I hope it will surprise no one reading this to learn that I am not old enough to have direct memories of World War II. I am however, old enough to have grown up among people who not only lived through ‘The War’ as it was universally called, but were constantly remembering it. People whose lives had been permanently shaped by it, sometimes dramatically. In my youth I was sick of hearing about the whole thing.
April’s blog post is finally here with some new artwork of Fred Astaire, just in time! It’s been an eventful month that has flown by packed with stress, achievement and family commitments. The stress was mostly due to the new Castle Sefton Press online store, which proved to be more difficult to set up than I had realised due to some limitations of WooCommerce that I hadn’t been aware of. Overcoming these certainly felt like a great achievement for almost twenty-four hours, until I realised that the store had a technical issue that I couldn’t fix and had to draft in expert assistance.… Read the whole post “Fred Astaire and Singer Sargent: Inspiration and Entertainment”
Regular readers of this blog will know that I am an admirer of the work of English author J. B. Priestley, now best known for his play An Inspector Calls. My enthusiasm for his writing was, as far as I remember, first ignited by the 1981 BBC adaptation of that very play. Those of us who live in the UK had the chance to see this for the first time in many years on BBC4 this week.… Read the whole post “An Inspector Calls, Integrity and Imaginary Cooking Friends”
Valentine’s Day is fast approaching, but having written about love at some length in my last post, I thought about food. Festivals and special days like Valentine’s Day are celebrated the world over by feasts of special dishes, and archaeology suggests that has been a feature human societies for a long time. In our house this year it will some wonderful cheese from The Courtyard Dairy, and Nigella’s Devil’s Food Cake.
There’s plenty of food and cooking in Ghost Train (“I skipped those bits,” said JB – my partner and fellow Castle Sefton Press author John Blake – who isn’t at all interested in culinary matters.)… Read the whole post “The Fawlty Towers Spanish Omelette”
Epiphany: time to take the decorations down and go back to work. (Actually, we take ours down before Epiphany these days, as no one visits after New Year’s Day and there is a lot more celebrating in the run up to Christmas than there was in the time of the twelve days’ festivities.) The process always reminds me of the Mole in Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows when he volunteers to repack the basket after his impromptu picnic with the Rat at the beginning of the book:
‘Packing the basket was not quite such pleasant work as unpacking the basket.… Read the whole post “Epiphany”
I’m tired. What with the launch of Castle Sefton Press‘ first book – Ghost Train – and preparations for Christmas, I think that’s only natural. And it’s good to be tired from doing productive things. At the last minute too, CSP also had to deal with some new EU legislation, the new General Product Safety Regulation, which means that we have to fulfil various disclosure and traceability obligations and ensure that our books are safe for EU customers. I don’t think there is too much to worry about, unless we come up with something like J K Rowling’s Monster Book of Monsters.… Read the whole post “Merry Christmas”
Ghost Train is published today – and will be on its way to those of you who have pre-orders – just fifteen months after I began writing it. I’m excited that it is finally on offer to readers everywhere, because all those who read it as part of the production process found it to be enjoyable and entertaining, and I’m sure that most of you will too. So I thought I’d say a word about ‘enjoyable and entertaining’ fiction.… Read the whole post “Ghost Train Publication Day: Pitching at the Hole in the Fiction Doughnut”
It is once more the time of short, dark days, warm glows and twinkly lights, hearty meals and inward pleasures. Like Clyde in Ghost Train, I have prepared the dark, rich foods of the heart of winter: mincemeat, fruit cake and a round splodge of a Christmas pudding. The first mince pies, a delight enhanced by their long absence, have been baked and eaten, I have rooted out my plastic apron with the holly pattern, and the artwork for this year’s Christmas cards is completed.… Read the whole post “What Will You Carry Through to the New Year?”
My new book Ghost Train will be published in paperback and ebook in the next few weeks. Watch out for more news!
