Sunday, September 12, 2010

Blind Dates galore

Book news:

I'm happy to announce that Tommy's Blind Date is published today and available at a first week discount at Amber Allure Press. Enjoy!

I've also spent a really wonderful day today at the inaugural UK gay fiction writers & readers conference in Ely - it's been fabulous and we're definitely going to do it again next year. It was fascinating to meet some of the writers whom I've known for a while on the Internet and via email, and to meet some new faces/names too. Great stuff. Special thank yous to Alex Beecroft for organising it all, and for Sarah & Jo who had to put up with me in the car - a special medal for them for sure! Can't wait for our Christmas get-together either.

Meanwhile, The Executioner's Cane has finally made it to the 70,000 word marker so well over half-way now. Phew. And the first-round edits for The Prayer Seeker are looking interesting, with my editor/consultant (a new one to me, but she deals with religious fiction) describing it as "quiet and luminescent". Gosh, I didn't think any of my stuff would ever be described in that way and it certainly feels nice. Still a lot to do to improve it but I'm on the road. Somewhere ...

This week's meditation is:

Meditation 424
Beware of dogs
and vultures,

beasts that bite
and beasts that fly:

no good will come
of either.


The Sunday haiku is:

Girl in a pink top
and purple skirt is dancing
amongst the fuchsias.


Life news:

K and I celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary on Saturday which was great. We spent most of the day at Wisley Flower Show - it's amazing what they can do with flowers, don't you know! - and had a picnic there as the weather was just about okay to sit out. At least it wasn't raining. And we opened a bottle of champagne in the evening - which always goes down well. I've never met a champagne bottle I didn't like.

Earlier in the week I spring-cleaned most of the kitchen. I have to say the under-the-sink cupboard was utterly gross in every way and took 2 buckets of hot soapy water to clean it properly. I don't know what had died in there but I spent a long time mopping up a vast and evil lake of what appeared to be a gravy and soy sauce mix that had flowed everywhere without us noticing (we are such slobs). Honestly I had to prize the tins of peas away from its sticky grasp, so it was not pleasant! All clean now, thank the Lord, and at least I didn't find the head of John the Baptist, or Shergar, both of whom would be grateful not to have spent time there, I imagine.

Finally, the news on the house remains distinctly disappointing and, really, I just don't want to talk about it that much. It just makes me too angry and upset. Suffice it to say we made another slightly higher offer in response to the vendors' new apparent reasonableness, and they have come back with another rude and unnecessary email not really responding to our offer but just expressing their personal opinions about us, so seem to have reverted to type somewhat. All very exhausting - don't these people have any idea how to do business??? Well, obviously not .... Anyway, we will send another letter to them and their solicitors reminding them that our new offer is still on the table if they wish to consider it again and see what that brings out of their very peculiar communications pot.

In the meantime and on a happier note, we continue the efforts to spruce up our flat and are busy admiring the lovely number of buyable properties in the local paper this week. If the vendors want to keep us as potential buyers which is after all the easy and cheap option for them as we're already in the damn house for goodness sake, then they're going to have to be a lot nicer and work much harder than they currently are. Hmm, don't wait up, eh ...!!

Anne Brooke

4 comments:

Jason Shaw said...

Firstly I'm saying nothing about the house or estate agents or solicitors, cuz I promised I;d be good today!

So congrats on another publication and even more congrats on the anniversary, 17 years, wow.

well done to you and Lord H (yes I know he's now known as K as that is his name, but old habits!!!)

wishing you a good week.

Anne Brooke said...

Thanks, Jason!! Hope you have a fabulous week! :))

Paul D Brazill said...

Cingratulations!

Anne Brooke said...

Thanks, Paul!