Disappointing places and a Maloney twin

Some exciting news on the book front – for the first and only time in my literary career, Maloney’s Law actually has a buying twin on Amazon in the US. Well, gosh! I’ve never had any of my books paired up with another for buying purposes before – I’ve no idea what, if anything, it might signify but it almost makes me feel like a real author, don’t you know. Not sure how long it will actually last, but in case it’s still there (click quickly to avoid disappointment and you’ll need to scroll down to see it …) the link is here - though strangely the actual twinned book seems to have changed since this morning. What on earth can it all mean? Anyway, Maloney’s mate, whatever it is now, is certainly a wild choice so everyone should have a lot of fun with that for sure!

Still on matters literary, here’s this morning’s meditation:

Meditation 114

Walk the desert,
track each grain of sand

with your skin,
and on your tongue

taste the full extent
of wilderness.

When at last you turn north,
the clear light

you find there
will brand your memory

like death or war
onto forgotten earth.

Start the weekend off with a jolly ditty is what I say, eh. Ah well. Talking of which, I’m in two minds about Mike Barlow’s poetry collection, Another Place. It started off so well and I was hugely excited by the depth and dynamism of the subject matter and style of this one. But there was some very serious and rather disappointing sagging going on in the middle and somehow, in the final analysis, the collection as a whole just doesn’t gel together as one, although there are some extraordinarily good poems in there. You just somehow lose sight of them in the general filling however. I felt very much as if it was a chapbook desperately trying to be heard in the middle of a too big collection. The way I sometimes feel that some novels are actually short stories trying to get out. If it had been a chapbook, with the very good poems included therein then it would have been top-notch indeed. Some of those poems of real excellence include: June Bug (with its real historical immediacy); A Night Out (wonderful humour and humanity); Something Between Us (romance and humour – fabulous); Hot Pursuit (bikes rides, love and reality); and my utter favourite, Frisking The Poem (what a poem looks like when it first turns up, aha!). One to read maybe, but don’t be afraid of skipping.

Today, Lord H and I have visited The Vyne in Basingstoke and walked around the grounds admiring the wildlife and enjoying the view from their one bird hide. New birds spotted for this year are house martins and redshanks, hurrah. There are also lots of ducklings looking totally cute and fluffy (Girly Moment Alert!!), and nesting swans and coots. Spring has indeed sprung, I believe.

Back home, I’ve been working away on Hallsfoot’s Battle and am now in the high ranges of 113,000 words. You’ll be pleased to hear that Ralph has woken up and is attempting to do something vaguely useful in the middle of the angst (about time too …) and I’ve at last remembered that the mountain dogs are there – I’d forgotten them until Ralph woke up, sigh … Lordy, but never believe that the author is in full control of events. My, how we laughed at that notion. It’s all done on a wing and a prayer, you know.

Tonight, we’re looking forward to battling with dinosaurs in the next episode of Primeval, and there’s the last episode of Alan Whicker’s past journeys that I missed before and I really must catch up with. Talking of the past come back, I have to say that ever since I heard about it, I’ve been very grumbly and cross about how anyone has dared to take the great icon and acting genius that was Leonard (may his name be praised) Rossiter and the incomparable Reginald Perrin series and attempt to reinvent them both – but Lord H persuaded me to give the reinvention a chance last night, and I have to say it was all right. Okay, it’s not Rossiter and it’s certainly not Perrin as we knew and loved him, but I think the first episode stood up okay and even made us both laugh on occasion. It’s not as dark as the original, but as a reinterpretation of a classic for the modern times, I think it might be worth a go. I shall certainly watch the second episode anyway.

Today’s nice things:

1. Maloney’s changing twin
2. Poetry
3. The Vyne
4. Birds
5. Writing Hallsfoot
6. TV.

Anne Brooke
Anne’s website – she’s actually the evil twin, you know …