They Don’t Make Them Like This Any More

Check out this amazing 70-year-old woman: she tackled six men robbing a jewellery store – with a handbag!  She thought a child was being attacked and ran across to save him. 

Buy The Book (1)

Exciting news!  I have two friends with books out.  I’ll tell you about one today and one tomorrow.

The first is Tom Fleck by Harry Nicholson:

‘Sharp as quivering hares are the Flecks. We’ve eyes and ears for things other folk miss.’

In the aftermath of Flodden, a young man finally understands his father’s words.

 

The year: 1513. The place: North-East England.

Tom Fleck, a downtrodden farm worker but gifted archer, yearns to escape his masters. He unearths two objects that could be keys to freedom: a torque of ancient gold and a Tudor seal ring. He cannot know how these finds will determine his future.

Rachel Coronel craves an end to her Jewish wanderings. When the torque comes to rest around the neck of this mysterious woman, an odyssey begins which draws Tom Fleck into borderlands of belief and race.

The seal ring propels Tom on a journey of self-knowledge that can only climax in another borderland – among the flowers and banners of Flodden Field.

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Harry Nicholson now lives near Whitby in North Yorkshire. He grew up in Hartlepool from where his family have fished since the 16^th C. He had a first career as a radio officer in the merchant navy. A second career followed in television studios.

Since retirement he has devoted himself to art (the cover is one of his paintings), poetry and the teaching of meditation. This is his first novel. 

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I’ve read Tom Fleck; I loved it.  It has a sweet romance but the heart of the book is Tom’s journey: a road trip for the 16th Century.  What I loved most about it is Harry’s gift for interesting detail, the fascinating stuff that’s usually left out and shouldn’t be.

Buy it!  You’ll love it, I promise.

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You can get it from Amazon and other online retailers, or from the author himself; go to his blog for a taster. 

 

A Bargain Is Only A Bargain If Your Wife Is Still Speaking To You

Image by paulproteus via Flickr

Marriage is a relationship in which one person is always right, and the other is a husband.  Anonymous.

The Hub came nearer to extinction yesterday than he has ever done.  Last week he cuddled me so hard I couldn’t move my arms as he said in a gentle tone, ‘Don’t be mad at me, darling.’  He didn’t say ‘darling’ out loud but I could tell he was thinking it.  ‘I have bought some printers.’

We need a new printer.  We won our present one in a competition about four years ago.  It’s smashing, but all printed out.  We don’t have the funds right now for a new one so we are propping it up with love and threats: ‘Work, dammit!  I’ll clean you, I promise.’

In fact, we need to replace a lot of our appliances: the toaster toasts only one side of the bread; the kettle is moody; the steamer is cracked and battered and leaking vegetables; my beloved George Forman died and was buried with full honours in the non-recyclable bin, those picky pick-up men refusing to take him when he was nestled with the tin cans and plastic bottles.  His offspring is George-lite and doesn’t have George’s capacity; he does for two people but three or more and he panics: he will strain and groan and set off the smoke alarm.  He has never lived up to his father and I doubt that he ever will.

We won’t be replacing them any time soon, but the Hub got ‘some’ printers off an auction site for £acertainamountbutwellwithinourpricerange.  A bargain.  He thought it was worth it if just one works; and maybe he can sell the others for spare parts.  My house is littered with things the Hub was going to sell for spare parts but never had the energy to do.  Once he has collected the items, his energy is all spent and, to quote Hawkeye through the same gritted teeth, ‘They stay where they lay.’  However, if I can’t print out my poems, I can’t print out my poems.  Paris is worth a mass and printers are worth their weight in A4.

So I thought.  Yesterday he brought them home.  As our old one sits atop a crowded cupboard, I had lost all perspective: printers are big!  Especially six or ten or seventy-three or however many there are forging the crazy paving from the kitchen to the lounge. 

He did it once before, with microwaves.  They sat in the shed for nine years until we discovered Freecycle.  This time, it’s the Hub I’m giving away.  Anybody need one?  I’ll deliver.