De-blog

I had a tough time at school - for lots of reasons, but the one that's relevant here is competitiveness, and not my own. By the time I figured out what the problem was, I was in my mid-twenties and studying for a degree. For brevity: I was fairly clever but shy, not good at sports, lousy at socialising, average height, average looking, an average musician - in general a bit of a wall flower. With adolescence, I put on weight, and that was so not  the attention I wanted to bring to myself. In fact, I didn't want attention at all. I just wanted to get on with being me, doing what I was good at, which is also what I enjoy: People watching. Writing. Reading. Listening to music. Discovering new things I'm good at. Thinking round corners. Being the best I can be. So, all those competitive team sports? Pure torture. Being ranked on exam results? Much the same. Eventually, I realised that my position relative to my peers was of no consequence. I knew  if I'd do...

Slight blog overload this week, but life is unpredictable, so I'm posting a few days early. My Christmas novella, A Midnight Clear , is available for free until July 31st in the Smashwords Summer/Winter sale (use SFREE at checkout). If you're not a 'Christmas in July' person, you could download it and save it for later. ;) The blurb: It's a cold, desperate December when a young girl flees home, in search of food, shelter and the real Santa Claus. Stranded in George and Josh's hometown, she discovers that the spirit of Christmas can be found in the most unexpected of places. Includes the story of The Little Match Girl, by Hans Christian Andersen. Length: 26,000 words (75 pages) approx. Suitable for younger readers and adults, aged 12+.  A stand-alone story from the Hiding Behind The Couch series. Also part of Boughs of Evergreen - A Holiday Anthology (proceeds to The Trevor Project). * * * * * An excerpt: "Hey," George said ge...

Finally, finally, finally... I'm posting my first RainbowSnippet! :) I've been in the Rainbow Snippets group on Facebook for a few months, and it's a fab idea (thank you, Charley). We get to share snippets from our LGBTQ+ stories, make recommendations of stories we've read etc. and readers of our posts can follow the trail back to other #RainbowSnippets. So, without further ado, this is a six-line snippet from Cherry Pop Valentine, which is a short story (11k words) I wrote last year for a Valentine's Day challenge. This month (July), it's available for free in the Smashwords Summer/Winter Sale (use SFREE at checkout). Here's the snippet: In the final clip of our band on stage, Sven brings a single rose across to me at the piano and kneels. I take the rose from him, and we fade to black. Ten years together, and even though he’d said yes to us one day getting married, we’d decided not to bother with a civil partnership and instead wait out the cha...