March 2017

Following the death our final parent last year, we’ve been investigating and organising their residual possessions. In November, we opened Great Grandfather John Donnelly’s 100-year-old strong box.

Of all the belongings Mum and Dad left us, the most interesting was a chest of photos and documents. These were accumulated across more than a century – stretching back through the old family house at Earlings, the earlier, larger, one at Lufkins, and my maternal grandparent’s previous base in Derbyshire from before 1942.

I was carrying four hemp bags worth of the chest’s contents when I visited cousin Donna in Suffolk, in November. Read more »

It’s time to add meat to the bone of the worldview sketched-out in The Jolly Pilgrim.

Thanks to all those who commented on that optimistic worldview. Bar these counterarguments, the central critique seems to be that – even though we live during the most enlightened and open-minded, least violent, least diseased, best fed, wealthiest, coolest, most exciting epoch the world has ever seen – it won’t count for much if Earth’s ecosphere goes into meltdown.

That’s a good point. Thanks to those who’ve made it. Read more »

To see a mad visual of this summer: Click here (use your mouse to move it around)

I’ll remember the Olympic Closing Ceremony until I drop dead or go mental. Read more »

11 August 2012

Since moving to Manor Park, five-minutes by train from the Olympic site, in 2008, I’ve watched the stadium rise from the wasteland north of Stratford during daily commutes to the City.

Beyond that physical manifestation of their approach, for most of the past four years the Olympic Games only impinged upon my consciousness to the extent of the predictable rows over their budget, occasional stories about Team GB and the reshaping of local land prices and transport connections. All that changed at the end of last year when a friend suggested I apply to be a volunteer cast member in the closing ceremony. Read more »

A blow-by-blow, first-hand account of writing and publishing the travel and philosophy book, The Jolly Pilgrim, is now live on this website.

The sales documents used to represent the book to agents and publishers are also online, as a free PDF download (both here and on page six, linked below). Writers and aspiring writers should feel free to use these documents for ideas, inspiration, or as an example of how to sell work. Read more »