Announcements: A quick update on my book

I’ve been delighted with the support from you all for my first book The Summer of Madness.  It’s meant so much. As such, I just wanted to give a quick update. Sales have been going well, both in digital form and in paperback. It’s such a wonderful feeling to know the story has connected with people.

You can read the reviews so far, including a rather amazing one from a blogger whose site I have admired for years. Beetley Pete has had a very entertaing life, full of anecdotes and adventures. You’ll love his blog.

Thanks again to you all 🙂

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Announcement: Exciting News. First Published Story.

In the summer of love, or rather of madness, a whole set of stories are emerging. But there is one that has got everyone talking. When Kurt Vannes decides to win back his ex-girlfriend with the help of a literary classic, he sets off a string of events that will build to a dramatic finale.

It’s been a pleasure to share with you my favourite literary works since creating the blog, but this time I have very exciting news. This is my first ever short story published and something I had to share with you all. I’ve long been a fan of short stories and it’s wonderful to finally have something of mine within the genre in print.

If you want to find out whether Kurt’s big gesture does win her back, it’s available here in both Kindle and paperback form.

The Summer of Madness

Gr8at: Underwater Photographer of the Year 2019

Regular readers of my blog will know of my great love of photography, especially when covering nature and the animal world. So when I saw The Underwater Photographer of the Year 2019 I just had to include it here. If you want to see full quotes and the relevant award winners from the photographs below, please click on The Guardian’s feature here. Please feel free to let me know which is your favourite.

Photography: London Sunset

Just another example of how beautiful nature is.

Photography #TearsForFears

From the 02 arena on Wednesday, where I saw Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal live for the first time. Better known, as course, as Tears For Fears. I listened to them a lot during childhood and so was great to finally see them perform classics like Shout, Everybody Wants to Rule the World, Mad World and Head over Heals. Click below for a bonus image.

Gr8at: Canary Wharf Winter Lights Bonus

Before the exhibition finished, I was able to see the visual delights that were the Winter Lights at Canary Wharf, a free annual festival that celebrates light, colour and movement.

Click below for a bonus eight photographs. You can see my posts covering the exhibition last year here and here.

Line(s) of the Day #CanneryRow

Early morning is a time of magic in Cannery Row. In the gray time after the light has come and before the sun has risen, the Row seems to hang suspended out of time in a silvery light. The street lights go out, and the weeds are brilliant green. The corrugated iron of the canneries glows with the pearly lucence of platinum or gold pewter. No automobiles are running then. The street is silent of progress and business. And the rush and drag of the waves can be heard as they splash in among the piles of the canneries. It is a time of great peace, a deserted time, a little era of rest.

The charming style of gifted Californian writer John Steinbeck from his acclaimed novel Cannery Row (1945). Winner of the Nobel Prize of Literature in 1962, the literary titan also wrote other masterpieces such as Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden.

Gr8at: Good Grief Charlie Brown

I quoted Charlie Brown recently, with a photo from the very fun exhibition at Somerset House, Good Grief,Charlie Brown! But i just had to add some more to give you a sense of how great it was to see the Charles M. Schulz’s characters brought to life again.

And a bonus message

Line(s) of the Day #TheThirdMan

I had paid my last farewell to Harry a week ago,when his coffin was lowered into the frozen February ground, so that it was with incredulity that I saw him pass by, without a sign of recognition, among the host of strangers in the Strand.

The lines of inspiration for the film that became The Third Man. In a rather unique turn of events, these lines never made it into the book, the film was set in Vienna and Graham Green’s book (never meant to be anything other than a draft to help plan the screenplay), was published after the success of the 1949 British film noir. It’s still my favourite film. Feel free to share any examples of any time you have preferred the silver screen adaptation to the original novel.

Line(s) of the Day #BraveNewWorld

Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly — they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.

As said by Helmholtz Watson, an Alpha-Plus lecturer at the College of Emotional Engineering, in the dystopian novel Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Published in 1932, the literary masterpiece tells of a future where genetically modified citizens have their future careers programmed, war and violence has been removed and the government assisted drug Soma is encouraged to remove any thoughts of unhappiness.