Back to the Blog!

Updates to the blog have been lacking this week because we took an unplanned trip to Cumbria, where a certain rather special person is doing fieldwork, and wifi connections up there were sporadic at best. Nevertheless, it was a lovely trip, not least because we got to see our young geologist at work. We paid a visit to the excellent Honister Slate Mine. If you're interested in mining, or just want to see some geology up very close and personal, I highly recommend taking one of their tours. For those of you interested, here's a link to their website:
http://www.honister-slate-mine.co.uk/index.asp
We were greeted home with a large punnet of strawberries from our friends' allotment - almost made it worth coming back! We've also seen our resident hedgehog several times, trundling around the garden investigating the bird food. Clearly he's found the locale to his liking and has moved in.
So to the writing: sales of the books are slow, clearly I'm not going to be retiring on the proceeds any time soon! Writing is a tough business. It doesn't help when 'prolific' authors turn out to have been plagiarising other writers work:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/universityeducation/9347317/Open-University-lecturer-under-investigation-after-publishing-a-Dylan-Thomas-story-under-her-own-name.html
It's not a pleasant story and I'm rather naively hoping there will be some reasonable explanation for her selling other people's work as her own but sadly I doubt it.

Fun in the ... Floods

I've mentioned before that the British summer has so far been spectacular for all the wrong reasons, but as we mop up after the latest deluge, it's might be helpful to know we're not alone. Minnesota has apparently seen some of its worst flash flooding this week, but rather than let it get them down, they decided to take the opportunity to have some fun:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/9348676/Minnesota-residents-go-tubing-in-flooded-carpark.html
It's to be hoped they gave the lamp posts a wide berth.

Inventive Business Cards

When I was looking into the marketing for my work, I came up with a design for a business card. I was quietly happy with the result. It was pleasing to the eye, clear, colourful and easily recognisable by use of the Quirky Tales logo. But then today I saw the business card designs on the Mail's website. Now I'm utterly depressed by my woefully unimaginative approach.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2162084/Amazing-business-cards-look-like-salami-sweet-wrappers--grow-cress-watered.html
I'm not sure about salami one, but I'd love to get my hands on one of the musical combs! So, back to the drawing board. I'm definitely going to have to up my game!

New Story

A story broke yesterday about a certain high profile working mother, married to a certain former prime minister, who had given a speech in which she attacked stay-at-home mothers, or 'yummy mummys', as she rather disparagingly called them. Whilst some of the points she made may have had some merit, it was a rather ill-considered snipe at a hard-pressed and largely voiceless sector of society.
I have to thank her, because it inspired another story for the website. The story is fiction, the characters are imaginary and in no way represent any actual person. The story is my attempt to allow the stay-at-home mum's position to be heard for once.
If you fancy a look, here's the link:
http://www.quirkytales.co.uk/stories/judgemental.php
For what it's worth I've been a stay-at-home mum, I've also been a working mum, albeit part-time, so I can see both sides. As such, I'm pretty sure there is no right or wrong, just individual choice.

Forty Winks

For some reason I'm incredibly tired at the moment, so much so that it's not beyond the realms of possibility that I could nod off whilst standing in the queue in the supermarket. Maybe I need a holiday, or maybe I need to adopt the strategy employed by the seal in the photographs on the Daily Mail's website today:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2161687/Smile-relax-Seal-finds-warm-spot-aboard-dinghy-soak-sun.html
Today's challenge: look at that face without smiling.

The Boldre Wood Trilogy

Kindle Publishing will be running a promotion on Billy of Boldre Wood on June 22nd, so if you don't have a copy yet, now is a good time to take a look:

'Billy of Boldre Wood' is the first in the trilogy and serves as an introduction to both Billy and the beauty and hazards of Boldre Wood.

The second book, 'Billy and the North Oakian Alliance' is close to being published and sees Billy making a perilous crossing of the Great Lake only to become embroiled in a turbulent and, at times, violent revolution. The preparations of Book Two are almost complete and we should be ready to publish very soon.

Book Three, 'Billy and the Carinthean War' is already drafted, so the full trilogy should be available in the near future. Watch this space for further updates.

English Reserve

I suspect my English reserve might be holding me back. It seems that the erotica genre is soaring in popularity at the moment, with the explicit romance novel Fifty Shades of Grey by Erika Mitchell (pen name El James) apparently flying off the shelves at an astonishing rate, earning Mrs Mitchell a small fortune in the process.
I dream of becoming a hugely successful author, as do all writers, but I'm not sure I could ever write convincingly in that particular genre. But who knows, my brand of fiction could be the next big thing!
I'm still working on the final story idea for the second anthology. Editing on the second book of the Boldre Wood Trilogy is going well, and I've had some good feedback on my story for Café ThreeZero.
I'm praying the great reading public soon decides that want they really want to read is imaginative fantasy adventure or maybe a collection of thought-provoking short stories.