There is one word to sum up my life – chaotic! I have two small children who, though I love more than life itself, have an amazing capacity to create untold mess, laundry and general havoc. I have a very untidy self-employed husband whose ability to leave stuff literally all over the house knows no bounds. I have two step-sons whose love of lego has left me many a time nursing bruised feet and cursing those little plastic bricks and I have a love of both red wine and Cadbury’s milk chocolate – frequent large helpings of which force me to the gym on a regular basis.
I also obviously have a passion for writing – so when I am not tidying up after my family or dashing to the gym that’s what you’ll find me doing. I just wish there were more hours in a day!
For Ruth, my oldest friend, who found her Mr Right.
And for Tom, my brother-in-law, who always wanted to know when this book would be published.
Well here it is!
In The Park Bench Test the heroine Becky needs to find out how you know you’ve met Mr Right. As I was single when I first started writing the novel (I am now married with two small children!) I was blissfully unaware how you knew when you’d found “the one”! To give the story a bit of authenticity, therefore, I interviewed my own friends, family members and colleagues on this issue. In other words, the interviews in The Park Bench Test are genuine – and not a figment of my imagination! Names have been changed to protect the innocent!
Love flies, runs and rejoices; it is free and nothing can hold it back.
Thomas À Kempis (1379-1471)
When I was eight years old Ken asked Barbie to marry him.
Barbie said yes.
I wanted to know why.
I wanted to know everything when I was eight. I wanted to know why I had two eyes and two ears, but only one nose and only one mouth. I wanted to know why grass was green and why sky was blue. I wanted to know why my eyebrows didn’t grow to be as long as my hair.
And I wanted to know why Barbie loved Ken.
It was the first day of the summer holidays and my best friend Emma and I had laid on a lavish wedding for our bride and groom – in a marquee made out of four plastic tent poles and a pink lacy pillowcase from Laura Ashley. It was the place to be that Saturday afternoon, with an enviable guest list that included four other Barbie dolls, My Little Pony – who’d plaited her mane for the occasion, Paddington Bear – minus one wellington boot which Emma had dropped out of the window while she was showing my mum the flower we’d forced into his buttonhole, and a naked Tiny Tears, all of whom were treated to a wedding breakfast of chocolate digestives and Love Heart sweets.
It wasn’t the first time they‘d got married but it was the first time we ever questioned why Barbie wanted to marry Ken. Not that we thought there was anything wrong with Ken – he was quite cool really, particularly in the white sparkly trousers we had made for him out of one of my dad’s old handkerchiefs, some Pritt Stick glue and a pot of blue glitter.
My mum was helping out at the village plant sale, so it was my dad who had drawn the short straw.
“Daddy,” I said, my tone giving away the fact that I was about to ask a question he’d rather I had saved for my mum.
“Yes Rebs,” he replied hesitantly, over the top of his newspaper. My dad still calls me Rebs. Everyone else calls me Becky – or B. He likes to be different.
“Barbie loves Ken, doesn’t she?” I asked, pulling