Authors and Reviews

First there was the unhappy writer on Scott Pack's Blog ('Why Do I Bother?' - Feb 25th 2009), then Alice Hoffman and now Alain de Botton publicly tweeting and twittering about negative reviews. Perhaps somebody could write a negative review about one of my novels so that I could publicly admonish them, get the press to report it and receive ungarnered publicity in the process.

I spot a gap in the market here...or have the publishing marketing teams got there before me?

Iraq Inquiry

I have contacted our local MP, Julian Brazier, to ask him to demand a full and open public inquiry into the Iraq war.

I can think of at least this many and this many reasons why...

The Fallen - BBC Television

I watched this unrelenting and extremely moving programme last night and would urge anybody who has read 'Soldier Boy' to catch it while they can on BBC iplayer. It was precisely the stories and experiences on here that I wanted my novel to address...

The BBC at its best, doing what it should do much more of in my opinion.

Today I was Victor Frankenstein

So we went to make a snowman in the field up the hill, my son and I, and we made him and he was sort of interesting but I forgot my camera and couldn't record him for posterity. Off we went, back to the house (all of two minutes away) to fetch it but when we returned somebody had destroyed him. Oh, the nature of evil!!!

Anyway, to cut a long story short he was rebuilt using bits of his old self and new bits. Here is the result. We called him 'Victor' (short for Victory in this case for he stands victorious over those that would destroy him) and he looks very pleased with the end result even if I do say so myself.

Now, I need more bodyparts!

PS Our friends created this rather bemused looking chap.


PPS Meanwhile the students across the road built a snow 'person' too. Pathetic!

Book Launch

I have now seen the cover for 'Soldier Boy' and completed the proof edits so with a release date of 31st March 2009 looming it is time to organise some sort of launch. I'm planning to finalise the details of this event today. It will be in Canterbury on Thursday 26th March. I'm off to see the proprietor of the prospective venue and then it will just be a case of getting invitations mailed out. If you're reading this and want to come along, drop me a comment!

Public Lending Right

I just received my PLR statement for July 2007 - June 2008. It informs me that Asboville was taken out 775 times. The year before it was 665. I suppose that's promising from a library lending perspective. I love things like this, to think that 775 people made the decision to take the book out and take it home with them. Now I know that's nothing compared to the big players but it's 775 more than zero and that's the way I like to look at it!

2009

I am not one for resolutions, not really. Life has a habit of rumbling along fairly similarly to the year before it regardless of the things we try to change. It's not easy to stop a runaway train after all. I will try to get myself a little fitter this year. I used to be able to rely on two 90 minute games of football each week and a training session mid-week too but those days are gone. All too often now I find myself watching from the bench. At 37 I suppose it's to be expected. But I hate the gym and I love to be competitve so I will be looking for a sport that satisfies. I'm starting with badminton as it's a decent enough workout when played to a certain level. It's too cold for tennis, golf isn't physically demanding enough and I'm crap at squash (I'm pretty crap at tennis and golf too...). So badminton it will be.

Beyond that 2009 promises, at this stage, to be an exciting year. It will see the publication of my second novel with Maia Press, Soldier Boy will be released in March and there are one or two other exciting things on the horizon that I'm not at liberty to mention. I wouldn't like to tempt fate either. It has a nasty habit of kicking you (me) in the teeth.

Festivals

Having an 18 month old son makes Glastonbury a little adventurous for me so after several years I gave it a miss this year. To keep in the festival spirit we bought day tickets for Zoo8 instead, a festival on land owned by Port Lympne Wild Animal Park.

It was a bit crap really. We got there at 1030am and had to queue until 1pm. None of the stewards seemed to have any idea what was going on, they had about ten people administering wrist bands for several thousand people and each one took a good 2/3 minutes. Yesterday people queued for 5 hours and I imagine it was the same for the people 'way' back behind us. On top of that a load of bands cancelled with one act alluding to the promoter as a 'c**t'. I'd probably ask for my money back (or at least a refund for the excessive queuing) if I thought I had the slightest chance of getting it. Perhaps Glastonbury spoils a person...too much of a good thing etc. After all, Eavis gets 160,000+ people in there and I can't remember having to queue for anything except the odd clean portaloo...

We went to the animal park to cool off. It was great!