Patrick C. Walsh's Blog

‘Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhereThe ceremony of innocence is drowned;The best lack all conviction, while the worstAre full of passionate intensity.’ William Butler Yeats , The Second Coming I first heard this poem many years ago but it was just a poem then. […]

The word ‘immigrant’ has become so politically charged that the leader of the USA is willing to destroy the agricultural, tourist and other sectors of the economy in pursuing a policy of terrorising and deporting anyone with a sun tan. We have our own tinpot mini-me Trump on this side of then pond too, the […]

We now live in a world where lies are considered to be the equal of truth, cruelty is the norm and old friends are being stabbed in the back. Diplomacy now consists of shouting louder than the other guy and breaking all your promises. Malignant narcissism is in fashion. My late wife was a historian […]

‘You can’t always get what you want but if you try some time, you just might find that you get what you need.‘ This is the chorus from a Rolling Stones song from the 1969 album ‘Let It Bleed’. It was one of many Stones’ songs that we covered in one of my first bands. […]

So, you’ve written your book, had it read and done the rewrites. At long last it’s time to push the ‘Publish’ button on the Amazon KDP site. So, what happens now? A huge booming silence usually. You next have to kick start your book sales by doing some marketing. I won’t go too deeply into […]

…since I last posted. I lost my wife just over six months ago and I have felt as if I’ve been at the bottom of a deep dark hole ever since. I have hardly put together a sentence although I now have all the time in the world to write. However, I am trying and […]

You can now find my latest crime novel, Murder At Shark Island, on Amazon books. This has been something of a new departure for me as so far all of my crime novels have featured retired murder specialist Mac Maguire. It would be fair to say that Biddie is a little different. She’s a Garda […]

I haven’t posted anything for a few months. I just couldn’t find the words to say. After a long illness, my wife and partner for well over thirty years, died a few months ago. Even though we knew what was coming, it was still a shock and one that I don’t think I’ll ever get […]

This is some advice that I wished had been given to me when I was publishing my first book The Body in the Boot. The big problem was that, now that I had a completed book burning a hole in my hand, I desperately wanted to get it out there as quickly as possible. And […]

As a writer, I try to make plans but I’ve learned that, sometimes, such plans can very quickly go out of the window. I was halfway through Mac Maguire’s fourteenth adventure, A Murdered Crow, when a new idea hit me pretty much out of the blue. It was all Mac’s fault really as I had […]