I have a story in the current issue of The People’s Friend Special. Just in case the title and beautiful illustration haven’t given it away, I’ll tell you that it involves sunflower seeds.

Quite some time ago I’d written a different story about sunflowers. That’s set in Little Mallow – the same fictional village as the cosy mystery series I’m working on, and due to be published in My Weekly very soon. As often happens, I had more ideas on the theme than would fit into one story.

Very soon afterwards, my editor at The People’s Friend forwarded me a lovely email from a reader saying how much she’d enjoyed one of my stories. The lady’s name was Olive and she mentioned that she’d been a teacher. I immediately decided to write about a kind teacher called Olive, and to have her use my sunflower seed ideas to help her pupils. I don’t know if the original Olive will ever see the new story she inspired, but I hope so.