Terrorism, Alien Gender Issues and Unbound, by Enid Richemont.

I am starting my blog on the day after the terrorist attack in Westminster, once more full of thoughts about life, death and the little deities we invent in order to make sense of our existence on this small planet. The guy who did this clearly thought his life was worth sacrificing in order to murder a few of the people he imagined were offending his god by not actually believing in him (although the latest evidence suggests that he actually enjoyed hurting people regardless of their beliefs or lack of them, and had already been banged up for GBH.)
      It seems to me, however, that if you're a real god, one who'd actually created universes etc etc, you'd be somewhat above being offended by the manners of mere mortals. But then, gods need believers, otherwise, like Peter Pan's fairies, they might cease to exist (cf Terry Pratchett's "SMALL GODS")  Mr Pratchett, regrettably no longer with us, always got these things quite uncomforably, but always amusingly, right.

This is the cover image of my new little book "AHMED and the NEW BOY" (my preferred title: "AHMED and the ALIEN", but maybe this is more accessble to young readers). No one, including the teacher - well, especially the teacher - seems to notice that the new 'boy' is green, and has antennae. This is true diversity and inclusivity, although I do wonder who, and indeed, how, the alien's gender has been determined - aliens, after all, are not kittens. My original character had no discernible gender as I felt that beings evolving on Planet Zog might have turned out differently, and maybe had three or more genders or even none at all. However, you may be pleased to learn that this particular alien turns out to be very good at football, although not very much else, so possibly an accurate analogy to certain-type Earthlings.

I am still hovering on the brink of publishing a curious adult novel with Unbound. The manuscript has been accepted by them, and they are picky - they even had a Booker author on their list. I'm daunted by the self-publicity, though, which apparently is very hard work. There was an interesting article by Alice Jolly, in the recent edition of "The Author", (the journal of the Society of Authors) who published a memoir with them. She has a lot of interesting things to say about the way publishing is going. To quote Alice: Unbound does book production to the same standard as a big publisher. They edit, proofread, design the cover and produce the ebook version. They also deal with marketing and publicity, presumably all this after the book has acquired the necessary funding - in my case, £4000, which does seem like a helluva lot to raise when I could set up the whole thing myself for peanuts. I've just been on its site, though, and picked up on the illustrated chronicles of Donaeld the Unready, the Best Medieval King out there. He's got great swords, everyone says so. Fake chronicles everywhere. Fight back against Mad Monk Bede and his Twisty Scribings. Love it! Feel Mr Trump has a second life, after impeachment, as a comedy act.

http://www.enidrichemont.org.uk