Back pressed against radiators

If you were looking for the younger me, you’d find me leaning against the nearest radiator, knees up, my face in a book. You’d need to take hold of my shoulder and shake me, to snap me out of it. Being lost in a story, and the itchy heat between my shoulder blades in a draughty house were intoxicating.

My early life was lived in story snippets; face down in the long grass, breathing in the earth and creating small life stories in the yew bush (The Castle of Yew, Lucy M Boston); up a tree, in the woods, surviving bravely for an afternoon (Brendon Chase, BB); scribbling in a notebook then discovered, explaining my own poisonous scribbles to my Mum, tears streaming down my face (Harriet the Spy, Louise Fitzhugh).

The books that mattered were those which conjured up hidden worlds (The Borrowers, Mary Norton); suggested I could do anything (The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar, Roald Dahl) or left me tearful during the final chapter, at the thought of no longer being with the characters (Brother of the More Famous Jack, Barbara Trapido).