Adele Cosgrove-Bray's

Rowan and Teeth!

2012-02-10T17:11:00.001Z

Hot off the software, here's the proposed front cover for Rowan, which should be available as an ebook by the end of this month. All the shells used are from either West Kirby beach or Red Rocks, Hoyake, which is where Rowan would have collected them. Some of the poetry which Rowan writes features shells. Anyway, let me know what you think of the cover.

Other than creating this, today I had an appointment with my dentist - a lovely man whose kindness has helped me overcome my childhood horror of dentists, which was caused by the horror of a dentist I was made to attend as a child. Why my sister Hazel and I were continually sent to this uncaring, even cruel person I do not know. His syringes had a similar thickness to knitting needles, and the drill he used was a huge thing on a folding arm which made your entire head vibrate. As soon as I reached my teens I rebelled and went elsewhere, and Hazel swiftly did likewise.

Amanda Hocking Interview

2012-02-08T10:32:00.001Z

I enjoyed this video interview with Amanda Hocking. She seems a very likable lady, and down-to-earth despite her huge success with ebooks.

Site Changes

2012-02-04T18:07:00.002Z

Snowdrops in my garden.

I've been wearing my techie hat today, giving this site a much-needed re-design. Instead of having all my books for sale in one heap, on one page, I've split them up. Now all the short stories are together, the two poetry ebooks are together, and Tamsin and Rowan have dedicated pages. It's easier for people to find what they're looking for, and I can add character sketches and other relevant bits 'n' bobs.

I am also considering shipping the bibliography to HubPages. There, it can rest in peace while satisfying the zealous administrator aspect of my make-up. Here, it's a bit pointless maybe? People might be confused between which material is currently available and which is not.

It always surprises me how long these 'little jobs' can take. Let me know what you think, anyway. And if you've any bright ideas for making the site better, please feel free to share them.

Ebooks a Fad?

2012-02-01T10:42:00.006Z

I read an unintentionally funny article in The Guardian (the online edition, as I never buy newspapers or magazines) which claimed ebooks are a fleeting fad. Real books are published on paper only, apparently, and people won't adapt to not owning collections of yellowing paperbacks. Who would jettison the pleasure of holding a crumbling, slightly pongy but much-loved novel in favour of a mechanical gadget?

There was the assumption that literary fiction requires the traditional paper format, and would only be accepted by its readers if this was adhered to. Genre fiction, on the other hand, was considered far less lofty (even though it outsells lit fic by the shed-load) and therefore it was thought permissible for this to slum-it on ereaders.

Remember twelve-track cassette tapes? Remember those 1" thick tapes on whopping great spools? People used to say CDs would never replace these, as CDs were too expensive and people who had accumulated big music collections would be reluctant to change formats even though the sound quality on CDs was better. Some people still had those brittle 10" discs which played crackles at 78 mph. Wax cylinders - let's not forget those! Or those scribes of old who'd sit in a market place and offer to write letters or copy scrolls in return for a shekel or two; they probably told their clients that those new-fangled printing presses wouldn't take over from their traditional role.

I think the changes in music formats are a good indicator of the changes happening in publishing. Most people under twenty apparently prefer to download music in digital form rather than buy a CD. They have cast off the desire to own big collections of physical objects (CDs, vinyl albums) in favour of portable, cheap formats. People buy only the tracks they like, instead of whole albums which have maybe five or six good songs plus a few pot-boilers. And if you're a student or someone who's living in a ~~poky~~ bijou apartment, or someone who is likely to be moving around a lot, its just easier to have less stuff.

Similar principles apply to books. There will probably always be a place for large-format art books, simply because people like looking at big pictures. On the other hand, once the technology improves and images (and text) can be projected like a holographic cinema screen, then this may not be an issue either.

Fads die out because they don't work well, or because their scope is limited. Ereaders, on the other hand, seem highly likely to keep getting better as with all technology.

Years ago, I used to work in Liverpool City Library. One of my jobs was to retrieve old books stored in the vast stacks. There were literally thousands of books there, on shelves inaccessible to the public. Some of these books were highly valuable, worth more than most people's annual salaries. Others were worth no more than pence, if their market value was the only value ascribed to them. These books were kept for reference only, and had to be read at the library tables. Now whole libraries like this can be carried round on one small gadget, accessible to all at any time. If you consider that knowledge is power, isn't this more powerful?

Elizabeth Gates at Riverside Writers

2012-01-31T11:14:00.005Z

The paperback edition of Tamsin is now available from Amazon.com and the Amazon UK outlet should be available in a few days.

Last night's Riverside Writers meeting was interesting. One of our members, Elizabeth Gates, has a BA. Honours in English Language and Literature and an MA in Linguistics. Since 1985, she has been a practising journalist. She is also an experienced ghostwriter. In 2005, Elizabeth trained as a personal and executive coach with the prestigious coach training school, Coaching Development. Since then she has developed the Lonely Furrow Company, which specialises in writing coaching and communication coaching using transactional analysis, neuro-linguistic programming and accelerated learning techniques.

Elizabeth ran a workshop on how to overcome writers block. She had put a considerable amount of forethought into the workshop, and included a few simple writing exercises, the first of which asked us to write for one minute only and answer the question, "What weather are you?" Without giving the exercise much thought, I wrote, "I am twilight; an equal blend of light and dark; a fusion of opposites."

Another exercise required us to write for three minutes, again without giving it much thought, and complete: When I'm writing well I feel ...(fill in the blank); if I were not a blocked writer I could ...(fill in the blank). In response to this, I wrote, "When I'm writing well, I don't think about writing. The words flow without plan. I'm involved in the story, watching the story unfold as if it was a film in my mind. The images unroll, and I merely write down what I see. The characters take on a life of their own; a cliche, but true. When I'm not writing well, I make too many cups of tea and think about biscuits." My response didn't entirely fit the project but writers block isn't an issue for me.

Elizabeth then went on to encourage people to have a comfy writing area, to develop a daily word count, and to read widely and analytically - which is pretty standard advice, but our group's membership has quite a few new and new-ish writers as well as those who've been hitting a set minimum daily word count for some years already.

In all truth, I don't have a problem with writers block. If a story gets stuck it's because there's something wrong with it. The trick is to work out what's wrong then fix it, even if that means changing and/or deleting large chunks of text. Being too precious about writing will hamper progress. For example, over the last couple of weeks I've been sporadically working on a 3,000 word short story which got stuck mid-way. The story was ok but nothing much had happened, plot-wise. So I changed the gender of one of the two main characters, and instantly this opened up the flow of ideas.

Learn more about Elizabeth Gates here: Lonely Furrow Company

Felicity Kendal and Penelope Keith Lay Eggs!

2012-01-29T09:42:00.002Z

My two young silver-laced wyandottes, Felicity Kendal and Penelope Keith, both laid their first eggs this morning! The third, smaller, egg in the dish was laid by my older hen, Joyce Grenfell, who is an ISA Brown.

You can watch them on this video:

Tamsin

2012-01-25T09:21:00.002Z

The paperback cover for "Tamsin"

The paperback version of Tamsin (ISBN 9781468092684) is now available from here. It will be become available on Amazon in around a week's time. The ebook is already available, of course, and the ebook costs less.

It will be interesting to discover which sells the most - the paperback or the ebook. At this point I suspect it'll be the ebook but time will tell. Not everyone owns an ereader, obviously. I don't; I've got Adobe's free ereader on my PC, but I would like a Kindle simply because it saves buying half a rainforest's worth of paper each year. Plus ereaders are so portable. You can carry a library with you wherever you go. When an ereader can double as a laptop (so I can write in Word then store the file for use on a PC-compatible CD), then I'll definitely get one. Or maybe someone's already invented a gadget like this? If so, let me know. I won't even attempt to pretend to be up-to-date on these things.

Interestingly, in today's news are reports of Amazon's plans to publish adult ebooks as paperbacks. Clearly they've found that enough paperbacks are still selling to make this venture worth their while. A similar reasoning is behind my decision to release my novels both as ebooks and paperbacks.

New Low Ebook Prices!

2012-01-19T10:23:00.002Z

Yesterday I dropped the prices of all of my ebooks, and overnight I've seen an increase in sales.

One of the highly useful aspects of self-publishing with today's technology is that any author is free to make changes like this at the drop of a hat. We can experiment to discover for ourselves what works and what doesn't, and adapt accordingly with a few clicks of a computer mouse. The power is in our hands, rather than with a committee who "know best".

Logic dictates that it's better to sell, say, 1,000 ebooks at $1 each than a few books at $6.99.

Logic also dictates that it's better to sell books than to leave them gathering dust on a shelf - hence my foray into self-publishing. I've been traditionally published in the past, in fiction anthologies and as a non-fiction freelancer. But could I sell my novels to an agent or publisher? I was told they're not commercial, or too "occult", or too strange. Let's let readers decide, hmm? Tamsin is the first in my series about a community of artisan-sorcerers, and you can pick up a copy today from Amazon or Smashwords for all of $1.99.

My other titles are available from $0.99. How long I'll leave things so cheap is another matter. This blog attracts increasing traffic, so if you like what you've been reading here then how about helping me out by buying my ebooks today?

Ebooks Easily Outselling Print

2012-01-13T15:05:00.003Z

It was reported that 32 of the top 50 best-selling book titles in America were ebooks. That's good news for ebook self-publishers! Or indie publishers, to coin the increasingly-used term. I'm not sure who we're independent of - certainly not the ebook buyers or online vendors, or the various search engines, internet service providers, software script writers, reviewers, PayPal, the tax inspector, and so on. All these do their bit to help, helping themselves along the way of course, which is fair enough. Well, maybe I'll exclude the tax inspector from that last remark...

Seaside Stories - Submission Guidelines

2012-01-08T12:18:00.003Z

Seaside Stories (working title) will be a free ebook distributed through Amazon Kindle and Smashwords (and via Smashwords, through Barnes & Noble, Sony, Apple iPlayer, Kobo, and Diesel).

No-one earns any money - the aim is solely promotional.

Wanted: stories and poetry with a seaside theme. Any genre is ok. Poetry should be no longer than 40 lines. Stories should be no longer than 1500 words. But this is a guideline only - query if you have something which you think would be perfect but is outside of these word counts.

Submissions Deadline: June 1st, 2012.

How to submit: Submissions are open to all members of Riverside Writers, who are invited to send up to three pieces each, or more if they are smallish pieces. Ask if unsure. Participants might want to include a small biography of up to 500 words (no photos).

Send by email to riversidewriters@aol.com. Please do not send attachments. All attachments will be deleted. All text should be in the body of the email. Please type SEASIDE STORIES in the subject line.

The ebook will be edited and formatted for digital publishing by Adele Cosgrove-Bray. It will appear on her Amazon pages (USA and UK) and website. All participants will be able to add it to their own webpages too, if they choose to.

Sleep Apnoea

2012-01-07T11:52:00.006Z

We spent the Xmas period waiting for the results of Richard's second MRI scan. The doctors thought they had found something but weren't sure what, hence the need for the second test, this time with an injection of luminous gloop so they could see more clearly what may be causing his awful migraines. The good news is that he only has an enlarged vein in his brain, which does not require any medical attention.

Richard has suffered from migraines for over thirty years. He's run through every tablet available on the NHS. Most night's he's sat with an ice-pack on his head. He also has irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) which means he can't drink alcohol, eat spicy or fatty foods, and has a string of allergies longer than your arm. Eating out can leave him ill for days, even when the menu is pored over carefully. Even minor changes of routine, such as a day's travelling, can put him in bed for days.

However, for years I've grumbled about his horrendous snoring. He sounds something like a cross between a hovercraft and a pneumatic drill. Watch the video to learn what I mean:

Being complained-at by me encouraged Richard to complain to his doctor, who sent him to a specialist clinic. They sent him home with a testing kit made up of a plastic peg for one index finger and a sort-of bracelet for one wrist. These were wired into a box which then sent data to the hospital's computer.

When he walked into the clinic to receive the results, he was told his was the worst case of sleep apnoea the specialist had come across in seventeen years. Sleep apnoea isn't just snoring - most people snore, and that's fine. Sleep apnoea is when the snoring noise is caused by the person fighting to breathe, if they even can breath. During a six-hour period, Richard stopped breathing 480 times.

The computer printed out a chart whose graph line is supposed to be a long, level line. Richard's zigzagged that much it went, quite literally, off the chart. He vanished for thirty minutes, probably whilst visiting the bathroom. No, our house isn't that big - he often falls asleep on the throne. Many a night I've yelled, "Wake up and get off the pot!" Such are the dignities of marriage.

When your specialist asks how come you're not dead, it's serious.

Oddly enough, what clinched the diagnoses was the video. The nurses found it most amusing and were eager to meet the star of the show. Richard apparently has an unusually narrow windpipe with a larger than usual epiglottis, which causes his air supply to be cut off. There is no cure, he was told, and in his case surgery wouldn't work. The only aid is to spend every night, for the rest of his life, with an oxygen mask. Better that, though, than dying in his sleep - which is a real possibility

Sleep apnoea results in a person not sleeping properly. As much of the body's healing and self-regenerating work happens then, this interuption results in lowered immunity, lethargy, bad temper, confusion, clumsiness, poor concentration etc. People who have this condition are significantly more prone to strokes and heart attacks, and also type-two diabetes.

Richard doesn't drive a car, but if he did then the specialist said the licence would have to be rescinded. Likewise, he would not be allowed to work with heavy machinery. A person with sleep apnoea, due to their poor night-time sleep, can readily fall asleep at any point in the day. The minute Richard sits down at home and relaxes he falls asleep, even in mid-conversation.

The specialist also told Richard that many of his other problems, such as migraines and IBS, will probably calm down a lot once the oxygen mask equipment has been organised - which will be sometime in April. April?!! Such is the efficiency of the NHS.

Goals for 2012

2012-01-03T20:30:00.005Z

Apparently if you write down your goals and share them, you're much more likely to actually achieve them than if you merely cast a few thoughts in the general direction of Wishful Thinking. So, here's my list of goals for the next year, in no particular order of importance. I'll review them in twelve months and let you know how I got on.

Publish 2nd poetry collection.
Publish 2nd short story collection.
Publish Rowan.
Write one short story per month (minimum).
Write one poem per month (minimum).
Publish a free ebook (possibly with Riverside Writers).
Complete 1st draft of Fabian.
Add one new design to Spooky Cute Designs per month (minimum).
Lose weight!
Put something into my ISA each month.

Those with sharp eyes might notice I've already achieved one of these goals, as Threads, my second collection of poetry, was published today. Sceptics might say this is cheating as the project was already nearing completion, but if a bit of positive psychology helps to achieve the remaining nine items then that's fine by me!

Threads - New Poetry Ebook Out Today!

2012-01-03T11:31:00.001Z

Threads: a diverse collection of poetry by Adele Cosgrove-Bray, dating from 1983 to 2008.

Many of these poems have been previously published in "Moonstone" and "Touchstone" (the journal of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids.)

Liverpool - Thatcher's Social Experiment?

2011-12-30T11:27:00.004Z

Secret governmental files dating from 1981 have now been released for public viewing. Most of the press seem fixated on trivia, such as Margaret Thatcher's alleged squabble over the purchase of an ironing board. However, of real interest is the documented deliberate financial crippling of the city of Liverpool.

Liverpool in the 1980s and early-to-mid 1990s was a tough place to live. It was probably the most difficult place in the UK to find work. The city shopping area was limited; wander away from Bold Street and the Bold Street end of Church Street, or the smatter of shops on London Road, and you'd pass empty buildings which swiftly faded into dereliction. It was a place where long-term unemployment was the norm, where those who had jobs were looked upon as lucky or treacherous, depending on your politics.

It is estimated that the city lost one third of its population as people relocated in search of better lives. Added to this was the stigma given by the British press, which labelled all Liverpudlians as thieves, trouble-makers, lazy dole-scroungers who'd go on strike at the drop of a hat. If sweeping statements like these were made about other specific groups of people, it would be called racism or similar.

Boys from the Blackstuff, the play written by Alan Bleasdale, caught the mood of the times despite mostly being written a year or so before Thatcherism began its climb. For many, the character of Yosser Hughes perfectly summed up the desperation felt after prolonged unemployment. When Yosser's refrain of "Gizza job!" became a joke used by TV comedians, outsiders failed to understand Liverpool's annoyance. Too many people from the city knew too many real-life Yossers.

People talked of a deliberate crippling of their city, and suspected their lives were part of a secret social experiment. This was dismissed as being typical of Scouse whinging. Now it seems such suspicions were totally justified.

I moved to Liverpool in the late 1980s, having got a job in the Religion and Philosophy Library in Central Library. Liverpool then was a depressing place; the sandstone buildings were black with grime, and an atmosphere of stoic misery hung over the city. People used to ask why Liverpudlians had a sense of humour, and the usual response was that a person needed a sense of humour to live there.

I resigned from the library job to go to art school. After art school, I was unemployed for around five years. I enrolled on various job creation schemes and attended Job Club but my situation remained unchanged. Each day, a bundle of paper slips arrived at Job Club with details of all the latest vacancies. We'd immediately phone to enquire, only to be told the job had already gone. This happened with such frequency we finally suspected that these jobs hadn't existed in the first place.

I'd have to choose between putting the fire on and eating. As it was, I could only afford two meals a day and one of those was breakfast cereal, eaten mid-morning in an attempt to balance out hunger. I was living in a tiny flat whose windows were padded with scrunched-up newspapers to keep the wind out. Silverfish ran over the kitchen worktops, and everything had woodworm. The only room for the waste bin was in the bath, and the bathroom was right next to the kitchen. The immersion heater, if left on for an hour, warmed two inches of bathwater only before running cold again. The downstairs hall light didn't work so I had to keep a torch next to the front door. There was no money to move elsewhere. There was no money for new clothes or shoes; I walked through snow and rain with cardboard patching up the holes in my shoes. It was usual to see people with plastic bags sticking out of the top of their worn-out boots to keep their feet dry.

I recall a Tory MP - though his name escapes me - who lived on unemployment benefit for two weeks to prove it could be done. His experiment was announced as a roaring success even though he quit early. And the simple facts that his kitchen cupboards and freezer were already well-stocked with food, his fuel bills paid, his car maintained, his clothing in good repair, his hair cut, his health good, his house not in need of immediate attention etc, were omitted from his experiment.

So many people were unemployed! Official figures today claim there were only three million people out of work, which is so false it's almost comical. I wonder when, if ever, the true figures will be revealed? I recall estimations of ten million, but who knows the truth of it - apart from the secret governmental files still locked away.

Anyway, today Liverpool is a very different city. Massive amounts of cash have come into the city; huge regeneration projects have transformed the look of the place. Old buildings gleam. New buildings are everywhere. Once-empty warehouses are now luxury homes. Skyscraper hotels are appearing. Designer shops fill the Liverpool One shopping quarter. A new multi-screen cinema is about to be built. International business is pouring into the city, and its population is rising. Prospects look good.

But the Thatcher years have not been forgotten in this city. And no-one cares about her ironing board.

Preferred Priorities Document for UK Cryonicists

2011-12-28T18:53:00.005Z

Of interest to British cryonicists is the new Preferred Priorities for Care (PPC) document. This piece of paperwork aims to ensure end-of-life choices are expressed clearly, so everyone involved knows what is wanted and how to achieve this.

To quote the NHS website, "The explicit recording of individual wishes can form the basis of care planning in multi-disciplinary teams and other services, therefore reducing unplanned admissions and avoiding inappropriate and/or unwanted interventions. "

For the cryonicist, this is useful development for the obvious reason that unless everyone knows about your intentions to not have an autopsy and to be cryo-preserved in tact, and it's in writing and witnessed, then that old phrase about mice, men and plans being put asunder comes into play. Having this in a legal Will is good, but Wills tend to be read after the event, whereas this document should be in the patient's Care Plan and medical records.

Download a PPC document for yourself here: http://www.endoflifecareforadults.nhs.uk/tools/core-tools/preferredprioritiesforcare

Turin Shroud and Da Vinci

2011-12-21T10:04:00.005Z

Apparently, Italian scientists have recently decided that the Turin Shroud was created by a supernatural event. This seems an odd conclusion for scientists.

Surely our lack of understanding of a thing does not mean that same thing is of supernatural origin. It simply means we don't understand it yet.

The cloth of the Turin shroud has been carbon dated. Three seperate investigations - Oxford University, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology and the University of Arizona - all concluded that the fabric was from the Middle Ages, somewhere between 1260 and 1390. It was woven on a perfectly ordinary loom of that era.

The real mystery surrounds the image itself, which some people insist is the face of Jesus, if only because it's a bloke with a beard. This actually only demonstrates that people choose to believe whatever is convenient or satisying to believe.

There is, however, another explanation which is rather more rational, as this video suggests. It might be noted that Leonardo da Vinci wasn't born until 1452, which means that the alleged shroud pre-dates his era. However, this doesn't discount the possibility that he bought a sheet of old cloth with which to conduct his experiment. These-days people call it shabby chic.

Ebook and Book Cover Design

2011-12-16T16:33:00.003Z

Here is the proposed paperback cover for Tamsin, which is due out in January 2012. The blank white square is where the barcode will go.

As of this afternoon, the ebook edition is available via Smashwords, and the Kindle edition will be online within a few hours of my typing this. Further distribution will follow.

Scroll down to a recent post to see the ebook cover, which has the same rose on the black velvet background, with the title above that. Different format, different cover specifications - as ebooks don't have a back cover or a spine, obviously - hence the minor adaptations.

When self-publishing, a person has a choice of paying someone to design covers for them or creating covers for themselves. If you're weak on design skills the first option is probably the best. Don't underestimate the importance of how a book cover looks. Think of your own behaviour when browsing in a bookstore, whether it's online or a brick-and-mortar shop - assuming your area still has any. What attracts you to a particular book, which you've perhaps never heard of before, if not the title and the attention-catching cover? A browser picks up a book to take a closer look because some element of the cover design has interested them.

Ebook listings tend to show cover images which are the size of a postage stamp. This means that complex images are going to look like a fuzzy splodge, and arty fonts will probably be rendered illegible. So the key is to create covers which will work at this small size. They need to grab attention, and they also need to be relevant to the book's contents. No matter how great that photo of your pet rabbit might be, if your novel is about a space-age detective then you'll need a different image. The picture needs to tell a viewer what the story is about. Keep it simple, clear and to the point.

It might be advisable to take some time to scroll through ebook listings and consider which covers work and which don't, and why. Consider all aspects of the cover, including predominant colours, wording, visual mood, vital information (ie. the title, author name, blurb).

Don't ever rush the writing of blurb! Blurb might take ten seconds to read, but those deceptively simple words make or break a sale. Having taken a year or six to write your book, you surely want to sell it . If you lifted up a cookery book and the back cover read, "This is about sausages and stuff", would you buy it? Actually, given a suitably quirky context, that just might work....

The image of a rose comes from a photograph of one of the last roses of summer from my garden. I took the shot against a black velvet cloth, using natural light through my kitchen window in combination with spotlights.

I'm particularly happy with the ebook cover, and expect the ebook to outsell the paperback edition anyway. Here's hoping potential buyers like the results. Let me know what you think, hmm?

Who's Reading Me? Or, The Joy of Statistics.

2011-12-13T10:51:00.003Z

For the first time ever, I took a look at my viewer statistics. It beats reading yet more gloom about the economy.

According to my YouTube stats, 73.2% of my viewers are female. Their ages range between the ages of 25 - 54, the predominant group clearly being between 45 - 54. The majority of viewers came from Germany, followed by Britain, Italy, America then Spain. Of British viewers, 74.9% were female, while 64.4% of American viewers were male. Gender stats weren't available for other countries.

My Facebook stats tell a different story. There, 49% of my readers were female while 47% were male - a much more even split. The ages spanned a wider range, going from 18 - 55+, with 33% being aged between 34 - 44, and 34% being between 45 - 54. The greater majority of viewers came from America then Britain, with other countries trailing far behind these two.

Here, Blogger's stats don't offer gender information. Most of the traffic comes from America and Britain, with Russia, Germany, the Netherlands then Canada following behind. The stats tell me which percentage of viewers used which browsers; if you're interested in that, then 47% use Internet Explorer, 34% use Firefox, 7% use Chrome. The number of people reading my blog is rising steadily, though comments are infrequent. (Are you all shy?!!)

However, on my blog there's a second stats-gathering gadget which looks like a mini Planet Earth with dots for visitors. The stats for that show that this blog's had visits from 46 countries, the main ones being America then England, with Australia, the Netherlands, Canada, Brazil, India, Belgium, Germany then Russia following behind. No stats about the gender of the traffic is available.

Make of this what you will.

Parallel Dimensions 2011.

2011-12-12T10:43:00.000Z

Photos from Parallel Dimensions 2011, which was the third annual F/H/SF event where authors share some of their stories with an audience. This year's PD took place in a side room in West Kirby Library, Wirral.

Adele Cosgrove-Bray

Adele Cosgrove-Bray - and orb (or dust speck, take your choice!)

Jon Mayhew

Mjke Wood

Peter Caton

Tim Hulme

Nell and Mince Pies

2011-12-11T15:36:00.006Z

Last night we watched Nell, which stars Jodie Foster, Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson. This is a story about a young woman who was found living in a remote shack without modern amenities. Nell had been raised by her mother, who spoke poorly due to the effects of a stroke, and consequently Nell's version of English was at first assumed to be the nonsense of a severely mentally handicapped person.

Jodie Foster's acting in this film was extraordinary. I've been an admirer of her work for years anyway but this intense performance was fascinating.

The film occasionally strayed into sentimentality, and there were a few little holes in the plot. Where was Nell's mother getting money from (which she exchanged for groceries delivered to a rock near their home, the money being left in a purse there). If the mother - who died at the start of the film - had needed to buy food so would Nell, an issue which was ignored by the plot. Trust me to spot a glitch in the practicalities!

Richard's in the kitchen cooking mince pies as I type this. He's using frozen pastry, the type that's pre-rolled. He forgot to defrost it, so "melted" it a bit in the oven. I advised him it might be a good idea to remove the plastic wrappers. He tried to do this and, being half-frozen, the pastry sheets cracked into pieces. He "melted" it a bit more then squashed it all together, rubbed flour into it to soak up the sticky bits, and rolled it out again. Now I can smell the results cooking in the oven.

Mince pie, anyone, hmm? No, I thought not! Bleurch.

Jacques Vallée on Why Things Aren't as they Seem

2011-12-10T11:48:00.004Z

Are you ready for a new kind of physics?

The universe which we're aware of is only one system within an infinity of larger and smaller universes. Jacques Vallée discusses this, among other things, in the video above.

Picture a Russian Doll, filled with smaller and smaller similar Russian Dolls. The outer doll represents the universe which we're aware of, filled with atomic then sub-atomic then sub-atomic particles and so on, infinitely smaller - as represented by the increasingly smaller Russian Dolls. But that outer doll is also surrounded by a bigger doll (which we're maybe unaware of), and that is also surrounded by an even bigger doll, and so on, infinitely.

Or to phrase it another way: As above, so below.

Emerging technology will allow us to communicate directly, not just with an ex-school pal who now lives on the other side of this planet, or with a relative stranger who shares an interest in collecting hand-made dolls, for example, but with some of these other dimensions. And who is to say that such communications haven't already been taking place?

Set aside confused ideas about little grey men from outer space. How about saying hi to the guys from the next dimension?

With thanks to the good captain and a poetic sailor for finding this video.

Tamsin

2011-12-08T10:43:00.005Z

Tamsin Book Cover

2011-12-02T15:46:00.001Z

Coming soon.... Tamsin

Set in Liverpool, Tamsin tells the story of a young woman's experiences with two very different secret societies. Kai's philosophy is spiritual but bizarre. Fabian is gorgeous but his company brings Tamsin into danger. How can she choose between them?

This is a vampire story like you've never encountered before. No teenaged angst, no gentlemen weeping at the beauty of the night... This is real-world grit.

Adele's Free Newsletter

2011-11-30T11:31:00.002Z

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/adelecosgrovebray/

Discover Adele's FREE Yahoo! group newsletter. There's a clickable link on the side menu, or use the link above. The group has been around for quite a while, but from today members can now communicate and reply to each other.

Enjoy!

Chester

2011-11-27T16:15:00.003Z

Ed Alleyne-Johnson plays his electric violin.

Thursday saw me in Chester, having a day's break from proofreading Tamsin. After a pleasant lunch of chicken escalopes with prosciutto di Parma and mozzarella, I wandered onto Eastgate Street and immediately recognised the distinctive sounds of Ed Alleyne-Johnson's electric violin. He was busking by one of the short flights of stone steps leading onto the mews, which are something of a tourist magnet because of their 'olde worlde' charm.

So, after enjoying the music for a while, I wandered round the shops. Why are Xmas decorations up already? It's November still! I really dislike the gradual spreading-out of this festival, with all its attendant kitsch. If it was contained to the main fortnight it would be far less tedious.

Each year at Riverside Writers, when we're setting our monthly writing project, someone will try to push for December's story or poem to be on a Xmas theme. By far the majority of us groan at the prospect. My response has always been to point out that if a person wants to give their story a religious (or political) theme then they're 100% free to do so - just don't try and inflict the theme on the rest of us. Anyway, I digress...

Chester. I've probably mentioned before that Chester's one of my favourite places. It has an attractive energy; a fusion of the historical and the contemporary. As cities go it's a pretty small one, but it's got a river and a canal winding around it, and those lovely old Roman walls, and a heavy scattering of cafes and coffee bars... At the height of summer the throngs of shuffling tourists can be a nuisance if you're in a hurry to cut through the city centre, but if you're smart you'll zip along the lesser-used sidestreets lined with lovely old buildings, which are a visual treat in themselves.

Chester's a place where I can easily see myself living. Venice has great appeal, but Chester's probably more practical. Ahem.

Climate Disaster a Hoax

2011-11-25T14:52:00.002Z

Apparently, climate scientists funded by the American government have announced that various gloomy global warming scenarios are extremely unliley to happen.

Scientists, comfortably funded to find conclusions which fitted a politically motivated agenda, only looked at the weather from 1850, apparently. As any schoolchild can tell you, Earth is a tad older than that.

How old is Earth? Most estimations come out at 4.6 billion years old, based on the radiometric age dating of meteorite material. It's fair to assume that during 4.6 billion years, Earth's seen a lot of weather. This includes possibly five Ice Ages, all of which took place numerous millennia before our little Industrial Revolution.

Had you heard that most of the oxygen in Earth's atmosphere is produced, not by tropical rainforests, but by kelp? So the story about us all choking to death due to deforestation - and believe me, the Druid in me loves trees - seems a bit of a stretch of the facts. Apparently in the UK we now have more trees growing than at any time since the Norman invasion.

Meanwhile, we've all been sold lots of "green" items: longlife light bulbs filled with toxic mercury, fridges with different gas inside them, new insulation which wears out after ten years, new-style double-glazing, extra waste bins to collect lots of recyclable packaging which doesn't actually get recycled because no-one wants a wopping great incinerator built next to their house... And there're lots of apparently worthy campaigns to save this, that and the other, which present themselves as charities when they're actually non-profit making businesses whose top staff slice off rather tasty salaries.

Bad Sex

2011-11-22T20:10:00.001Z

Are you ready for the Literary Review's 19th annual Bad Sex in Fiction Award?

Famous nominees include Stephen King, James Frey, Jean M Auel and Haruki Murakami, and the subject has its very own Twitter hashtag in #badsexaward.

I can think of a few names to add to that list of nominees, but we all like different things and if it was good for you who am I to cast aspersions on your preferences.

It's a Beautiful Day...

2011-11-22T17:16:00.001Z

The mid-afternoon sun was streaming through newly-revealed branches, keeping the top layer of fallen leaves crisp. These mounds of leaves are apparently enthralling, at least to my dogs who seem compelled to inspect in detail each undulating heap. Puddles command similar attention, which means that a walk which should take under an hour actually took closer to one and a half. But it was a lovely autumn day; there was no reason to rush.

The bulrushes have shed their fluffy wigs now. Ygraine once savaged some poor bloke's prize pampas after it made the mistake of waving in a breeze. And as much as she loves a good swim, trying to fish a dog out of a deep pond whose banks are slathered with greasy black mud is not my idea of a fun diversion during an otherwise pleasant stroll. Therefore Ygraine has to be restrained around anything tall and wobbly like bulrushes.

As the late afternoon sun cast amber-gold over the tree tops, we headed into the little woodland then out amongst the snarled and drying grasses. This is Emily's favourite bit. She springs through the tickly grass stalks, pretending to be a great hunter, ears upright, dark eyes sparkling, nose snuffling like a Dyson. Once, she caught a sock.

Anyway, as I type this they're both snoozing. Emily is on a trampled-flat cushion which she's not supposed to be on, and Ygraine is in Woolly Jumper Corner. That's a heap of old Arran jumpers which sent any wearer into a frenzy of frantic itching, but the dogs like them well enough.

Spanish Jones now on Kindle

2011-11-19T09:51:00.003Z

This short ebook is now available on Kindle.

The ASIN for this in all Amazon stores is ASIN B00690Q10I.

Pirates, selkies and witches battle to survive in this dramatic short fantasy tale. When Charlie Porter makes a deal with Spanish Jones, he ensnares the Porter family in a vicious centuries-long feud. Can Charlie's descendent stop the violence? Set on the ruggedly beautiful Hilbre Island in the Dee Estuary, history and folklore blend to create a magically atmospheric tale by Adele Cosgrove-Bray.

Entering the Grove now on Kindle

2011-11-18T09:54:00.001Z

As of today, Entering the Grove can be purchased direct from Amazon UK, USA, France and Germany.

The ebook's ASIN for all these stores is B00695TH5Y.

What was the beyond-human being who walked into her dreams? How could mere dreams seem more real than reality?

This collection of poetry describes how, at the age of nineteen, Adele Cosgrove-Bray entered an order known variously as the Eternal Companions or the Initiates of Ma'at, which was led by an elderly man called Thomas Joseph Walton, (or "T"). His philosophy was similar to that of GI Gurdjieff's.

"Entering the Grove" describes her seven years with this group. She hoped to find answers to a series of experiences which had haunted her since early childhood, as depicted in the poems "I Wonder", "Twilight" and "Love's Hermitage", but she gradually became disillusioned with Walton’s philosophy.

In 1999, Adele joined the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids (OBOD), and this heralded the start of a highly creative period. Yet she had still found no solution to the life-long mystery which haunted her dreams. What was this presence, this beyond-human entity, who had walked into her dreams all her life? A figment of a vivid imagination, or simply longing for an idealised companion? No-one had any answers.

As she moved deeper into the Ovate grade with OBOD, her inner journey took her along an unexpected route away from OBOD, as is hinted at in the last poem of this collection, "Dream Life".

ALSO INCLUDES the first chapter of Adele Cosgrove-Bray's forthcoming novel, "Tamsin".

Penguin Moves into Ebook Self-Publishing

2011-11-17T09:56:00.005Z

Penguin's Book Country self-publishing option offers writers 70% of the sale price of any book. The catch is that this publishing service costs between $99 for a DIY option, and $549 if you pay Penguine to format the text for you.

I fail to see why a person would pay $99 for the privilege of formatting their own ebook when this can be done for free, for similar returns, on Smashwords. Book Country seems to want exclusive rights to epub files, also.

Ok, so you'd get the famous Penguin logo on your ebook. But it will take more than a cartoon birdie to promote the resulting ebook. The author will still have to do the majority of that for themselves - as is also usual with traditional paperback publishing these-days anyway.

Learn more: http://bookcountry.com/

Learn even more Joe Konrath's blog at: http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/2011/11/book-country-fail.html who by sheer synchronicity blogged about the same thing today, as I've just discovered when checking my feeds.

Autumn Garden Clean-up

2011-11-15T10:46:00.004Z

Bonfire time at Maison Cosgrove-Bray. Going up in flames was a 1940s chest of drawers, the type which is more wood than drawer space - an ugly old thing well beyond its usefulness or re-sale value. There was also a heap of autumn pruning - branches, bits of hedge, snapped bamboo canes, broken brush handles etc. Oh, and two kitchen rugs which were remarkable only for their vileness.

In the midground of the photo are two compost bins made from recycled rubber. The cone-like sides lift up cleanly if a garden fork is levered beneath them; they don't have a base. These bins have been in constant use for ten years and show absolutely no sign of wear. Beyond the compost bins is the green-coloured chicken coup.

The photo shows only half of our rear garden, which is also the side which we've done the least with so far. The garden is now ready for a good tidy-up before winter sets in. Brick flooring can a mixed blessing, as every tiny groovy between each brick becomes a home for weeds, and the floor by the compost bins is a mess due to leaves falling off the branches I'd pruned.

These autumn leaves went straight onto the bonfire, which was still smouldering when we retired for the night. We only rake up leaves which have fallen on the lawn as otherwise the grass dies. Leaves which fall into the borders which run around the entire edge of the garden stay there to encourage wildlife, some of which is then eaten by our hens. Besides, the hens love rummaging through stuff.

The ash from the bonfire, once cool, will be shovelled around our rhubarb.

David Bach on How To Get Rich

2011-11-14T09:31:00.003Z

While some of the information in this video relates specifially to Canadians, much of the advice can be utilised by anyone anywhere and is well worth listening to.

One of the areas in which the education system fails, here in Britain anyway, is in finance. Even if a schoolchild seems likely to spend their working lives in low-paid jobs they still need to know how to handle money, and it would be helpful for them to also know how to improve their lot in life.

Besides, who can accurately judge how well a child might do in later life? Many self-made successful business people were told that their innability to score highly in school tests meant they were "less gifted", whereas many university graduates become employed in jobs which bare no relation to their qualifications and are not well paid either.

I mention schoolchildren because it's never too soon - or too late, even if you're well into middle-age - to start building up your finances.

Therefore, a person has to educate themselves about how finance really works. One book which demystifies the process of investment is Joel Greenblatt's The Little Book That Still Beats the Market. If you're one of the many people who feel stocks and shares sound scary and too risky - just as I did before I read it! - then this easy-to-read, goggle-de-goop-free book is a worthy investment in itself.

Parallel Dimensions 2011

2011-11-06T10:16:00.001Z

Here's the poster for this year's Parallel Dimensions, which takes place on Saturday 10th December at West Kirby Library. Doors open at 2pm, but be early to ensure a seat as previous PDs have been well-attended.

This is the third Parallel Dimensions, so I think it's ok to call it an annual event now.

FREE event!

Please pass on the image and the information. If you have any queries, either leave a message here or email me.

English National Ballet's Strictly Gershwin

2011-11-04T12:20:00.004Z

Yesterday I saw the English National Ballet's new production, Strictly Gershwin, at the Empire Theatre in Liverpool. I love ballet, and was excited to see some of my favourite dancers again, especially Erina Takahashi who partnered with Zdenek Konvalina for Someone to Watch Over Me and with Esteban Berlanga for The Man I Love.

The dancers were wonderful, the costumes were gorgeous...but did the choreography quite work? Gershwin was never meant to be twee, and unfortunately the show sometimes felt stilted and unadventurous, particularly with Rhapsody in Blue where the dance bore no relation at all to the story told by the music which, for that piece, was played in a lacklustre manner by the orchestra.

The orchestra formed a large part of the backdrop for the performance. Perhaps this could have been exploited to greater visual effect, so that soloists might have been picked out by a spotlight - hardly a groundbreaking method of allowing the audience to see more clearly who was playing what, but this opportunity was overlooked.

The remainder of the backdrop was created by a sequence of still images depicting famous old-time Hollywood actors and images of Paris, which worked well. However, what did any of this have to do with outer space? Fuzzy images of stars and planet Earth were not relevant to the show's content. If budget cuts were the cause of the setting's limitations, then why not make a virtue out necessity and do away with the film show altogether? Gene Kelly used a bare stage with simple props to great effect for his dance sequences; a similar idea could easily have been employed.

The tap dancing sequences were excellent; brimming with energy and fun. I'm not usually enthusiastic about tap, but these dances were among the highlights of a show which otherwise felt too safe and conformist - and Ira and George Gershwin, in their day, were neither.

Entering the Grove

2011-10-29T16:47:00.001+01:00

What was the beyond-human being who walked into her dreams? How could mere dreams seem more real than reality? This enchanting collection of poetry describes the author's long search for answers.

This collection of Adele Cosgrove-Bray’s poetry describes how, at the age of nineteen, she entered an order known variously as the Eternal Companions or the Initiates of Ma'at, which was led by an elderly man called Thomas Joseph Walton, (or "T"). His philosophy was similar to that of GI Gurdjieff's.

Entering the Grove describes her seven years with this group. She hoped to find answers to a series of experiences which had haunted her since early childhood, as depicted in the poems I Wonder, Twilight and Love's Hermitage, but she gradually became disillusioned with Walton’s philosophy.

In 1999, Adele joined the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids (OBOD), and this heralded the start of a highly creative period. Yet she had still found no solution to the life-long mystery which haunted her dreams. What was this presence, this beyond-human entity, who had walked into her dreams all her life? A figment of a vivid imagination, or simply longing for an idealised companion? No-one had any answers.

As she moved deeper into the Ovate grade with OBOD, her inner journey took her along an unexpected route away from OBOD, as is hinted at in the last poem of this collection, Dream Life.

Meet Aliens in Your Dreams!

2011-10-27T11:26:00.002+01:00

Researchers have learned that they can train volunteers to meet aliens in their dreams by focussing on a half-dream state, ie. lucid dreaming, and seeking out ETs with thier minds.

In this recent post I offered this idea: "The potential of the mind is immense. What if...the universe is all mind? What if the world you see when your brain interprets light beams caught on your retinas is really a creation of your mind? What if the whole of Planet Earth is, in effect, a giant holograph kept in place by mutual unconscious agreement? What if other collectives of mutual conscious agreement could create for themselves another kind of holograph - a parallel dimension, in other words?"

Is it really so difficult to accept that if a person determinedly sets out to visit other dimensions via their own will power - which, like most abilities, can be improved upon with practice and persistence, that it is possible to slip from one dimension to another? Contemporary terms like "alien" and "little grey men" can easily be replaced with older words such as "elf" or "god" or "mighty spirit". People have been travelling between dimensions for millennia - just ask a suitably skilled shamen, druid, witch or ritual magician.

To dismiss the experience by saying, "Oh, it's just a dream; it's all in your mind" is incredibly short-sighted when everything is all in your mind.

Dark Tides & Spanish Jones

2011-10-25T23:17:00.002+01:00

Dark Tides is now available on Apple iTunes at: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/book/dark-tides/id472904959?mt=11

Spanish Jones is available on Apple iTunes at: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/book/spanish-jones/id472906427?mt=11

You can also find both these ebooks on Barnes & Noble at: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/c/adele-cosgrove-bray

I'm still waiting for these to be shipped to Kobo and Amazon, but that's in the pipeline. They should also be available on Sony and Diesel within the next week or so.

Entering the Grove

2011-10-25T11:21:00.003+01:00

Life Off Earth - Futuristic Philosophy

2011-10-21T12:37:00.005+01:00

Looking forward into the future...

And further into the future...

One of the arguments against cryo-preservation and life extension insists that humanity will run out of space. Earth is already a cramped cosmic island, so where are we all going to fit?

Firstly, not everyone will choose an immortal life. How many times have you heard people say they'll be glad when life is over? To an immortalist, this is the statement of someone with suicidal tendencies but many think this way, imagining that death will always be inevitable and unconquerable despite the continuing progress of sciences which - given proper investment and further research - will overcome present limitations.

Secondly, look up. It's a big universe up there... Big as in infinite. If the "universe" is expanding, logic dictates that it has to have something into which it can expand. If it had a boundary, an edge of some kind, there would have to be something beyond to define that boundary - in other words, more universe.

Thirdly, look in. The potential of the mind is immense. What if it - the universe - is all mind? What if the world you see when your brain interprets light beams caught on your retinas is really a creation of your mind? What if the whole of Planet Earth is, in effect, a giant holograph kept in place by mutual unconscious agreement? What if other collectives of mutual conscious agreement could create for themselves another kind of holograph - a parallel dimension, in other words? It's an idea to play around with, no?

(With thanks to our favourite captain, who found the videos.)

1st Mummification for 3,000 Years

2011-10-18T10:00:00.004+01:00

Alan Billis, a sixty-one year old taxi driver with terminal lung cancer, volunteered to be mummified after the manner of Ancient Egyptians. The taxi driver from Torquay allegedly said his only regret would be that at he wouldn't be around to see the programme, although he hoped it would give his grandchildren an insight into his personality.

I wonder if Mr Billis gave cryonics any consideration? If cryonics works, then he could tell his grandchildren (if they also opted for cryonics) all about himself for himself - and that's assuming cryonics isn't a working reality before Billis's grandchildren require cryo-preservation to make that leap into the future.

A cryo-sceptic would say that's a lot of "ifs", and that is a fair point. However, looked at with a rational mind which makes the most sense - a slim chance of a possibly-eternal life, or no chance at all?

Mummifying Alan: Egypt's Last Secret will be screened on Channel 4 on October 24 at 9pm.

Guest Blog: Nick Armbrister - Author

2011-10-18T09:49:00.001+01:00

Adele says: Welcome to the first of a series of guest blogs written by a diverse array of interesting people. This installment is from author and poet Nick Armbrister. If you would like to contribute to this blog, feel free to contact me via email at ACBwrites@aol.com and write Guest Blog in the subject line.

Nick Armbrister writes: 2011 has been busy for me; I released 5 books on www.lulu.com/spotlight/nickarmbrister of poetry and fiction stories. I could pick out one important book of the five but to me, all five are important. One is a huge poetry collection covering my fifteen years of writing poems (The Complete Nick Armbrister Poetry Collection), two others are short story collections. One is erotic stories (Take It In Your Stride, a series of erotic adult stories) and the second normal ones (Heart Of The Country Short Story Collection). Finally there are two fiction novels in my Juniper’s Daughter series (Juniper's Daughter: The Final War and Juniper's Daughter: Frontier Town).

I like each for different reasons. The short story collections have a good variety; Heart Of The Country contains stories on jet fighters used in combat (Red Empire and Final Flight) and horror (Loss of the Icequeen). Take It In Your Stride has erotic stories for adult readers. The work is very varied and eye opening. Juniper's Daughter books are a two book series of times of conflict and hardship of people. A witch figure, Juniper’s Daughter, tries to help and stop the conflict. I’m working on a third follow up to these. And finally my poem book, The Complete Nick Armbrister Poetry Collection, covers my poems from April 1996 to summer 2011 and is a free download ebook and normal for sale hard copy on Lulu and Amazon. As you can see, it’s been a busy year for me.

Back in the day and the ‘small press’

Back in the day when I started writing, I simply picked up and pen and got on with it, while listening to music in my mate’s flat when drinking beer. Being into gothic and metal music helped form my views on the topic matter, a lot of it dark, into poems that could have become powerful songs if I could sing or write music or play an instrument. As I couldn’t, I wrote poetry instead. Many people consider a guy writing poems quite girly. When the poems cover war, aircraft, sex, drinking beer and similar topics, my poems appeal to lads and my finer work on nature, love and happy topics appeals to women. Basing my poems on my own life experiences and views gave me a sound way to write, at first in verse but never rhyming. I saw rhyming as limiting my wordplay and eventually left verses behind to do free verse prose type work. Only when harassed by some publisher or editor did I format some poems in verse. I like to get my poems down on paper or the computer and have done with it, the initial impact of the moment when I created my poem being untouched, except for some small edits.

Within six months of writing my first drunken boisterous poems, I was published in the ‘small press’, my poem Ode to Alanis being featured in a ‘zine about Alanis Morrissette. In quick fire actions I had more poems published in magazines, fanzines and poetry anthologies. One of the top UK small press editors/publishers, Atlantean Publishing run by DJ Tyrer of Southend in Essex , published my work for over a decade. I became part of a family of poets/writers who created something out of nothing and gave it their all; not being paid but receiving complimentary copies of the mag or ‘zine that their work appeared in. Today I still love the thrill of being in a small press publication. Those early days of writing for me are still with me, in spirit and creativity. I keep each and every magazine that my poems appeared in.

Juniper’s Daughter

In December 2000 I started to write my first novel called Juniper’s Daughter. I spent a decade getting her right, till I released her in her finished form in 2011. Re-written several times and partly lost forever on obsolete electronic typewriters and mislaid manuscripts, this book is my main project, eclipsing all others. Based in Oldham and featuring several strong characters, it tells a story of war, death, sex, hope and magic. Sarah is a twenty something freedom fighter, living with her mates Lee and John. They drink and cause mayhem, taking on anyone who picks a fight. When their actions lead to war, a mysterious figure steps in – Juniper’s Daughter. She has a job on her hands, to stop the wars and bloodshed before it’s too late. Her enemy, The Devil, is equally cunning and powerful. Will the witch win?

Juniper’s Daughter: The Final War is the first book, Juniper’s Daughter: Frontier Town is the follow up, set in a fictitious town halfway between Carlisle and Newcastle. More evil actions by a resurgent English army allied to The Devil make the way for an intimate dance of death with Juniper’s Daughter. This war will affect everybody living in Renford, the frontier town. From Goths to gangsters to sexual deviants, all will face their own fears to live or die in the coming fight.

Written Expressions

In 2009 I joined a small American publisher called Written Expressions. I wrote many short stories and over a dozen were published on wide ranging topics; erotica like Ian Gets a Treat to Little Red Lise, horror like Loss of the Icequeen and romance like Tattoo me a Smile and What Could Have Been. It was more or less a successful venture, with nearly a hundred ebook sales of my work including on the Kindle ebook reader. It wasn’t to last.

With many new stories finished and unreleased, I wondered if my future was with WE. After editing issues that threatened to stall my writing career, I left WE and went back to self publishing in 2011. In a few weeks I compiled two volumes of my short stories. One is normal stories and the other erotica. I named the books after His Latest Flame songs (a Scottish 80s rock band. Check them out).

The Future

I plan to take things easy for a while after years of being busy. I attend Fitton Hill Writing Group once a month to write short stories, I go to writing festivals and do open mic when the chance arises (having supported local Manchester band Blouse and Write Out Loud poem nights). I contemplate working with a solo guitarist backing me so I can do my poems live and go on tour. I have the poems, I just need a guitarist. Also I think about recording more poems and get them on You Tube; I need the multi media skills to do videos and edit them to do that successfully. Other things I’ll be doing are ongoing poems when I’m inspired, my third Juniper’s Daughter book, a short story collection and other things I think will be fun. For now I don’t want the hassle of working with a publisher or band (done it before, it involves a lot of complex issues. We did an album). I like to do my own thing and take my time.

www.lulu.com/spotlight/nickarmbrister
www.myspace.com/nickspoetrybooks
http://nickarmbristerwriter.webs.com/
http://writeoutloud.net/profiles/nickarmbrister
https://nickarmbrister.wordpress.com/

King of the Publishing Castle?

2011-10-17T10:24:00.003+01:00

Amazon will allegedly be publishing 122 books, fiction and non-fiction, in the autumn. This is far more than many traditional publishers produce in an entire year - or two or three years, even. Not only can authors already self-publish with Amazon's Create Space (for paperbacks) and Kindle (for ebooks), not only are all authors offered virtual shelf-space and dedicated pages on Amazon's massive - and always growing - site, now Amazon is diving into the role of a traditional publisher. And I say good!

Does this action finally kill off the myth that ebooks, including self-published ebooks, don't sell? If there wasn't money to be made then a hefty company like Amazon wouldn't be expanding further into this field. While many businesses take chances, the successful ones only take informed chances.

If a product works and is wanted and is affordable, it will sell.

If a system, no matter how long-established, ceases to provide what is wanted it's customers will look elsewhere.

If producers of products find they can't get a look in edgeways with a traditional system, they'll explore other outlets for their products, just as increasing numbers of writers are doing with ebooks.

I recently read a blog by a writer who justifiably complained about the 'no reply' policy which many agents now operate despite their websites promising they'll reply within a stated time. If they're interested in an author, they'll reply within the stated time; if not, they'll simply not reply at all - so the writer is left wondering what happened, if the MS arrived, if anyone even bothered to read it, or how long they should wait before giving up and trying elsewhere. Do you really want to work with people who are so rude?

Remember the kids teasing song that went, "I'm the king of the castle, and you're the dirty rascal...?" This seems to be the attitude of many in the traditional publishing industry. Well, thanks to ebooks, we're not obliged to play that game anymore.

Wirral Bookfest 2012

2011-10-13T21:30:00.004+01:00

Wirral's annual Bookfest began today, with a chick-lit event at Bromborough Civic Centre with authors Lesley Pearse and Judy Astley. Tuesday sees Professor Stephen Hawking at Birkenhead Central Library, talking about a replica Viking longship named Draken Harald Fairhair, which will sail to Wirral from Norway next year. Wednesday brings Sir Andrew Motion, a former Poet Laureate, to Bromborough Civic Centre.

There are two events on Thursday 13th. Elizabeth Williams, of the Gaskell Society, will give a talk at Bebington Central Library about the role of love in Jane Austen's and Charlotte Bronte's fiction. The history of Birkenhead will be the subject of a talk by Elizabeth Davey at Upton Library.

The event which interests me the most will be held at Wallasey Central Library on Friday, when Gavin Chapell will give a talk about the infamous Wirral privateer called Fortunatas Wright. Personally, I suspect Wright might just be a pseudonym used by Spanish Jones....

Friday will also see a bookswap in the Pyramids Shopping Centre in Birkenhead. Bring along your pre-loved books and swap them for someone else's.

Marc Gee, who has visited Riverside Writers twice now, will talk on Saturday at West Kirby Library about his work as a playwright, screen writer and novelist.

The search for the next Wirral Young Poet Laureate will also take place. This runs in conjunction with the Chris Salmon Foundation, named in memory of a local poet who died at the tender age of fifteen. The competition is open to all primary, secondary and 6th form students.

There are only three free events - the bookswap, the longship talk and Marc Gee's talk - and those with sharp eyes will have noticed that neither Riverside Writers or myself are taking part this year. But fear not! Because Parallel Dimensions will be happening later in the year anyway, on the 10th December, 2pm, at West Kirby Library.

Christian Fear of Love

2011-10-12T10:29:00.004+01:00

Apparently, former SNP leader Gordon Wilson wants a referendum on the government's proposals to allow same-sex marriage. In a nine-page document he allegedly described same-sex marriages as an assault on Xtian values which could lead to social disintegration and sexual confusion.

Excuse me, but exactly how can two people loving each other and deciding to get married bring about the end of life as we know it? Who is anyone to declare how love should be expressed or where love should blossom for anyone other than themselves? And how do gay people become a social hazard through marrying each other; does this mean that by remaining unmarried they're somehow more safe? How ridiculous.

As for Xtian values, how about:-

“Do not judge so that you will not be judged.” Matthew 7:1

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:34-35

Actually, I don't care what is written in the Xtian Bible. There's a quote in there to fit any requirement, especially if taken out of context. On the one hand, Xtians express belief in an all-powerful, all-knowing, perfect god while on the other hand many decide that they know better than their deity with regard to some of his creations.

But there is Christianity, and then there is the far more frequently practised Paulianity... It is a pity that many devotees of Paulianity (which was allegedly described as being in error by Jesus's own disciples) find the concept of love to be so frightening.

Interactive Ebooks!

2011-10-10T08:37:00.001+01:00

Have you ever loved a story so much that you wanted to visit the place where it happened? Have you been so involved in a scene that you felt like you were really there?

Well, a new innovation means you almost can be there - almost. When an ebook's tale is set in a particular place - a cafe, a theatre, an historic location, a bowling alley etc., - then readers can click a link to learn more about the factual place.

This opens up a new angle in virtual tourism, which could potentially result in readers of a story booking into a hotel or diner where their fictional heroes stayed. So what we have here is another way of writers gaining an income. Just as sports people are sponsored to wear trade logos, then why couldn't writers be sponsored to include linked-to places/businesses in their ebooks? The principles are fairly similar.

Blind Fate by Patrick Brian Miller and Dixie Noir by Kirk Curnutt are the first of these innovative ebooks to be published on Kindle (which can also be read on an ordinary PC, smart phone or tablet).

Personally I think it's a great idea so long as the inserted advertising doesn't spoil the story.

Photos Which Make You Smile

2011-10-09T09:37:00.006+01:00

Hazel and Adele, a long time ago...

There are some photos which simply make you smile. They might not be the most professionally done or the most artistic, but they're precious in their own way. Like this one, above, which shows my sister and I paddling somewhere near Southampton. I totally forget the name of the place; it had three shallow pools in a row, and I recall feeling incredibly adventurous for walking through each of them all by myself. We visited this place more than once during various visits to my Aunt Kathleen and Uncle George's home. My four cousins were probably paddling not too far away, just out of camera shot.

My first typewriter, a Smith Corona, which was a Xmas present shared with my sister. I used to type poetry on this before mailing it off to various magazines. Some of it got published, too... This machine worked well for many years until the carriage developed an annoying habit of jumping spaces or of not moving at all. This didn't exactly aid presentation - rather like that vile pink top, hmm?

I studied Shotokan Karate for a while when I was in high school, at a dojo run by Theo Humber. I enjoyed karate as a sport and for learning some self-defence.

Here's Adele Hayes (nee Bilsbury) and I, canoeing in Scarborough. She'd joined my family for a week's holiday there, and we had a great time. One afternoon, the two of us decided to take a chairlift ride to the beach. It began with a gentle ascent of a long grassy slope. Then the ground fell away as we sailed over the cliff edge, revealing the beach at least a thousand feet below. (What, exaggerate, moi?) We were convinced the chairlift would fall off the wire with every stanchion it rattled over.

Dark Tides Ebook Video

2011-10-08T10:38:00.001+01:00

Enjoy!

Interivew with Richie Tattoo Artist

2011-10-06T13:09:00.001+01:00

Learn about the history of tattooing, and about Liverpool's famous tattooing family, of which Richie Tattoo Artist is a member, in this interview with Richie broadcast on Radio Merseyside in 1996.

Ebook Logic

2011-10-04T10:55:00.003+01:00

Several people have asked me why I've recently self-published two ebooks, Spanish Jones and Dark Tides. In the past, I've been dead set against self-publishing. Vanity publishing (where you pay a company to publish your book) is mostly an expensive dead-end, and self-publishing (where you DIY) requires much product promotion, can also be pricey, and in the past wasn't taken seriously. The given wisdom was that people only self-publish when no-one will buy their book.

Is that still true in 2011? If readers didn't take self-published ebooks seriously, they wouldn't be buying them. And they are, in ever increasing numbers, to the point that ebook sales are now apparently overtaking paperback sales.

Producing an ebook can cost nothing but time if an author can create their own eye-catching front covers and do their own editing. In my case, I went to art school where I studied art and design; I've worked as a photographer and an editor; and I also get practical feedback from fellow members of Riverside Writers. I undertook some research into what constitutes a good front cover. Most ebook catalogues display lists of covers which are around the same size as a postage stamp, so the design needs to be clear, bold, concise yet relevant to the book's contents. Text needs to be simple, and to tell a viewer what the product is. Do my two front covers work? I'll let you decide.

And of course the book needs to be well written. If a reader thinks an ebook was shoddy they'll be unlikely to buy another by the same author.   That's hardly a revelation - or at least it shouldn't be - but one of the arguments against ebook self-publishing is that the quality can be low.   It will be sometimes, but for the reason I've just given such work will be quickly dismissed. It's a matter of stratification; the good stuff will rise to the top.

Traditionally published authors have to do an increasing amount of promotion themselves. I've been traditionally published many times, and much of this work fell to me. So no change there!   So how do you promote a product without yelling "Buy My Book!" in a world that is thoroughly bored with people trying to sell stuff? Whole books have been written about this subject, called something like How To Yell Buy My Book Without Yelling Buy My Book!

Another issue: Why settle for around 15% profit when you can have the 70% offered by self-publishing via Smashwords? I recently read through the submission guidelines for an anthology, and if the editors accepted your work they'd pay $0.01 USD per word. Wow. And we're supposed to jump through hoops for that, and be grateful.

Spanish Jones had been sitting on my office shelf for too long. In 2007 it had been accepted for inclusion in an anthology, which was to have been edited by Raven Digitalis, but this project came to nothing. This is not so unusual in the writing world. Plus I had a whole bunch of other short stories floating about; some of these had previously been published by Amazon Shorts and so First Rights had already been sold.   Very few markets want material which has previously been published. What use are 'second rights' when just sat on a shelf? All these stories were merely providing a home for dust mites.

And along came ebooks. Horns. The. Grab. Bull. The. By.

And thus my ebook experiment begins.   I've more releases already planned, with the intention that each ebook will help to support the others. I've been told that ebook novels sell better than shorts or collections, but I'll see how things go. Watch this space, hmm?

Spanish Jones

2011-10-02T12:22:00.001+01:00

Spanish Jones - a new ebook short by Adele Cosgrove-Bray, out October 1st, 2011.

Available from: Here

Secret Underground Lair in Paris

2011-09-30T10:52:00.001+01:00

"Police in Paris discovered a cinema-cum-restaurant in a large and previously uncharted cavern underneath the capital's chic 16th arrondissement...  A tunnel held a desk and a closed-circuit TV camera set to automatically record images of anyone passing. The tunnel opened into a vast 400 sq metre cave some 18m underground, "like an underground amphitheatre, with terraces cut into the rock and chairs"...a full-sized cinema screen, projection equipment and a wide variety of films. A smaller cave next door had been turned into an informal restaurant and bar. "There were bottles of whisky and other spirits behind a bar, tables and chairs, a pressure-cooker for making couscous," the spokesman said.   "The whole thing ran off a professionally installed electricity system and there were at least three phone lines."

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/sep/08/filmnews.france?fb=optOut

This article dates back to 2004; I recall mentioning it in my old LJ blog.   How did the police deduct that the pressure cooker was used specifically for making couscous? Maybe the occupants had omitted to wash the dishes. Personally I find couscous to be bland and ultra-boring; a lair like this surely deserves finer cuisine. But it seems an intriguing place, and its occupants even more interesting - which is one of the reasons the idea has been incorporated into my fiction.

Discussion about How To Market Ebooks

2011-09-27T10:18:00.002+01:00

"...We offer "singles" for 99 cents and five story collections for $2.99 (which brings the per story price down to 60 cents.) And we offer ten story collections of the singles for $4.99. Think of albums in music. A single song is 99 cents usually, but albums with that song on it are more. Same thing in short stories and books. The story should be both ways to give readers choices." - Dean Wesley Smith

This excellent interview with Dean Wesley Smith, Joe Konrath, Blake Crouch, Scott Nicholson and David Graughan explores the exanding market for ebooks, which type of ebooks sell well and why how to offer readers more choice.

Read the interview: http://www.fearnet.com/news/interviews/b23910_short_stories_ebooks_discussion_with.html

800 Year Old Witch Burial found in Italy

2011-09-27T09:06:00.005+01:00

"Archaeologist Alfonso Forgione, from L'Aquila University...said, 'I have never seen anything like this before. I'm convinced because of the nails found in the jaw and around the skeleton the woman was a witch. She was buried in bare earth, not in a coffin and she had no shroud around her either, intriguingly other nails were hammered around her to pin down her clothes.'

"'The second skeleton we have found was buried in a similar fashion but this time we found 17 dice around her - 17 is an unlucky number in Italy and also dice was a game that women were forbidden to play."

Source: http://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2011/09/800-year-old-witch-burial-found-in.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheArchaeologyNewsNetwork+%28The+Archaeology+News+Network%29

Parallel Dimensions - 3rd Annual Wirral F/SF/H Fiction Event

2011-09-26T11:20:00.001+01:00

Hot off the press - well, off the phone, actually - comes a date for the 3rd annual Fantasy, Science-Fiction and Horror fiction event.

Parallel Dimensions will take place on December 10th, 2011, at West Kirby Library, Wirral. Doors open at 2pm.

Participating authors have yet to be confirmed. If you're an author whose work falls within the F/SF/H category and you'd like to take part, email me ASAP at ACBwrites@aol.com. There is no payment for taking part but you are welcome to sell your own books and to hand out flyers.

The event gives people the chance to hear new, orginal fiction and to meet the authors. Authors get the chance to read aloud some of their work before an audience.

I'll post further news as things develop.

An Infinite Universe

2011-09-26T08:27:00.003+01:00

"The notion of the "swerve" is taken from Lucretius, who lived in the first century B.C. and taught that the world, uncreated but infinite in extent, is composed of nothing but atoms and the void....

"The message of Lucretius' poem was subversive and liberating. Following his master Epicurus, the poet placed the highest value on pleasure (voluptas)...."

Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904353504576566621864350318.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
(From a review of a new book, The Swerve, by Stephen Greenblatt).

And yet people today generally refer to people in the distant past as being ignorant. Ironic, hmm?

Silver Laced Wyandottes

2011-09-23T13:45:00.003+01:00

Penelope and Felicity are eighteen-weeks old silver laced wyandottes. They arrived this morning in a cat carrier, and are now pottering around in the chicken coup in my garden. Our older hen, Joyce, who's an ISA brown, is a bit stroppy right now - marching up and down the run and clucking loudly - but she'll settle down once the pecking order has been negotiated.

Speed of Light Broken - Inter-dimensional Travel

2011-09-22T22:37:00.002+01:00

CERN scientists have allegedly broken the speed of light by sixty nanoseconds. It might not sound much, but if these claims are verified by further tests then this discovery could herald the final nail in the coffin of classical physics - much of which has been disproved already by quantum physics.

News article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/8782895/CERN-scientists-break-the-speed-of-light.html

The long-held theory is that if things can move faster than the speed of light, then time travel and inter-dimensional travel ought to be possible.

Ideas about time travel and inter-dimensional travel were around long before the commercial success of Dr Who. Actually, Dr Who was around long before the current commercial success of Dr Who... UFOlogists have been debating the possibility of UFOs being inter-dimensional rather than interplanetary craft for decades, and HG Wells published The Time Machine back in 1895. But tales of side-stepping into other dimensions can be found in The Mabinogion and similar collections of folktales dating back centuries.

Ok, so those old stories were couched in different jargon. Phrases such as Tir na nOg, the Summerlands, the faerie realms and similar, have been elbowed aside in favour of parallel dimensions, (no, not the annual Wirral F/SF/H fest which I've yet to sort out), but pasting a new label on an old bottle won't alter the wine.

Maybe science has been looking in the wrong direction. While all the telescopes have been pointing outwards, away from Earth - which is not to imply that there isn't a possibly infinite heap of fascinating stuff waiting to be discovered beyond our little galaxy - maybe now more attention will be devoted to alternative theories of reality.

So what is real and what isn't? As quantum physics demonstrates, it all depends on the observer's point of view - such as with light, which can be a beam or a wave depending on, quite literally, how it's looked at. It also depends on democratic agreement to settle upon and believe in a dominant version of reality.

How, then, do people decide upon their way of looking at life? Beliefs and expectations, learned since early childhood, form most of our reactions.   Some of these will be useful, some won't. Some people go to great lengths to learn how to look at life without beliefs and expectations which have hampered their lives - and find that their experience of the world changes as a consequence. They've passed from what might be called a grey world to a sunnier world. They've passed from one dimension to another - but because they still live at No.3 Same Street, Same Town, this way of looking at internal change tends to be ignored by themselves and the other people around them.

The change has been internal, mental. Now, what if that change was so great that not only did the world seem a sunnier place but previously unnoticed aspects of reality began to unfold? This is the journey of the shaman, the ritual magician,  the seeker of hidden knowledge - or the people in lab coats, creating tests to challenge theories of reality.

It is with these largely unnoticed aspects of reality, these other dimensions, and the people who pursue them, that much of my fiction is inspired by.

Dark Tides

2011-09-21T13:01:00.005+01:00

Dark Tides

A Collection of Short Fantasy Fiction

Adele Cosgrove-Bray

Nightmares from ancient myths glide through our thoroughly modern world. When selkies, faeries, old gods and young mortals rub shoulders, tensions quickly flare.

Terrifying watchers, devious lovers, mischief makers, dangerous business partners - you will meet them all in Dark Tales.

OUT TODAY!

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/90668

About the stories in Dark Tides…

Liar: Can you separate fact from fantasy in these words from a born liar?

New Year’s Day: Tom had always known that Louise would leave him. That’s what selkies do. So why did he marry her?

Snack Time: A chance conversation has surprising consequences in this chilling tale which introduces Fabian, from the novel of the same name.

Rebirth: After the closing of one door and before the opening of another, there is a dark journey to be made.

Swap: Learn why the tidal River Dee never returned to the harbour at Parkgate in Wirral, in this tale of the notorious Caldy fae.

The Four Seasons: A whimsical exploration the generation gap and levitation.

The Princess Cave: An elderly mother reminisces about her encounter with the selkies of the Dee Estuary.

School: Mischief heralds unforeseen changes in this science-fantasy tale of two very different schools.

Song of Earth: Ancient archetypes run riot through this, the only poem in Dark Tales.

Punch: For everyone who views office parties with a sense of impending dread.

Food: When four schoolboys play truant, they bite off more than they can chew in this tale of the Caldy fae.

The Solution: An artist’s models proved unreliable until a solution was found.

Clara’s Wristwatch: Childhood can be a magical time, but some games lead to danger as Clara discovers in this contemporary faerie tale.

Watcher: The terror which dragged Joanne to the brink of insanity returns. What will it take to get her attention?

Learn One Minute Meditation

2011-09-20T21:40:00.001+01:00

Another Role for Ebooks?

2011-09-19T10:05:00.002+01:00

Are ebooks changing the way news and magazine articles are structured?

Some articles which are too big for traditional magazine print, but too small to make anything more than a booklet, are now finding a niche as ebooks.

This idea gives publishers another way of marketing their products. They can create a virtual bookshelf of titles which relate to their main publication(s), and also attract new readership and revenue. Their most popular columnists can make use of their existing readership to sell their ebooks, also. It sounds a practical and, from the point of view of writers whose work doesn't always fit neatly into a fixed word-count, liberating concept. Most writers are quite happy to earn a bit more, too.

From the readers point of view, if they find themselves interested in an article or regular column and want more, they can buy the ebooks. If they'd like easy access to archived material, buy the ebooks. If the price is kept very low this will happen frequently enough to make these linked ebooks a financially viable offshoot of the main publication(s).

The Hoops Writers Jump Through

2011-09-18T18:00:00.073+01:00

"Lie-zee Sandai Arrffta-noon, Oi Got Nah Toym-tah Warree...!"

Well it's all right for some, snoozing the day away. Unlike the rest of this household, I've been wielding the red pen on what was a 5,000-word story; so far I've cut out 500 words. That's a lot of editing by my usual standards, but this may be because I don't write much sci-fi and School is (more or less) a sci-fi story. It's a sci-fi/fantasy hybrid, really, destined for inclusion in Dark Tides.

I was reading the submission guidelines for an anthology yesterday. The requested subject matter sounded like my kind of thing. The editors did not accept email submissions, and planned to pay $0.01 USD a word if they used a story (which is not unusual, unfortunately). So for a 1,000-word story they'd pay $10 USD. At today's exchange rate, that works out at £6.33. Deduct a third for UK tax, and that leaves £4.22. Postage for a light MS from England to America would cost around £2, leaving me with £2.22 out of which I'd also have to pay for paper, an envelope, printing ink - and at the end of the financial year, my accountant. All this assumes my story would be selected by the editor. If it wasn't, then I would have worked at a loss.

All writers collect rejections like a church yard collects confetti. I know a traditionally published (in magazines and books) sci-fi writer - who I won't name! - who says his writing account is £2,000 in the red. His earnings from being published haven't covered postage, stationary, travel etc.; costs accrued in the pursuit of his writing activities.

Now, creating a fully edited 1,000 word story usually takes me around six or seven hours - longer if it's slow going. I'll be generous and call it six hours work. The legal minimum wage for adults is £5.93 her hour, so the that amount of work should earn me a minimum of £35.58. Instead, being a writer to quite naturally loves to write, I'm supposed to happily and willingly chase after a few pence just for the hope of getting my name in print.

Bah humbug!

Hattie

2011-09-18T09:04:00.001+01:00

Hattie Jacques

Died in her sleep.

18th September 2011.

And here are Hattie and Joyce (Grenfell) in the garden...

Food: A Modern Faerie Tale

2011-09-16T09:05:00.002+01:00

Four schoolboys play truant in ancient woodland on Caldy Hill, Wirral, where they are taught a lesson they didn't bargain for.

This modern faerie tale was recorded live on 7 Waves Radio in 2008, and is read by the author, Adele Cosgrove-Bray.

How to Write a Novel

2011-09-14T22:03:00.003+01:00

More gifts for writers at Spooky Cute Designs: http://www.zazzle.co.uk/AdeleCB

I was asked, today (again), how a person goes about writing novels. My reply of, "It depends" probably wasn't all that helpful. In my defence, at the time I was busy attaching a rebellious strand of millet to the inside of a budgie cage while dear ol' Archie was trying to discover if my fingers were edible. How's that for gratitude. And I'd given him fresh water, too...

Over time, every writer develops their own way of working. Otherwise, they tend to give up and do something else. There's no right or wrong way; only the way which works for each individual. Some people plan every chapter in great detail before they even consider starting work on the text. Other people plan nothing at all; they just start writing and see where an idea takes them. Others fall somewhere in between these two. How do you find which way works for you? Easy - get writing and discover the answer for yourself.

Some people pour over mountains of 'How To' books, expend small fortunes on courses and seminars, set themselves up with fancy office stationary, do endless research, talk to other writers about how they've been wrapped up in the planning stage and there's so much more still to do... Other people simply get on with writing, researching only the bits they need as they need them.

Some people lock themselves away in a hermit's retreat, insisting upon solitary confinement, and absolute silence for weeks at a time until the first draft is complete. Others type away happily while the kids are squabbling, the dog's trying to eat the postman, the washing machine's making an ominous grinding whine and music's blaring so loud the roof tiles are rattling. Again, each to our own.

Some people comb over every page as they write it, trying to get it all perfect before moving on to the next bit. This can result in abandoning the project entirely as true perfection is never reached. Others storm through 100,000 words to the finale, and only then go back to edit. This way tends to work best for most people, an enthusiasm isn't hampered by fussing over details, and at the end of it you've at least got a complete first draft. But it's your choice to make.

But beyond all that there's really only one way to write a novel - get on with it.

Further reading on this subject: http://hubpages.com/hubtool/edit/1171202

How Much Is That Robot In the Window? The One With the Waggly Tail...

2011-09-13T20:04:00.004+01:00

"...Robotic labor seems like a brilliant idea that will ultimately create more wealth, and open up more opportunity for humans to pursue enjoyable work." - Aaron Saenz

Source: http://singularityhub.com/2011/09/12/robotic-labor-taking-over-the-world-you-bet-here-are-the-details/

Following from this post, when I wrote about the changing role of employment in the future, I now turn to the idea of robots. The article linked to above offers a concise summary of the way things seem likely to go. But I don't want to write about automated manufacturing or similar. Much more fun is an idea I've touched on with Seth's Basement. Artificial companions, in other words.

For around $6,000 USD it's possible to purchase a male or female life-sized doll from a company like Real Doll. Dress 'em how you like and go play. They're an excellent solution for some people's needs. The first person to combine these with (improved) robotics, AI, and the beauty of Asian ball-jointed dolls will be a billionaire within the hour.

I'd have a small harem of around half-a-dozen gorgeous male doll-bots - not so much for sex toys but for more practical purposes. First, they'd all be programmed with martial arts skills and therefore function as security guards. Other useful programming would include DIY skills, cookery, multiple languages, business and finance, gardening, multiple vehicle operation (car, plane, boat etc.), domestic maintainence, and data banks full of useful or interesting information. Being fully programmable, any tendency to drone on about sports, Top Gear and cartoon super heroes will be kept only to the absolute minimum required to allow them to communicate effectively with human males. Also the list of useful doll-bot downloads could be improved upon indefinitely, and no laptop would ever look so cute.

Agents and Publishers Dictating Characters' Sexuality

2011-09-13T09:23:00.003+01:00

Are literary agents and publishers dictating the sexuality of fictional characters? Apparently, Rachel Manija Brown and Sherwood Smith were told to 'straighten' one of their characters in their YA novel, or not have him come out until at least the third novel. The responses to their blog post echo their dismay.

Read the post here: http://blogs.publishersweekly.com/blogs/genreville/?p=1519

Teenaged readers will be totally aware of the existence of non-straight preferences. Some of them will have non-straight preferences of their own. So why, in the 21st Century, is this bigotry being perpetuated? To me, it seems ridiculous.

Any agent or publisher with a similar tunnel vision need not apply to represent me. (Ok, the way things work in this business is that traditional agents and publishers hold up the hoops for writers to leap through...) My characters include straight people, bisexuals, homosexuals and one happy trio. Mine are not stories about graphic sex; they're dark/urban fantasy tales with an underlying philosophy. There's a bit of romance too. While most of my characters are white English, which reflects the area in which the stories are set, there's a black English guy, some Welsh and some Scots people, a Japanese guy, and some who aren't human. Diversity is the keyword here - as in real life.

I've been told that my novels are "too occult" (several times), and to "make them more new age, like Pablo Coelho". One agent advised me to remove all the philosophy and magic completely despite the glaring fact that this would eliminate one of the main threads which link my series of novels and short stories, which can be read in any sequence. No-one's moaned about sex yet. Maybe they didn't get that far.

Jobs in the Future

2011-09-12T23:54:00.004+01:00

Aleksander Iljaszewicz shared an interesting article with me today, in which the author pondered on how our idea of working for a living may change in the future. Douglas Rushkoff wrote:-

"The question we have to begin to ask ourselves is not how do we employ all the people who are rendered obsolete by technology, but how can we organize a society around something other than employment? Might the spirit of enterprise we currently associate with "career" be shifted to something entirely more collaborative, purposeful, and even meaningful?"

Source: http://edition.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/09/07/rushkoff.jobs.obsolete/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

How many of us would turn up for work each day if we didn't get paid, hmm? Equally, don't most working people resent those who make a career out of living off state benefits which our taxes pay for? And yet there are those who insist that if all unemployed people found jobs then this would immediately create more unemployment, as an army of civil servants and other people whose businesses are founded on meeting the various needs of the unemployed found themselves, in turn, out of a job.

The idea that technology will eventually - and probably sooner rather than later - make most jobs obsolete is not new. I can recall this subject being raised in my high school's computer studies class, wherein the valiant Mr Kennedy did his utmost to explain the massive potential of the first tentative expansion of the internet. To give some indication of how long ago this was, let me add that our school owned only one computer - and that was a weird contraption which only accessed a real computer via a telephone hook-up.  7" floppy discs were just starting to make the mountains of oblong punch cards obsolete. You'll only see such items in technology museums now.

Following a class discussion about the role of jobs in a mostly automated world, we had to write an essay describing our personal vision of the future.   I trotted out some Utopian ideal where we all did whatever we wanted, free to pursue our interests in whichever way felt fulfilling to each individual. That still sounds like a good idea to me. The only tricky bit is how to implement it.

The scenario of people being employed in totally pointless jobs, just to keep the economy ticking over, reminds me of Keith Waterhouse's novel, Office Life. Such prospects feel dismally self-defeating. A more creative and liberating plan would be to change the way in which our current economy operates. We need a new social model. But bright theories often fail in practice because they often don't recognise an honest view of human nature, which tends to be rather less lofty than we'd like to wax poetic about.

Intelligent machines are supposed to make our future lives ever easier - but we've all seen what happened in The Terminator (Special Edition)...   Intelligence divorced from genuine human empathy could potentially result in disaster. But social change has always inspired a flurry of doom-laden imaginings which never came to pass. Who now remembers the mythical Millennium Bug? Is anyone still looking for weapons of mass destruction or waiting for Rapture? People have been proclaiming that the end of the world is nigh since, oow, Pliny the Elder's time, at least. And those of us who're blessed with enough foresight to arrange cryonic preservation have the real possibility of being around for a long time yet; an infinite time, perhaps. Maybe periodic proclamations of gloom is something we'll just have to get used to.

So, how do you anticipate the role of work in the future? If few people, or no people, need to work, how will wealth be distributed? And if most people don't need to work, who'll opt to be one of the few who do carry-out necessary jobs when they'd sooner be fishing, knitting, sunbathing - or writing a blog, even?

Related reading:- http://adelecosgrovebray.hubpages.com/hub/Money-in-the-Future

Dark Tides Book Cover Preview

2011-09-09T18:10:00.001+01:00

This is an idea for an ebook cover. The design needs to be simple and bold, and also clear when viewed in an online catalogue listing when the images are around the size of postage stamps. Likewise, the wording needs to be concise and to clearly tell people what the contents are.

The photo is one of mine, of course, and shows West Kirby beach at sunset. The subject of the photo needs to relate to the contents of the book, and several of the stories include oceanic and local references.

Comments are most welcome!

Database of Virginian Slave Names

2011-09-09T09:55:00.011+01:00

"Scholars at the Virginia Historical Society in Richmond have set out to leaf through eight million documents dating back to the 17th century, seeking the names of slaves."

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/09/arts/design/database-of-viginia-slave-names-goes-online.html

It seems incredible, in this time when genealogy is so popular, that research into the identities of slaves hasn't been done already. Liverpool was one point of the infamous slavery triangle, the other two being Africa and New York. Ships from Africa would arrive at Liverpool to sell their human cargo and restock for the long haul to New York. Ships from New York would arrive in Liverpool, sell cotton and similar crops raised on American plantations by slaves, then to prepare to sail for Africa where they'd barter for more slaves to re-stock the workforce.

Not all the slaves were black. Many Scots and Irish people were sold as slaves by English magistrates. Those people caught up in the Highland Clearances and the Potato Famine didn't just disappear; they found themselves in chains on ships destined for Australia or America.

Liverpool now houses the International Museum of Slavery, http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/ism/ which offers a wealth of information about this city's historical role but also about modern slavery. What, you thought it was all over? Hardly.

Emerging information about African slaves is of interest to Richard, as his great-grandfather left his native Sierra Leone to study Law in England. He already spoke English fluently before leaving Africa. His family's wealth had its origins in slavery. His was one of the black African families who sold fellow Africans to the European slave merchants. He was an elderly man when Richard was just a small boy, and Richard remembers him as being a very tall, powerfully-built man with huge hands and a deep, booming laugh. He married an Irish lady with flame-red hair.

His African name is unknown. He called himself Christopher, after Christ. His surname of Golly was lifted off the brand of jam as he thought it sounded amusingly English, as with the old-fashioned phrase "by golly!" The racial connotation was unknown to him before he came to England.

But this is as far back as Richard's family history research has gone. Everything about his great-grandfather's African life seems lost. Richard can remember his childhood home being decorated with carved African masks, spears and shields, and objects relating to voodoo, which his great-grandfather and grandfather allegedly practised.

It's a story which is repeated for hundreds of thousands of families of African descent. So every new piece of the jigsaw, such as with the Virginian archives, will surely be widely welcomed.

Access the database: http://www.vahistorical.org/news/pr_unknownnolonger.htm

Punch

2011-09-08T16:18:00.001+01:00

Read live on Cath Bore's show on 7 Waves Radio, in December 2008; written in 2008. Enjoy!

The Faerie Tree

2011-08-26T12:28:00.002+01:00

Friend or foe? The fae can be loyal companions or ruthless enemies...

Enjoy!

On Being Published

2011-08-19T10:40:00.007+01:00

Sales of hardbacks, which is apparently the most lucrative category of books, are down by 23%, though some authors are doing better than ever due to increased sales in ebooks and clever use of interactive websites.

Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2011/08/17/the-worlds-highest-paid-authors/

What does all this mean for the unsigned author?   How will the downturn in sales effect the number of new publishing contracts?

I've been thinking about what it actually means to be published. It's fair to say that every writer dreams of having their work read by thousands if not millions of people. I'm no different. As much as I enjoy the creative process of writing and editing subsequent drafts, I also want my work to be read - and hopefully enjoyed.   And some of my short stories, one extract from Tamsin, some poetry and non-fiction have been published over the years. But I want more; of course I do.

There is the undeniable kudos of having had someone else consider your writing worthy of spending their hard cash to publish and market it. Suddenly you're a "real" writer, not just an enthusiast hammering away on a computer keyboard in pursuit of art for art's sake. Fellow members of writers' circles begin asking how you found the magic ticket. And you'll tell them, in all truth, that there is only this:   Write well, keep writing, network, send out your best writing, get used to rejections.

Being published does not mean your writing is necessarily any better than that of someone who hasn't been published. It just means the editor who read it liked it and thought it was the right piece for their current project.

It could also be said that nearly all writers - as with actors, dancers, fine art painters and other creative types - also need to have another job. Most people don't want to hear that. They are too busy imagining that they'll get a book or two published then retire to some glossy paradise and spend the rest of their days writing in the sun. Such people imagine that getting published is the key to a life of wine and roses. Sometimes this actually happens, or seems to, and therefore logically it might happen for you too.

But for every big name writer, there is an ever-growing torrent of traditionally published writers whose work languishes in the sidelines. Add to this the issue of new authors' sales not meeting overly-optimistic advances, which can result in a book being unfairly deemed a flop. If you think landing a first publishing deal is tough, try landing one with the stigma of a failure to your name.

Will being published change your life?  There is an insightful essay written by Duncan Murrell, who was an editor for Algonquin Books for five years before going freelance, which casts an insider's view on what it really means to bag that contract:-
http://www.pw.org/content/measures_success_what_publishing_your_book_really_means

So, what does being published mean to you?

Apple Harvest!

2011-08-16T20:29:00.000+01:00

Freshly harvested from our four-year old tree - and not one drop of insecticide was used. We lost two apples to wasps but the rest are ours. They even smell sweet!

It's as well we're not relying on this small harvest to support us through the coming winter. Richard's already ear-marked them for an apple crumble, anyway.

Photos of Cryonics by Murray Ballard

2011-08-14T11:07:00.002+01:00

Can you spot my DNA archive amongst these photos? (Though I do have more than one archive, stored in various places.)

See the gallery: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14509425

The photographer's website: http://www.murrayballard.com/

2011-08-13T11:07:00.001+01:00

Recent press articles about the continuing rise in popularity of ebooks have set me thinking. My stance on self-publishing has long-since been one of obstinate refusal, partly due to my past experiences when running a self-published music zine a long, long time ago.

Who on earth remembers Smokin' Dragon now? Even I have to flex my memory - and I owned the pesky thing! And before anyone asks: no, the title did not imply a heroin habit. Any drug-related implication didn't even occur to me until the zine's name was already well established. I forget who pointed it out to me now. Its name was a reference to Chinese astrology - I was born in the year of the dragon - and to an admittedly corny usage of the word "smokin'" as in "hot". I did say it was corny...

The project began as a few sheets of A4 photocopying paper stapled together, printed with news about emerging rock bands, penpal contacts, and a smattering of badly reproduced photos. It ended up as a sticky, inky and delightfully messy approx. 30 page zine which sold all around the world but never made a bean financially. It was produced on an antiquated mimeograph printer, which pressed ink through a wax paper stencil. The stencil was cut on an Olympia typewriter, and it was impossible to correct typos or spelling errors, or any accidental tears to the stencil. Sticky tape worked fairly well until the ink soaked through the tape's glue. Inky finger prints and smudges were unavoidable.

My mailbox used to receive a continuous flood of demo tapes from an ever-widening river of bands hoping for even a little exposure. Some of those bands are still around today, such as Inkubus Sukkubus and Porcupine Tree. One, Steve Andrews, is still a friend (even though we've never met, which probably sounds a bit weird).

The advent of affordable PCs swiftly changed the zine scene. There used to be a thriving sub-culture of zany, quirky publications but this was before people began tuning-in en masse to free message boards and RPGs. Some printed fanzines linger on, such as Shari Green's Black Velvet. She was one of Smokin' Dragon's first subscribers...

Anyway, the point I'm making - in a roundabout, rambling way - is that self-publishing requires a lot of time and effort for little gain.   That is as true today as it was in the past.

And yet on my shelf sit two collections of short stories, both previously published as ebooks by Amazon Shorts, which are merely gathering dust - Quiet Lives and A Wirral Otherkin Trilogy. All Amazon Shorts were withdrawn in June 2010. As my two ebooks' First Rights have already been sold, no-one else has shown any interest in re-releasing them. Meanwhile, the dust gathers, and to no purpose. Consequently, I'm seriously thinking about re-publishing them myself. I'll probably join them together as one item, and definitely add a better book cover - the covers given them by Amazon Shorts were totally boring and provided no visual hook. The project is only in the early planning stage, but I'll keep you posted on its progress.

Mysterious Bavarian Tunnels

2011-08-07T10:02:00.000+01:00

700 underground chambers have been found in Bavaria and another 500 in Austria, whose purpose is currently unknown. Where they hideouts or sacred spaces? They are often too narrow to have been used for food storage, and the only artifact found so far seems to have been an iron plowshare.

Read more: http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,775348,00.html

The Definitive Writer's T-Shirt?

2011-08-03T08:48:00.000+01:00

Also available in other styles for men & women.

Exclusive to Spooky Cute Designs: www.zazzle.com/AdeleCB

Sherrilyn Kenyon

2011-07-29T12:26:00.000+01:00

I've just read Sherrilyn Kenyon's biography on her website, and what a story that is! It apparently took ten years to get her first novel from her Dark Hunter series published, and her determination and tenacity throughout her difficult life has been amazing. Many others in a similar situation would have given up. Kudos to Sherrilyn!

Read it here: http://www.sherrilynkenyon.com/about/history/

Robert Ettinger now Cryo-Preserved

2011-07-28T13:09:00.001+01:00

One of the leading lights of the cryonics movement has now been cryo-preserved at the Cryonics Institute, which he founded. Robert Ettinger died on July 23rd.

Read the Cryonics Institute's press release here: http://cryonics.org/Press%20Release%20-%20Robert%20Ettinger.pdf

Watch a short video about cryonics & cast your vote: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/life-ice-world-crazy-cryogenics/story?id=14167348

The Keret House

2011-07-28T11:54:00.004+01:00

Architect Jacob Szczesny has designed what may be the world's narrowest house, which fits neatly into a small gap between two pre-existing buildings. It's intended occupant is writer Etgar Keret.

I'm not sure why the design is triangular, as from photos it seems like there's plenty of room for a rectangular house which would provide more space.

Also, I suspect the remote control stairs which flatten when raised to make a level floor space will be a mixed blessing. No object (or person) could be left on that area of the floor as surely it (or they) will go flying whenever anyone wanted to leave the room. Still, it might be an effective method of ejecting unwanted guests.

The first floor is reached by a ladder surrounded by an alarming hole in the floor. Where does the occupant store clothes, groceries etc? There doesn't seem to be a washing machine but then is it described as a workplace (and an art installation) rather than a home - though it does have a double bed, a silent comment, perhaps, on the artistic temperament in general. Has anyone tried carrying bedding up a vertical ladder? One solution would be to hoist clean sheets to the bedroom via a basket on a rope. Certainly this would be less hazardous.

I've no idea how the top floor is reached as the ladder seems to stop half way there.

The design reminds me of an extended version of those Japanese capsule hotels where people sleep in a glorified locker. It might be tolerable for brief periods of time but I would politely decline any offers of an extended stay!

View the design: http://www.archdaily.com/152505/keret-house-centrala/

Cross-Stitch

2011-07-24T11:17:00.000+01:00

These little cross-stitch samplers will among my contributions to a fund-raising craft fair this coming Sunday. I like the second one best. Three watercolours of mine are in the raffle, too; two portraits and one landscape - sketches really, rather than finished paintings.

Lucian Freud

2011-07-24T07:52:00.001+01:00

There is a rather lovely tribute to one of my favourite artists, Lucian Freud, who died this week, written by someone who knew him well:-

Visit: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/jul/24/lucian-freud-william-feaver-appreciation

Ray Kurzweil to Speak

2011-07-21T09:37:00.000+01:00

"What if you could live forever? Transcendent Man: A Conversation about the Future with Ray Kurzweil...explores this idea with renowned futurist Ray Kurzweil and an all-star panel.

"NCM Fathom, Ptolemaic Productions and Therapy Studios (will) present a live and all new in-depth discussion to explore Kurzweil’s theories on immortality and the Singularity, a point in the near future when technology will be advancing so quickly we won’t be able to keep up, unless we merge with the intelligent machines we are creating. This idea is known as the Singularity."

For details of how to pose questions to the panel, or for ticket sales, visit: http://www.fathomevents.com/originals/event/transcendentman.aspx

Sketches circa 1990

2011-07-20T10:11:00.002+01:00

Fying Cars Now a Reality!

2011-07-18T08:24:00.000+01:00

Mower Mutiny!

2011-07-17T10:21:00.001+01:00

In the eleven years we've lived here, we've gone through four lawn mowers. Whatever happened to electrical goods whose life extended long after the manufacterers' guarantees expired? These-days products seem to be made as cheaply as possible in the full knowledge that items will develop faults sooner rather than later. Perhaps it's a deliberate method of keeping the economy turning over, in that goods are made to break down so people will keep buying more of the same. Repairs cost nearly as much as a new product, assuming spare parts are even available. This is one contributing factor to the planet's ever-growing rubbish tips.

It's also rather annoying. Our high-pressure waterjet patio cleaner, for example, lasted one season before the plastic handle split, meaning all pressure was lost and water was pouring over the electric wiring. Could a new handle be bought? Of course not. Our fairly new bread-making machine went on fire. Our deep-fat fryer, one in a long line of similar products, suddenly decided that it didn't need to be hot. Our fridge, the third since we've lived here, developed a bizarre rattling crunch then decided it didn't need to be cold. The repair man said, "Oh, yeah; they do that." Could he fix it? No. I cleaned our gas oven with a well known oven-cleaning product whose "muscles" bunged up the gas jets and two guys with blow torches couldn't unbung them.

The catalogue of woes goes on but you get the idea. You've probably got a similar catalogue.

Gradually, we're going Kind-Of Amish. If it can be done without a machine, it's being done that way. Tasks take a bit longer, it's true, but the results are just the same. Only kind-of Amish, I must stress - Xtianity, medieval clothing and penchant for dying rather than accepting surgery will never be "back on the menu, boys". And life without a computer would be undesirable to say the least...

I have absolutely no objection to machines making life easier. On the contrary. But actually our old flymo really didn't make mowing easier as it weighed a ton and getting round corners was more laborious than steering a hovercraft. One of our other old electric mowers worked fine till it was asked to cut grass. Every few yards it needed unjamming - which meant walking across the garden to unplug it, walking back to the mower to poke at it with a stick, then walking across the garden to plug it in again, then walking back to start mowing again. The pleasure of mid-mow garden strolls soon wore off.

When the latest lawn mower went up in smoke - literally - I seem to have inspired a small mutiny. My purchase of an old-fashioned push-it-yourself Qualcast Panther mower, which costs much less than an electric one and does just as good a job of cutting the grass, has inspired a growing avalanche of people expressing an interest in buying a similar model. They too are fed up of electrical goods which conk out long before reasonable wear and tear can take their toll - which was my reason for buying a manual mower.

Could this herald the growth of a slow, non-violent revolution whose converts protest the manufacturing of shoddy goods by simply not buying them anymore?

Telling Tales: An Afteroon with Riverside Writers - Photographs

2011-07-10T10:16:00.001+01:00

Event poster.

Adele Cosgrove-Bray

Tim Hulme

Peter Caton

Dave

Peter

Audience participation from Helen Brickwood

Audience participation from Frank Hogan

Note: The lovely photography exhibition which served as our backdrop is by pupils from West Kirby Residential School.

Press Clipping

2011-07-08T21:06:00.001+01:00

Press clipping from The Wirral News, 6th July, 2011, announcing Riverside Writers' event tomorrow. Click on the image to see it in a larger size.

The clipping's title makes it sound as if attendees will be expected to write all afternoon. Not so! People will be treated to a diverse range of original fiction and poetry from some of Riverside Writers longest-standing members, most of whom are published (and I do not mean self-published!).

Telling Tales is the first of two literary events which I'll be organising this year, the other being Parallel Dimensions, the third annual Wirral Science-Fiction, Fantasy and Horror festival whose audience gets bigger each time.

Time To Die?

2011-07-06T20:42:00.000+01:00

Have a play with this Death Clock. No, not the cartoon death metal band; this gadget is supposed to be able to calculate the date of your death.

I got July 8th, 2054 - but this date doesn't take into consideration my cryo-preservation contract, or my other (shall we say philosophical?) pursuits.

Russia 2045: Transhumanism

2011-07-05T10:23:00.001+01:00

"We believe that the world needs a different ideological paradigm... The new ideology should assert, as one of its priorities, the necessity of using breakthrough technology for an improvement of man himself and not only of his environment. We believe that it is possible and necessary to eliminate aging and even death, and to overcome the fundamental limits of the physical and mental capabilities currently set by the restrictions of the physical body.

"Scientists from various countries in the world are already developing technology that ensures the creation of an artificial human body prototype within the next decade. We believe that before 2045 an artificial body will be created that will not only surpass the existing body in terms of functionality, but will achieve perfection of form and be no less attractive than the human body."

Source: http://2045.com/plan/

UFOs Filmed over London?

2011-06-27T08:31:00.001+01:00

"The footage was filmed near the BBC Radio 1 building in Great Portland Street, and shows specks of white light flying at high altitude over the capital. A larger object then emerges from behind a cloud before vanishing moments later."

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/ufo/8599547/UFOs-spotted-over-London.html

Dignitas Clinic & Assisted Death

2011-06-21T11:18:00.002+01:00

I watched the recent TV documentary - on iPlayer as I have no desire to own a TV - which featured the popular Fantasy author Terry Pratchet at Dignitas Clinic. He spoke to two people before they chose to take their own lives at the clinic, and he watched as one of them did so. We, the viewers, watched too.

Inevitably the programme has caused a storm of protest. People argue about the sanctity of life being violated, and are concerned about the dismissal of various religious ideas, the ethics of money earned through aiding suicide, the potential exploitation or ‘removal’ of vulnerable people, and the possible grim ramifications of state-sanctioned suicide. These are valid points which need serious consideration.

Who has the right to define any standard on what is a good and worthwhile life for anyone other than themselves? My definition will differ from yours, and yours will differ from the next person’s, and so on and so on, endlessly.

Pratchet’s documentary emphasised that these people had made an informed choice about when and how to end their lives. It was that individual’s own body, and therefore it was surely their choice to make an exit from life on their own terms before their quality of life deteriorated to a degree that would be considered intolerable by that individual.

Yet I couldn’t help but feel compassion for the newly bereaved wife who had to drive away from the clinic on her own, go back to the hotel and pack hers and her late husband’s things, catch a flight to the UK alone and go home to an empty house and face the legal consequences of her part in her husband’s suicide. Yes, she had a choice. She could have stayed at home while he went away to die. And before her husband swallowed the clear toxic fluid which quickly killed him, she had positively stated that she did not want her husband to go ahead with his planned suicide. She also felt it was his choice to make and wished to respect his choice.

But she’ll always have the memory of sitting on a sofa next to the man she loved while he killed himself. That moment will stay with her and, thanks to the documentary, all their family and friends for the rest of their lives. I suspect this will be no easy thing.

I was concerned that, at Dignitas, it seemed as if only one doctor spoke to the man who we later watched die, albeit on two seperate occasions, and both interviews seemed very brief. No further counselling was seen to take place. Perhaps it did, but this wasn't shown in the documentary.

Both men who died during the documentary would have lived longer. Their physical health didn’t seem so bad, and mentally they both seemed lucid. Exactly how much longer might their lives have continued is impossible to guess, but in neither case did death appear in any way immanent. The problem, as they seemed to see it, was that if their conditions deteriorated beyond an uncertain point then they might become unable to make the choice to end their lives. Rather than risk this, they chose suicide before any final decline could begin.

I have to wonder if they had really looked at other options available, such as nursing homes and hospice care. Despite recent scary headlines trumpeting gloom and doom, many such places do a marvellous job - but no newspapers print stories about the fantastic work which the majority of health care professionals perform every day.

One disturbing aspect of the Dignitas Clinic which I had not known about prior to this documentary was that almost a quarter of their clients choose to die to escape depression. But depression is not terminal! I’m well aware that it can be a terrible illness and a cruel blight on the lives of those who suffer from it, but with psychotherapy, appropriate medication and the will to move on then depression can be overcome.

And I have to wonder how many of these eager suicide committers have even considered the extraordinary potential of nano-technology and nano-medicines? How many have thought about cryo-preservation, or even bothered to make a DNA archive? Yes, even a simple dollop of spit could have given them a second chance of a full and healthy life. Ok, it’s currently only a very slim chance - but better that than no chance at all.

I support the concept of assisted death only to humanely ease immanent passing. Running into death’s embrace in order to dodge circumstances which can be cured or might not even happen seems insane to me.

Further reading: http://hubpages.com/hub/The-Case-for-Assisted-Death

Rare Photos of Tibet's Largest Buddhist Grottoes

2011-06-16T09:42:00.001+01:00

"Hidden among sandstone hills in remote western Tibet, a stretch of honeycomb-shaped caverns is way beyond the reach of most travellers. Known as the Donggar Piyang grottoes, the 1,000-year-old caverns in the Tibet Autonomous Region's Ngari Prefecture hold one of the world's greatest collections of Tibetan Buddhist murals... Frescoes that are currently open to the public mainly depict Buddhas, Bodhisattvas and other deities, but also feature animals that are not native to Ngari."

Source: http://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2011/06/rare-look-into-tibets-largest-buddhist.html

Transhumanism: Interview with Nick Bostrom

2011-06-13T08:55:00.003+01:00

"It is my view that long before that there would be a big population of people who are several hundred years old...."

Nick Bostrum is the Director of the Future of Humanity Institute.

Source: http://www.bedeutung.co.uk/magazine/issues/3-life-death/withey-interview-bostrom/

Stained Glass Artist Michael Watts

2011-06-12T08:39:00.001+01:00

Browse through a gallery of beautiful stained glass created by artist Michael Watts, whose website rightly describes his work as "romantic with a decidedly old-world European flair". His work is exquisite!

Visit: http://www.studiowatts.com/index.html

Egyptian Pyramids & Tombs Found

2011-06-07T08:10:00.000+01:00

"Seventeen lost pyramids, thousands of tombs and more than 3000 settlements have been discovered in Egypt, using infrared technology from 700km above Earth.

"'These are just the sites close to the surface. There are many thousands of additional sites that the Nile has covered over with silt,' (U.S. Egyptologist) Sarah Parcak said."

Source: http://au.news.yahoo.com/queensland/a/-/article/9519866/egyptian-pyramids-found-from-space/

Photographs of India

2011-06-05T08:04:00.000+01:00

An excellent gallery of photos from India:

https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/media/set/?set=a.230450446965140.70777.100000005601801

Cryonic Stem Cell Bank Now Available

2011-06-05T07:33:00.000+01:00

"Wealthy Britons can now pay to freeze and store their stem cells as an 'insurance policy' that could be used to treat diseases they develop in the future or even grow new organs.

"The companies behind the project, which charges £2,495 to collect and store the stem cells in cryogenic freezers for 20 years, have begun taking the blood samples from their first clients..."

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/8556764/Blood-stem-cell-bank-to-provide-biological-insurance-for-adults.html

Solitude and Socialising

2011-06-04T11:01:00.008+01:00

"The paradigm experience of solitude is a state characterized by disengagement from the immediate demands of other people - a state of reduced social inhibition and increased freedom to select one's mental and physical activities."

Source: http://www.psychologytoday.com/collections/201105/solitude-vs-loneliness/solitude-part-2-the-benefits-it-brings-and-the-special-str

This reminds me of Tristan. He was certain that the only way to develop any real knowledge of the self was through embracing solitude. By removing the demands and distractions of other people, he hoped to then focus on discovering the true essence of his inner immortal self, (or soul, if you prefer that term).

I tend to stand somewhere in-between, in that while I'd agree that solitude offers uninterrupted opportunity for inner work, I find also that a deliberately created contrast between solitude and socialising presents a greater strengthening of unfolding knowledge. In plain English, it's easy to swan around feeling 'spiritual' when there is no challenge to supposed abilities. The true worth of acquired knowledge can be measured by its usefulness in our dealings with the world. (This is no criticism of Tristan, by the way; and besides he lives in Rome now - hardly a hermit's isolated retreat!).

I've been basking in a few brief days of relative solitude after an unusually busy but also highly enjoyable time. The contrast between the two is, in itself, a pleasure. After days filled with travel, dining out and meeting people - some of whom I'd not met in the flesh before -, plus attending a family get-together which I'd organised, I've now had a few days to properly wind down and digest experiences before resuming my usual routine.

As anticipated, the backlog of snail mail had already created a small, teetering mountain which I haven't completely vanquished yet. Half of the waiting emails could be deleted instantly, of course, but this is typical. Trust me when I say I don't have a penis to extend; neither do I bank with many of the companies who allegedly claim my account needs attention. I've yet to meet anyone who really earns worthwhile money from home, and surely there can't be any relatives left alive in Africa considering the phenomenal quantity of them who have died in car crashes.

The phrase "unexpected car crash" amuses me. If disaster was expected, who'd ride in the car?

Left to right: George, Andy, Richard, Tony, Hazel, Evelyn, Agnes, Victoria, Catherine, Alexander.

Left to right: George, Andy, Richard, Tony, Evelyn, Agnes, Adele, Victoria, Alexander

and a few orbs, (or dust specks, take your pick!).