David Lynch
Ideas are like fish. If you want to catch little fish, you can stay in the shallow water. If you want to catch the big fish, you’ve got to go deeper.
Indie Author Lab, London
Key Takeaways from Jo Penn’s talk at the Indie Author Lab, London.
Jo Penn at the Indie Author Lab, London
I have no good reason to go to literary events, except that I just love them!
I love meeting other writers and buying their books. I love learning about emerging technologies and literary trends… And I love listening to how the most profitable writers run their business.
Joanna Penn is one of my favourites. I’ve never read her fiction books, but her podcast is super interesting. Here are some key takeaways from her talk this week:
1. What do you really, actually want [from your writing]?
2. What do you need to do to get that?
3. What are you doing instead?
4. Stop doing that!
In other words, (talking to myself here), are you SURE you want to run an author business? Because if so, you’ll need to do a million things you don’t really want to do. Namely, build an email list, grow social media, implement a marketing and promotions strategy and on and on and on until the end of time.
Or, you could just write books for the love of it. Because it’s fun.
xo, L
Books Read in February
Books I read in February 2026
The Names by Florence Knapp
The book opens in 1987 as a woman is choosing a name for her newborn son. She wants to call him Julian. Her daughter wants to call him Bear. Her abusive husband insists on Gordon — after himself. From the day the name is chosen, the novel revisits the boy every seven years to trace how a single word shapes an entire life. I'm not quite finished yet but I'm absolutely riveted. If you like quietly devastating literary fiction that plays with fate and identity, this one will get under your skin. Loving it!
Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage by Belle Burden
A memoir about a woman's marriage — what she thought it was, what it actually was — told in the aftermath of having the rug pulled out from under her. It reads like a juicy Vanity Fair article, and it sparked some controversy because of exactly how much she was willing to say.
Well, you know what Anne Lamott would say, right? "You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better."
Less by Andrew Sean Greer
Arthur Less is a mid-list novelist who, to avoid his ex's wedding, books himself a round-the-world tour of literary events that any author of repute would turn down. I’m a total sucker for a novel about a novelist, and this one is great. The globetrotting adventures make for a story that’s fun, fast, and surprisingly tender. Read it if you like novels about writers - but I have a feeling I might forget I read this book by the end of the year.
How Yoga Works by Geshe Michael Roach
A parable about the living the philosophy of yoga, so that you don’t actually have to read The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. This was required reading for my yoga teacher training and… well, it does what it says on the tin. If you're a yoga practitioner who wants to understand the deeper philosophy without your eyes glazing over, this is your book.
Still Writing by Dani Shapiro
Part memoir, part craft guide, this is Dani Shapiro's love letter to the writing life. I have a stack of creativity books that I look at whenever I’m in need of inspiration or understanding - this will go on the shelf (see my Creativity Bookshelf on Goodreads). And as it turns out, Shapiro has a serious yoga and meditation practice which she weaves through the book in the most wonderful way. It’s a must read if you are a writer. But if you aren’t, then it’s probably not your thing.