Mark Stay's Blog

Pernille Hughes is the author of TEN YEARS, PROBABLY THE BEST KISS IN THE WORLD and PUNCH-DRUNK LOVE; novels brimming with warmth, wit and unforgettable characters. And now she’s back with her new novel A COPENHAGEN SNOWMANCE, which is here to herald in Christmas. Yes, I said the C-word! What of it??

WE DISCUSS:

Discovering your voice

Hygge

Hero drafts

Finding your tribe

Writing on HRT and why you should lock yourself in a room with a glass of wine when writing… and much more!

Or watch it on Youtube…

LINKS

Pernille’s website: http://www.pernillehughes.com 

Writing Regency England by Jayne Davis: https://www.jaynedavisromance.co.uk/writing-regency-england/

What’s Giving us Joy…

Celebrity Traitors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Celebrity_Traitors 

Slow Horses: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_Horses

The Great Pottery Throw Down: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Pottery_Throw_Down

Ludovico Einaudi: https://ludovicoeinaudi.com/ 

Vitamin String Quartet: https://www.vitaminstringquartet.com/

Mr MC Grammar: https://www.mrmcgrammar.com/ 

Christmas on Fifth Avenue by Julie Caplin: (I earn commission if you click on this link) https://amzn.to/4paxDP1

Christmas at the Scottish Lodge by Donna Ashcroft: (I earn commission if you click on this link) https://amzn.to/48zsM3V

Cressida McLaughlin, The Secret Mistletoe Promise: (I earn commission if you click on this link) https://amzn.to/49Af4yT

Human Croquet by Kate Atkinson: (I earn commission if you click on this link) https://amzn.to/4og65Gy

Alan Partridge: How Are You?: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/m002hcb7/how-are-you-its-alan-partridge 

Katherine Priddy: Matches: https://www.katherinepriddy.co.uk/home/ 

A huge thanks to Emily for production assistance, to Kai Newton for the edit, and Dominic Currie for the jingle. 

Support the show

Visit https://markstaycreativedifferences.com/
Join The Green Room: https://ko-fi.com/markstaywriter/tiers
Buy my books here: https://witchesofwoodville.com/#bookshop
And there’s more about me at: https://markstaywrites.com/

I just got back from setting up at this weekend’s London Film and Comic Con and reckon it’s time for another round of…

For more details of where I’m going to be in the near future, click here.

Jeevani Charika (‘Jeev’) writes award nominated romantic women’s fiction and romcoms. She also writes under the name Rhoda Baxter.
She is a ‘resting’ microbiologist – she used to study Rhodabacter species, which is why her other pen name is Rhoda Baxter. She lives in Yorkshire in the UK, where she enjoys eating cake, playing with Lego and, when she’s run out of excuses, writing.
She has a YouTube channel teaching authors how to use Canva to make marketing graphics and her latest book How Can I Resist You is out now!

Or on Youtube…

Local novelist and screenwriter Mark Stay joins me for this latest edition of Cabin at the Movies to choose his favourite horror movies. They include…

Cabin at the Movies Saturday 1 November 2025

A few weeks ago, I wrote about a rising and extremely prolific marketing scam that I’ve been able to trace back to operators in Nigeria. 1,560 more …

Return of the Nigerian Prince Redux: Beware Book Club and Book Review Scams

The copy edits are in! And yes, I know I’ve probably made that Richard Curtis joke already, but what do you want? It’s early. Here’s me with a gravelly voice with the update…

Lucy Strange is an award-winning children’s author whose books feel like classic children’s literature, but are written in a style that is engaging and accessible for today’s younger readers.

Most recently she’s collaborated with artist Pam Smy on their spooky, funny new series Lockett & Wilde’s Dreadfully Haunting Mysteries! Often inspired by folklore and fairy tales, Lucy combines historical settings with touches of magic and fantasy to create utterly convincing worlds in which anything might happen.

And before becoming a professional writer, Lucy worked as an English teacher for fifteen years. Having also trained and worked as an actor, Lucy narrates her own audiobooks, winning the 2019 Audie Award for The Secret of Nightingale Wood.

Collaborating with illustrators

What Lucy learned from abridging Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein

Writer’s Block and how to deal with it

And how scary is too scary when writing for children?

And much more!

Or watch it on Youtube…

Lucy’s Website: https://www.lucystrange.org

The Episode with GB Ralph: https://markstaycreativedifferences.com/2024/12/12/episode-5-with-gb-ralph-share-the-excitment/

Essex Serpent, Sarah Perry: https://serpentstail.com/work/the-essex-serpent/

Instead of a Letter, Diana Athill: https://granta.com/products/instead-of-a-letter/

Once Upon a River, Diane Setterfield: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/437745/once-upon-a-river-by-diane-setterfield/9781784163631

Death at the Sign of the Rook, Kate Atkinson: https://www.kateatkinson.co.uk/books/death-at-the-sign-of-the-rook/

Buckingham Nicks: https://www.roughtrade.com/product/lindsey-buckingham-and-stevie-nicks/buckingham-nicks

Superstore: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstore_(TV_series)

Robert Redford: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Redford

A huge thanks to Emily for production assistance, to Kai Newton for the edit, and Dominic Currie for the jingle.

My Mum passed away a few weeks ago. Cancer. It came on fast and shocked us all. In the brief time between Mum’s diagnosis and her death, the team from the Prince Alice Hospice provided her with the best care we could hope for, and they took a weight from my dad’s shoulders. Whenever I encounter people like this, I am reminded that there have always been good people in the world, who are selfless and do the things that many of us cannot bear. It’s Mum’s funeral soon, and instead of flowers we’re asking folks to pop a few quid in the direction of the Princess Alice Hospice. I appreciate that few of you will have ever met my mum, and I wouldn’t expect you to donate anything. But if any of you can spare anything to help the Princess Alice Hospice to continue providing care with dignity, then I should be eternally grateful. Simply click on the button below…

Back to waffling about books and stuff in the next post. Thanks for your time.

Ooh, shiny!

I’ve updated my events page with the remaining comic cons that I’ll be selling and signing m’books at in 2025. They include Croydon, Southampton, Watford, Newmarket, Hatfield, Reading, Tonbridge and the two biggies in London: the MCM and LFCC.

A couple of things to bear in mind: some of these locations are a bit like Ryanair destinations, eg: the Croydon one is actually in Carlshalton, and the Southampton one is in Eastleigh. And I’m posting this on the day that half the internet has collapsed thanks to Amazon’s monopoly of the world’s servers, so some of the Evenbrite links might need a few tries to make them work. Or, y’know, read a book instead and come back tomorrow, maybe?

Anyhoo, if you fancy a fun day out and the delightful prospect of meeting me in person (I promise to shower and shave and brush my hair) then click on the button below to find out more…