Science. Fiction.

You know I've always had two loves. I've never kept it secret. But perhaps it's time to acknowledge it openly: I love science as much as I do fiction. As part of this open declaration, I've hastily amended my little blog header image. Don't ask me why frog = science. Perhaps because the poor things were always getting dissected in biology classes.

My third year at University has just started. It's the penultimate one, and things are getting more serious. Everything is double-weighted this year, and I need to get a very high aggregate mark in order to proceed on to the experimental project in my final year.

Going back to Uni as a mature student – and having to pay my way out of my own earnings – was a big decision for me. This really is my last chance to get started on the career path I want. There's no room for screwing it up. I work 0.8 full time as well as studying for my degree. Free time is in short supply. I've had to weigh up my priorities – and this year, study has won.

I won't be writing as much, or reading as much fiction, or blogging as much. Although I will still do those things – because I know I will need a break. And also because I don't think I can stop doing those things.

The book that started it all.

I've been reading fiction like a crazy woman ever since I managed to read my first book unaided. (The Ladybird book of The Emperor’s New Clothes. I still remember my sense of achievement when I read all the way through to the last page without help from my mum – and the sudden, weird conviction that this was some sort of magic, this deciphering of code; that somehow I had unlocked the key to it in my head and now I could read anything. Wow. It's still probably my best achievement.). And I've been trying to write books since I was about seven years old and produced my first attempt: a few A4 pages, folded to A5 and covered with scrawl and pictures of ponies; the plot, such as it was, plagiarised entirely from Elyne Mitchell's The Silver Brumby.

Anyway. I just wanted to let you all know that I might be updating here less often, and when I do, it might sometimes be about (very misunderstood) science rather than reading or writing. I feel bad about that, as though I've drawn you here under false pretences. But I hope you'll keep reading.