“After about three months of fairly easy writing I came to a juddering halt in chapter six,” says A Charmed Life author Liza Campbell. “I spent two weeks cleaning out cupboards, licking the wallpaper, and staring out of the window. Then one night, lying in bed fretting about confessing my failure to my agent... Caramba! I suddenly realized what had to be done.”

     A Charmed Life is the story of Liza Campbell growing up in MacBeth’s castle. Yes, the one in Shakespeare. That’s how long the castle has been in her family. It’s a privileged atmosphere, with a history that goes back to 1295. She learns to live with the grandeur and shortcomings of her family and its history.

     “I went back to the beginning, hugely shortened the chapter lengths until, without writing another word, I was on chapter 57,” says Campbell. “It did the trick. The block passed. When I reached the end, I removed the scaffolding poles of the shortened chapters, praying that the whole thing would not collapse in a messy pile of adverbs & nouns.”

     “As a journalist it was always in the back of my mind that maybe one day I would manage a novel, but every time I started, my own story would poke its nose into the plot and I would stop,” says Campbell. “Eventually I decided to write a memoir and forget about dressing it up as fiction.”

     “Most of my family history had been drummed into my head as a child,” says Campbell. “But, I did double-check details of things like the Battle of Culloden. I’m an artist as well as writer, so after the book came out I concentrated on my art as it had forced onto the back burner while I wrote.”

     Campbell’s latest exhibitions were in France this summer. She went to Chelsea Art School, but after leaving remained uncertain of what to do. “Writing took over, as I was already earning a precarious living at it,” says Campbell.

     Liza Campbell is originally from the windswept highlands of Scotland, and currently lives in London. At 25 she started writing professionally. A Charmed Life is her first book. It took Campbell six months to write. She’s now starting her second book, a novel.

     Campbell is a very vivid writer. Campbell’s years growing up with an almost fairytale childhood define who she is. A Charmed Life is very well written, yet Campbell hasn’t quite forgiven her father. It will be interesting to see her next book.