Authors Electric

Susan Jane Smith           The last day of July saw me posting “Pay it Forward” on www.Goodreads.com as a discussion item because I am curious.   What do you think this phrase means?   What do you do to “pay it forward”?         In April people from Goodreads entered a competition to win 3 copies of my book Emotional Health for EmotionalWealth. The response was overwhelming for me and I had to stick to sending off just 3 of the paperbacks due to the cost of postage.           Now, in order to “pay it forward” I’ve just sent all the other entrants a free e-book copy and told them about the free app on my revised website so that they can read e-books on their computers, phones, iPads etc.   Praise for the book, and great reviews, would be lovely especially if they lead on to mega sales!   No expectations, but lots of hope!  ...

My computer, who I mistakenly believed was my friend, thought it would be funny the other night to hide all my documents, just so that it could watch my face when I came down in the morning and discovered them gone. When it realised that I was not going to see the funny side of this merry jape it took umbrage and flatly refused to tell me where they were. In the end I had no option but to take it to see a man who is better than me at disciplining recalcitrant machinery and he agreed to spend a couple of days persuading it to reveal where it had hidden my life’s work and to teach it the error of its ways. I handed it over and returned home alone. Once my fury at its thoughtless behaviour had abated I found myself missing my friend with an almost physical pain. It is, after all, my closest companion. I probably spend more time with it than I do with my wife, (which is food for thought in itself). As I sat, twiddling my thumbs and thinking of all the work I should be doing, all the messag...

‘As they rose, the sun rose with them as if they were racing for the top of the sky. Its warmth welcomed them, turning the dark skin of the fiery balloon a beautiful midnight blue. They flew straight up. Above them, the sweet, clear music of the lonely pipe, the only sound left in the whole world, drew them on until they prepared to hit the very roof-top of the sky itself. Then the smooth sky puckered into cloth-of-blue and drew aside for them, like curtains parting. The music called again, and they passed straight through.’ This is Bonnie, the heroine of my novel, Midnight Blue, passing from one world to another, leaving behind her old life. And today - launch day for Midnight Blue’s 21 st Anniversary edition - I feel much as she might have done, wondering what lies ahead, what I’ve let myself in for and why. SO WHY AN E-BOOK? Twenty-one years ago, Midnight Blue was launched into a very different world where Amstrad computers were the latest thing and e-books were little...