It has been a while since I last managed to post anything here but I have been busy
working on my third book - -which is very exciting. You can find it on Amazon now
and it is called 'Riddle at Castle Cliff'.
I decided to post this old picture of myself and my best mate, ( when I was 11years old),
Graham getting ready to test drive our latest go-kart. We were always building new ones,
always trying to get them to go faster!!
I was an only child.
I suppose that is the reason why books very quickly became a big part of my life. Although I had friends, I lost them all regularly every two or thee years because my father was a sergeant in the army and postings to different countries were a feature of my early life. Add to this the fact that as a rule my friends were not welcome at my house: my father would not allow it, and the characters in the books I read were very real to me. They were constant companions in a sometimes lonely childhhood.
One of the earliest books I can remember reading and re-reading over again was titled 'Shadow the Sheepdog'. I can see the bright yellow hardcover now in my mind. It was of course by Enid Blyton and later in my reading career I was to discover the whole Secret Seven and Famous Five series from her also.
Owing to my father's dislike of children in the house I spent most of my pre-teen life outdoors playing with my mates. Our activities in many ways mirrored those of the children in Enid Blyton's adventure books and were easy for me to identify with in consequence.
Hello there and welcome to this blog - -the first I have ever written.
Recently I have restarted writing children's novels after a break of about 5 years in all. I was relieved to discover that I still enjoy the process as much as I ever did--although the biggest thrill always is when a reader tells you how much they enjoyed a book and ask when the next one is coming out!
I envisage this blog as an add-on to my author website. Here I hope to be able to share some personal details about my life that have influenced me in the way I write and what I write about.
Let me say right off the bat that the stories I tell are mystery and adventure tales of the sort that I loved as a child, when I devoured all the books I could find by authors like Enid Blyton and Arthur Ransome.
