Today is publication day for m’chum and Choc Lit colleague Alison May’s new book Midsummer Dreams. For those who don’t already know, Alison writes rather fabulous modern adaptations of Shakespeare. Her previous book Sweet Nothing is a great read.

To celebrate the big day, Alison asked a whole bunch of us to write something about dreams. So here goes.

I had a dream about two women. It was all very exciting, but the only bit I remembered when I woke up was a single image of the two women sitting on a park bench together. You could tell they knew each other very well, but that there was something awkward between them. Frenemies, if you like. One of the women was quiet and mousy and the other was a ghost in a wedding dress. This image stayed with me for the whole day. Eventually, I decided I had to find out what was going on. The end result was Please Release Me – which will be published by Choc Lit later this year. It didn’t turn up as a complete story (if only!), but it started with a dream.

I had a nightmare where I was trapped inside a giant chocolate sponge. More specifically, I was in one of those air bubbles that you get when the cake doesn’t rise evenly – the sort that Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry would probably tut at. ‘But what’s nightmarish about that?’ I hear you cry. Well, the nightmarish bit was that I started to eat my way out and started to feel sick! See. Total nightmare, right? I felt so ill that I couldn’t eat any more and I knew I still had several feet of cake to eat before I could get through. And then I remembered that it was Monday morning and I hadn’t sorted the kids’ school uniforms out, which made it all the more important that I break out of the giant cakey prison. Shudder.

I do believe that nightmares (and dreams) are my subconscious trying to tell me something. I think the subtext in this one is probably that I eat too much cake. And that I need to be more organised about school uniforms…

My dream for the future: I reckon, in the future we’ll make more of the sea and start having underwater communities where people live in giant bubbles with the entrance at the bottom of the bubble (so that the air pressure keeps the water out). A cross between the Willard Price’s Underwater Adventure and The Octonauts. Any power needs would be generated using tidal turbines and drinking water would be desalinated from the surrounding area. There are issues with waste disposal and disrupted eco systems, but I’m sure we can sort something out.

Of course, by then, I’ll be a fabulously famous novelist with oodles of money. I will also know some fabulous recipes for seaweed cake.

Right. Enough of my wittering. Now please go and check out Alison May’s Midsummer Dreams. Shakespeare never sounded so good.