The Official S. J. Bolton Blog

It's launch week. The guest list has topped 100, speeches are written, the wine merchant has delivered, the food is underway, manicure and final facial are both booked and, most important of all, (thanks to Emma R, the finest personal shopper on the planet) I have a dress that will ensure I out-glam my kid sister.  I've got to say, I didn't put this much effort into my wedding.

In fact, so tied up with party preparations am I, I'm in danger of forgetting what this week is really all about. My latest book, the culmination of two years' work on the part of author, agents, editors and publicists, not to mention the sales and marketing people, is about to hit the bookshops.  (Actually, it's been in Waterstones for a few days now - my friend Sandra bought a copy)

So, two years after starting the planning and research, probably a decade after I first had the idea, Blood Harvest is going to be read. And judged. It will be compared to the last two. Reviews will appear in the newspapers (if I'm lucky). They'll certainly appear on Amazon and they won't all be kind.

In publishing, I've learned, you're only as good as your last book. And my third book is different to my previous two. Two years ago, when I started it, I was feeling brave.  I'm not sure I am any more.

In Blood Harvest, instead of one central female character, the point of view is shared between three people, one of them a young boy, another a bloke.  It's written in the third person, a style that doesn't come so naturally to me. And instead of fairly relentless action - something else I've become known for - this book deals much more with relationships. It even has a love story. It also feels like the darkest book I've written to date, dealing as it does, with young children in danger and the grief experienced by parents who lose them.

I honestly don't know how it's going to be received. Life is going to be a bit tense around here for the next couple of weeks.

Blood Harvest, a rollicking Pennine tale of murder, mayhem and moonbeams, is published on the 1^st of April by Bantam Press.

It's hard growing up in the shadow of a famous older sister.

Ok, so she wasn't famous when we were younger but she definitely was first in line when it came to dishing out the better quality genes. We three Bolton girls have widely different personalities, which does make you question how the whole genetics distribution is decided. Sharon certainly got the adventurous gene. She'd lead the three of us, and any friends who were brave enough to tag along, on many a madcap scheme, usually ending badly but fun nevertheless. She had the leadership gene where as I inherited the 'tag along and get into trouble' one!

At school, she was a hard act to follow (tick gene boxes for intelligent, popular, diligent) and Kerry and I often failed to live up to the 'Bolton girl' reputation.

She then whizzed around the country fine-tuning her career, ending up as 'something in the city' complete with company BMW, before trading it all in to try her hand at writing and become a best-selling author. Definitely the work of the ambition gene.

I, on the other hand, appeared to get the homely gene - marrying my childhood sweetheart, mum to three kids, having a job - not a 'career' - so it was with some amusement that I found myself described as the infinitely more glamorous one! Had my high-flying, successful, highly-proficient sibling compared herself to her 'not any of the above' little sis and found herself wanting? Bizarrely, it seems that despite what we have been given we all covet the personality traits that genetics denies us.

As I watch my own three children growing up and developing their own personalities, the same thoughts cross my mind - which genes will they have inherited and how will their genetic make-up allow them to handle what life throws at them?  I can only hope that they will be able to embrace the differences between them, see that actually the genes do balance themselves out and remain, as we have, the best of friends.

Whilst leaving you all wrapped in that warm, cosy Walton-family glow of peace and harmony, I should point out that I also inherited the wicked gene. I've just posted a link to this article to everyone in my address book (that's 64,000 employees) inviting them to read this, so that when the viewing figures come in, the most read blog on S J Bolton's website will the one written by her 'infinitely more glamorous' younger sister!

Louise (nee Bolton)

It seemed like a good idea at the time. 'The Sunday Telegraph would like you to write an article for them', said Lynsey, my publicist. '750 words, on an important, relationship-centred incident or turning point in your life. They'll pay you and you get a book credit.'

Well, fledgling authors, especially those with books out soon, don't turn down the chance to write for the Sunday Telegraph, but finding something to write about, that was a different matter entirely. Especially as it soon became clear that any incident from my past that might interest Sunday Telegraph readers was unlikely to be one I was prepared to have aired in a national newspaper.

But there was one idea that wouldn't go away. It wasn't a subject I was comfortable talking about, (for reasons that should become very clear) but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed that this was the one. The biggest point in its favour? It was directly relevant to the central theme in Blood Harvest.

People often ask authors where they get their ideas from and my answer is always the same. Personal experience. The villainy at the heart of Blood Harvest is built around the idea of children in danger from the very people they should be able to trust. Well, that was a subject I knew something about.

I've never harmed a child, (just so we're clear) and don't believe I ever would. But when my son was a newborn I experienced what I believe is considered a form of post-natal depression. I fantasised about harming, even killing him.

So that's what I wrote about. Those terrifying first weeks with my baby when dreadful thoughts would spring into my head from nowhere and I genuinely believed there was something seriously wrong with me.

I wrote the article, but was far from sure I wanted millions of people to read it. I talked it over with a few friends who didn't seem particularly phased. They even mentioned hearing of other people who've experienced the same thing.

Still wasn't sure.

'People might think I'm nuts,' I said to Mr B one night.

'A lot of people think that already,' he replied, helpfully.

I was going to do it, I decided, it was my duty to all the other new mums who would be going through the same experience. It would let them know it was normal.

The article appeared last Sunday. On Mothers' Day. Nice timing. There was my name, in bold type, a photograph of a woman not unlike me cuddling an infant and the startling blood-red heading: "I fantasised about killing my baby."

Why had I ever thought this was a good idea?

As I braced myself for a visit from Social Services, I took comfort from the fact that new mothers the length and breadth of the country would know that the scary thoughts in their heads were nothing more than the brain's way of processing an entirely new and bewildering experience. I fully expected a few friends to take me quietly to one side and thank me for being so brave.

A week on, no one's said a word. Does no one read the Sunday Telegraph? Despite my courage in speaking out, is the subject still not ready to break free of its taboo? Or - now here's a thought - maybe it is just me. Maybe I really am a monster.

Sharon J Bolton: Psycho Mum, available for lift share, play dates and baby-sitting. See you at the school gate, ladies!

The UK launch of Blood Harvest is at the end of this month, and my sister has just bought her third new dress for the occasion. Quite what she's planning to do with the other two is anybody's guess.  Wear them underneath? Change at hourly interviews? Drape them, sculpture-like, over the walls? Granted, it is a bit of a stunner (see pic) but that's hardly the point.

I do not have a new dress for my book launch, nor given everything I have to do at this time of year (plan next book, promote last book, endlessly revise current book) will I have the time or the energy between now and then to find one. I will have to do with digging something out from the back of the wardrobe and brushing off the dog hairs.

If I sound bitter, it's because I am. Younger, infinitely more glamorous sisters with three dresses to choose from, is not what a woman wants at her book launch. Especially when the room will be full of people I haven't seen since we were all in school uniform (at real school, in case you're wondering, not just a bit kinky that way) and I really don't want their first reaction to be: God, she's aged!

On the subject of people I haven't seen for a while - Margaret from Wigan, are you out there?  I'd love to invite you along.  Send me a message on the contact page and we'll sort something out.

I should point out that my sister's head doesn't end just above her jaw line, but if I publish a full frontal without permission, her revenge will be swift and serious. She does though, as you can see, have very knobbly knees!!!

My phone chirps beside me; my colleague shifts uncomfortably; we both know its going to be ugly.  The familiar number can't be ignored and so I make my excuses and say it won't take long - this I know for sure.

These calls can start in any number of ways but rapidly reach the same conclusion.  The best ones start with something like "I've opened the blog, pasted in the text from Word but how do I insert the picture?"

Others start with the more ominous "the computer's gone funny what do I do" or worse still "I'm in London and Desmond (he is the Sat Nav but curiously has a female voice) has gone mad which way do I turn - quickly the lights have changed!"

From then on the conversation goes rapidly down hill, we may be able to progress the problem - with me desperately trying to remember all the commands for whatever the problem is but we usually end up with a seriously hissy fit and lots of bad language. I have to promise to fix it later when I get home.

Now I've deployed the best technical firepower available from Mr Gates and Mr Jobs; we have thin client hot stand-bys; SaaS, IaaS, Remote Infrastructure Management, Cloud Computing and most other technical wizardry you can think of.

But a curious question remains; why can't she who twists a plot a thousand times and still untangles the threads into a satisfactory conclusion sort out a few buttons on a machine that always does what you tell it to?

Mr B

PS. For the curious the Sat Nav question is easily answered - the answer is always left regardless of destination - in the hope this minimises the chance of an accident.