Authors Electric

 Hi, I thought for my first post here I’d share some of my life changing books. They all show the power of stories! The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey Tey’s Inspector Grant is confined to a hospital bed after  a nasty fall (and it was set some time ago! They’d have him on his feet and out now!). Grant is renowned amongst his colleagues for having an eye for criminal faces and he is brought a picture of someone he discovers is Richard III.  The only thing Grant knows is what everyone thinks - Richard killed The Princes in the Tower to take the throne. Grant decides, with the help of a research assistant going to the British Library for him, to investigate. Whatever your views on Richard III, this is a great detective story. (Colin Dexter uses the same  premise when his Inspector Morse is confined to hospital - see The Wench Is Dead ).  The book made me change my views on Richard III. It is renowned for being the catalyst for many joining the Richard III Societ...

 Like so many people, I’ve been watching a lot of TV recently. There are a number of very good series available at the moment, The Great being my current favourite. The script is first rate, and very funny, despite having its darker moments. Two of the other series I have been watching are The Drowning , and Finding Alice . But there are enormous plot-holes in both of these, and I can only imagine that they have been left in the expectation of another series, although nothing has been said about this. Don’t read the rest of this if you still intend to watch them, as there will be spoilers. I have no issue with the acting or direction in either of these; excellent all round. It’s just the storyline! Where’s that script editor when you need her/him?   The Drowning: The premise is that a five-year-old boy, Tom, disappears on a family picnic by a lake and is presumed drowned although his body is never found. His mother is understandably devastated, and her marriage falls apar...

  As you read this it is pancake day or Shrove Tuesday which means it's almost Lent (yes I know this is a writing blog, bear with me). Every year I give up sugar, however, for the past few years I have also done a writing challenge. Before you get to be overwhelmed by my dedication to the craft of writing I should point out I failed miserably every year. What was the challenge? It was a 40 day writing prompt and you are supposed to write a piece of prose, short story, flash fiction, a blog post or even a poem every day. I think this was where I fell down - the thought of all those different pieces of writing froze my brain.  Those of you who know me well know that I would never in all my days call myself a poet. Yes, I write rhyming picture books but those appeal to the average 3-7 year old. Not really what I'd call poetry. I was thinking of giving you an example of my poetry but decided you were already suffering enough during a worldwide pandemic. Why would I make your eyes ...

Every winter in the Netherlands there is a chance of an Elfstedentocht (Eleven city tour). It’s an ice-skating tour that passes eleven cities in Friesland, in the north of the Netherlands. It’s about 200 km long, and can only be done when it’s very, very cold. Not just your average frost, when people flock to the canals and town ponds to skate around for a while. No, it has to be a prolonged hard frost, for the ice has to have a certain depth and hardness to it. Believe it or not, an Elfstedentocht is very popular, so tonnes of people will want to take part. Fancy getting up in the middle of the night to make a five o’clock start with temperatures of about -20C? The last one was in 1997, and I remember sitting in the neighbour’s living room watching it. The king, then crown prince, even took part, in disguise. It’s gruelling, and frostbite is a real danger. It’s a race or a tour, depending on what you sign up for, but either way, to get to the end is incredible. The whole country watch...

  Only two things are certain in life, Ben Franklin said. But to death and taxes, a third can be added for most working novelists: sooner or later they're sure to encounter a heavyweight problem they must beat or abandon a book. And no matter how many lesser ton fights have been won in the past, the heavyweight variety can take the wind out of one's sails. This is a true account of how I succeeded in making 17k tons of metal and glass disappear. The problem shouldn't have been there at all. My work in progress had a strong outline and was rolling along toward the final section set on board a train speeding through the American Southwest. The desert setting was essential for the type of creepy karma that I had in mind. Though I'd never ridden a train on this route, I had ridden numerous Amtrak trains and felt confident that Amtrak would sponsor a trip in exchange for a travel piece to print in its on-train magazine. Thus I could nail my research for the setting and the u...

  Hello! We haven’t met, so I thought I’d kick things off by telling you five facts about me. Like an ice breaker. As if we were all together at a party. Remember those? I hate fresh tomatoes with a passion. I once found myself at a dinner party faced with a vast slice of the said fruit prettily sprinkled with fresh herbs. Rejecting it was out of the question, so I cut it into four and washed each chunk down, unchewed, with gulps of white wine. Bill Bailey called my baby cute (he was, too). I can recite all the books of the New Testament in order. Just sayin’. My fifteen times great grandfather was the Bishop of Gloucester, burned at the stake by Mary Tudor. I once won a Walnut Whip eating competition (it was a grudge match back in my carefree twenties). Now we’re acquainted, let’s go! I’ve been a freelance writer for nearly thirteen years, an obsessive and voracious reader all my life and a novelist since I wrote my first work of fiction last year in lock down. That book, th...

    One of the great mysteries of the universe is how meringues came into being. I understand about toast-bread getting burned on the fire-and about stew-throwing vegetables into the cooking pot to bulk up the meat, or simply to avoid having to cook them separately. Custards and sauces make sense too. I can imagine cooks experimenting with milk, eggs and cream or adding flour to a runny sauce to stop it dripping off the plate, but who on earth decided to separate an egg and then whip up the white with sugar and vanilla? Whoever it was, I am eternally grateful, as meringue is one of my fail safe and most popular desserts. Apart from the classic Pavlova with cream and strawberries, I do one with banana and stem ginger, a plain coffee meringue, one with whisky flavoured cream, another with summer berries and am about to try out a chocolate version. In fact the list of fruit or flavours is vast and it’s fun to experiment. Once you’ve got the basic technique sorted, it’s easy...