Rae of Light

Wishing all my followers, their family & friends a happy and prosperous new year. May all your most heartfelt dreams be realised.

I’ve done it! Just ahead of my 31 December deadline I’ve finished my final book of the Discworld series. There are 41 books in total so the smallest amount of cheating was involved since I’d already read 16 of them prior to setting myself this challenge. Despite this it was more difficult than I initially anticipated.  Some of the books took longer to read because they didn’t grip me in the way I expected. Because of this I was forced to abandon my desire to reread several of my favourites such as The Wee Free Men . There is however next year for that. The most unexpected part of this challenge was that I didn’t automatically love every single Discworld novel penned by Sir Pratchett. Happily I loved enough of them to justify this author’s status as one of my favourites forever more. Besides, anyone who co-authors a book like Good Omens is a writing god as far as I’m concerned. I didn’t only read the Discworld series during this period though. There were several others

Reading through 41 Discworld novels is harder than it would seem. This I realised after I undertook the challenge at the start of 2017. I originally figured since I find Fantasy my go to genre when life’s being a bit antsy, it would be a breeze. The trouble with this though is that not every single book written by a favourite author may be as good as the last one you read. I came to understand this quickly as I was disappointed by some of the books on offer in Pratchett’s Discworld series. But I was quickly heartened to find the themes, characters and humour I so love about Pratchett coming to the fore in their droves the more I read.  I once again began to feel my choice of genre and author was justified. Top of my list are the following: Guards Guards Men At Arms Carpe Jugulum Feet of Clay Hogfather However, by far my favourite of the entire series is The Wee Free Men . I defy anyone to read this and not come away thoroughly entertained. These outrage

If you’ve been following this blog for some time you’ll be aware I don’t do Christmas presents. This has resulted in the mistaken view that I’m related to the Grinch. This could not be further from the truth. It is a season I relish for several reasons which are about to become very clear to you. In truth, one of my favourites relies on a turn in the weather. The minute I feel the merest ear tingling nip in the air it means I can begin to indulge in earnest. But indulge in what? Hats of course. I love wearing hats and find it as difficult to turn my back on a good hat as I do to shut my eyes when I pass a shoe shop. I’m not entirely sure where this love of hats comes from but I decided long ago not to fight it. I tend to favour hats which hark back to the 20s, 30s & 40s. And who can blame me? They just scream style as far as I’m concerned. You only have to watch an episode of The House of Eliott to see what I mean. By now I’m sure you’re wondering what

It’s today!  So if you’re anywhere near New Cross then please pop on by, we’d love to see you. I’ll be reading from the new book. Then there’ll be music, poetry, stand-up and much more. Food & drink available as well as copies of the book for you to buy and me to sign.   Book 1 in the series will also be on sale. Also on sale: Stories for Homes Vol 2 in aid of Shelter , which is also available as an e-book. & Featuring Special Guest Author: Ross Montgomery Huge thanks to Mihaly & the team at The Rosemary for helping me put this event together. Added thanks to my wonderful MC Amanda Hamilton for her support and advice throughout the preparations.