Write hot, edit cold. Write drunk, edit sober — Ernest Hemingway After decades of random scratchings I gave myself permission to become a writer. That was after I burnt all my old work. Big, big mistake. I wrote my manuscript Motherlands in a year — and felt pretty chuffed. Then Pantera Press made short shrift of my initial foray. It sucked, my writing sucked and in writerly fashion, I set to work on a daily basis. After a further four years of editing and re-writing, I have