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Charlie's latest newsletter
Jun. 7th, 2019 04:54 pmMea culpa. My jokey prediction in the last newsletter of rain in the offing has manifested itself as the heavens opening today. If I see a chap out there building a big gopher wood boat I shall be cadging a lift on it.
News
Love in Every Season is now available for pre-order and will be out on 22nd July. It contains the reissued stories Horns and Halos (representing spring), Tumble Turn (summer), Sand (autumn) and What you Will (winter). There’s an excerpt later in this newsletter.
I had a great time at Havant Writers talking about blending genres together and getting the balance right. I think I was coherent. I hope I was, anyway. You’ll be able to tell for yourself as I’ll be posting what I spoke about at my blog, starting next Tuesday and then every subsequent Tuesday until I’m done. We also had great fun doing an exercise on genre mashups: everyone had to pick two slips of paper which had genres written on them and then write a short piece. Humour/horror proved to be highly amusing! (And never underestimate the skills on show in these local writer groups. They’d put some published authors to shame.)
This week’s special offer is something different. We’re off on holidays soon (again, Charlie?) to our favourite island, Jersey. So a British summer themed goodie bag seems appropriate, winner to be drawn from all newsletter subscribers on August 5th. I’m happy to post it anywhere in the known universe, even Bognor.
The excerpt this week is from Horns and Halos, the first story in the Love in Every Season Collection.
Jamie didn’t think he had a guardian angel. If he did, the so-and-so had been noticeably slacking on the job over the last few years, especially regarding hitching him up with a decent bloke. So, the fact that he’d been put on the same practice interview panel as Alex—therefore could legitimately spend the next day and a half of the course working alongside him—must just have been good luck.
Or maybe bad. Two days of trying not to make it obvious that he fancied the pants off the bloke. Why did nice things always seem to come on the horns of a dilemma?
Chatting over coffee break was fine, the whole of his table having congregated together, the six of them looking a bit nervous at what they’d let themselves in for. Inevitably the conversation had drifted off into matters February the fourteenth-related, at which point Jamie had tried to look interested, although he’d dreaded the seemingly inevitable, “What surprise have you got lined up for your girlfriend?”
“I can’t stand all this Valentine’s nonsense,” one of the blokes in the group said He was the one Jamie had nicknamed Mr. Daft Ideas—although not to his face—because of the answers he’d come up with for the quiz.
“What does your wife think of that?” Sandra, the panel leader—elected because she’d smiled and nodded at the wrong time—asked.
“The same as me,” the bloke replied, as if there couldn’t be any other answer. “It’s just another way of conning people out of their money.”
“I’d agree with you on that.” Alex broke his biscuit—a custard cream, Jamie noted, with approval—made as if to dunk it then clearly thought better of the manoeuvre. As though he was weighing up every word and every movement. “And it always seems so cruel.”
Jamie sipped his coffee, intrigued. Something about the day clearly made Alex feel uncomfortable, maybe at a deeper level than the obvious, I never got any cards when I was a spotty teenager.
“Oh, Jamie, you’ll have to be the one to stand up for your gender,” Sandra said, tapping the table with an elegant, pink painted nail. “Surely you’ve got a romantic streak in you.”
“I have,” Jamie said, looking anywhere except at Alex, “although I’m not sure Valentine’s Day really has much to do with romance. Sorry to be a disappointment, but...” He shrugged.
“You’ll be in trouble with your—”
Sandra was interrupted by Bossyboots insisting they reconvene. Never had Jamie so welcomed being called back into class and so avoid having to explain why he couldn’t be in trouble with his wife or girlfriend, as he didn’t have one and never would. Out of the frying pan into the fire, though, because his group had to get their heads down over some hot school improvement plans and person specs, and maybe his and Alex’s heads would be a bit too close for comfort.
And finally – inspiration for so much of my writing, the island of Jersey. This bit of the island comes with Neolithic and Roman remains.
News
Love in Every Season is now available for pre-order and will be out on 22nd July. It contains the reissued stories Horns and Halos (representing spring), Tumble Turn (summer), Sand (autumn) and What you Will (winter). There’s an excerpt later in this newsletter.
I had a great time at Havant Writers talking about blending genres together and getting the balance right. I think I was coherent. I hope I was, anyway. You’ll be able to tell for yourself as I’ll be posting what I spoke about at my blog, starting next Tuesday and then every subsequent Tuesday until I’m done. We also had great fun doing an exercise on genre mashups: everyone had to pick two slips of paper which had genres written on them and then write a short piece. Humour/horror proved to be highly amusing! (And never underestimate the skills on show in these local writer groups. They’d put some published authors to shame.)
This week’s special offer is something different. We’re off on holidays soon (again, Charlie?) to our favourite island, Jersey. So a British summer themed goodie bag seems appropriate, winner to be drawn from all newsletter subscribers on August 5th. I’m happy to post it anywhere in the known universe, even Bognor.
The excerpt this week is from Horns and Halos, the first story in the Love in Every Season Collection.
Jamie didn’t think he had a guardian angel. If he did, the so-and-so had been noticeably slacking on the job over the last few years, especially regarding hitching him up with a decent bloke. So, the fact that he’d been put on the same practice interview panel as Alex—therefore could legitimately spend the next day and a half of the course working alongside him—must just have been good luck.
Or maybe bad. Two days of trying not to make it obvious that he fancied the pants off the bloke. Why did nice things always seem to come on the horns of a dilemma?
Chatting over coffee break was fine, the whole of his table having congregated together, the six of them looking a bit nervous at what they’d let themselves in for. Inevitably the conversation had drifted off into matters February the fourteenth-related, at which point Jamie had tried to look interested, although he’d dreaded the seemingly inevitable, “What surprise have you got lined up for your girlfriend?”
“I can’t stand all this Valentine’s nonsense,” one of the blokes in the group said He was the one Jamie had nicknamed Mr. Daft Ideas—although not to his face—because of the answers he’d come up with for the quiz.
“What does your wife think of that?” Sandra, the panel leader—elected because she’d smiled and nodded at the wrong time—asked.
“The same as me,” the bloke replied, as if there couldn’t be any other answer. “It’s just another way of conning people out of their money.”
“I’d agree with you on that.” Alex broke his biscuit—a custard cream, Jamie noted, with approval—made as if to dunk it then clearly thought better of the manoeuvre. As though he was weighing up every word and every movement. “And it always seems so cruel.”
Jamie sipped his coffee, intrigued. Something about the day clearly made Alex feel uncomfortable, maybe at a deeper level than the obvious, I never got any cards when I was a spotty teenager.
“Oh, Jamie, you’ll have to be the one to stand up for your gender,” Sandra said, tapping the table with an elegant, pink painted nail. “Surely you’ve got a romantic streak in you.”
“I have,” Jamie said, looking anywhere except at Alex, “although I’m not sure Valentine’s Day really has much to do with romance. Sorry to be a disappointment, but...” He shrugged.
“You’ll be in trouble with your—”
Sandra was interrupted by Bossyboots insisting they reconvene. Never had Jamie so welcomed being called back into class and so avoid having to explain why he couldn’t be in trouble with his wife or girlfriend, as he didn’t have one and never would. Out of the frying pan into the fire, though, because his group had to get their heads down over some hot school improvement plans and person specs, and maybe his and Alex’s heads would be a bit too close for comfort.
And finally – inspiration for so much of my writing, the island of Jersey. This bit of the island comes with Neolithic and Roman remains.
