Here we are, five days into the New Year. How’s it going for you?
We started the year’s tango early with an afternoon of dancing locally on New Year’s Day but I must admit that, with that on top of the excesses of New Year’s Eve, Tuesday was a bit of a blur. Despite this, it’s been a good New Year so far, with a lovely review of Eat the Poor turning up on amazon.com (“Two of the best written characters ever”) and one for Something Wicked from Rosie Amber’s Book Review Team (“Clever, with sharp edged humour that is sure to delight”). It’s fantastic to see my Galbraith & Pole Urban Fantasy books getting some love. Will 2024 be the year they take off?
Speaking of Urban Fantasy, my son gave me three short graphic novels spun off from Ben Aaronovich’s Rivers of London series. I do love his books (there’s a review HERE), even if the plots are becoming insanely convoluted. I discovered them when a friend said that the Galbraith & Pole books reminded him of them. There’s a definite similarity, but I swear I wrote G&P before I read Aaronovitch.
A more weighty Xmas gift was ‘A Mohawk Memoir from the War of 1812’. It’s hardly a fun read but I’m reading my way into that war because there is just a chance that James Burke might find himself in North America. It will be a while though. It’s going to take time before I know enough about the 1812 conflict for me to feel comfortable writing about it.
That’s all for the future, anyway. For now I am quite enjoying not having to get up and pound at the word processor. It turns out that while I was writing two books last year there was a certain amount of domestic administration that wasn’t getting done, so 2024 is going to see quite a lot in the way of builders and decorators.
Like a lot of people (at least among my friends) I felt that 2023 didn’t fill me with enthusiasm. I had fun certainly. But life wasn’t notably better at the end of 2023 than at the beginning. I’m hoping that a certain amount of clearing away of dead wood and making some space in life could mean a much more exciting 2024. I live in hope, anyway.
Does anybody else have exciting plans for the year ahead?
