Guest Post: My Five Favourite Things About Writing - Cara Thurlbourn


  1. I’ll never get bored of the thrill of having an idea. They can come to you at any time, sparked by the smallest thing, and it’s amazing now that Fire Lines is finished to see something that started as a tiny kernel of a thought turn into this huge world inside my head and, finally, into a story that other people will read.
  2. Being able to channel emotions into words is really quite special. Just the act of writing is quite cathartic and when I’ve gone through tough times putting pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) has been the best kind of therapy.
  3. This one is a bit of a double-edged sword as it can be quite distracting, but I think one of the joys of writing is that it ticks along in the background no matter what you’re doing. Even if I’m not sitting at my desk typing words, I’ll be thinking about writing, making up plot lines, fleshing out characters, making notes…
  4. It’s fun! What could possibly be better than letting your imagination run away with you? As children we make up stories, play-act, dress-up, and then we become teenagers or grown-ups and tend to think we should stop those things. But why?! I love that as a writer it’s my job to talk to myself in my head and day-dream out of the window about what my characters are doing.
  5. There’s a quote I’ve always loved, from Alan Bennett’s The History Boys, and it goes like this:
“The best moments in reading are when you come across something – a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things – which you had thought special and particular to you. Now here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met… and it is as if a hand has come out and taken yours.”
As a writer, you get to be the one who creates that feeling. You could even reverse the quote and say that when you write something, you wonder whether anyone will connect with it, and then you discover that someone has read it, enjoyed it, felt feelings about it, and it creates a connection – and that is amazing.



Cara Thurlbourn writes children’s and young adult fiction. 'Fire Lines' is her first novel and it’s a story she’s been planning since she was fifteen years old.

Cara has a degree in English from the University of Nottingham and an MA in Publishing from Oxford Brookes University.

She lives in a tiny village in Suffolk and has worked in academic and educational publishing for nearly ten years. Cara blogs about her author journey and in November 2016 she crowdfunded her first children’s book. 10% of its profits are donated to animal rehoming charities.

Cara plans to write at least two more books in the Fire Lines series, as well as a young adult mystery series, and has lots more children’s stories waiting in the wings.

You can sign up for Cara’s newsletter, for giveaways, updates and latest releases, here: www.firelines.co.uk






Check out the other stops on the Fire Lines blog tour here:


1 comment

  1. I totally agree with all the points you have added it. I also find writing as a means of expressions my deepest emotions that maybe i am not good at sharing i conversation.

    ReplyDelete