As part of my ongoing thinking about "Near Enough", I came up with this list. Not too shabby is it? Australia Belgium China Denmark England Finland France Germany Greece Grenada Guernsey Hong Kong (pre- and post-China acquisition) India Indonesia Ireland Italy Japan Kenya The Netherlands Northern Ireland Scotland Sierra Leone Singapore Spain Sweden Switzerland USA … Continue reading Countries I have slept in… →

Question. If you set yourself the task of writing a single blog entry / post every day and had these two options, which would you choose? You could only write forwards, in anticipation, at the end of previous day / very early on the day in question - and only cover what you were expecting to … Continue reading Forwards or Backwards? →

Taken from first scribblings, and the putative second 'chapter' called "Ancient History"... Of my mother’s five siblings, I knew her sisters - my aunts - best of all. My recollections of Ernie are sketchy and probably limited to imperfect recollections of the Isle of Wight (place again!). Cyril I never met thanks to the intervention … Continue reading “Near Enough” – a snippet →

"The approximate biography of a man who still hasn’t given up on literary glory..." Fact or fiction? It's an idea... “Near Enough” – a snippet

Because this was too good not to get down... Let's see where it goes. “Life,” she said, “is a bit like peeling brussels sprouts.” He had been sitting at the dining table worrying at a jigsaw puzzle that had too much sky. Increasingly blurry, uniform blue shapes stared back at him defiantly. The space he … Continue reading Making a start… →

Occasionally - at various and irregular points in time - I like to stand back and review where I am with my writing. This normally happens either a) when nothing has been going on for a while(!), or b) after something significant has actually happened! So, with the completion of my submission yesterday to the PS … Continue reading March ’17 – Quick Review →

At Ripon Writers' Group (28th February) there was an 'Instant Inspiration" exercise. The idea was that from a number of objects / props / photographs you selected one thing, wrote about it, and then read to the whole group the end result. Once you had chosen your item, writing time was about 25-30 minutes. I picked … Continue reading Instant Inspiration →

The only reason I ask the question is that I've been struggling with an unfinished story in my draft "Secrets and Wisdom" collection. And that struggle has seen nothing much added for a while - and created a roadblock for the whole thing. And now I think I recognise that I don't actually care about … Continue reading Is there really “Writer’s block”? →

I have just watched the 2016 remake of the 1960 classic, "The Magnificent Seven", [56 years - really?!] and I was struck by the question as to when a copy ceases to be a copy and becomes something else. Something original. In "The Magnificent Seven", although there are echoes of the earlier film's music and … Continue reading When is a Copy not a Copy…? →