![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Charlie's latest newsletter
Jul. 19th, 2019 04:03 pmThe Cochranes are back from Jersey where the sun shone fit to crack the paving stones. A great time had by all including fleecing the bookies at the evening race meeting and the sighting of choughs (twice!), something we’ve never achieved before.
News
This week’s bargain is Pack up Your Troubles – three stories for only £1.99!
THIS GROUND WHICH WAS SECURED AT GREAT EXPENSE
An officer thinks he finds love in the trenches, but is it really waiting for him on the home front?
HALLOWED GROUND
A doctor and an army chaplain spend the night in a foxhole and discover there’s hope even in the darkest situations
MUSIC IN THE MIDST OF DESOLATION
And an old soldier discovers that there are romantic problems to solve even after you’ve cashed in your chips.
Want to pick my brains (what there's left of them after the last few weeks of devices self-destructing all around me)? Am doing an author chat at the Elm Books forum this coming Saturday (20th July) at 3pm EST, 8pm UK
Love in Every Season is out on Monday. Watch this space for news on the next Cambridge Fellows novella – working title Lessons in Playing a Murderous Tune – which will be released soon. Just waiting for the finalisation of cover art.
Don’t forget I’m offering a British themed goodie bag this summer, winner to be drawn from all newsletter subscribers on August 5th. I’ve been adding some wonderfully tacky seaside items to it thanks to our holiday. You can sign up from any page of my website.
The excerpt this week is from the forthcoming Cambridge Fellows novella, which is set in 1911 so is one of the ‘making up the gap in time’ stories.
Once Orlando had got a bit of sun on his face, some hot coffee in his cup and a good helping of bacon and eggs in his stomach, Jonty was ready to broach the delicate subject. “So, what ails thee, oh love of my life?”
“A possible case.”
Jonty put the back of hand to his head. “You stun me. A case? And you’re not jumping up and down with joy? Is it from the college next door?”
“Worse than that. It’s from my old college at Oxford.”
“Ah.” Jonty put paid to the over dramatics and stirred his tea, meditatively. He could instantly see all sorts of reasons why Orlando would be torn between the natural attractions of having something to get his investigational teeth into and a return to a place he’d inhabited when he’d, to all intents and purposes, been another person. A person who was a shadow of his present self. “And will you take this commission?”
Orlando glanced up at the apple tree, where a robin was lustily serenading the new morning. “I don’t know. On the face of it, the puzzle itself is intriguing, but I’ve no great inclination to return there—to college or university—unless it’s on business.”
“Mathematical business, I suppose you mean by that? An investigation counting as merely pleasure?”
“Precisely.” Orlando managed a smile.
“I can understand you might not want to return to old haunts—they’re never the same—but to turn down a case seems odd, when it’s been a while since we had one.” It had been February when they’d last had to pit their wits against a criminal of proper cunning. Neither of them would count the matter of some poison pen letters which had reared their ugly heads in London over the Easter holidays. That had turned out to be easily soluble, given the correspondent’s tendency to write loose instead of lose and insert apostrophes where none were needed. Somehow that had been more offensive than the lurid content.
“I know. You’ll no doubt think that I’m being stupid, but I can’t help worrying. Supposing we take it up and this turns out to be the case we’ve always dreaded? The one that’s insoluble? I’m going to look a total idiot.” Orlando ran his long, agile fingers through his hair. “They’ll say I lost what little intellect I had when I headed eastwards and into the territory of the dark blue’s most deadly rivals.”
“Balderdash. If they say any such thing I’ll tan their hides. And consider the opposite. What if it turns out to be a triumph? A masterpiece of deduction that nobody but us could have delivered? Your name will resound in college legend, if it doesn’t already. In fact, I’d imagine rather than thinking you’ve lost your abilities they’re secretly furious that your reputation is associated with the light blues rather than them. I’m surprised they haven’t offered you an enormous bribe to return. Or kidnapped you.” That seemed to be an ample sufficiency of fanning the guttering flames of Orlando’s confidence. One didn’t want the man to be getting too smug. “By the way, did they ask both of us to be involved? Or would they eschew the services of a man who spent his undergraduate years at Cambridge?”
“If they hadn’t asked for your involvement I’d have turned the case down without a second thought.”
“Would you? Just as well they want me to tag along, then.”
“You think I should accept it?”
“I think you’ll kick yourself if you don’t.” Jonty reached over to pat his partner’s hand. “You can’t let down the alma mater. It’s a matter of honour. What’s the case, anyway? Perhaps if you relate the details to me it’ll whet your appetite.”
“It’s about a mysterious violin that just appeared in the Old Quad at Gabriel very early one morning.”
“A violin? You disappoint me. How very mundane.”
“How very Sherlock Holmesian,” Orlando said with a snort of disdain.
And finally – from our Jersey adventure. The loveliest sunset over the loveliest racecourse, just after we've had our fifth winner out of five races.
News
This week’s bargain is Pack up Your Troubles – three stories for only £1.99!
THIS GROUND WHICH WAS SECURED AT GREAT EXPENSE
An officer thinks he finds love in the trenches, but is it really waiting for him on the home front?
HALLOWED GROUND
A doctor and an army chaplain spend the night in a foxhole and discover there’s hope even in the darkest situations
MUSIC IN THE MIDST OF DESOLATION
And an old soldier discovers that there are romantic problems to solve even after you’ve cashed in your chips.
Want to pick my brains (what there's left of them after the last few weeks of devices self-destructing all around me)? Am doing an author chat at the Elm Books forum this coming Saturday (20th July) at 3pm EST, 8pm UK
Love in Every Season is out on Monday. Watch this space for news on the next Cambridge Fellows novella – working title Lessons in Playing a Murderous Tune – which will be released soon. Just waiting for the finalisation of cover art.
Don’t forget I’m offering a British themed goodie bag this summer, winner to be drawn from all newsletter subscribers on August 5th. I’ve been adding some wonderfully tacky seaside items to it thanks to our holiday. You can sign up from any page of my website.
The excerpt this week is from the forthcoming Cambridge Fellows novella, which is set in 1911 so is one of the ‘making up the gap in time’ stories.
Once Orlando had got a bit of sun on his face, some hot coffee in his cup and a good helping of bacon and eggs in his stomach, Jonty was ready to broach the delicate subject. “So, what ails thee, oh love of my life?”
“A possible case.”
Jonty put the back of hand to his head. “You stun me. A case? And you’re not jumping up and down with joy? Is it from the college next door?”
“Worse than that. It’s from my old college at Oxford.”
“Ah.” Jonty put paid to the over dramatics and stirred his tea, meditatively. He could instantly see all sorts of reasons why Orlando would be torn between the natural attractions of having something to get his investigational teeth into and a return to a place he’d inhabited when he’d, to all intents and purposes, been another person. A person who was a shadow of his present self. “And will you take this commission?”
Orlando glanced up at the apple tree, where a robin was lustily serenading the new morning. “I don’t know. On the face of it, the puzzle itself is intriguing, but I’ve no great inclination to return there—to college or university—unless it’s on business.”
“Mathematical business, I suppose you mean by that? An investigation counting as merely pleasure?”
“Precisely.” Orlando managed a smile.
“I can understand you might not want to return to old haunts—they’re never the same—but to turn down a case seems odd, when it’s been a while since we had one.” It had been February when they’d last had to pit their wits against a criminal of proper cunning. Neither of them would count the matter of some poison pen letters which had reared their ugly heads in London over the Easter holidays. That had turned out to be easily soluble, given the correspondent’s tendency to write loose instead of lose and insert apostrophes where none were needed. Somehow that had been more offensive than the lurid content.
“I know. You’ll no doubt think that I’m being stupid, but I can’t help worrying. Supposing we take it up and this turns out to be the case we’ve always dreaded? The one that’s insoluble? I’m going to look a total idiot.” Orlando ran his long, agile fingers through his hair. “They’ll say I lost what little intellect I had when I headed eastwards and into the territory of the dark blue’s most deadly rivals.”
“Balderdash. If they say any such thing I’ll tan their hides. And consider the opposite. What if it turns out to be a triumph? A masterpiece of deduction that nobody but us could have delivered? Your name will resound in college legend, if it doesn’t already. In fact, I’d imagine rather than thinking you’ve lost your abilities they’re secretly furious that your reputation is associated with the light blues rather than them. I’m surprised they haven’t offered you an enormous bribe to return. Or kidnapped you.” That seemed to be an ample sufficiency of fanning the guttering flames of Orlando’s confidence. One didn’t want the man to be getting too smug. “By the way, did they ask both of us to be involved? Or would they eschew the services of a man who spent his undergraduate years at Cambridge?”
“If they hadn’t asked for your involvement I’d have turned the case down without a second thought.”
“Would you? Just as well they want me to tag along, then.”
“You think I should accept it?”
“I think you’ll kick yourself if you don’t.” Jonty reached over to pat his partner’s hand. “You can’t let down the alma mater. It’s a matter of honour. What’s the case, anyway? Perhaps if you relate the details to me it’ll whet your appetite.”
“It’s about a mysterious violin that just appeared in the Old Quad at Gabriel very early one morning.”
“A violin? You disappoint me. How very mundane.”
“How very Sherlock Holmesian,” Orlando said with a snort of disdain.
And finally – from our Jersey adventure. The loveliest sunset over the loveliest racecourse, just after we've had our fifth winner out of five races.
