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Dead Scared

The end of SF as we know it

We all know the dilemma: if you go back in time to knock off, say, your great-grandmother, you start off a never-ending paradox. Dead great-grandmother = no you, so how could you go back to commit the dastardly deed? But if you didn’t go back, then great grandmum survives and you get born after all. But that means…

Fortunately I am able to report that this paradox has been solved, by none other than Dylan. Apparently there are three mutually exclusive possibilities which together solve the paradox. Note the contact details at the top. Contact Dylan for any further explanations, not me.
add comment | read comments (0) | 2012-05-20

Free as a bird

Actually, this is my third week of retirement. People keep asking me, ‘Are you enjoying yourself?’ and ‘Are you having a good rest?’, to which the answers are yes and no, respectively. I have just completed two fairly big jobs on the editing front, and I’m about to start marketing in earnest for some more. I’ve had several meetings on the BNI front. I’m proofreading The Magic Door as I read it to Dylan (more of that in another post), and I have a whole list of things to do round the house (including making a double bed) that I haven’t even started yet. That's why it has taken me almost three weeks to get round to making this post: I simply haven't had time!

But yes, I’m enjoying it. I’m sitting in front of a log fire watching Test cricket right now, as I work on updating my website. I could never do that before without using up my ration of annual leave. The fact that I don’t need annual leave to plan my activities hasn’t quite sunk in yet, but I’m sure I’ll get there!
add comment | read comments (0) | 2012-05-18

The Magic Door

Somewhere in the depths of my website I bemoan the fact that when I was in primary school, we were read a book called The Magic Door, and I could no longer trace it. I couldn't remember who wrote it, I could find no mention of it on Amazon or similar sites. I couldn't, to be honest, remember a great deal about it apart from the fact that a magic door led through a wall somewhere, and I enjoyed whatever the story was about.

Lo and behold just last week I got an email from a lady who had studied Accountancy with me and my first wife Mary way back in the 70s. "You won't remember me," she said, but actually I did. Anyway, she had happened upon my website, and knew that the Magic Door had been reprinted. If, that is, it was the same Magic Door that I'd been remembering.

It was. I visited Dan Billany's website and ordered the book forthwith. I have even been in contact with Dan Billany's niece Jodi, who has reprinted the book who "hopes that I will enjoy it as much now as I did way back then".  Naturally everyone thinks I have bought it for Dylan; who would buy a children's book at my advanced age?

I shall review the book in due course, and the result will appear in my book review blog. I'll write back to Jodi Brake, who has been kind enough to email me, too. But I'm fairly certain that if you have a child of, say, seven to twelve, then you won't go far wrong by getting yourself a copy of The Magic Door.
add comment | read comments (0) | 2012-04-08