Earlier today, I was part of a Twitter conversation about bad reviews. Goes with the territory, for writers. Criticism has two faces: there’s the constructive, reasoned aspect and the other, far more common, version where the comments stray into personal abuse territory. Obviously, I’ve had my share of both and the more books you sell, [...]
Archive for January, 2012
You’re a Shit Writer, not Your a Shit Writer. Critics, Bless Them.
Posted: January 31, 2012 in Random Posts8
Size Isn’t Everything. What a Title for a Former Porn Star!
Posted: January 30, 2012 in Random PostsNo, of course, I’m not a former porn star! I just happened to have a rather splendid moustache at one time and this caused some dubious elements to speculate on my former mode of employment. A more personal post than usual. Decisions that will have a drastic effect on our life have been made in [...]
Yesterday I was at a beach bar near Tarifa. The customers were all surfers and the man serving the drinks was from Hawaii. Surfers and Hawaii are a natural fit. That’s the home of the biggest and best waves anywhere. The barman was no surfer. He was immense. About six-foot-ten or so and must have [...]
Travelling round Europe, as we do, there’s bound to be a time when we enter familiar territory. We passed through Finestret, a small village at the foot of Mount Canigou, almost as far as you can go in France without being in Spain, on our way down. We lived in Finestret for almost five years, [...]
I’m supposed to be an ex-writer these days. Taking a sabbatical, perhaps. Try telling that to the voices in my head in the wee small hours. I’ve got four unfinished novels gathering virtual dust in my computer. Who needs another one? Ideas don’t behave rationally and this one arrived at three o’clock this morning. As [...]
‘Inside every older person is a younger person wondering what happened.’ Jennifer Yane ‘Nobody grows old merely by living a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul.’ Samuel Ullman ‘For age is opportunity no less than [...]
Two years ago this week I broke my toe by dropping a breezeblock on it. accidentally! This was not an attempt to get out of the trenches and secure a ‘Blighty wound.’ I once stood by and watched as a drug dealer deemed to be fleecing his supplier was held firmly by two burly men [...]
The Hound of the Baskervilles and Racial Stereotyping are alive and well in Spain.
Posted: January 14, 2012 in Random PostsDisclaimer: None of the national stereotypical views expressed in the following paragraph, or elsewhere are mine. I happen to disagree with each and every one, but more anon… Here’s a brief summary of some of the views expressed by patrons of a café this morning. The English abroad, at their worst, rating the inhabitants [...]
We’re taking a break in a motorway services, halfway down Spain. The sun is shining, the sky is blue and all is well. We finish our coffee and head back to our trusty vehicle; parked in the shade. We left some old friends a few days ago. A young couple who’d been the only [...]
A new year and time to take stock. Having made the decision to carry on with my utterly selfish life I am free to write what I want. No more ‘dumbing down’ for a mass readership, you may think. Well, maybe. Here’s a short that popped onto my head late last night. It’s not [...]
