My new Brighton novel will be launched at Brighton's Have A Word in March

My new novel, Blue Notes, Still Frames is now officially published and generally available from online sites as well as bookstores and it's now time to announce the book's Brighton launch which will take place on Thursday, 2nd March at the splendid Have A Word event, brain child of the enthusiastic and energetic host, Ellis Collins. As Blue Notes, Still Frames is the second in my series of Brighton-themed novels, it's seems right to give it a grand Brighton send off so i'm delighted to be reading in my home town with my good friends and fellow novelists, VG Lee and Allie Rogers. Music is an important theme in the novel so it is doubly appropriate that Brighton band Octopuses will be there too, playing music from their current album, Yes Please,  and, I'm told, songs from their projected new album too. As Octopuses is my son Adam Bell's band this will make the show a family affair.

Tickets go on sale today at www.wegottickets.com 

Family too is VG Lee, or so it seems, as her work is published by Ward Wood Publishing,  http://www.wardwoodpublishing.co.uk/ as are both my novels.  My good friend VG Lee, is also a Sussex writer, and her novels are both wonderfully funny and powerfully poignant. Her latest, Mr Oliver's Object of Desire came off the Ward Wood production line just ahead of mine. It's a great and entertaining work and VG Lee is a terrific performer, so her reading will be terrific, I know.

I'm really happy too that the other reader on the night will be another of my friends, fellow Brighton novelist, the highly talented Allie Rogers who will be reading from her debut novel, Little Gold, due to be published by Legend Press in May this year. http://www.legendtimesgroup.co.uk/legend-press/books/1446-little-gold

To put you into the mood, take a listen to Octopuses' latest single, Not The Bees, now officially endorsed by Caroline Lucas and the Green Party. They are great, believe me, hear it for yourself:

My new Brighton novel is published!

Great news! My new novel has arrived. It's always a thrilling moment to see it in print after the three years of drafts and redrafts. Yes, it really exists - that's my first reaction. It looks great too. So thanks to my publishers, Ward Wood Publishing, and to the cover designer, the hugely talented Kayla Bell.


Blue Notes, Still Frames is my second Brighton novel and it moves forward to 1994 - My first Brighton book, Stephen Dearsley's Summer of Love was set in 1967.  Here's the publisher's blurb, if you want to know what it's all about.

You can buy the paperback edition a number of ways. Either directly from the publishers:

http://www.wardwoodpublishing.co.uk/titles-fiction-colin-bell-blue-notes-still-frames.htm

From Book Depository, especially if you are outside the UK:
http://www.bookdepository.com/Blue-Notes--Still-Frames/9781908742629

You can buy it at Amazon too - especially if you want the Kindle edition which is already online:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_24?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=blue+notes+still+frames+by+colin+bell&sprefix=Blue+Notes%2C+Still+Frames%2Caps%2C124&crid=1N88VF8VOJ86O

Or, of course, you can order it from your local independent bookshop. Mine, here in Lewes is the excellent independent bookseller Skylark and they will be stocking both my novels:

http://www.skylarkshop.com/

I shall be doing my first reading from the new novel tonight, here in Lewes, at the latest Needlewriters event at the lovely Needlemakers centre, in West Street, with my friend, the poet and novelist Kay Syrad and the science fiction writer, Matthew De Abaitua, whom I'm yet to meet. It should be a fun evening so, come along if you can. It would be great to see you there.

Here's the Needlewriters' web link to give you more information about the writers:

http://www.needlewriters.co.uk/#/whats-on/4539813579

P.S. The readings went really well last night at Lewes' Needlewriters' event - I left feeling that new new book is well and truly  'out there'. My thanks to Janet Sutherland and the Needlewriters' committee for their support and for asking me to read. It's a lovely event.

Why the 19th of January is the beginning of 2015 for this particular writer.

I know it isn't January the First today - let me look, ah yes, it's the 19th, well that'll do.  It feels like the beginning of the new year so give me some slack here, OK. It's 2015 which, for me, is worth celebrating mainly because it's not 2014. If I'm to remain optimistic about 2015, I've decided it should begin today rather than on the more mathematically correct date.

On New Year's Eve 2014, I was perfectly prepared to celebrate until a fever over-took me and sent me to bed shivering, my teeth chattering, in a relapse from an unpleasant condition that had begun in November and that has only really left me, I hope, in the last couple of days. I don't see why we can't invent our own diaries, calendars and schedules and, even if I can't persuade you all to see today as the beginning of the new year, then I intend to go ahead anyway.

It's not just a health thing. Last Monday I finished and sent off to Ward Wood Publishing, the fifth draft of my second novel, Still Notes, Still Frames, which will be published later this year. I'm sure there will be more tweaks and adjustments but it is, in reality, finished until the ever vigilant Adele Ward of Ward Wood comes up with her usual insightful comments. As far as my brain is concerned though, the bulk of the work is done and it can relax into other duties like mostly concentrating on my new novel that is now a quarter through its first draft. Thinking two novels at the same time has been a hazardous occupation so my brain and I are celebrating 2015 in the spirit of ring out the old and ring in the new.

Feeling less cluttered mentally, and much better physically,  has encouraged me to establish new working practices and a new rhythm to my daily life here in Lewes, UK.  I know you've all done your New Year stuff - made and already broken your resolutions, got over your hangovers, decided to give up that diet or that frail attempt at spending January on the wagon but, yes, give me some slack here everyone.

My resolutions centre around finding more space in my life, seeing a bit more blue sky, settling into a fitness regime that suits my schedule, getting this daily blog back up and running now that it is entering its 7th year and, a difficult one this, staying healthy.

Wish me luck because I'll need it. It might be registering very cold here today on the poncey South-East England thermometer but the sun is shining and I can't detect any physical ailment so far this morning, so optimism reigns, Happy New 2015.

Four have fun in Greenwich - the Ward Wood Writers hit the road.

It was a full house at the very welcoming Greenwich gallery, Made In Greenwich yesterday when I and three of my Ward Wood Publishing colleagues gave our first collective reading together. Like a band on the road, the four of us had a great time and have vowed to do this again in the spirit of The Beatles movie, A Hard Day's Night.

An idea dreamed up months ago in a conversation at London's Poetry Café finally came to its very enjoyable conclusion last night in front of a large and encouragingly receptive audience (many of them were poets from the Greenwich area) hosted by the wonderfully informal and enthusiastic Irena Hill, co-owner of the gallery who stepped in at the last minute to replace our publisher, Adele Ward, who had become a victim of the London Underground strike. Thanks, Irena, you were great.

First up was Peter Phillips who fully engaged the audience right from the start with his wryly humourous and yet passionate readings from his two Ward Wood poetry collections, No School Tie and Oscar And I.

The No School Tie poems provide a vivid poet's impression  of a boarding school childhood as well life as a writer,  a husband and a grandfather. Then Oscar And I, the confessions of a fictional minor poet George Meadows who experiences all the fragile hopes and stoically received disappointments of any writer's life but with irony and honesty and humour. If you have read the poems but not heard Peter read them then you've missed a treat. Once heard, his voice always sounds in my head when returning to these delightful collections.

Next was American-born but London-based novelist and poet, Sue Guiney who is working on a series of novels set in Cambodia where she has founded a writing workshop for street children in Siem Reap and now spends about two months each year teaching there.  Her most recent novel, Out of the Ruins, the second in her Cambodia series, was published by Ward Wood in January. 

Sue read from Out Of The Ruins continuing her exploration of what happens when East meets West, in this case when two European doctors set up women's clinic in Cambodian town of Siem Reap with the passionate assistance of a young Khmer nurse. Sue read this and some of her new Cambodian poems with the real passion and commitment she feels for this much put-upon country. She also read from her Ward Wood poetry collection, Her Life Collected, my latest "loo read" - a collection of wonderfully direct and personal poems that are my current inspiration.

Then there was Joe Stein, Ward Wood's impressive crime writer, who is much more than that. He is a terrific writer who draws on, amongst other things, his life as an amateur boxer and professional bodyguard. His main character, Garron, is a body-guard with a philosophical soul and an ever-questioning attitude that gives the Garron books their special quality - I would say literary quality if that didn't sound dull which the books most certainly aren't.

Joe read from his latest Ward Wood novel, the third in the series, That Twisted Thing Called Truth and then, a special treat for people like me, hooked on what is going to happen next with the intriguing existentialist Garron, Joe read from his new novel, Through Another Night due to be released in October. I can't wait.

And then there was me, the newest of all the Ward Wood novelists. I read some extracts from my book Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love enjoying the contrast between my hapless young fogey character Stephen and Joe's much more muscular Garron. Afterwards, Joe and I pondered what it would be like if the two of them met. As Made In Greenwich usually hosts poetry events, I read part of my Fibonacci poetry sequence, Brief Encounters, a work still in-progress, but one day, I hope, a collection in the spirit of the Romantic song cycles by two of my heroes, that I used to sing as a young music student, Schubert's Winterreise and Schumann's Dichterliebe.

Peter, Sue, Joe and I are enthusiastic about doing this again. Our work is so contrasted that collectively the readings really do add up to something greater than it's individual parts. More important than that though, it was fun.

Why I'm all red-faced over Noel Duffy's new book.

I blame Noel Duffy for my red face. My friend, the Irish poet whose inspiring new poetry collection On Light & Carbon sat in my lavatory for the last couple of months begun enthusiastically but then fell victim to my recent illness that has removed me from life as I knew it all year.  I'm still not fully recovered but I'm a lot better and having finished the collection a couple of weeks ago,  I decided to read it over again in one sitting to piece together the links that went flying around my brain since the first interruption.

Noel Duffy

As a fan of his previous collection, In The Library Of lost Objects, I had been looking forward to this new collection from Ward Wood Publishing, who also published my novel - just to let you know that Noel and I are part of the same family.  On Carbon & Light draws on his scientific background (he studied Experimental Physics at university) but that needn't deter anyone like me who wasn't allowed to do Physics A 'level at school because it couldn't fit into the school curriculum with English, History and Music. I've always regretted my scientific ignorance but, believe me, this collection isn't a physics textbook, it's about man's lot in a universe beyond our control and, to me at least, frightening in its chemistry but beautiful too in its mysteries. Into this universe, Noel pitches himself, and us, against the force of scientific truths and their significance to Time as perceived in our own lives and in the history of homo sapiens while allowing us into poignantly moving tales from his own personal history. It is no wonder that many of the scientists mentioned in the collection, are concerned with news ways of seeing, this is what Noel encourages us to do too in our own lives. These poems, in impressively paired down language, restored my wonder in creation but challenged my courage in dealing with my place in time and space.

The April sun shone down on me while I read Noel's book, not this time in the loo, but out there in my garden -  you can even see the light beams that found me there in my garden chair. I came inside red-faced, partly because it has taken me so long to read Noel's book and partly because I still haven't fully learnt all there is to now about sunlight's effect on pale-skinned poetry lovers who spend too long out of doors under the influence of Noel Duffy's inspired vision. I'm now regretting all over again that I wasn't allowed to mix physics, history and English literature at school - Noel shows that they are profoundly interconnected. I've returned to my own humble verse newly inspired.

Here in one of the key poems from the collection,  Reykjavik, he shows us how exploration into the unknown, sometimes ecstatic, sometimes cruelly painful, leads us back to ourselves where we have to live enlightened, hopefully, alert to meanings beyond our understanding but ultimately, inseparable from our tiny space in the great order of things.

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Talking of my fellow Ward Wood writers, I'm going to be appearing with three more of them in Greenwich,  London on 30th April.  Come along if you can.

An interview with Sue Guiney about her new Cambodian novel, Out Of The Ruins

My friend and fellow Ward Wood writer, the American but London-based Sue Guiney has just published a new novel, Out Of The Ruins. We meet pretty regularly these days at either Ward Wood events or at the monthly poetry readings held in London by Camden-Lumen Poetry. There's a real sense of family between all of us writers published by Ward Wood Publishing and, delightfully, whenever we meet we also manage to laugh a lot as well as discuss the wonderful world of writing so it was great meeting up with Sue again in London on Friday for the launch of the new novel.

Sue Guiney

We are fellow bloggers too. Sue writes regularly about her writing and her work in Cambodia where her previous novel, and now this new one, is based one her website:

http://sueguiney.com/

She was kind enough to suggest doing a blog interview with me when my novel, Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love was published last year and now I'm returning the favour.

Out of the Ruins begins with one Cambodian doctor’s frustration over how the poor women in his country are dying needlessly. He reaches out to friends to help him create a new clinic for the local villages around Siem Reap’s world famous temples, and they answer his call. Tradition collides with science as East meets West, and though the doctors are all too eager to help, they have much to learn about their own personal demons in this desperate and seductive society.

Me: I loved your first Cambodian novel, A Clash Of Innocence and I’m really looking forward to reading the new one, Out Of The Ruins. I’m happy to see that at least one of the characters, Srey, from the first book has made into the second and I’m wondering if this is a sequel or maybe part of a planned sequence of related Cambodian novels with shared themes.

Sue: Thanks so much, Colin! I must admit, I’m really excited about this new book’s arrival, too. Your question about sequels is interesting. This has all happened organically. When I wrote A Clash of Innocents I assumed it would be a one off. But people responded well to it, and I realized I had much more to say about Cambodia, so I decided to write a second novel. Actually, I was trying to work out the plot of a completely different book at the time,, set in Ireland actually, but the plot just wasn’t happening. I mentioned that to our editor, Adele Ward, and she suggested writing another book set in Cambodia. And once she did, its plot popped right into my head. But it was a story set in a different part of the country, and so I knew it had to have different characters as well as some from the first. All this is a long way of saying that Out of the Ruins became a “companion” piece, a book that can stand on its own, but which shares some characters with the previous novel. So if you happen to have read that one as well, then the experience is even richer, I suppose. And now that Ruins is complete, I realize that there is at least one more in the series that needs to be written. I’ve already started planning that, but I won’t talk about it now. First things first.

Me: I know that you are a regular visitor to Cambodia. When you first went there did you imagine that you would become so involved with that country or even that you would write so extensively about it? How much do your novels reflect not just your experience of living and working in Cambodia but also your life as an American living in London and spending so much of your time between three continents?

Sue: My connection with Cambodia is one of the great surprises of my life. I first went there on a family volunteering holiday, with the notion that this “would be good for the teenage son.” It was, of course, good for him. But it actually changed my life. I was writing my first novel, Tangled Roots, at the time, and that one is actually set in Moscow and Boston, so I wasn’t thinking about writing anything else but that. But being in Cambodia opened my eyes and heart to so much, and then the story of A Clash of Innocents just came to me, complete with characters and themes. It is clear to me, though, that my own expat experience underlies much of what I write. I seem to be endlessly fascinated by why some people choose to live their lives outside their native country, and why others don’t. How does that decision change you? Are we running away from something or towards something? These questions are still there in the new book, and probably always will be. Growing up in suburban New York, I lived a rather sheltered and protected life. I never knew that it was even possible for someone to decide to live outside their own country. Me spending my adult life in London? Impossible. And yet, here I am, both an outsider and an insider on both sides of the Atlantic, and now also in a country on the other side of the planet.

Me: I’m intrigued that you and I both write fiction and poetry and have a background in classical music. Do all these elements come together in your writing and do they influence each other or do you manage to keep them separate?

Sue: Excellent question. The more I write, the more I realize the way my musical background influences my writing. It is certainly key to my ear for cadence and rhythm, which is important to me not only in poetry, as would be expected, but also in prose. Being a violinist who has spent her life playing in orchestras, I have also been intrigued by the fact that so many physicians play musical instruments, and especially string instruments. What is that all about? I’m still noodling that one, but you’ll see it is addressed to a certain extent in the new novel, which is the first time I’ve really written about the experience of playing music. I loved doing that, and I’m sure I’ll write about it more. A funny thing, though, is that the more I write, the more important playing my violin is to me – it’s the only time when I don’t have words in my head, and believe me, the constant words can be exhausting.

Thanks so much for asking me onto your blog, Colin. I do hope you enjoy this book, as much as you did the last!
I'm sure I will Sue, I have it on order and can't wait to read it.

Sue Guiney's Out Of The Ruins can be ordered online from the publishers, Ward Wood Publishing, from bookshops and from Amazon and The Book Depository:

If you'd like to read Sue's interview with me then here's the link:

http://sueguiney.com/2013/11/767/

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I've been Kindled - and it feels just great!

I'm excited to find out that my novel, Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love is now available on Kindle and that the publishers are selling it at a special festive price for a limited period. If you want to order it you will have to go to your own country's Amazon site or the Amazon site that ships to you. It was exciting to see just how far my book has travelled since it was published as a paperback here in the UK at the end of October this year. Now anyone with the splendid Kindle machine can download it instantly for a very small cost.

I love my Kindle and use it constantly. I'm currently reading Marcel Proust's massive 7 volume novel  À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search Of Lost Time) and find it wonderfully easy to transport around wherever I go. I love buying books too of course as they are beautiful objects in their own right but also solid momentos of reads that you want to keep on a special shelf at home.

Also, as far as my novel is concerned, it's been fun signing copies  - not that you need to have my signature  - but it's much more difficult to autograph your Kindle.

Here are links to some of the major Amazon sites where you can buy the Kindle edition. If you do decide to read it, it would be great to hear from you here on my website.

Brazil:

http://www.amazon.com.br/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/192-7302333-0848351?__mk_pt_BR=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley's%20Summer%20Of%20lOVE

Canada:

http://www.amazon.ca/Stephen-Dearsleys-Summer-Love-Colin-ebook/dp/B00HI0KKXC/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388147550&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=Stephen+Dearsley%27s+Summer+of+love

France:

http://www.amazon.fr/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/277-2140862-0206023?__mk_fr_FR=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley's%20Summer%20of%20lOVE

Germany:

http://www.amazon.de/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?__mk_de_DE=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley's%20Summer%20Of%20love

India:

http://www.amazon.in/Stephen-Dearsleys-Summer-Love-Colin-ebook/dp/B00HI0KKXC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388145326&sr=8-1&keywords=Stephen+Dearsley%27s+Summer+Of+love


Italy:

http://www.amazon.it/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/276-9907493-9144042?__mk_it_IT=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley's%20Summer%20Of%20love


Japan:

http://www.amazon.co.jp/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/377-9761966-0682217?__mk_ja_JP=%E3%82%AB%E3%82%BF%E3%82%AB%E3%83%8A&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen+Dearsley%27s+Summer+Of+Love

Mexico:

http://www.amazon.com.mx/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/189-9030876-5922100?__mk_es_MX=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley's%20Summer%20Of%20love

Spain:

http://www.amazon.es/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/278-9292365-9412902?__mk_es_ES=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley's%20Summer%20Of%20love


UK:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stephen-Dearsleys-Summer-Love-Colin-ebook/dp/B00HI0KKXC/ref=pd_rhf_gw_p_t_2_KK11


USA:

http://www.amazon.com/Stephen-Dearsleys-Summer-Love-Colin-ebook/dp/B00HI0KKXC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388145252&sr=8-1&keywords=Stephen+Dearsley%27s+summer+Of+love
http://www.amazon.com/Stephen-Dearsleys-Summer-Love-Colin-ebook/dp/B00HI0KKXC/ref

Bare feet, Luis Alvarenga and my novel cover

This 'self-portrait' photograph was taken by the young Portuguese photographer Luis Alvarenga,  who likes to record his travels around the World with images of his feet, the part of the body designed to allow us to travel. Here he is on a rock in the Algarve, Portugal. Feet also 'plant' us on the earth and, if we focus on them, let us feel the spirit of 'place'. Hippie jargon, you might think,  but I believe in it, mostly practising my martial arts barefoot at home in my garden or wherever I am on my travels.

 In the 1960s, bare feet became a symbol of liberation and freedom from society's restraints. It was for all of this that Luis' photograph became the cover shot for my just published novel, Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love.

I love the image and especially, the colours of Luis' photograph which makes a handsome cover for my novel, stylishly designed by my publishers, Ward Wood Publishing.  I can feel the heat of that rock but also a certain vulnerability in the feet exposed on such a rough surface. The image is perfect, in my opinion, for Stephen Dearsley's gradual and difficult liberation. Another of Luis'  'self-portraits' shows him standing on an inviting stretch of sandy Portuguese beach at Montegordo. Lovely shot though it is, for me, it is the rock photograph that better expresses the feeling of my novel because, the beach has always been one of the few places feet have always been allowed to go bare.

Here is Luis again, this time in Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset, England, where he first discovered that British beaches can be considerably colder than Portuguese ones.

Here he is in Antigua against a very green lake.







Having spent some time discussing the cover photograph with Ward Wood Publishing, I got to know the picture and, I guess, Luis' feet very well so it was good to finally discover who Luis Santos is and what he looks like above foot level.

He is currently living in Reading, in the UK where he makes his living as a professional photographer most recently specialising in travel and live music photography.

This is one of his favourite music shots taken when he feel in love with this guitar seen at the 2013 Oxjam Reading Festival. I love the colour co-ordination here.

This is Patrick Wolf, the young London singer-songwriter, a musician much admired by Luis. The photograph taken with a vintage 80-200 lens that he had just bought for the occasion marked his debut as a fully accredited music gig job. He tells me that he was nervous when he first had to go on stage at London's Queen Elizabeth Hall "but in the end everything turned out great, even the pictures!"

Here are two of his favourite travel photographs, above, the Monument To The Discoveries, Lisbon, the city where he was at university, and, below, this beautifully textured image of a beach in Maldives.

It was good to see his other work and to say hello to Luis because there is, I've just discovered,  a special relationship between a writer and the creator of his book's cover. It was also good to share some of Luis' enthusiasm for his chosen artform - he is obviously a young man with the World, quite literally, at his feet.

If you want to see more of Luis Alvarenga's (sometimes also known as Luis Santos) work or to contact him, here is a link to his websites:
http://www.thelivephotographer.com/
http://1-luis-santos.artistwebsites.com/

My novel is off to the printers today - Stephen Dearsley is leaving home.

I think it's only normal for me to feel excited today because my novel is off to the printers ready for its release next week on 31 October. I've enjoyed each stage of writing my book, Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love, but there is something special about the feeling today that it is all done and beyond any temptation to rewrite. It is also a strangely emotional moment, the final stage before poor Stephen leaves the safety of his author's and publisher's  protection before facing his fate out there in the world. I hope people will be kind to him, poor guy. It feels like he's leaving home.

I now have the exciting moment to look forward to when my novel is finally there in my hand - completed, printed and giving off that wonderful aroma unique to new books. I first dreamt of that moment as a child.

Second Life: a writer's life in a virtual world.

Believe it or not, blog-readers, there is still a lot of prejudice around concerning on-line networks and so-called virtual worlds. We are not far enough away from the 20th Century yet for some people to see that there is no great difference between communication media - for good or for ill. The tabloid print press, every now and then, run a story about how this marriage broke up because of a relationship formed in the virtual world of Second Life or that a child became hooked on war games or someone else found some other on-line addiction. Well, we humans fail, fall and get addicted to almost anything and, if the sensational world revolution that is the web has to get the blame then, blame too, newspapers, films, television, the telephone, letter-writing, conversations at the supermarket check-out, anything where human speaks to human. I am thinking in particular about Second Life today because I have some experience of this international network of strangely animated avatars who can speak freely to fellow humans in any country in the world because it is free in all senses of that word. These people, because behind each avatar is an individual human being, can explore wherever their imaginations lead them. I am a fan of communication, freedom and the imagination and I discovered that in Second Life, all of these things are in abundance.

For me, it's a very creative place with a lively literary world where, like last night, you can put on an exhibition of poetry and people come to it from all over the World. I run a gallery in a place called Book Island and often hold other poetry events at a village known as Written Word and have done since my brain haemorrhage of nearly five years ago when going out at all would have been impossible. In both places, it is quite difficult to find a philistine or a modern art cynic and last night, at the opening of my exhibition, the conversation was about poetic form and writing styles with people coming to explore the world of Fibonacci Poetry without any prejudices or preconceptions.

In this virtual world, we have to make everything ourselves, or get help from clever friends - that is how my gallery, Wolfanatolia was born. I then had a space to fill with 40 of my Fibonacci poems along with some of my photographs which, I hoped, were complimentary to the poetic themes. These little arithmetically conceived poems take concentration from reader and writer alike so I was thrilled to find such an intent and appreciative audience for these little Minimalist pieces that I have put together into a sequence when previously they have had to stand alone - mostly individually published in succeeding issues of that pioneering journal, the Fib Review. Here is a link if you'd like to read some of my work and also Fibonacci poems by many other poets from a round the world:

www.musepiepress.com/fibreview/

I had never read them as a sequence out-loud before and didn't know if they were going to work as performance pieces. Second Life, not for the first time, gave me the chance to find out.

In the audience there were people from Hawaii, India, Singapore, California, South Carolina, Tennessee,  New York City,  London, Manchester, Wales, Lisbon and Paris. I was there too without having to leave my hometown of Lewes in the UK.

We were all linked up visually and aurally by the amazingly clear telecommunication that is Second Life. An international conference call with a difference perhaps and absolutely free. It is in moments like this that I feel hopeful about our planet Earth. Moments when we don't have to worry about presidents, dictators and generals or even the sneers from that great army, the silent majority of reactionaries.





I think my Fibonacci Sequence, Brief Encounters, worked as spoken word - I hope it did, the audience thought so anyway. They stayed for the excellent live music provided by my friend Brendan Shoreland,  singer-songwriter, a Yorkshireman from Plymouth,  who also finds inspiration in virtual worlds. People even stayed  afterwards to walk round the exhibition.

I am not alone in finding inspiration in the technology that allows like-minded people anywhere in the world to share ideas and creative endeavours,  I met Adele Ward, the future publisher of my novel, Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love, at just such an event as last night. She is one of the pioneers of bringing  and developing literature in virtual worlds. I have grown as a writer since visiting this place and see it now as yet another inspiring part of my always interesting life.

So don't laugh when you hear people talk about virtual worlds because you might just be missing something. You might even be wrong. OK, then, laugh if you want to, sometimes it's safer that way.

I think I'm allowed a few moments of quiet celebration now that my novel is about to go off to the printers.

It was the weekend when I actually believed that my novel really is going to be published and that it is going to be happening almost immediately now. Well, actually 31st October but that's no time away. The text has now been agreed and it will soon be off to the printers. I've even made it into the papers! I did this interview for the Sussex newspaper, The Argus last week and it came out on Saturday.  Take a look - it felt very strange reading about myself in the newspaper.

http://www.theargus.co.uk/magazine/celebratingsussex/10724508.Second_chance/?ref=rss

It's almost enough to make a guy come out with corny remarks about this being a lifetime's ambition coming true. Well, it's true. Do I believe it? Well, actually, not fully. I'm amazed and I shall endeavour to enjoy these next weeks knowing that nothing could be quite as exciting again