Free books and Sunday Haikus

Book News:

Am blogging a little earlier than usual today as there's a competition at Jessewave Reviews to win a FREE copy of Tuluscan Six and the Time Circle for today only, so hurry on over and comment on the post to enter - good luck!

I am also absolutely and incredibly delighted that I have a new poetry collection out! Yes, my collection of haikus for 2009, called simply Sunday Haiku, is now available as an eBook direct from the publisher, Seventh Window, and also at Amazon Kindle. Here's the publisher's blurb:

Since 2002 Anne Brooke has written a haiku or two every Sunday. This book contains her haikus written in the year 2009. These short poems are Anne Brooke’s meditations on life, publishing, nature and herself. They are simply brilliant and beautiful.

And I'm sure you'll all agree that the cover is lovely. All this has been a complete surprise to me as the lovely Ken Harrison of Seventh Window Publications only contacted me this week as he's been enjoying my Sunday haikus on Facebook, and so it's been a rollercoaster ride since Monday! I gather he's even managed to sell some copies, so thank you to those of you who've taken a chance and I do hope you enjoy the read. Thank you, Ken! Goodness, how refreshingly different the world of ebooks can be.

I also continue to be bemused but happy at the fact that The Delaneys and Me continues to float around the Amazon Kindle Gay Fiction charts and was apparently at one stage at the dizzy heights of No 16, well gosh. It's fallen rather since then though, but I think the excitement might have been too much for the twins. Meanwhile, Martin and The Wolf recovered its dignity somewhat since its beating last week, with a 5-star Amazon review, so thank you, Amos, for that. Lucas sends love ... fiercely, of course. And there's been a nice round-up of my Untreed Reads fiction, including the latest offering, so thank you for those kind words also, Jay - though I'm not really sure that I move seamlessly anywhere in any part of my life, to be honest! I am from Essex after all, and we don't do seamless.

Moving on to other people's books, may I recommend this marvellous and very readable fantasy, which frankly is the best book I've read all year. Including my own, dammit. The good news is that I gather it's shortly to be published by Untreed Reads in ebook version, so will be cheaper, and at that stage I intend to review it thoroughly for Vulpes Libris, so you'll have to wait for that a while longer. But it's definitely worth a read, and some.

Today, however, my review of Geoffrey Best's Churchill, a Study in Greatness is at Vulpes instead, so you can admire The Great Man in a great and inspirational biography while you're waiting. Never say I'm not good to you.

This week's meditations:

Meditation 393
The fragility
of the lily

encased in the glory
of bronze

shines its delicacy
on your slow path.


Meditation 394
Metal and water
and the lily’s slow bloom:

strength made perfect
where delicacy dwells.


Meditation 395
If you possess
everything,

lions, bulls,
winged creatures

and palm trees,
then you’ll always need

a cart to put them in,
in bronze, of course.


Life News:

It's been a very muddly and difficult week, work-wise, and really I seem to have been often at odds with the universe and the world around me. Does anyone else get weeks like that?? Or is it just me? I feel very much like I'm only just holding on to the sense of what's going on in the office and how the heck to deal with it, and everything seems to have been a real effort. I suspect I'm simply overtired, and am not coping well and obsessing about the slightest thing - hmm, sounds of Lord H muttering that it doesn't appear to be any different from usual really, but you know what I mean. I hope.

Mind you, all the angst and trauma has been rather mitigated by the success of last night's work quiz at a local pub (which Ruth and I arranged) - though it has been causing some of the issues this week, not least because the pub's phone has been out of order for a week so getting hold of them to sort things out has been ... um ... a challenge, though they are very nice. Anyway, it all went well in the end and our quizmaster was absolutely excellent, so everyone had a good time, phew. Including me.

Still, I was looking forward to a wonderful Clarins massage this afternoon at the House of Fraser Guildford to ease out the tensions of it all, but there's been a mix-up, and they and I had different days down for my appointment, dammit. Not sure whose fault it is, but frankly I think they could have at least offered some sort of apology rather than sounding as if I was wasting their time by even existing, sigh. I've been a customer of theirs for seventeen years after all, and I think I've always been a very reliable and easy-to-deal-with one. It would be nice if I felt I was getting something back. Maybe I should go elsewhere? So if anyone knows another Clarins treatments provider in the Surrey area, please do let me know! I'm open to offers (as it were).

Anne Brooke
The Prayer Seeker's Journal