog London winter, don't you think? No more bare legs to worry about! No more bikinis, and Christmas around the corner with all its eating and drinking opportunities! The legacy of which can be hidden under layers of wooly things. Win win.

I'm also well into my sixth book - never imagined I'd write that - and hugely enjoying it. Headline, my publisher, are putting final touches to the cover of It Happened One Summer (which happens in April 2011) and as soon as it's done I'll stick it up on the site.

My brood - now aged 7, 3, and almost 2 - are still the most enticing distractions from writing and get bigger, louder and more opinionated by the week.

Other distraction? Jonathan Franzen's brilliant new novel, Freedom. You can hear me guffawing from space.

Best wishes,

Polly xx