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Went to see ‘Bumblebee’ tonight. Expectations were low because of, well, the last few Transformers movies and Michael Bay, but the new guy at the helm Travis Knight knows his stuff. What an amazing little story! The action is stripped back and the main focus is on the relationship between Charlie and her friend/car Bumblebee. There’s a brilliant scene at the beginning set on Cybertron, which is what we’ve been waiting for all these years, but my absolute favourite moment is when Bumblebee tries to encourage Charlie by playing Stan Bush’s ‘The Touch’ from the original animated movie. Every hair was on end for that bit.

I’m working on a paperback which will contain Dave Richmond’s story so far, including a prequel to the original short story. I think I’m going to call it ‘Richmond’s Rarities Volume One’.

It seems an appropriate time of year to announce some of the projects I’ll be working on in 2019. First up will be finishing off ‘A Fifth Visitor Or How Scrooge Kept Christmas’. I’ve been working on this for several years now and I was planning on releasing it this Christmas, but due to one thing and another (mostly another) I’ve not been able to polish it off. It’s mainly just grammar and punctuation I need to work on, and, due to the extra time I have now, I’m going to add some illustrations to the mix.

Speaking of illustrations, I’ve been toying with the idea for a while now, but I’m finally going to put a book together of the first fifty Still Life cartoons (a cartoon strip about a bloke called Jeff and his sofa. It’s more interesting than it sounds). There’ll be some rarities in there as well, including some old strips from Jeff’s original creator Mike Chapman.

If you read yesterday’s blog you’ll already know that I’m working on two new sequels to my short sci-fi story ‘Bright Future’. The working title for the first one is ‘Shutdown’, and it’s set around thirty years later. I won’t spoil the plot, but it involves a teenage girl who doesn’t fit in to the technology enslaved world around her. Will Cooper from the first book will have an influence on the plot, but whether he’s dead or alive remains to be seen. I’m quite excited about this one, so hopefully I’ll have something for you by the end of the year.

Another ongoing project is ‘The Badger Helper Watcher’. This is the very first book I started many moons ago. It’s aimed at young teens, and it’s set in the fictional and too good to be true town of Valleyvale. I started working on it just as the culture of internet shopping was starting up (quite a while ago then) and the plot is a commentary on that. Until recently, I was thinking that the message of getting whatever you want when you want it, has consequences was a little dated, but considering the state of the highstreet now, maybe it’s the perfect time for me to finish it.

And that’s it for now. I’m sure other stuff will pop into my head along the way and I’ll keep you posted when it does. All the best to you all for 2019.

I’ve had an idea rattling around in my head for a while now, and I think it’s viable to turn it into two sequels. People have been asking me what actually happened to Will at the end of the story, and until now I’ve been happy to leave it hovering out there in the ether, but I think the time is right to start answering that question. Maybe there’ll be more questions layed out before that answer is fully revealed, but if what I have in my head at the moment translates to the page well enough, I think it should be a worthwhile adventure to embark on.

I’ve got an idea for the second book’s cover which involves using the design from the first one, but zooming out a bit to reveal some kind of figure. Also, the colour scheme will be flipped, so the background will be black and the outline white. The working title for the first sequel is ‘Shut Down’, but that may change. I’ll keep you updated, and hopefully I’ll have something for you by this time next year or sooner.

Sales are going well for my latest ebook. Well, I say sales, but I’m giving it away for free for the next few days, and a few people have been tempted by it. One person has even snatched up a copy of ‘Bright Future’ which is encouraging.