Tales of Dusty Death, a new collection of short stories, takes you travelling: France, Norway, Greece, Russia; as far away as South America and back at home. They illustrate the dilemmas of contemporary death and lead you into the realms of murder and magic realism. The new arrival ‘Jane Hayward's distinctive stories step unafraid into … Continue reading A New Publication
Sunday is no longer a universal day of rest. Back in 1994, John Major, the Prime Minister, brought in legislation to allow shopping and going to the cinema on a Sunday as well as following the normal weekend activities such as walking in the park or having tea with Granny. Which is one pleasure we … Continue reading A Day of Rest
We have jumped the gun a bit and have escaped to a warm and sunny place in Italy. I’m not saying how we did it but we have. No longer physically in lock-down seems to have unlocked my brain too so here I am writing a new post for my blog. Before we left London, … Continue reading Style Proofs
For now, at least! Here is the situation. I published The Baby Box through Matador Publishing Co. Enjoyed the experience; learnt a great deal. First on the learning curve is that I probably ordered too many copies, asking for 500. For sure the books are still selling and opportunities are still presenting themselves to me, … Continue reading Last Thoughts on Self-Publishing
I wrote a memoir. I’m not a celeb. Why would any commercial publisher be interested? I self-published. It used to be the fact that the face of self-publishing had mud all over it. The more realistic description of the method of publishing your own book was Vanity Publishing, a term which is now extinct. … Continue reading The Respectable Face of Self-Publishing
For just this week, I’m returning to the question of self-publishing as I had a friend of a friend ring me to discuss the experience of my publishing The Baby Box. I’m deliberately not going to confirm which publisher I used. You can discover that for yourself if you want to. These are the questions … Continue reading More on Self-Publishing
With Chiswick Book Festival over – it has been fun – @W4BookFest – it’s a return to this autumn’s main task. To polish and submit short stories. The question of finding publishers of short stories came up more than one during the Festival’s sessions. There are 2 main destinations for short stories: competitions and submissions … Continue reading Short Stories – where to send them
Hello and Good Evening. Most of you here lived through the 1960s and some of you didn’t. So here’s the story. The 1960s was perceived as the swinging 60s and the permissive society, with the Beatles singing Love, Love Me Do. And we did. We loved each other. But behind the pop songs and the … Continue reading Chiswick Book Festival 2019 : The Full Pitch
The sights, smells and memories of the past weeks must be put away. No more moths drowning in the milk or dozing on a lampshade. The porcini mushrooms found in the garden have been eaten and we are still alive. The sun cream lotion is stored away, the beds are stripped and a large pile … Continue reading Moths in the Milk and Porcini on the Plate
Anyone out there who has read my memoir, The Baby Box, could be forgiven for assuming that I am an only child. One friend certainly did and said that being an only child explained why my mother was so harsh with me. No, my mother was harsh because I upset the middle-class, domestic apple-cart big … Continue reading Whose Memory?
