Writing
THE THREESOME Jenny and Torsten lived in what anyone who knew them whose opinion they attached any value to agreed was a fabulous little house, backing onto a cliff: not what was generally perceived to be one of the most desirable cliffs in the area, but a real find, nevertheless.
Writing
* Jim is a cat our male cat Charles brought over to our house in early December last year. It’s mid-April now and Jim’s still here so I guess it means he’s officially ours - especially since the lady whose barn he used to live in seems fine
Writing
One of the many ways that the internet is cruel and annoying in a “pissing down your back and telling you it’s raining” way is that, at the very same time as ruining people’s attention spans and preventing them from concentrating properly on books, it is constantly reminding
Writing
* People always ask you if you’re lost if they live in a place and see that you’re in the place too and you’re looking at a map. It can be socially tricky for someone like me who walks a lot, loves maps, is quite proud of his
Writing
Since my new novel is set there, I’ve been thinking a lot about Nottingham recently, remembering the many the good and interesting things about growing up there. You can listen to the brief tour of the city and its edges that I took a few weeks ago with my
Writing
My big news today is that I’m writing and crowdfunding a new novel. It’s very different to my last one, but that tends to be what happens with my books, since I’m restless like that: I have had a habit, both in my recent writing and my
Writing
Hello! It’s only just over a month now until the paperback publication of my debut novel, Villager: a psychedelic story of swirling time, earth magic, river spirits, wise stones, lost music and opinionated hills. It’s my thirteenth book, the one I truly feel is my best, the one
Writing
A HEALTHY YOMP FROM CUCKLAND VIPERS FARM TO MOGFORD SHALLOWS AND BEYOND (11.7 miles) It is a day for walking on the margins, a time to avoid the centre of everything scrupulously. Your route takes you down a sunken path where the assorted rubble underfoot feels as untrustworthy as
Writing
1. Cornwall Sometimes I drive to see empty houses I can’t afford. The more dilapidated the better is the general rule. It’s a combined symptom of my obsession with abandoned buildings being reclaimed by nature and the arguably contradictory materialist part of my personality which is in awe
Writing
JOHN I first met John on a brutally crowded train from Birmingham to Devon. It turned out our reserved seats had been commandeered by two members of the same shrill family from Tamworth and that got us to talking. He could not have looked more out of place, standing there
Writing
Serendipity Range (1971) 11.39am. Carol’s head felt like a fire in a neglected pedal bin. The vodka had been a mistake, the downers a larger one. There would be no chance of making it to her aunt’s luncheon now and all hope of a reconciliation would be
Writing
* It’s amazing, the ways all our different minds work. We give names to some of the ways but that’s just a method of attempting to stop all our different minds from being blown by the unbridled diversity at play, all the minuscule differences that mean no person can