Authors Electric

And now folks - Rump of Rump Hall! Somehow or other this blog appeared briefly on Weds, then just as mysteriously vanished. Hillary to blame, or Mr Trump - the choice is yours. Maybe the blonde bombshell himself will evaporate. Trump. Ooh, what a disgusting thought... Is it possible to watch the world events of today without despairing just a teeny weeny bit? In England the whole concept of truth is being redefined by the day, with political integrity leading the van. Men and women who pride themselves on their probity (they are honourable and right honourable members, for God’s sake) now talk about a ‘post-honest society’ as if it is the most natural thing in the world. Brexit battle buses festooned in blatant lies are now passed off jokily as rather neat examples of how to game an unimportant argument, while our new and unelected leaderene insists that she has an unshakeable mandate to do what most thinking people look on with growing apprehension. Ian Duncan Smi...

Isn't there something missing? I'm sure most of you reading this will be as relieved as I am that I'm not going to be scratching around for new things to say about Wild Wood. We had a wonderful launch party in the Slightly Foxed bookshop in Gloucester Road, another in the Albert Club in West Didsbury, and a third last night at the Conservative Club in Uppermill, near Oldham. Now, still slightly hung over from Ma Ferret's Special bitter, I intend to lie back and wait for the money to roll in. In case my fellow authors assume that that is just a normal part of writers' fantasy, let me tell you of something rather wonderful that happened today. I opened a letter and found a cheque from sales of my cut-down and edited version of Herman Melville's Moby Dick. (Pleased to see that my voice recognition engine did not put in a hyphen. Like me, it assumes that that unnecessary, and technically incorrect, punctuation mark was stuck in by a junior printer while Herman...

W ith impeccable timing, my ebook publisher Endeavour Press just told me that my sea novella, The Devil's Luck, is going up for free on Amazon at nine o'clock THIS MORNING!      Yeah, TODAY.      They suggested I asked as many people as possible to 'buy' it for nowt, to help it up the freebie ratings. I'm not sure how that helps me , but they say it does. Optimum time for free download algorithm is as close to nine as possible, so if you're feeling bored with toast and Weetabix, please click on the url below . Failing that, do it when you've finished crunching, or any time to suit yersen. And you don't even need a Kindle, I've just learned from this magnificently useful AE site - I've put the link below for people like me who tend not to read instructions. For once, it seems, I haven't missed the boat...     Missing the boat, however, is a trick I've made into something of an art form over the years. Most spectacularly was when I had...