I don’t use AI to write my books. My readers are real people and I don’t think it’s fair to ask them to buy a book and spend time reading it if I can’t be bothered to write it myself.
If you’d like to read any of my novels or themed short story collections, you can request them from libraries, order through bookshops, or buy them here.
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Wednesday word of the week – Catchword
This book is ‘Display of Heraldry’ which was published in 1660.
Back then it was only the very rich who could afford books (the kind of people who had heraldry to display). It wasn’t uncommon for workers, even skilled ones to be illiterate. You can imagine this had to potential to cause problems when some of those skilled workers had the job of binding individual pages into a book.
To ensure the pages were stitched together in the right order a catchword was used. The last word at the end of a page would be repeated at the start of the next. This meant that even those who couldn’t read the text could match up these two words and avoid expensive errors.
Judged to Perfection
I attended a book fair yesterday. 
It had been hoped some of the authors could give readings of their work. Unfortunately the acoustics in the building made that impossible.
As I’d printed out my story and nerved myself up to do it, I decided to have a go at home. It’s actually much harder to talk to a camera than real people especially when, without your glasses, you can’t see whether the thing is on or not! (I can’t read them on, just in case you were thinking I’d overlooked an obvious solution to the problem, which admittedly I sometimes do.)
Here’s the result. The story, Judged to Perfection makes up part of the free download offered when you sign up to my newsletter.
Purple scissors!
I
‘m attending a book fair on Sunday (if you’re in Portsmouth, please come and say hello – it’s free entry and there’s a cafe selling cakes).
That means I need some books to sell, and I therefore ordered some. Feeling pleased with myself for having remembered to do it in time for me to unpack and check them prior to the day I got a little bit carried away and decided to make an ‘unboxing’ video. I’m not sure when or why these became a trend, but from the ones I’d seen I had the impression it was an easy thing to do. I’m less sure about that now! Click here’s to see the result. I hope it makes you smile.
Do you use Audible?
A couple of years ago I experimented with audio books. I got three made, but never did anything much to promote them. I’ve just discovered that the free promo codes for the UK and US sites, which I should have used at the time, are still active. If you’d like one, in exchange for leaving an honest review (Audible/Amazon/Goodreads) then let me know. Please state which book, and whether you want UK or US links.
Click on the images above to learn more about each title.
Special offer!
If you use either the UK, or US Amazon store, you can currently buy the first book in my Little Mallow cosy mystery series for a reduced price.
Boo!
Happy hallowe’en! If you fancy getting into the spirit of hallowe’en but there’s not a ghost of a chance or you reading a really scary book, or you just don’t know witch to choose, then you might enjoy my collections of slightly spooky stories.
Killer New Look
The cover of my romantic murder mystery, Acting Like A Killer, has had a tweak. Do you like the new look?
Free cosy mysteries
Here’s another opportunity to sign up to author newsletters, and download a free book from each of them.
Free reads – and some to buy
I’m taking part in a few author / book promotions. This one and this one both offer free reads from authors of crime, thriller and mystery books. To claim these you must subscribe to the authors’ newsletters, but you can opt out any time if you decide you don’t want to keep receiving them.
There’s also this one which has mystery and thriller books for sale. Finally this one has cosy mystery books which are for sale, or can all be read via kindle unlimited.
Hopefully you’ll find something of interest in one of those!