It’s January 24th 2021 and the Covid news in the UK is dreadful. It’s also snowing! But I have three (at least) reasons to be cheerful.

FIRST: This afternoon my partner Bevan has his first vaccination shot at the Town Hall. We may have to wait another three months for the second, but at least it’s happening and is something – at last – that the govt. seems to be getting right. Not before 100,000 deaths though.

SECOND: The paperback version of my biog of Elaine Madden I Heard My Country Calling, is finally coming out next week (27th) after only six years! I haven’t seen it yet, but my agent says it’s looking good. It will be great to see Elaine in print again, even if this is the worst possible time to have a book out with bookshops and libraries shut. But there’s always Amazon. I’d include a pic of the new cover if I could remember how to add an image… Details: £12.99 Published by the History Press.

THIRD: I’m writing again – Hooray! Can’t believe how much I’ve missed it, and winter lockdown is the perfect time to hunker down with the laptop. It’s the biography of a beautiful house in the centre of Bristol and the people who’ve lived there since 1828. Like every book I’ve ever written, it’s an amazing learning experience: everything from the Bristol Riots of 1831 to Victorian bedroom etiquette. The ‘outside’ history is fascinating enough but the stories of the people ‘inside’ really capture the imagination – they are real to me.

For the moment the book will have a limited, private circulation, but if we can interest a publisher it might get a wider readership. Let’s hope David Olusoga hasn’t completely sewn up the market in house histories…