Book of the Year and Sick Sunday

Once again a busy few days to catch up on. I'm pleased to say that I'm now at the 8,000 word marker in The Executioner's Cane, and already in the middle of a death scene (whose, I'm not saying) - though I must admit I'm not writing in linear order. Linear writing is so last year, ho ho ...

In other writing news, I'm pleased to say that my first reader for short story, Two Christmases, has enjoyed it (thank you, Sarah!) and particularly commented on the voice of my main character, Danny. I fear Danny's voice is still echoing in my head so there may be more to come from him. You never know. It's also great that Elly, one of my poetry course colleagues, has bought the first copy of Salt and Gold, so I'm hugely grateful for that. Thank you, Elly! I was starting to worry that the sum total of my sales for that one would be zero. Arrgghh!! Now, only another 10 copies to sell and I'll have beaten my run for previous poetry book, A Stranger's Table - though I fear if I get to double figures a second time in my poetry sales, my place as Worst Selling Poet in the History of Time will, alas, be irretrievably lost. Ah well.

And Amazon US are finally selling copies of Pink Champagne and Apple Juice in its brand-new cover, which you can find here. And I was equally happy to see The Bones of Summer was for a short time at Number 82 in the Amazon US gay fiction charts this morning (sadly, now no more ...), well gosh. Thank you, kind buyer, whoever you are - and I do hope you enjoy the read!

Finally, to cap all this literary excitement, you can find my personal Book of the Year choice here. It's a damn classy read, so do pop in, find out what it is and give it a go. I can thoroughly recommend it!

Ooh and I mustn't forget that the lovely Shanta Everington has an article on the pleasures and pains of writing (with some input from me - thanks, Shanta - but let's hope none of my church contacts are reading this!) which you can find here. Another read I'm sure you'll enjoy.

In the non-writing world (which still exists somewhere in my head, I'm sure), I played some rather chilly and very bad golf on Friday - so bad that Marian actually won, shock horror! The only high point for me was chipping in from off the green on the 4th. Result! Sadly downhill from there, I fear - my attempts at second shots were just shameful. Still, at least while I was playing, the boys from the club cleaned my car inside and out so I am now wonderfully sparkly and new, hurrah.

Yesterday, we spent a wonderful day with Peter & Sue - a surprise visitation for Peter's birthday - happy birthday, Peter! - and had a lovely time wandering around Polesdon Lacey, plus an excellent lunch. We also managed to squeeze in a smidgeon of birdwatching and caught sight of a fieldfare - our first of this year, double hurrahs. I was starting to wonder if we'd see any at all, so am glad to be proved wrong.

Sadly though, Lord H was as sick as a dog yesterday, and has passed on the marital illness to me today, so we are all snorting like dying horses and and quaffing the Lemsips and Lucozade. What a jolly Sunday indeed - I just hope we didn't infect anyone yesterday ... Not a birthday gift anyone would want, I fear. Keep taking the Vitamin C is what I advise.

This week's haiku is:

Grey heron rises,
legs trailing slow promises
and one dancing fish.

Anne Brooke - where books are guaranteed infection-free

Champagne and Gold

I'm really pleased to say that Pink Champagne and Apple Juice is now available with its brand-new cover at Lulu Books. It should fairly shortly be available at Amazon and other online book stores too, so I'll let you know when that happens.





In the meantime, I'm also very happy to say that Salt and Gold - which is a collection of the first forty of my meditation poems - is now available at Amazon US as well as at Lulu Books. Ideal Christmas presents for all the family indeed ...


I've also finished the final read-through of Thorn in the Flesh, ready for Lulu Books, but I'll worry about that when we're back from our holiday, I think. No point getting over-excited now.

Other news for these last few days is that Lord H and I thoroughly enjoyed a wonderful production of Jenufa at Woking last night. It's a veritable plum of an opera, and includes dead babies, domestic violence, murder, love, hate and an incredible scene of forgiveness and hope at the end which gets me every single time I see it. Plus it has the dream role of Laca, the unloved brother who's in love with Jenufa and has this astonishing journey of growth and maturity to take during the performance. He's the man in the photo in the link. He was bloody good in the role, I must say too. Wonderful. Honestly, I could see that opera every single day and there'd always be something gut-punchingly good about it.

The only problem was attempting to get out of the car park in Woking afterwards. They have this new system that means you can prepay so you don't have to queue with a million other opera-goers after the performance to get your ticket stamped. We've done this once before with no problems, but what we hadn't realised is that there are 2 pay bands depending on whether you get there before or after 7pm. It doesn't say anything on the machines about this, dammit, and neither does it give you a choice of payment. So, you've guessed it - we arrived before 7pm, and then at the barriers at 10.30pm the bloody things wouldn't let us out. There were about 12 cars behind us getting angrier and angrier, but nowhere to reverse to as there were no gaps. Groan. Added to this the fact that we were in 2 cars, so once we'd contacted the little man at the end of the Help button and persuaded him to let Lord H out, we then had to go through the whole ruddy rigmarole again in order for me to make my escape. I swear, I was within seconds of being torn limb from limb by angry car parkers. It puts poor Jenufa's problems entirely into perspective, though of course I would have been more than happy to throw a few dead babies into the baying crowds to fend them off, I can tell you ...

Oh, and some lovely person has knocked my driver's side wing mirror console off - though thankfully the glass is still intact, so that's another job to do for after the hols. £100 is what it's going to cost me - hell, I'm in the wrong business for sure. So currently, I have a car with a limp, poor thing. But hey ho and never mind - Lord H and I will be at the Westleton Crown in Suffolk for the next few days, so frankly my dears, right now, I don't give a damn. Bring on the rain and the birds! Hope you all have a fabulous weekend.

Anne

Salt, Gold and Sexy Scavengers

I'm pleased to say that the revised version of Salt and Gold is now available from the Lulu store at a very reasonable price, if anyone is so tempted. I'm hoping it will also be available on Amazon at some point, but I'll let you know when that transpires. And if they allow it.



Speaking of which, here's today's poem:

Meditation 230

Sometimes blindness
leads to sight

and palm trees
to iron chariots.

Everything that is
contains its opposite

twin and is as fluid
as the ungraspable air.


Have had a lovely morning today - my first port of call was a glorious back and facial massage with Alice, the Clarins gal. My, how I've needed that this week - the thought of it has been keeping me going through the start of the week for sure. After that I also met Jane H (hello, Jane!) for lunch and a catch-up, which was totally lovely. Really, I should do more of this Lady of Leisure stuff - I think it suits me.

On the way back, I popped into the doctor's to pick up my latest prescriptions, but only one of them was in store - so I have a fresh supply of nasal spray (hurrah! Breathing is sooo useful ...), but have to go back tomorrow for my HRT packages. And it's such a nightmare to park at the surgery at the moment too as they appear to be rebuilding it from scratch. The poor pharmacy lady has to ply her trade from what is little more than a Portaloo.

Anyway, this afternoon, I have been updating my website with the latest poetry news, and creating mini-sites for Salt and Gold - as above - and also for A Stranger's Table. I'm pleased that both my extant poetry collections now have their own separate worlds, however tiny.

I've also been continuing the edit to The Hit List, and am now on page 200, which is about two-thirds through. It's a real slow-burn romance, that one, but I like it and it seems right for the angsts and uncertainties of the two men involved. They'll get there. They're just taking their time.

Tonight, I'm looking forward to It Takes Two, with Claudia, and - are the rumours true? - is Boris Johnson in EastEnders?? Now there's something I really have to watch. But, my goodness, soon we won't be able to tell real life and fantasy life apart at all ...

Finally, and very excitingly, I've been included in the Dark Divas Sexy Scavengers October competition and there are a multitude of book prizes to win (including one of my own books). So do pop along and enter. The deadline is (of course!) Halloween. Good luck!

Today's nice things:

1. The revised Salt and Gold collection
2. Poetry
3. Clarins massage
4. Lunch with Jane
5. Website
6. A Stranger's Table having its own small page
7. Editing The Hit List
8. TV
9. The Sexy Scavengers competition.

Anne Brooke
Sexy Scavengers - the place to be

Reviews and stonings

I have to say it's great not to be in the office today. Almost feels like being normal (perish the thought). Here's today's poem:

Meditation 226

To start the day:
a good stoning.
Cover your ears

and let sharp rocks
blanket the words
that pierce you most

while the rough cloaks
of murderers
lie heavy in your arms.


My, Saul of Tarsus/St Paul could be a bloodthirsty man on occasion. And really I can't blame him - Stephen the Martyr did go on so. If I'd been there, I might well have stoned him myself. Just to shut him up. Hush my mouth.

Anyway, I'm pleased to say that Maloney's Law has received a five star review on Amazon US, which you can read below:

“This is one compelling and riveting story. I could not put it down. Paul is one tortured soul and his mesmerizing narration grips me from page 1. International intrigues, heart stopping plot, gut wrenching love, a heart tugging friendship, Maloney's Law has it all. Paul is such a complex character. Flawed and pitiful when it comes to his obsessive love for a man who could never reciprocate. Yet without a thought for his life when his search for the truth drives him on. His tragic loss since childhood, his plunge into despair, his sense of justice, his struggle to live on, all these powerfully expressed by the writer. Just brilliant and I look forward to reading the sequel, The Bones of Summer, and more from Anne Brooke. My only regret is that I should have read this earlier.”

Gosh, thank you, R Parkland - so glad you enjoyed the read!

I've also received my proof copy of Salt and Gold and have made one or two corrections and lowered the price to £3.50 for the paperback. So I've asked for another proof copy and will wait to see what that looks like before I go properly public. As it were.

For the rest of the day, I've been continuing the edit of The Hit List and am now happily on p50. Which is roughly one-eighth through. Yes, I do need to cut drastically, as it's quite long for a comedy romance (which is what I'm now intending to make it, rather than comedy crime). We'll see how things shape up as we go on, as they say.

I've also had my back realigned at my Alexander Technique lesson - and goodness me but it needed it after two flights and a tense work week. I think I was all but Toblerone shaped when I walked in, but rather more normal (ho ho) when the lesson had finished. I have to think about inhabiting my space more, apparently. Trouble is, I do find people difficult (they're stealing my space, they're stealing it!) so I tend to duck down and shy away from them, especially if I don't know them. Which of course leads inevitably to a hunched back and a very stiff neck. Sigh. What a lot there is to relearn indeed. On oh so many levels.

Today's nice things:

1. Poetry
2. The review of Maloney's Law
3. Tweaking Salt and Gold
4. Editing The Hit List
5. Alexander Technique.

Anne Brooke - conserving her sense of her own space to the best of her limited ability
Maloney's Law - a tortured soul made good ...

Of ex-agents and Strictly gold

Back to the meditations this morning, so here's today's:

Meditation 223

Twelve leaders,
seven accountants
but only two altars

for prayer
just about sums up
the church,

both then
and now.


Is it just me or is everything topsy-turvy in terms of standards? Ah well. Anyway, this morning I have finally brought to an end the relationship between my agent and me, and honestly it feels as if a great weight of literary expectation has been lifted from my shoulders. And I hadn't even realised it was there - though abandoning any form of agent representation has been going through my mind for months really. Ye gods though, it feels good to be free. After all, no mainstream press is ever going to give me the time of day, so why put myself through the agonising mill each time? Crazy really. So it's back to my usual small independent press outlets, plus self-publishing. It's like coming home.

With that in mind, I've uploaded my third poetry collection, Salt and Gold (Forty Meditations) onto Lulu UK and you can find out more here. I've requested a proof copy just to check it for sillies, so it's not quite ready yet, but I do so love the cover:



It will be available as a paperback and in ebook versions, so I'll let you know when that's happened. And talking of good things (hurrah - makes a change after yesterday's misery, eh), I must say that the Chris & Ola's rumba on Strictly Come Dancing yesterday absolutely took my breath away. It was romantic, strong and very very poignant, and Chris (who I've never heard of before, I must admit) was somehow a dead ringer for Colin Firth during the dance, so he is definitely now my favourite. I've watched the dance on YouTube several times already and here it is in case you've somehow missed it. Well worth a viewing for sure.

Other events of today - we managed church this morning, though slipped away before the agonies of the post-service coffee & chat could come upon us. Some great hymns too, and someone behind me was singing really well, so it meant I could keep in tune more easily. Always makes a difference.

I've also caught up with Ugly Betty on TV, though the episode was a tad on the gloomy side, really. Bring back the humour is what I say. Tonight, there's not much viewing pleasure on offer, so I might dig out a DVD and chill a little before the horrors of the week to come (double groaning alert). Ooh, and so far, my Sony Reader is at least a thousand times better than the CoolReader - it's much quicker and even allows me to read an eBook without breaking down, ho ho. I love it and I've named it Eric. The wretched CoolReader is thankfully forgotten.

And here's the week's haiku:

Tall, dark and silent.
Forgotten sunflower fields
wait their turn to die.

Today's nice things:

1. Poetry
2. Abandoning the agent
3. Salt and Gold
4. Strictly rumbas
5. My Sony Reader
6. Haikus.

Anne Brooke - Strictly impressed
Salt and Gold - meditations for today