Maggie O’Farrell

And they said, yes, we can't have a gravestone because we don't know where he is.

But there are now two rowan trees and two plaques, one for Hamnet and one for Judith in the churchyard.

And that was really important to me to make a marker, a real marker of those two people.

It really was.

And the vicar of Holy Trinity gave a whole dedication and gave a whole kind of service for Hamlet and Judith.

It was incredible.

I mean, I was tearing up.

And so many people turned up and apparently now tour groups take them people there and

Yeah, so it's fabulous.

And I've got the brilliant Annie who runs the literary festival that occasionally sends me photographs and the trees are growing and they're thriving and they bring out beautiful berries.

Jodas are pink and hamlets are red.

I think it comes... I'm not much of a planner in writing or in life, actually.

I don't know if that shocks you, Fern, but I do know that there are writers out there who will plan everything meticulously, chapter by chapter, before they even start to write the book.

But I don't do that.

I tend to kind of dive in and just write a scene here and a scene there and see how it feels.

I always feel that

I leave that kind of decision about style and grammar and voice up to what I think Rudyard Kipling called the other side of his head.

I think the story will tell you what it needs.

And there have been times when I've been writing a book and it's in kind of, I don't know, the first person.

It's, you know, I said or I sat.