I'm incredibly excited by this new publication, which has taken so long to come to fruition. Literally years lie between the planning and the forthcoming publication of this collection of 13 stories, edited by Raven Digitalis and published by Moon Books on March 1st, 2025. Take a look at the list of contributing authors:- 1. Candle Magic by Storm Constantine 2. Spanish Jones by Adele Cosgrove-Bray 3. 3:33 by Rhea Troutman 4. Entombed by Corvis Nocturnum 5. Fata Morgana by S.M. Lomas 6. Automatic Writing by Gabrielle Faust 7. The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe 8. Don’t Forget to Feed by Miranda S. Hewlett 9. The Night Everything Changed by Raven Digitalis 10. ReBound by Tracy Cross 11. Captured by Jaclyn M. Ciminelli 12. Red Gifts by Daniel Adam Rosser 13. The Iconoclasts by Mona Fitzgerald-King You can pre-order a copy now from Amazon using this link:- Pre-order Here! Black Magick will be available as a paperback and an ebook.

Here are March's efforts for my one-sketch-per-day project, now presented as a short video. Do let me know what you think, or if you've any suggestions or ideas. Actually, the hyacinth you see in one of the watercolour sketches here has now finished flowering so I've planted it in the garden. Hopefully it will come up again next year. It was in our living room, where it filled the air with its delicious, heady perfume. We're living in strange times, hmm? The news is laden with tragic death counts and infection rates and tales of life under the shadow of the coronavirus/COVID 19. The restaurant where my husband works is closed and this is his third week at home. So far he's weeded the garden, washed down all the windows inside and out, spring-cleaned the house and finished reading the entire series of graphic novels of the X-Men. At the time of typing this, he's just come back from walking the dogs and is now listening to Scala Radio while reading a Derek...

According to this article , in 2019 just 26% of under-18s spent some time each day reading, and only  53% said they read books purely for pleasure. This is the lowest level recorded by the National Literacy Trust since 2005. Elsewhere in The Guardian , it was reported that, "According to a 2018 Author’s Guild Study the median income of all published authors for all writing related activity was $6,080 in 2017, down from $10,500 in 2009; while the median income for all published authors based solely on book-related activities went from $3,900 to $3,100, down 21%. Roughly 25% of authors earned $0 in income in 2017." As I've written previously , all writers have experienced a steady decline in book sales. There is so much free reading available online, including free books by the thousands just waiting to be downloaded. Consequently most writers, including traditionally published writers with established reputations and fan-bases, hold down conventional jobs as well. I...

You're invited to read one of my short horror stories, Make Do and Mend , which was published in Flash Fiction Magazine yesterday. It's attracting some very lovely comments below it, also. Read it for FREE here: Flash Fiction Magazine 4.09.19 This is the second short story I've had published with this online magazine this year. You can read Whatsername  here: Flash Fiction Magazine 02.18.19

My short story, Whatsername , was published in Flash Fiction Magazine, and you can read it online  HERE . This 500-word monologue comes from a conversation I had while sitting on a bench in Birkenhead Park. A lady using a mobility scooter began chatting to me, and all the time she talked I was thinking "This would make a story..." And so it was done - and now you can read it online. You can also download a free ebook of flash fiction by various authors at that same URL.

The Grumpets! ISBN: 9781301565078 ASIN: B00D3JB0CW (for Kindle) Published Today! Grumpets are shy creatures who live in compost heaps.   At any moment of any day, wilting flowers, mouldy cabbage leaves or faded roses might tumble down upon them. But the heap can be a dangerous place. Grumpets have to keep alert for horrible Slimers.   And the dreaded Time of Turning…. Introducing a new species, one which even the mighty Sir David Attenborough has, as yet, overlooked!  Grumpets are, (as the above book blurb suggests), rather shy and retiring by nature, and they spend much of their time burrowing within warm, snug compost heaps.  They can be found in many gardens but it is unlikely, unless you keep a sharp eye out and know what you're looking for, that you will have spotted them. The Grumpets is a short fantasy story for children, though it may well appeal to 'children' of all ages.  This foray into children's fiction is ...

"Little sister, let me tell you this story. I know your days are busy and your life full of important things. I promise not to delay you for long. "It is a simple story. It came to me last night in my dreams, and its beauty impressed itself upon my mind so strongly that when I woke, still hearing these words echo through me, I remembered you and sought a way to share it...." So begins this enchanting account of a mystical journey.         What is the ebook equivalent of "hot off the printing press"?  Here's the long-awaited release of an oldie which has been on the backburner for a while.  Getting the cover right caused the delay, as I did not want to see a pretty pastiche in pastels.  This cover is simple but bold.  Well, I think so anyway!  You're welcome to share your opinions of it.  Message... is available now from Smashwords  and Amazon . 

According to the Financial Times , a new self-publishing wing is to be offered by Simon & Shuster, as their response to the large increase of consumer interest in self-publishing. However, elsewhere it is claimed that S&S intend to offer their basic self-publishing package from $1,599 USD, rising to $24,999 USD for the deluxe self-publishing package.  So that's from just under £1,000 British Pounds Sterling up to £15,618. Is this true?  Surely I can't be the only so-called indie author to laugh aloud at this.

"Data gathered by the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society in 2007 revealed a median income for authors of just £4,000." There is an interesting and revealing survey here which looks at authors' experiences of publishers.  The above quote augments my recent blog post about most writers needing an alternative source of income other than writing. Organising finances can be tricky when income is erratic.  Amanda Clayman is a psychotherapist specialising in financial well-being, and here she talks about some of the traps that writers and artists often fall into. John Scalzi claims he has made an average of $100,000 from writing for the last decade (in an article written in 2008).  Read his financial advice for writers here .  The article has a strong American bias but the ideas are valid for writers of any country.  He, too, says that most writers need another source of income such as a second job or a partner who doesn't mind partially supporting...

Joe Konrath's written a great blog post here , which explains the veiled ramifications of publishing contracts.  If you are still in the long-winded and frustrating process of hunting down an agent and publisher, I recommend that you take the time to read this post as it could change the way you think about the publishing industry and, if you're still dithering over the prospect of self-publishing, help you climb off that fence. Self-publishing used to be classed as the last bastion of the desperate.  Writers who self-published were giggled at, the usual assumption being that if you had to DIY it was because no 'proper' publisher thought the work worthy of investment.  And so the wannabe writer tended to pay for course after course, searching for the magic pill which would cure whichever literary malady prevented the blossoming of their ambitions.  If only their work was good enough, polished enough, individual enough while still nestling neatly...

Neil Gaiman addresses an audience of university graduates in this interesting video, in which he talks about creating good art, writing, self-belief and the changing face of distribution.  Watch it here:  http://player.vimeo.com/video/42372767?color=ffffff   

According to an article in USA Today , 21% of the nearly 3,000 people asked had read an ebook since December last year. This indicates a big change in the way people are buying and reading books, a change which looks set to continue snowballing.  And of course that's more good news for writers - not just American writers, either, because in case this fact has slipped you by somehow, people from all around the world can now buy ebooks from writers who live all around the world.  I still say paper books won't vanish altogether, but will become the preserve of big art and photography books - right up until the day when an ereader can also act as a projector, so its user(s) can see a big version of whatever's on the screen.  When you look at a painting, you want to be able to see it in sharp detail rather than squint at a fuzzy, pixilated miniature version. The demise of the familiar pulp paperback format is, however, inevitable.  I wo...

Having read through Mark Coker's free ebook, The Secrets of Ebook Publishing Success , it seems I'm already doing pretty much everything he suggests - with one main exception.  The front covers of Tamsin and Rowan didn't give quite enough information.  A browser needs to be able to know, at a glance, what the product is and if it's likely to be their kind of thing. So, after a bit of thinking, I've now re-worked the front covers slightly by adding a subtitle which reads simply, "An artisan-sorcerer story."  This lets a browser know they're looking at a series, that the series doesn't have a number and so can be read in any order, and also gives a minimalist description of what the book is about.  Having re-done the covers, I then uploaded new versions to Smashwords and Kindle.  Rowan is currently only available on Kindle, but the paperback version should be out within days.  After May 17th, Rowan will have completed its three month's e...

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...

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 d...

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...   

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). 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...

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.)                  

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 thi...

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 l...