Season's Greetings and Other Stories — Fiona Walker

Especially for you, Fiona tells us about the special inspiration behind the stories and what they mean to her:

Season's Greetings
Receiving the annual round robin from friends is a Christmas tradition I devour with the same indulgent pleasure as the green triangles in the Quality Street box. Season's Greetings tells Holly's story through a decade of Christmas letters.

The Nativity Scene
I'm now proud to count myself among the ranks of tear-stained parents who hold camera phones wonkily aloft at the school nativity play each year. In The Nativity Scene, the under 9s in home-made wings are not the only ones for whom the day could spell high drama.

Dine Out On It
When I was moving house a lot in the nineties and noughties, I clung onto spare front door keys as a keepsake. Dine Out On It came from seeing the clutch of Yales swinging on a hook at the back of a cupboard, and wondering what would happen if I ever tried them out again.

Elizabeth
Elizabeth was written for a Sunday newspaper at a time my heart regularly came unglued when falling in love without a safety net. I loved the idea of a complete reinvention, and the secret hope that somebody would one day find my leopard's spots beneath the whitewash.

Freudian Slips
This story was inspired by something a friend of mine did, and the image of lipstick on cricket whites was so heavenly, I just had to write Freudian Slips...