Recently my best friend gave birth to her third child, a handsome son named Harry. With a ten and twelve year old already in the fold Harry has proved a delight, although I’m sure for Skye there have been some old skills that quickly needed to be brushed up on. Skye and I have been friends forever, well at least for a good twenty-six years. Through boyfriends, weddings, christenings and divorces and any number of professional and personal milestones we have pretty much stood shoulder to shoulder, albeit with a good 700 kms between us at times. So it was we found ourselves in the process of gestation during 2011, with curve balls thrown at us from divergent directions yet our experiences were strangely similair. Skye was pregnant, I had another book to write.

It occurred to me during one of our regular telephone chats how similair our conversations were; she talking about concentrating on the final goal, me trying  to work out where my goal was in terms of storyline, character development  and the finished product. Both our due dates were pretty much written in stone, although mine was hardly comparable.

The night before Harry’s arrival Skye was understandably both anxious and excited.

‘The goal’s in sight,’ I reminded her.

‘Yeah I know,’ Skye sighed, ‘I just have to head for the try line.’

At the time there was no turning back for either of us. The next day I spoke to Skye in the hospital. Harry greeted the world quickly and without fuss and within a hour we were chatting once again on the telephone. I had about a month to go before the manuscript for Absolution Creek was due to the publisher and in her inimitable style Skye was quick to check on the manuscript’s progress. Writing this year has been a struggle for me. With separate floods top and tailing 2011, ill health in the family and an increased workload on the property my inability to come to grips with what I was trying to write at times overwhelmed me. At one point I deleted thirty thousand words as part of a re-write. Skye knew all this.

‘Well,’ Skye reminded me, a mewing Harry in her arms, ‘you’re up next Nick so pick up the ball and run.’

What can you do when such fiesty advice is thrown at you? With a month to go until the manuscript was due I ran like bloody hell.

Today Random House came back to me. They had read Absolution Creek.

 ‘Nicole,’ my editor emailed, ‘it’s a cracking story’.

I was at the main homestead, so after sharing the news with my parents, I rang Skye. After that I sat down on the back step and thought ‘thank heavens for that’.