Sunday morning brunch: paratha, stuffed with a chilli and onion omelette.  Before she even takes a bite (snatching it away from Simon's grubby, wiggling fingers and ignoring his anguished howls of 'more, more'...) Jacqui is sniffing madly and looking glazed... It's not the eye-watering onion or the all-powerful chilli, not even the dextrous daintiness (poetic licence for those of you viewing the door-step pictured in the link below) of the rolled-up flatbread.  It's the smell; the spicy, warm, bready, just-cooked-eggy scent of a roadside food stall in rural Bangladesh.  It got us talking about the evocative nature of the sense of smell, that fleeting whiff across the nostrils that has us momentarily in a different place or time.  For Jacqui, Bangladesh was locked inside that paratha, but my Bangladesh wafts on a nostalgic air of RID insect repellent...  Christine had a vat of it with her on that first trip and as it was far superior to mine and she appeared immune...

I've just read the great reviews of my friend Michael Malone's new crime novel, Blood Tears, (available from Five Leaves now) and he deserves every single one of them - great stuff, Michael!Needless to say, it made me think of my own  - using the term 'review' very loosely to mean any feedback I've ever had - and I've decided I can certainly outdo him in one clear category...Consider my top five from the 'damning with faint praise' school of thought:1      'The main character is just an interesting version of you, isn't she?' 2      'I had an Amazon voucher with £4 left on it.  I had to put 11p to it to buy your book for my Kindle.  It was well worth the 11p.'3        'I couldn't get to the library that week but (a colleague) had a copy she'd got at your book launch so I read that instead of a proper book.'4        'I did like your book.  I know an excellent proof-reader you...

The most frequently asked question I'm asked - from both friends and strangers who have read A Blonde Bengali Wife - is 'whatever happened to Munnu?'  Munnu, the indisputable hero of the story, without whom I would have spent a few interesting weeks in Bangladesh and gone home with some good memories, poor (pre-digital) photos and a diary that would never have made it into a book.  Instead, he was the catalyst for getting to know the country, getting to love it, and staying in touch.  Most importantly though, he'll always be one of the most special friends I will ever have.  We keep in touch sporadically, but somehow the lapses never seem to matter and makes the news all the more exciting when it does come!So what has happened to Munnu?When I wrote the epilogue to A Blonde Bengali Wife after my second visit to Bangladesh, Munnu had already left for the USA.  He had...

So, here comes April with a spring in her step and a few jokes up her sleeve: 23 degrees in Edinburgh one day and zero the next...But it's the name 'April' which has got me thinking.  Last month, someone - Bootsie (not sure I know you personally but thanks for the interest) - commented about my novel-in-progress.  I'm going to take up her challenge and write a mini-mini-synopsis here, on the basis that it might shame me into finally finishing it, submitting it, and hopefully, eventually, maybe, gaining a PhD and publication!Where does April come in?  Well, she's my main character and she's on a quest in Cyprus.  I've carried the travel theme on from Bangladesh, realising how much I enjoy having a real location in a place I love, but that's where the similarity ends: the current work is definitely a novel.  April is ostensibly looking for her childhood friend, Elena, who...

(Yes - really - two posts in one day!  Unheard of.  It will never last...)Got five minutes to fill on your tea break?  Over at the LL-Publications blog, you can pass the time reading an interview with me, and lots of other interesting book-related articles fromm my publishers:http://llpublications.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/interview-anne-hamilton-a-blonde-bengali-wife/