A GRANDMOTHER was reduced to tears as after 60 years of writing books her efforts were finally being permanently put in print.

Christine Shaw's novel The Baker's Daughter has been published after the 69-year-old secured a publishing deal with GWL Publishing.

Mrs Shaw, of Foxley Grove, Burnham, wrote her first book when she was nine-years-old, and has finally achieved a long-held ambition to get a book published.

She said: "I have always done it. I have been writing since I could hold a pencil in my hand but I had not been able to get published.

"I could wallpaper a room with all the stories I have written over the years.

"When I found out I was being published I was so thrilled that I cried! They were tears of joy and also disbelief - after all this time I managed to get my name on a book."

Mrs Shaw, originally from Liverpool, worked as a teacher all across the country, and when she retired she moved to Burnham where she could focus on her passion of writing novels.

She joined Slough WEA Creative Writers' Group, which encouraged her to find a publisher for her novel The Baker's Daughter - a contemporary love story about a young widow trying to run a family bakery.

Mrs Shaw, who is grandmother to her partner's two grandchildren, said: "Teaching took a lot of my creative energy. It was hard to concentrate on writing stories then, but I am retired now and took the opportunity to make an effort this time.

"I write the sort of books that I like to read. It is the sort of book that you can take on holiday and enjoy.

"I was watching the Great British Bake Off one day and I thought that there was a story in it, and that morphed into the idea of a woman running a bakery.

"I couldn't exactly write something on Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood!"

The Baker's Daughter is available to purchase on Amazon and Kindle, and is available to order from bookshops, and Mrs Shaw will be reading an extract from her book and signing copies at Burnham Library in Windsor Lane at 2pm on Saturday, October 8.