It was a cold October evening when I wrote a post asking for feel good, cheerful, and uplifting songs. Queue Matthew Peters, Facebook friend for almost two years with…wait for it…You’re Beautiful by James Blunt. Really? I said uplifting, goddamnit! After a suitable amount of chastising he came back with You Shook Me All Night Long by ACDC and was redeemed.

From there on in I had the bug. The music flowed back and forth like a hypnotic ping-pong ball. Not only that, he helped me out when I was stuck on my blurb for my latest novel Kissing Katie. All authors know what a pain in the arse blurbs are. His input was invaluable to me. Although I hasten to add that his tracked changes almost gave me a heart attack.

By way of thanks I emailed over my first two books with a warning they might not be his thing. I’ve since learned he usually only reads books written by dead people. Since I’m very much conscious and breathing I feel honoured that he enjoyed my books. Blinded by curiosity I went over to Amazon and got Conversations Among Ruins. Conversations is a semi-autobiographical novel. It gave me some deep insights into the man that I was corresponding with. I connected with the novel and he connected with mine. I admitted that Teagan was based on me, except that I’m not a vampire. Honestly…I swear it!

Then the selfish bastard went on holiday and I was stuck without him. How very dare he! Matthew let me know how he was getting on with Falling to Pieces and I did the same with Conversations Among Ruins. Just before the end of us reading both of our novels respectively, Matthew said he had something to ask me. Of course I replied that I’m already married, besides he’d have to get to the back of the queue ;). Just kidding. He wanted to write a book with me. Both of us have been propositioned in much the same way, I believe a deeper understanding of our shared hardships as children and an odd connection made me agree. I’m a control freak by nature, and I think that Matthew is, too. Something told me that perhaps that is why the book would be BRILLIANT.

We quickly came up with a fantastic idea of how we were to pull this off. Then came the need to have a face-to-face chat about it. Matthew sipped (I use the word loosely) from a black cup, and at some point during the chat I expressed my utter disgust. How on earth can someone drink out of a black cup? What if it’s dirty? My OCD truly kicked in. He thought it was the most funniest thing ever. I quickly sought to rectify this at Heathrow airport in the Harrods store when I replaced the evil black cup with a white lined, bone china mug emblazoned with Union Jacks ;).

I wanted to know if he had any odd quirks too. He admitted that he had things written down on hundreds of index cards. I raised a brow. He explained, “You know, like scenery, places, characters, body parts.” A dramatical scratched record sounded at that point. WTF!? ;). Anyway, I didn’t actually think that was too quirky. I later found out whilst sitting at his kitchen table that he refuses to eat wobbly food. Wobbly food? God, I laughed so hard. He wore a serious expression when he said, “Never eat anything that can move faster than you.”

The book we’re writing, that has yet to be named, began to take serious shape. I was due to visit MK Meredith in a few weeks and seen as he was only a few hundred miles away from North Virginia I wanted to go see him for a few days. I suffer from driving related PTSD, but I’d just finished therapy and my counsellor was all for me driving down there. So, I went ahead and did it. Now, I’ve never professed to being sane, but shit the bed, it was terrifying. Although American drivers are much kinder and politer than their British counterparts I found the highways, bridges, trucks, and Richmond a truly harrowing experience. I arrived in a wreck in over double the time it should have taken. However, I arrived alive, and for that I was glad! It was then that with a shaky hand I dropped my bloody phone and smashed the screen to smithereens. I looked skyward and said, “Seriously? Anything else?”

Anyway, that was the bad stuff I’m pleased to say. I met Matthew at 7am the next morning and we went for coffee. I already knew what a wicked sense of humour he had, but in person he’s even funnier. We share such a sense of openness that it seemed impossible that we weren’t going to hit it off immediately. With our joint appreciation of music, plus our co authorship to discuss didn’t really leave much room for anything else.

On day two Matthew took me to a barbecue place called Allen’s. He’d warned me prior to our arrival that the decor wasn’t exactly amazing. I scoffed when we arrived because it was just like the inside of any olde worldly British pub. I immediately became at one with the taxidermy fox that watched over us as we ate lunch. Shockingly enough, and despite the fact that Matthew had been severely reprimanded for putting too much sugar in my coffee the previous day, I thought that sweet tea tasted gorgeous. The cheeseburger I had was like nothing I’ve tasted before either, and I left thanking God that I reside no where near that place. I have one word for you and that’s bariatric.

We decided to have a nice photograph taken together. However by this point I was pretty wired on thirty odd cups of coffee. I pointed out that by four o’ clock I usually switch to wine so I had to be flexible within my available options and stick to coffee. That, along with the broken phone screen is why the following picture turned out not so well!

Also, I couldn’t let the poor fellow get away with not having at least one silly selfie ;).

Sadly, the time came for me to return to North Virginia to spend Thanksgiving with the wonderful Meredith family. I’m hoping that the first time isn’t the last time Matthew and I will meet. We share a friendship like no other, and a dedication to our work that I’m hoping will propel our project to some great places.

Please check out my interview with Matthew HERE