December 3, 2022

DAY 4/5: I HAVE CONFIDENCE

ALLAN:  One of the enduring puzzles surrounding the high point of our trip is, just who in their right mind (apart from us) would want to go on a Sound of Music coach tour? Our pre-trip imaginings have conjured images […]
November 30, 2022

DAY 3: CRISP APPLE STRUDELS

KATE: I’m not quite sure I can say I have now been to Munich. After a 7 hour train journey from Brussels and a changeover in Frankfurt, we arrived in Munich, well and thoroughly knackered. Consequently, I did not get […]
November 29, 2022

DAY 2: THE SOUND OF MUZAK

ALLAN: The baroque grandeur of Grand Place is the premier destination for any self respecting tourist and is undeniably beautiful (as well as being home to a life-sized and strangely aryan nativity scene, that sits firmly in the middle of […]
November 28, 2022

DAY 1: THERE MAY BE LIEDERHOSEN

ALLAN: It seemed like a good idea at the time – a shared love of ‘The Sound of Music’ with my daughter Kate was innocent enough when its only manifestation was an annual viewing and singalong on Xmas day. But […]
May 17, 2022

Getting paid

I followed a recent thread on Twitter where several writers discussed how their invoices for school visits were being paid chronically late or, sometimes, not at all.  Whilst this is bad enough, it transpired that several of them felt uncomfortable […]
December 11, 2020

THE ‘AFTER SCHOOL DETECTIVE CLUB’ IS HERE!

Over the last few months I have been privileged to work with the massively talented, million-selling author, Mark Dawson on a project to create a brand new children’s series. With our shared love of the classic Enid Blyton stories of […]
November 29, 2020

The After School Detective Club!

Lockdown has been a busy period for me as I have been hugely privileged to be working with million-selling thriller writer, Mark Dawson to co-author two new children’s stories. The result is the first in a brand-new series, ‘The After-School Detective […]
April 30, 2020

Hygiene factors

The essence of packing for the jungle is to travel light.  That is my theory and it seems a sound one.  Packing has been planned, re-planned and honed down to the bare essentials and includes no more than three dry […]
March 5, 2020

BIG BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT!

I am hugely excited to announce that my next book, the first in a brand new sci-fi adventure series will be published by Faster-Than-Light Press on 1st June 2020 and will be entitled STARLESS & BLACK…and the case of the […]
January 30, 2020

The best and the worst of sci fi predictions.

Anyone who loves sci-fi (that’s everyone, right?) is looking for a glimpse of the future.  And all sci-Fi writers like to paint big, bold visions of the future that we find exciting, amusing or just plain scary.  So, who has […]
June 9, 2019

‘One small step…’  my top ten moon stories for kids

On July 20th1969, three days before my ninth birthday, I crouched in front of our TV set, mesmerised by the grainy, black and white images of Neil Armstrong taking his first steps on the moon.  I watched the footage over […]
April 25, 2019

My top five aliens

A top five list of aliens?  Out of the wealth of alien-ness available in the field of science fiction how could I possibly settle on only five?  Well, I don’t claim this is a list everyone will agree with but […]