Seems to come around quicker each year. Our neighbours already have Christmas trees up and decorated. I have indulged in my first mince pies of the season. (For non-UK readers: mince pies aren’t made with meat. They are very sweet small pies with fruit filling which has often been soaked in brandy – or something similar) Now looking forward to the first taste of mulled wine – another festive treat.
No new books from me this year. But, once again, I would point you in the direction of my Christmas stories. Christmas at Winterbourne is now eight years old but I think it stands the test of time. Lots of fun and games at a lesbian retreat in Sussex.
Always fun to see all the Christmas stories promoted at this time of year…ranging from short stocking fillers to full on season-long romance. My Christmas offerings are a few years old now, but I think they stand the test of time. I certainly enjoyed looking in on the family at Winterbourne House to write a short story for Affinity’s 2020 Christmas Anthology. Lots of festive traditions mixed in with some lesbian shenanigans (including the obligatory Christmas cracker jokes). Worth taking a look at Affinity’s Christmas Medley collection of stories from 2017 too.
Audio book update
A Wild Moon Rises, narrated by Nicola Victoria Vincent, is now available on more sites including Amazon, Audible, Apple Books, and Spotify.
Cold weather in December is to be expected, but this past week has seen exceptionally icy temperatures. It’s the first time in about thirty years that we’ve resorted to putting a hot water bottle in the bed a few hours before retiring for the night.
These photos depict some of the evidence of our cold snap in this part of Yorkshire. (The first one was taken on the shore of Walney Island in Cumbria in November – the strong winds made it bitterly cold.)
With all this cold weather, and soon to be warmer, wet weather, I should be sitting in front of my computer, well wrapped up, writing my next novel. But the words seem to be sluggishly frozen in my brain and not reaching my fingers. I’ve learned not to fret too much about non-productive days and focus on what I’ve achieved so far. 12 novels, 1 novella, 7 short stories, and 3 audio books over the past 9 years is more than I could have envisioned at the start my published author journey in 2014.
2022 Achievements
1 Novel: number 12, published by Affinity Rainbow Publications, came out on October 1st. Changing Times is not a Christmas story, but one of the main characters is called Holly. Like many of that name, she was born in December, so the epilogue takes place on her birthday which is Christmas Eve. A gathering of family and friends is always a great to tie up any loose ends.
1 Audio Book: number 3, Darcy Comes Home, narrated by Nicola Victoria Vincent…available on Audible, Amazon, and Apple from 18 March 2022. (The book was published on 1 November 2021.) Nicola narrated my other two audio books and has done an amazing job with all three.
My personal epilogue for this year would include those achievements plus getting out and about with my wife to some lovely places in this country. Previous blogs this year show photographic evidence of these travels.
Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and hopes for many more reading pleasures to come in the New Year!
The idea of comfort reading when it’s cold and snowy outside brings to mind two of my childhood favourites – that I still go back to now and again – The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis and Winter Holiday by Arthur Ransome.
Eventually I found a way to weave my own winter story with Christmas at Winterbourne. Narnia gets a reference in it (as it does in a few of my books).
Last year, when my publisher invited their authors to submit stories for a Christmas-themed anthology, I decided it was time to see what had happened to my characters in the intervening four years since publication.
“Winterbourne Revisited” was the result. The main focus for the story was the child who was born on Boxing Day. Teri is looking forward to her fourth birthday and all she wants for Christmas is…snow. Lots of it…just like at the time of her birth, when Winterbourne House was snowbound. As in the original story, I managed to include some Christmas Cracker jokes. This is an excerpt from the family’s Christmas Eve dinner with just Teri, her parents, and Clare, their guest from Australia.
Teri had followed her mother into the room and climbed onto the chair next to Clare. She immediately picked up her cracker and said, “Pull.”
Clare obliged with a smile, then offered her own to the girl. Teri was clearly well versed in cracker etiquette and pulled it before diving in to explore what had come out of her own. Wil and Gaby shared theirs with each other.
“Eat your soup before it gets cold.” Gaby’s instruction was aimed at her daughter but Clare picked up her spoon obediently. She’d only managed two mouthfuls when Teri plucked at her sleeve and held out her cracker joke.
“You want me to read this. Okay. Hm. I think it’s been written especially for you, little one. What do they sing at a snowman’s birthday party?” Clare looked around the table. “Any guesses?”
Blank looks all round.
“Must be something to do with cold or freezing,” Wil offered.
“You’re getting warm, or maybe I should say, cold.” Clare smiled. “Freeze a jolly good fellow.”
Teri looked puzzled, although her parents had laughed. “What does it mean?”
Clare sang the words for her, but the girl still looked puzzled. “Who’s he? It’s my birthday on Boxing Day. I want lots of snow and a snow horse.”
“I know, sweetheart.” Clare looked to Wil for help.
Wil shrugged. “How about this one, then? What kind of bird can write?”
“Oh, I know that one.” Gaby said quickly. “A penguin!”
Teri was distracted with the toy that had fallen out of her cracker. Clare wondered if her either of her parents had x-ray vision when they’d distributed the Christmas crackers at each place setting. The girl was playing with a small plastic horse.
So, if you’re looking for some Christmas-related comfort reading, how about giving this one a go.
(Short story for Affinity’s 10th Anniversary Christmas Anthology)
When asked by my publisher to submit a story for their 10th Anniversary Christmas Anthology, there was no hesitation on my part in deciding what to write.
My fifth novel, Christmas at Winterbourne, was published in November 2016. The story takes place over four days of the Christmas holiday at the lesbian retreat in Sussex, Winterbourne House. Wil and Gaby are the owners and hosts to the family and guests arriving for the festivities. Gaby is heavily pregnant and hoping to get through this Christmas period without giving birth. But, of course, she does…on Boxing Day.
So this short story, a visit to Winterbourne four years later, gave me the chance to see how things were going with the family. Teri is now coming up to her fourth birthday and all she wants for Christmas is…snow. Lots of it…just like at the time of her birth when Winterbourne House was snowbound.
I have read all the stories in this collection – you’re in for a lovely Christmas-themed treat with contributions from Samantha Hicks, Ali Spooner, Annette Mori, Del Robertson, Natalie London, and JM Dragon. All royalties from this limited edition anthology (only available until end of March 2021) will benefit the Wayward Whiskers Cat Rescue in San Antonio, Texas.
The authors have also contributed some of their favourite seasonal recipes in the book. So come along and enjoy Affinity’s 10th Anniversary Christmas Anthology.
Ebook links for Affinity’s 10th Anniversary Christmas Anthology
Is it January already? Time for another blog. A dreary January day seems ideal for a reflection on the wonderful time we had over Christmas. We’ve spent a few Christmases at Lake Windermere. This year was lovely, as it always is, regardless of the weather. Christmas Eve and Boxing Day were both wet days, but Christmas Day the sun came out.
This was a contrast to the same place ten years earlier when we made snowbears by the lakeside.
Clare Lydon invited lesbian fiction authors to take part in a Festive Lesbian Book Club Podcast. I was happy to answer her questions and this was the result with myself, Jae, Clare Ashton, Melissa Tereze, Lise Gold, Jody Klaire and SR Silcox answering the following questions: First, favourite lesfic of the year. Second, favourite festive lesfic ever. Third, what we’re hoping for from Santa. Fourth, what we like to eat & drink at Christmas. Finally, our publishing plans for 2020. Clare also added her own answers to the questions.
Thank you to everyone who took advantage of Affinity’s December sale and bought copies of Christmas at Winterbourne, as well as the other books on sale during the month. Always worth checking out the Affinity Raingbow Publications website for free books and special offers. Subscribers to their newsletter can also benefit from the monthly flash sales.
2020 is starting out slowly for me. But it will be picking up speed in the next few weeks. I’ll be doing edits for my book due out in March – Country Living. Nicola Victoria Vincent has started recording Starting Over which will be the second one of my books to make it into audio. And I’m working on a new novel!
So let’s get on with more happy writing, reading, and listening this year!
Braced for the great snowstorm of 2018 here in the UK – billed in the media as the ‘beast from the east’ – my wife’s shopped for the impending snowcalypse, along with everyone else in the area who have faith in the weather forecast. Excellent business for supermarkets as the shelves are emptied of bread, milk, alcoholic beverages…
Will we be waking up to a snow-covered landscape Tuesday morning? Will there be traffic chaos, cancelled buses and trains, school closures? Perhaps in some parts of the country. But I think we’ll get a few snowflakes drifting about here, barely leaving a covering on the grass.
I grew up in southern Ontario, Canada. I don’t recall ever missing school because of snow. Then I took a job in a town in northern British Columbia. I was advised to invest in long underwear as soon as I arrived in October. And to buy cross-country skis as soon as I could. Temperatures regularly plummeted to -30F (this is where I learned that -40 is the same in either Fahrenheit or Celsius). No one ever missed work because of snowstorms or freezing cold temperatures though.
The last time we had significant snowfall here was in December 2009, lasting well into January 2010.
Pictured here: My wife with two snowpeople we created on Christmas Day, 2009 – staying at a hotel on Lake Windermere – the lake completely obliterated from view in the background.
Above: At home in January 2010, looking across the valley from the high school playing fields. The school was closed for an extra two weeks after the Christmas holidays that year.
So although I wouldn’t wish the disruption to everyone’s lives that a massive snowfall can bring, I’m sort of hoping for something big from the ‘beast from the east’. I would like to make a snowperson in my garden. Even if it only has a short life, like this snowthing I managed in January 2015, melting rapidly the day after its creation.
Snow, or no snow…this is always a good time of year to settle down with a book. Happy reading as the shortest month moves rapidly towards March!
I can’t compete with the Queen. She’s no doubt already recorded her Christmas message, which will be broadcast on Christmas Day. I don’t know what she will say, but analysis has revealed that her most commonly used words in the previous 63 speeches she has given during her long reign are: Commonwealth, children, families, peoples. She’s not supposed to air any political opinions so we won’t likely hear what she thinks of Brexit or the result of the US Election.
Her most memorable speech was for Christmas 1992 when she labeled it her “annus horribilis”. It had been a horrible year in personal terms for the royal family with a devastating fire at Windsor Castle and the breakdown of three of the Queen’s children’s marriages.
Perhaps, collectively, this is our “annus horribilis”. Is it likely to get any better or will the human race be wiped out like the dinosaurs with a cataclysmic event beyond our control?
Maybe there is a meteor hurtling towards us with “Earth” written on it. The dinosaurs didn’t have any pre-warning as to what was going to hit them, but we will. With astronomers monitoring the skies and full-on media outlets, we will know exactly how and when it will happen.
But, I digress. Back to the present, and a reflection on what Christmas has come to mean in our society. Christmas nowadays, in this part of the world anyway, seems to be very much a secular occasion with the commercial focus on children’s expectations of presents they want, families thrown together for enforced jollity, and single people left feeling a deeper loneliness than during the rest of the year. (There – I’ve managed to use all the Queen’s favoured words in this paragraph – except for Commonwealth!)
I have no control over any of this. I can only carry on with my life and hope that in some small way, with the publication of my books, I bring a little love and laughter into other people’s lives.
My message is simple…be kind to yourself and to those around you.
Six years ago we bought our first Kindle. It was supposed to be ‘ours’ but we quickly realised that wasn’t going to work.
I remember the first ebook we purchased for the allegedly joint device – choosing it together – Jasper Fforde’s Shades of Grey. Brilliant story, which I would like to reread, but it’s on what soon became my wife’s Kindle.
Six years on, we not only have separate Kindles, but also our own iPads. Sharing the first iPad went the same way as the e-reader.
The main reason for getting a Kindle in the first place was because we’ve run out of shelf space for paper versions of books. We still buy books and Christmas is the time when we accumulate more. Instead of trying to think of what to buy each other for Christmas, we just exchange book lists a few months before. Then on the day when we unwrap them, we can say, “Oh, great! I forgot I asked for this.”
Last year’s haul of Christmas books
So, how have our reading habits changed?
For one thing, I no longer know what my wife is reading on a daily basis. As a result we don’t talk much about the books we’re reading. She knows I’m usually reading lesfic or another fiction genre that she’s not interested in. But I really have no idea what she’s reading unless I ask. It’s most likely to be something fact based: science, history, and biographies. Occasionally she will read a crime book. I know that Ann Cleeves is a favourite.
The other main thing I’ve noticed is that we both spend less time reading, especially if reading on the tablet. Then it’s ten minutes reading before switching to checking Twitter, Facebook, or playing a game.
Love them or loathe them, I think the e-reader is a necessity for us. Otherwise we would have to move to a bigger house or hire a storage unit.
A small selection of the books in our house – mostly old and a few new favourites
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