Stuart Aken's Blog

Sure, we all know sometimes tech needs to be updated to flow in synchronicity with other tech, and that’s an accepted necessary evil. But why, oh why, these constant changes in style, appearance, and especially, connections to bloody AI? We are the customers, the consumers of your products. We BUY them. Don’t we deserve a …

Continue reading Technology: Why, Oh Why Those Constant Updates?

Subtitled ‘A new author’s guide to publishing and marketing for success’ this book was recommended to me by another writer, who thought it might be of use to me. It is! First, I’m a published writer, both self-published and published with a small indie publisher, so, on the face of it, this book could seem …

Continue reading How To Self-Publish Your Book For Free And Not Get Conned, by TW Robinson: #BookReview.

Complex, moving, full of insight, and harrowing in places, this novel haunts the reader with its rich, expressive prose and its comprehensive depiction of its characters. Set mostly in Ireland and Africa, it uses the emergence of Eire as a republic and the difficulties that separation from mainland Britain imposes on that society during the …

Continue reading The Temporary Gentleman, by Sebastian Barry: #BookReview.

It’s that time of the year again. Time to bring a spot of horror to the coming night of terrors, eh? ‘Julie, dressed just for summer fun, is coerced by controlling fiancé Kasim to visit her ancient Aunt Agatha at her isolated old manor house. Local rumours inform him the Folly in the grounds holds …

Continue reading Halloween: Time For A Tale Of Terror!

This slim volume of the, at the time, relatively revolutionary poetry of the Liverpudlian poet, Roger McGough, I discovered on the bookshelves at my brother’s home when visiting recently. This edition was published by Jonothan Cape in 1972, though the title poem was first published in 1969. I picked it up to read while waiting …

Continue reading Watchwords, by Roger McGough: #BookReview.

Subtitled ‘The Dry Crumbs Of An Adventure’, this is a humorous tale of unlikely events taking the reader from darkest London to even darker Egypt via routes made more convoluted than expected by the hapless participants. Two ‘gentlemen’, I use the term loosely for these men, earn their comfortable if confined living by producing an …

Continue reading The Curious Cliché of The Black Scarab, by Mark Millicent: #BookReview.

Subtitled ‘Forget General Knowledge, here’s the right stuff!’ In common with the other books in this series, this isn’t a volume to sit down and consume in one go. It’s a pleasurable source of entertainment combined with education that deserves to be savoured so each tasty morsel provides the full flavour and nutrients to the …

Continue reading The Third QI Book of General Ignorance, by John Lloyd, John Mitchinson, James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray: #BookReview.

This is my seventh post on the progress of my WIP. I suspect it won’t be the last. But I feel I’ve made real progress. The last post was on 19th July, when I was about to start work on Chapter 24 of 40, and the MS stood at 121,716 words over 280 pages. Today, …

Continue reading How Goes the WIP?

Reviews for books are often overlooked by readers searching for something to read. So, I thought I’d share some short quotes from reviews of my books over the years. This one is a short book, available in digital form only. It’ll appeal to those readers who enjoy some spine-tingling, a bite of horror, a delve …

Continue reading Sharing the Love

So, how’s the WIP progressing? I think the best description is ‘not as quickly as I would wish’. But I do have an excuse. A few weeks ago, I was diagnosed with a small hernia. Having been advised the waiting list for the necessary op was currently at around 21 months, I put it to …

Continue reading More Progress on the #WIP.