Only a month...

When we arrived home from Portugal our post consisted of two junk mails, a fan letter and an appointment for Dave to go and see his heart consultant at the Northern General Hospital, on 12 November.

My relief was quite overwhelming; I had seen how slow Dave had become in Portugal, unable to walk even on the flat and he had used his GTN spray at least half a dozen times a day.

So on that Saturday morning we set off for his 12 noon appointment at the hospital with Professor Newman.

Dave. as usual, waffled on about things being okay, so when Professor Newman told him to go into the adjoining room, get up on the bed and he would listen to his heart, I spelled out exactly how bad he was and that he couldn't even walk up the hill to the clinic. Thank God he listened to me.

He checked Dave's heart, arranged for a new ECG and some blood tests and sent us off with the relevant forms and instructions to go straight back to see him after the tests had been done.

We did, and he admitted Dave immediately.

He consulted with the surgeon and gave us the news that he needed a triple heart bypass, and it was a pretty immediate need. He got progressively worse over the following week and kept being moved to wards that offered more extensive care; he wasn't even allowed to walk to the toilet in the end, he had to be taken in a wheelchair.

On 22 November at 8 am they began the operation, and he was brought back on to the CICU at 2pm. He was critically ill for four days, then moved to progressive care. Things began to look a lot more positive and he now has a wire fitted in his chest for the connection of a pacemaker if he needs it. We will know more about that in four weeks.

He is now back at home although still quite poorly. He sleeps a lot, which is good, but I think it will be a quiet Christmas.

On the plus side, while all this was going on 34 Days was performing beautifully in the Amazon charts and has now sold around 15,000 copies. It seems to have done exceptionally well in the States, thank you America.

Wonder if President Elect Trump has read it?

And two days ago I finished Essence of Lavender. It is now with Bloodhound Books, awaiting their verdict.

I am 1200 words into the sequel to 34 Days, this would be yet another sequel that I hadn't envisaged writing.

I must learn to kill everyone off at the end of my books...