Authors Electric

Church of England Christmas:  Carols round the Tree So wrote Janette Winterson, making this quote from her adoptive mother  the title of her autobiography (published in 2012). “Fast forward” from Thursday 12th December, and we’ve nearly hit Wednesday 25th December, Christmas Day... As a person who studied social and political science, my involvement with the recent shenanigans in our Parliament has been on alert . For the UK election, the NHS and climate change topped my agenda. And I am unambiguously appalled by the results. On “social media” many of us have shared – not reviled, ranted, or abused, but shared – our distress for our country. We  are not happy. We don’t want to see this as “normal”. Parents of disabled children, people with long-term health problems (like diabetes), people who know through their work the cost in human life and future prospects of child poverty, homelessness, poorly funded education and failing health and mental health ser...

‘Merry Crishmus.’ The text was from my guide, reminding me I’d agreed to be up early to go hiking today.             Pokhara was twinkling but I did not look back as Tika led me through the city and across a suspension bridge into the foothills of the Himalaya. I puffed up, with boots and walking pole, as two women in flip-flops came down with oranges for the market. Would I like to buy some? Of course.             Less than a mile later we met a friend of Tika’s who took us to his house. His tree was laden with oranges – we must eat some. But we could not linger long, as his aunt expected us for lunch. High in the mountains there is little choice and we ate traditional a Nepali meal of rice, spinach and lentil dhal. At least she has a biogas stove and no longer has to collect wood from the forest for cooking. And her tree was laden with oranges; she picked some ju...

          All of us Electric Authors here at Authors Dreaming Central wish our readers a very happy Christmas.           It's Christmas Day, so I don't suppose many people are going to read this - apart from the odd one taking a breather from the festivities.  But for those who do, here's a short and rather sweet Christmas story, inspired by my own family's Christmas memories.... THE CHRISTMAS TREES           'Oh look! Look! The chimney sweep! Oh, I used to love him!' Jennifer held up a small glass globe which tapered, at the top and bottom, into delicate glass spikes. It was a perfect, pale lavender in colour, neither too red nor too blue. The translucent glass sphere attracted light and held it, like a bubble.             Painted round it was a dark-blue silhou...

A month ago, after twenty years in publishing, I launched my first e-book. Now it's feedback time. Three words spring to mind when I ask myself how it went. Panic. Exhilaration. Exhaustion. In that order. Even the most careful planning can go awry. Everything was lined up to happen at the push of a button. Book launched on Kindle, click . New look Pauline Fisk website launched with fabulous new ‘Midnight Blue’ artwork, click . Authors Electric posting launched entitled ‘Why Now, Why an E-Book and Why Kindle’, click . Mailshot launched to two hundred and fifty addresses, click . But you can’t launch anything without the internet. At five in the morning [yes, so keen was I to get launching that I was up at five] I was to be found on the phone to a BT engineer trying to figure out what had gone wrong. After an hour of phone calls back and forth, involving crawling under my desk, pulling out plugs and reinstating them and being sent to obscure corners of my computer to click the ‘...