OOPS!

I forgot to mention that The Owners Volume IV :A New Epoch will be free to download over the next few days. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity so don't miss out!

Happy Reading!

This will hopefully be the cover for The Owners, Volume IV: A New Epoch. Isn't is beautiful? It was specially created for me by the wonderfully talented Martin Darcy. Visit his Facebook page here https://www.facebook.com/martin.darcy2?fref=ts.

As you know I have been incredibly busy writing Volume VI of the Owners series. But now that I'm more than half-way through, I think it's time to finish editing my series for children aged 8-10 and finally get them out on the shelves.

The Mellillia books are funny and quirky and are very different to The Owners books. But that is only part of the appeal. Writing books for children requires a certain mind-set - a way of looking at things differently from how we normally view them. It's a refreshing take on our lives as adults and I find myself smiling even as I write.

With The Owners, the writing is more intense, more frenetic and I barely have time to breathe as the words hurtle themselves out of me and onto the screen.


And then there is my adult book which still requires me to sit down and get on with it. This is very different again from either of the two series I have previously mentioned but is just as intense as The Owners but in a very different way.

Finally, there are the other eighty odd stories I still have to write. By my calculation that means I will have to live to about 120 just to get them all out there...

Now where did I put those multi-vitamins again? And why did I just make coffee with cold water...guess the brain won't hold up to 120 after all ;)

Karma! [I hope]

Yesterday, after enjoying a lovely day out in Birmingham city centre, I returned to the car park to find that my spare wheel had been stolen from my car.
 
As you know I have rather a bad temper but I do believe in fate and in Karma. So this is my Facebook status today.
 

To the bleep who stole my spare wheel from under my car yesterday, I have this to say..."May your luck, like my wheel, circle onwards into darkness, may your happiness spin always away from you and may you go round and round in life, never achieving your dreams!"

Now Karma - go get that swine! ;)

About time to write my review about About Time

I went to the cinema yesterday. Now I state that as a bald fact to ensure that you understand what an occasion that is for me, to go to the cinema to see anything!

A friend of mine had gone to see the exact same film at the sitting directly before mine and had texted me to say that it was slow to begin with. This was also the view held by my viewing partner, who thought that the opening scenes and first third of the film dragged.

I have to say I disagreed. Whilst I did find the exposition of the concept a little heavy-handed at times [you almost felt that they explained it in such a painfully slow way that even a learning-impeded five year old would have understood it] it somehow fit in with the quaint Britishness of the film itself.

What I mean by this, is that it had neither the pace of the ideal American offering such as 24, The Bourne conspiracy films or even the speedily delivered witticisms of the average Big Bang Theory episode. But instead there was a sweet meandering to the plotline.

This was only enhanced by the simply brilliant acting of Bill Nighty and the gentle but inevitable fall of the character Kit-Kat, who I found mildly reminiscent of the character Mary Steenburgen played in the tv adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender Is The Night.

But I won't tell you more and risk spoiling your enjoyment. All I will say is if you like quirky British films you will like it. If you enjoy bitter-sweet ending you will love it and if you like your tales to have a moral at the end...well then, you will simply love it!

Either way...give it a try and let me know what you think.

Finished!!!!

Well, having written the last chapter, it turned out that there were four more pages to write and how could I stop there until September...so I wrote the final four pages!

I had no idea the baddie was who he or she [not giving that away] actually was! And I had no idea how they had schemed and twisted the knife so much. I am shocked but even more eager than ever to see how this epic tale will resolve itself...

I'll keep you posted!

Here is the latest professional review of The Owners, Volume I : Alone


Book Review:
Fast paced and gripping, while vastly divergent from my normal fare, this story held my interest and kept me reading. The ambitious storyline tackled world-building and characters with equal success, providing references that were easy to relate to even as the plot seeks to carry you to places unknown.
For a debut novel, this book provided several high points: Capuano is a good storyteller with the ability to present her characters in a manner that instantly provides empathy or scorn. I’m still undecided if the alien language used, and depicted phonetically worked for me or simply made those passages more difficult to read. While it was cleverly presented, I’m not a huge fan, and much of my understanding of conversations was directly derived from the other context of the story.
There were a few moments where the underlying moral dilemmas presented by the action felt a bit heavy-handed, but the scope for further thought about the underlying question of what it means to be human, or have humanity are threaded into the tapestry of the plot, providing plenty of options for questions without the author’s overreach to provide simple one-dimensional answers. To her credit, Capuano manages to bring questions that young and old have pondered for ages, and provide enough information that everyone will draw their own conclusions in the many shades of grey within a moral choice.
This is a really good start to a series: enjoyable because of the dimensional layering of subtext and lack of reliance on more traditional fantasy / sci-fi tropes.
I received an eBook from the author for purpose of honest review for inclusion in children read week at I am Indeed. I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.

http://iam-indeed.com/2013/06/07/alone-the-owners-volume-1-by-carmen-capuano/

A Two-Way Mirror in a Bathroom???

I have just seen reports of a two -way mirror in a ladies toilet in  a club in Glasgow, which my friend put on facebook.

Really?? I mean really? Come on guys how weird is that? If the only way you can get your kicks is by watching some unsuspecting woman reapplying her make-up, or adjusting her hair, then I feel very sorry for you...

And as for the billionaire club owner who termed it "a bit of fun", let's think how he would like it if we all got a sneaky-peek at his most prized possession - his bank details. Not a lot I would imagine!

I would love to think that men would shun these private rooms where the images behind the mirrors can be seen but a good knowledge of human nature, suggests that there will always be punters ready to part with their cash, for the deviant thrill this will provide.

Britain - you are getting sleazier by the minute and I for one am ashamed.

My holiday in Brean.

Now I did tell you a few weeks ago, that I had just come back from holiday and that I would tell you all about it, so here it is.

Before I start, let me just explain one thing...I am a bit of a nervous home leaver. Not a nervous flyer, or even traveller but an actual person who is nervous of leaving home.

Not that I am agoraphobic - I have no fear of open spaces - it's more that I am terminally nervous of being away from all my belongings. So much so, that once, as a child, I packed my entire Enid Blyton book collection, plus a few other authors' works into the bottom of my poor unsuspecting dad's suitcase. You can imagine his horror upon opening it, to find that he had not in fact packed too many clothes but that the case was instead filled with my books.

Since we had walked the ten minutes journey from the train station to our rental holiday home [with of course him carrying the suitcase as this was prior to wheeled suitcases becoming the norm,] he wasn't best pleased. However, I digress slightly...

Let's suffice it to say, that I am utterly convinced, that if there is such a thing as reincarnation, I was a snail in a former life, carrying my home around with me.

I have a tendancy therefore to take everything I could possibly need [and lots of things I couldn't possibly use] with me on my travels. The checklist alone is enough to require the felling of several trees worth of paper! But on reflection, it makes for interesting reading!

So there we were, me, the kids and our two dogs, sandwiched into the car with enough clothing, food, towels and a whole host of other irrelevant stuff, to last the length of at least one world war. [Because of course there would not be a nearby supermarket which would sell any food that I found remotely recognisable, what with this being a different county to the one in which we live - except that there was].

And there would not be anywhere I could purchase a bottle of wine,[other than the on-site shop and any number of other places locally which sold alcohol.]

Nor could there possibly be anywhere that sold chocolate, thus requiring me to take not one, or even two, but three bars of chocolate...

I could go on but I think you get the picture!

Armed as I was with my mountain of food, the kids could have been forgiven for thinking that we were going on a trek to the end of the world! And what did I find when I arrived? A caravan that exactly fitted our requirements, heaters put on ready for our arrival and everything neat and tidy.

Well laid out, the caravan was fitted with everything we could have needed and was a real home from home, so much so,that I would have no hesitation in recommending it to anyone visiting the area.


In fact, I fully intend to return in the near future. But this time I will be packing less for the journey. Even a snail like me can learn something...

P.S. should you want to contact the owners of the caravan I stayed in, you can call them on  07944445556 and ask for Brian or Tina from Finishing Touches.