Well I had heard a rumour, but a glance around the local WH Smith bookshop while back in the UK has confirmed it. Animals are the new hot publishing sensation. 'Misery memoirs' are being nudged off the shelves (thank God – if ever there was genre I really dislike it's that one!) by cold noses …
Have you ever read a book which states that by the very act of picking it up and reading it, you have become part of the writer's world? I just love this idea. Anything that begins: 'You have not found this page/website/book by accident…' and I am totally, utterly hooked. Call me naive, but the …
I have just been watching Andrew Marr's brilliant programme Britain From the Air. One of the facts that struck me was how our concept of the British countryside is actually a false one – so much of it is man- made and the idyllic pastoral scenes we all cling to are figments of our imagination. …
As promised, here is the guest blog from writer Anthony Peake. Thanks Tony!The itch had been building up for a few months. Now I was in the position to respond with a damn good scratching. I was going to write a book! I was in the fortunate position of being able to take a twelve …
I'm very pleased that Anthony Peake has agreed to write a guest blog for me. Tony, author of Is There LIfe After Death and The Daemon, is a highly original author with provocative views on consciousness and is a sought-after speaker who, among other things, has a regular fortnightly slot on BBC Radio Merseyside. You …
Roman Polanski's £21 million film The Ghost Writer will be premiered during the 60th Berlin Film Festival from 11 – 21 February. Based on the best selling novel The Ghost by Robert Harris, Ewan McGregor stars as a ghost writer hired to pen the memoirs of a former British Prime Minister Adam Lang, played by …
I have a rather unusual New Year's resolution. I am trying to pay attention to the present moment, as advocated by Eckhart Tolle in his book The Power of Now, which I have been reading avidly. I am appalled at how my butterfly brain flits about from thought to thought – the past, the future, …
It's the last day of the year and I'm really pleased I've finished the final draft of the young adult novel I've been writing for my US client. It seems a far cry from the paragraph his little son wrote to the full blown 250 page manuscript, and the plot has twisted and turned like …
Writers often describe getting their inspiration from an external source – a muse, a daemon. There are a number of theories on what this could be, ranging from the writer's own subconscious to past lives and tapping into universal consciousness. Where we get our inspiration from is a fascinating question. I love the idea that …
I have in front of a me a six-page document in old fashioned typewriting. Its cover page is entitled 'My Life by John Cameron'. Below that is typed: Born.. 12th April, 1855 Died..20th March, 1939. It was typed by his daughter Kata, my great aunt. John Cameron was my great grandfather. Whenever I am feeling …
