Picture taken in the few moments available when the cat was not in the box with them. He was busy killing some of the packaging on the floor at this point.
Smashwords
The ebook should go live at Amazon on 12th June, at or around 9.00 a.m. GMT.
Pre-order from the Book Depository.
From your local Amazon, if you live outside those two.
Filed under About My Writing, Author Updates, e-publishing, General Wittering
One Man: No Plan is finally available for pre-order on some sites: Kobo and Smashwords so far, B&N and Apple soon. Amazon does not do a pre-order service so, Ammyphiles, I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to hang on.
It will be available in paperback and in all digital formats, everywhere, on the launch date: 12 June, 2014.
So, the main points again:
One Man: No Plan is on target for release in paperback and e-book on 12 June, 2014.
AND… You can pre-order it in electronic format from these places so far:
Kobo
Smashwords
You can pre-order your print copy from:
The Book Depository, here.
Amazon, here.
OR… you can check this page for seller links – each site will be added as the links go live…
Filed under About My Writing, Author Updates, Blimey!, General Wittering
It’s been a bit too long since I posted anything on my blog. I have a box 010 post owing and heaven knows what else but there may be a bit of a hiatus until after I’ve launched both books… not that I have much time to launch both books.
You know about the old dears; Dad came out of hospital on Friday. And it’s half term this week, so I won’t be doing much writing related stuff for the next few days, either. Just to complicate things we have also adopted a rescue cat. He is just coming up for 10 weeks old as I write and in the words of the vet he is “a bit of a monster”. Not in temperament, he is a poppet, if he sticks his claws in, you just mewl like a kitten in pain and he withdraws them at once. He’s gentle, loving and a real character. In short, well, in his case it’s more like, long, he is great fun but he is absolutely bat-shit crazy. He is also at least a foot long, about 18 inches if I include his head as well, with enormous feet and ears…. which, as the vet explained, he’s going to grow into.
He was already named before we got him: Harrison, after George (his mother was Beatle and his brothers were Lennon and McCartney). He answers to Harrison, as well, so we’re stuck with it. With those ears, we’d quite like to call him Spock but it’s not going to happen. He’s great fun but he also takes up a lot of time. If we want him to be a people cat there has to be lots of interaction from the get go.
So, without more ado, here he is: Harrison. My latest distraction.
Harrison has two settings: On.
or Off.
Obviously, ‘off’ is the easier of the two states to photograph. He moves extremely quickly.
Filed under Blimey!, General Wittering
No, really! Look! Mwah hahahargh!
Check out Number three!
Filed under About My Writing, Author Updates, Blimey!, Free Stuff
Thanks so much for the well wishing and support.
Yes, the oldster is OK. He will be in hospital for a while and there’ll need to be rehab and big changes at home. That isn’t such a bad thing. In fact, some good may well have come out of this. Dad can go back home. However, when he does there will need to be a lot more care, possibly 24 hour round the clock, care; for both of them. That may sound bad but I think it’s what they’ve needed for a long time.
So a lot of relief all round.
Filed under General Wittering
A bit of a bum day today. Things have been rather hectic recently – you may have noticed this from the distinct lack of posts but Real Life has thrown me a bit of a curve ball.
As you know, if you read my drivel regularly, my Dad is not too good. He has a heart murmur – actually it’s called something I don’t know how to spell; an atrial affribillation. My Mum, meanwhile has an atrial agitation – seriously I shit you not it is called something along those lines – which sounds like exactly the same thing with a different name. Both are caused by pacemaker cells – the things that make your heart beat. These should give out an electrical impulse all at once causing the muscles around them to contract and your heart to pump. In the cases of both my parents, the pacemaker cells are firing off at different times, causing the muscle to just kind of… jiggle rather than squeeze in a nice neat contraction. This means the blood doesn’t go round the body efficiently.
My Dad is not getting enough blood to the head and is having a lot of short term memory problems. My Mum was his sole carer until recently and her problems have only started up in the last couple of years. They have lots of people round them who love them almost as much as me and bro do but… they’re a long way away.
On Wednesday, I saw them both for lunch and they were on great form, despite the fact that Dad fell over on the lawn. Mum and I got him up and the three of us laughed and joked about it afterwards. He was much more compos than usual, didn’t fall asleep and it was really like a visit to both parents. Kind of a gift.
Thursday morning he fell in the shower. The long and the short of it is that he went to hospital to be checked out, came home and then on Friday evening, had to go back. The daughter of the lovely lady who is officially Mum and Dad’s ‘cleaner’ but is oh so much more than that, had spotted the ambulance and they were both there with Mum and Dad at the time I rang, about to leave. McOther was at a wine dinner somewhere in Cambridge so I couldn’t do anything, anyway, until he got home: E.T.A. half 11.
Lovely lady rang my brother and he went down. This morning when I rang I got the low down. Dad’s blood oxygen is very low but at the same time his heart is racing. This is not a state of affairs that can continue long term. So they may stabilise him, and this may just be another visit to the hospital. Or, it may not. They’ll know more this afternoon so until then, all I can do is wait. So here I sit, preparing the house for dinner as if it’s all going ahead, as if I’m going to be here.
I’ve put the washing away, done the beds, fed McMini his lunch and now I must clean the floors and clear my guff out of the conservatory, where we’re having dinner – or will it be they? I don’t know. It’s the most bizarre disjointed feeling; limbo. Such a normal day and yet, so extraordinary. Preparing to think, to act and possibly even to grieve while, in the meantime, acting; filling my minutes with things to do, so as not to do any thinking. It’s a bit like the time when, as a kid, I wanted to ring my friend in Guildford and forgot the code, I had a bit of a spelling block while looking it up and ended up ringing a woman in Guilford County Armagh. Everything was right and yet… not.
I know that if this one is goodbye, my Dad will want me there. So I have to cue in back up, even though I’m unlikely to need it. I have to make sure I can go, even if the chances are I won’t have to. And so the hours tick by and I wait. Ready but actually, really not ready. Not ready for this at all; though it’s been coming for months and I fear that it might, now, be happening for real.
Between you and me and the gatepost, I feel I’m being a bit of a drama queen. But if I’m not around for the next couple of weeks, you know where I am.
In the meantime, here’s a picture of next door’s cat (Chewie’s Girlfriend, as she’s known to us because Chewie would let her into the garden but no other cats). What on earth she’s seen I don’t know but she’s been staring at that drain for hours.
Filed under General Wittering
Hello again and welcome back to Box 010 the results edition. Our most recent special guest was Angela Burkhead who has just published Sticks n’ Stones and the Garden of Phea, a young adult fantasy novel. So, the poll is closed and the votes are in. Without more ado, let’s find out how many of Angela’s items she got in.
Angela Burkhead, thanks to your fine powers of persuasion, these evil things are now gone for ever:
1. Auto Correct.
Overwhelmingly voted in, to my absolute delight.
2. Using More Than One Exclamation Mark To Express Excitement.
Yippee!!!!! Mwah hahahahrgh. Sorry, couldn’t resist it. Thank you everyone. You are clearly people of taste and discernment. Well, of course you are, you’re reading my blog. Phnark.
3. Disney Owning StarWars.
They binned Clone Troopers. Nuff said.
Angela, top job that’s a very good result. Thank you so much for joining us. Ladies and gentlemen, that was Angela Burkhead and if you agree with her choices why not check out her latest book, Sticks n’ Stones and the Garden of Phea.
You can also stalk Angela on the internet at the following places:
https://www.facebook.com/AngelaBurkheadAuthor?ref=hl
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7824929.Angela_Burkhead
https://twitter.com/TheMsBurkhead
http://themsburkhead.tumblr.com
http://angelaburkhead.blogspot.com
Filed under Box 010, General Wittering
Well here’s a bit of a turn up, Few Are Chosen is featured on the Indie Book of the Day site. You can see it here for the rest of today (Pacific time, which is probably until about this time tomorrow) and you can see the permanent entry here. And they’ve also given me a lovely badge which I will put on my sidebar tomorrow – unfortunately I’m out tonight.
So there we are, do go and check out Indie Book of the Day because they are clearly people of astonishingly fine taste and good discernment. Phnark… OK so I nominated myself but hey. I’m still excited and for those of you who are authors, too, I’ll let you know what the blip in downloads looked like!
See the lovely seal for my blog!
And the lovely certificate. Weeeee! Happy dance.
Filed under About My Writing, Blimey!, General Wittering
I don’t often Reblog but Charles Yallowitz has been doing a spot on his blog where people give him made up silly words and he comes up with a definition. Most of us have played this in the car on long journeys, right?
Anyway today he’s ‘done’ – if that’s the right word – mine. Enjoy.
Today’s list comes from M T McGuire! Enjoy the weekend!
Gralark
A member of the crow family, this bird has a grainy coloration to help blend in with the wheat fields. It feeds off insects and rodents, using its camouflage to sneak up on prey. There are sharp barbs on the underside of their wings, which can deliver a paralytic toxin for taken down larger prey like rabbits. Gralarks can get fixated on shiny objects and have been known to get pulled into wheat threshers because a fallen item has stolen its attention.
Scaboildan
This beast is covered in scabs caused by the hot water that it lives in. The Scaboildan thrives in bubbling springs and sitting on the hot bottom creates a solid shell of rough skin. These large amphibians have no pain receptors, so they are able to live within the dangerous water. They move very slowly…
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Filed under General Wittering
Well hello, and after a bit of a hiatus, welcome, once again, to Box 010; a bit of light whimsy which is, in no way, inspired by the popular BBC programme Room 101. Here’s now it works. Every two weeks, except in the holidays when I turn into Mumzilla and everything goes a bit mental, my special guest will pop in and then present us with five things they would like to see consigned to the dustbin of existence. This week’s special guest is Angela Burkhead. She has just published Sticks n’ Stones and the Garden of Phea, a young adult fantasy novel.
Hello Angela and welcome to Box 010. Before we get started, would you like to tell us a bit about yourself?
Hi, yes I would. I’m a full time writer and a full time mom. Of the two jobs, I cannot decide which is more difficult and time consuming, but both bring the joys of fulfillment and accomplishment.
My son and I currently reside in Richmond, Ky, just north of Kentucky’s arts and crafts capital, Berea, Ky, where I was born and raised.
Ah a fellow author combining the rigours or writing and motherhood. Right then, let’s get onto your rant. What is the first thing that you would like to see expunged from existence for ever?
The first on my list I wish to ban from existence is Auto Correct. Let’s face it, we have all been victim to Auto Corrects evils in which the sentence: “I’m hanging out with Mary Anne” has become “I’m hanging out with Marijuana” causing a parent or two to inflict unnecessary punishment. D@$! you Auto Correct! It needs to be unmade.
Heavens yes, Auto Correct is the Devil’s tool. Good plan. So, onto your second item.
Commercial Duct Tape Products is on the top of my list.
Well, technically, it’s at number two.
Pedant!
I know, I’m sorry please carry on.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Red Green who is always welcome to invade my tv with his quirky duct tape repair ideas, but people actually pay a company for something made out of duct tape? There are so many duct tape patterns out there, go on Pinterest and make it yourself! At least that way when someone asks you why you have a duct tape wallet you can say, “Oh, because I’m poor and couldn’t afford a real one.” People may be so impressed they’ll tell you how special you are. Just remember to take it as a compliment….
Oh my giddy aunt! Do people do that? Is there a whole duct tape subculture thing going on, here, that has passed me by? Mwah ha hhahargh! How did I miss it, or am I going to be grinding my teeth in a year’s time, when it hits good old Blighty. Hmm. That’s a worrying thought! Wow… so what’s your item number 3?
The use of more than one exclamation mark to express excitement. Nothing can ever be that exciting. Plus, the people reading the overly-exaggerated exclamation tend to need to express the same, if not more, enthusiasm which leads to a small army of exclamation marks that, if they were truly an army, could probably take over a small town whose inhabitants would tweet about the invasion with more exclamation marks… At this rate, the Army of Exclamations could take over the world in less than a week. One exclamation mark is enough!
Yes, oh yes, oh yes. Phnark. Vote it in. Please… Er hem. Sorry what was I thinking of, I’m supposed to be impartial. Right then, please can you tell us what your fourth item is Angela?
Space Chimps. Not actual chimps in space, I mean the movie Space Chimps. I worked at a theater the year it came out. I’m pretty sure the children lost IQ points during the film and I still wish I could get back the 10 minutes of my life I spent watching the film during my work break.
Tell me about it. We have a kids programme on TV called Waybaloo and I swear I used to feel my brain turning to mush as I watched with my boy. Although, I confess I’ve never heard of Space Chimps – clearly I’ve lived a sheltered life. This has been an education. OK, then, what is your fifth and final item?
Best for last, Disney’s rights to Star Wars. Oh, George, what have you done? Lucas may be frighteningly awful at romantic scenes, and I think deep down he knows he should never have filmed movies 1-3, but handing the rights over to Disney does not make up for his mistakes. It actually made things worse. I will never be able to forgive the destruction of my beloved Star Wars and I have only one thing to say; Live Long and Prosper.
Yeh and the first thing they did was stop making Clone Troopers, which my boy loves and which is brilliant.
Right then, Angela Burkhead, thank you very much for joining me today. Now it’s time to vote. You can find more information about Angela’s latest release, Sticks n’ Stones and the Garden of Phea – along with details of where you can stalk her on the interweb below the poll. Join us in a couple of weeks when we find out how many of Angela’s pet hates you have voted into the oblivion forever.
Sticks n’ Stones and the Garden of Phea
Rather than spending one more day amongst the humiliating remarks to the amusement of her fellow peers, Emily Fickeltin runs away. Or, rather, walks away. Emily is misunderstood and disliked by what seems to be every other child her age and on top of it all, she is overweight.
Her attempt to escape her pain leads her to discover a hidden place with new hope for friends and acceptance, though she cannot stay long. In this magical garden, Emily meets Phea and finds that she is not the only one looking for an escape.
Together they battle their inner most demons. Will they ever discover peace and acceptance? These two lost and disheartened souls must find who they are before they are both lost forever.
You can stalk Angela Burkhead on the internet in the following places:
https://www.facebook.com/AngelaBurkheadAuthor?ref=hl
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7824929.Angela_Burkhead
https://twitter.com/TheMsBurkhead
http://themsburkhead.tumblr.com
http://angelaburkhead.blogspot.com
Filed under Box 010
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Few Are Chosen, K'Barthan Trilogy: No 1 has been awared the Awesome Indies Seal of Approval
A group of London teenagers judging the Wishing Shelf Book Awards awarded a silver award to Few Are Chosen, K'Barthan Trilogy: Part 1. Escape From B-Movie Hell was also voted a winner - of a bronze medal this time - in 2015.
M T McGuire Authorholic 