It is my pleasure to welcome Lynda Young Spiro to Linda’s Book Bag today to tell us all about how colour can enhance our creativity. Lynda has harnessed that creativity into her debut novel There Is Always More To Say. There Is Always More To Say was published by New Generation on 21st April 2016 and is available from Amazon and via Lynda’s website.

I am also reviewing There Is Always More To Say.

There Is Always More To Say

Soho 1984: Two people meet and their worlds are changed forever. An unexpected meeting – a look that means their lives will never be the same again. In “There Is Always More To Say”, Lynda Young Spiro chronicles the lives of the couple through friendships, marriage, fleeting moments and snatched time. It is a passionate account about a connection between two people that never dies even when tested by distance and when life throws the unexpected at their feet. “The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances. If there is any reaction both are transformed.” C G Jung

Colour and Creativity

A Guest Post from Lynda Young Spiro

I’m a mixed media artist who mainly works with fabrics, colours and recyclable bits and pieces which are all incorporated into my work. My passion for colour, my fascination with texture and my love of recycling have all found expression in a large body of work that includes textile design, latch-hooked rugs, needlepoint cushions, mosaics, painting and sculpture.

Over the last eighteen months I have been channelling my creative energies into writing and I have recently published my first novel which is called There Is Always More To Say. Because as we know, there is always more to say.

I’m a colour evangelist. The colours I wear can affect my mood. Wear a bright colour and my mood lifts. From my socks upwards. And my shoes. Colour makes me feel happy. I am always astounded by the number of people I see wearing black. Why envelope yourself in such darkness? Wearing black can influence my mood and make me feel sad. I’m not suggesting that everyone wears as much colour as I do, because it could be said that I take it to an extreme but I am influenced by the colours that bedeck me. The only time that I am happy to wear black is when I am painting. So that my paintings are not influenced by the bright colours that I prefer to wear.

Colour expresses emotions and stimulates the senses. It surrounds us. My morning mood determines the visual cacophony of multi-colours that I will wear on any particular day. Wearing colour when I am writing appears to feed my creativity. I like to wear many differently multi-coloured layers of clothing when I write. Wearing colour allows me to express myself and I have at times been told that I am indeed as colourful as the clothes I wear!

I am inspired by and draw on both my own experiences and those of other people.

My Review of There Is Always More To Say

I approached reading There Is Always More To Say with the thought that it’s a short book and I could help reduce my TBR pile quite quickly. This was a mistake. There Is Always More To Say captivated me from the very beginning and, whilst it is indeed a short and quick read, it is also a moving and thought-provoking one that should not be rushed.

Lynda Young Spiro has the uncanny ability to express perfectly what many of us feel but cannot articulate. She cleverly explores the emotions and experiences that make us who we are so that I would defy any reader not to find an echo of themselves within the pages of There Is Always More To Say.

I am completely not a religious person, but I loved the spiritual elements to the writing too. There are appropriate and inspiring quotations that serve to underpin aspects of the narrative so that at the most basic level this beautiful book could simply be read as a self-help text.

The narrative is presented as a first person internal monologue but simultaneously addressing the ‘you’ of the story who is never fully identified or named. So clever too is the ambiguity over names that are androgynous so that the reader can almost impose their own understanding onto the text. Alex, Sam and Ashley could be male or female and there is a wonderful undercurrent of homosexuality and sensuality.

There is such an intensity of emotion presented so that anyone who has lost a loved one through death, distance, time or another’s intervention will find much that resonates with their own feelings. There Is Always More To Say is a study in grief and love, joy and despair.

The structure of the book is inspired. There are repetitions of phrases and events that weave like texture as memories are constructed. I try not to quote from books I read for fear of spoiling the plot but Lynda Young Spiro’s writing frequently reads like poetry so that it is a delight to read.

Having set out merely to reduce the pile of book awaiting review, I have found in There Is Always More To Say a touching, intense and emotional book that deserves far more recognition than it has already had. I really recommend it.

About Lynda Young Spiro

Lynda Young Spiro is a mixed media artist whose love of textiles, found objects and recyclable materials are incorporated into her colourful work. Lynda was born in 1959 in Hampstead, London, where she now lives with her husband and two sons. Her previous book Latch-Hooking Rugs is published by A & C Black. There is Always More to Say is her first novel.

You can find out more about Lynda by following her on Twitter and visiting her website.