Since babyhood, my twin granddaughters, Isla and Mia, had always babbled to each other in a stream of random vowels and consonants. But when they were about seventeen months old, these exchanges began to seem more intentional.This curious phenomenon even has a name: cryptophasia.

While waiting for my next memoir to be published by Vine Leaves Press in 2026, I’m developing an interest in the short form of nonfiction, also known as Flash Nonfiction. I love the discipline of this form, where every word has to be involved in the heavy lifting. This teeny tiny piece was published this morning in  50 Give or Take. 

This Australian summer has so far been brutal and it’s only January. Don’t be fooled by the Sydney beach scene above – I was home by 9am. Heat and humidity are my (MS-related) kryptonite, causing me to retreat into books and, if I find a good tv series, please let me binge watch it. At the moment, I always have three books on the go. One on audio for driving, watering the garden or walking (heat permitting), one in hard copy for the sofa when I’ve no energy for anything else, and one on Kindle at bedtime. The fact that the three I’ve recently read are all experimental memoirs is no coincidence, as each one led me to the next. Beginning with the most recent: