Amsterdam – Page 3

Top to bottom: Zak Tracey, Derek Nicholson, John Rowley, Mick Bush, Sandy Shaw, Dave Crisp (RCT), Jim Farrell, Me, The chef, an u/k RCT driver

For over a year now, I’ve been doing a three-day working week at my retail assistant job, so most of my time is spent writing, which is how I like it. Imagine my shock and delight, when on 15th January, into the store, walks a man I last saw 38 years ago.

Top to bottom: John Worsell, Mick Bush, Jim Farrell, Dave Crisp, John Rowley, me

In 1976 when I left the city of Londonderry, I was a Private soldier, and my Troop Commander was Captain Les Fox. Why, might you ask, after such a long time would I still remember him? In all of my 23 years in the military, he was one of only a handful of men, (and the only officer), that I worked hard to impress. Sadly, he’s not included in the photo I’ve used in this post, but he was there with us, on the Mull of Kintyre on a memorable two-week exercise in 1975.

Still ‘looking back’, in December 2013, sales of my crime novel, ‘Beyond The Law’; were in double figures for the month, and copies of my poetry books sold too, so it was a good month.

I’m presently making headway with my next romance novel, ‘Amsterdam Calling’, which is due for publication in June this year. The second draft is going well; the characters are behaving, and I’m happy with the places of interest I’ve been able to include in the tale. My son Andrew has agreed to lend his expertise in producing the cover, which removes a lot of pressure. Apart from being important, the cover is a very personal thing, but I trust Andrew implicitly, especially after the cover he produced for, ‘Beyond The Law’.

With regard to ‘looking forward’, I am more eager than ever, to get back to work on my next big project, ‘A Life of Choice’; which is a fictional tale, using many of my own experiences, and those of others from my military service. Meeting Les Fox again, has provided me with the incentive I needed, to get working on my fact-based fiction story.

For now, I must get back to Amsterdam …

Windmill painting - acrylic on canvas — Windmill painting – acrylic on canvas

It’s been four weeks since my last ~~confession~~ , I mean blog post. What excuses can I offer? Well for a start there was the first week when I got to grips with my second romance ‘Discovering Amsterdam’ and got the first draft completed. That story is now in cold storage until I get my thriller e-published on Amazon. There will be excerpts from each of my novels on both this site and my website.

I was then on holiday for two weeks. The first week was spent in Germany where we were based in Cologne, but we travelled further afield as usual. Favourite places on this trip with lots of pictures taken were; Cochem in the Mosel Valley and Monschau which is about 800 years old. On returning to the UK we managed a day here and there for the next week. I dabbled in my writing, but I also painted.

I’ve been looking through my recent pictures and I’ve got them down to a shortlist. I want to paint a scene from the Mosel Valley and one from Monschau, but they will be a while coming because I’m doing them a bit bigger than usual. Results will appear on here when completed.

Having just returned from Germany perhaps I would be expected to paint something of that trip – but no, not me. I have my Amsterdam Collection of paintings that was still incomplete. I had a canal, a corner café and a Dutch East Indiaman (three-masted ship). I decided that what was lacking was a windmill – so that has now been sorted. I had pictures that I had taken a few months ago on a trip over there.

The thriller is about a vigilante and it’s had various working titles. I tend to change the title when I do the next draft because that way I can get used to seeing it and I consider if the particular title will work. The latest variation is ‘Hawk – A Vigilante’, which seems to tell the reader what the hero is all about.

My intention is to have someone else design the cover for me on this occasion. I can give a brief of the story and see what comes up and it might be better if another set of brain cells has a go at it. As for the story itself, I’m now on the third draft and the whole thing is already feeling better. What’s better about it? I’m ensuring for example that there is an action scene in every chapter, two in some of them. There will be more death and violence than in the first drafts too – it is about a vigilante after all. I’ll post a chapter or two on here as they are completed and then if anyone has an opinion they can voice it. I do appreciate feedback.