Latest news 2024-10-15: New blog post: Tales for Our Times Book Launch.

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Walking 🔗

Image of rough sea

[Originally posted on Facebook 2015-05-12] When I was a child, my family used to go out for walks at the weekend, usually after Sunday lunch. Seaford Head, Hope Gap, the Cuckmere, Friston Forest and on the other side towards Newhaven, the Tide Mills. I resisted such activity as it interrupted my reading, writing or guiding my plastic figures and animals on their adventures. (It may seem odd for sheep, pigs and cows to go on adventures — especially normal farm animals rather than the anthropomorphic cartoon variety — but these were fleeing from some evil villain or oppressor and had to brave the mountainous terrain up the radiator, down the wardrobe and across the chest of drawers.) However, despite my opposition to these outings, I benefited not only from the physical exercise but also the clearing out of mental cobwebs and the stimulus of my surroundings. My thoughts went to the wreckers who had lured unfortunate sailors onto the rocks, the smugglers who lurked in the Cuckmere estuary and, as a child, the abandoned Tide Mills sent shivers down my spine. The Seaford to Brighton trains may well pass through there during the day, but surely there were midnight ghost trains that stopped at the disused station! I miss the eerie call of the foghorn, I miss the sea and I miss inspecting the world of the rock pools. Although my knees don’t miss the downland ascents!

I always have excuses for not getting up and going outside, but it’s bad for me to sit in front of my desk all day long, so I’m trying make the effort to go out for walks. It drops the mundane clutter from my mind and helps to re-order and re-focus ideas. Norfolk has its own share of wonders, both natural and man-made. Ruins and oddities that whisper of a long forgotten age with forgotten people who were once born, lived and died, in essence no different from ourselves. We are brief dwellers in this place, but we cause ripples in the stream of time and leave our footprints on its banks.

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image of dickimaw parrot with cookies in cloudsOnce upon a time, a little parrot decided to migrate across the vast ocean to the cloud lands, with nothing more than a handful of cookies. The Dickimaw Books site has migrated to a new web hosting provider and this is the story of its journey.
Nicola Talbot 2019-09-15 📂 Site 🔖 Migration

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image of dickimaw parrot with cookies in cloudsOnce upon a time, a little parrot decided to migrate across the vast ocean to the cloud lands, with nothing more than a handful of cookies. The Dickimaw Books site has migrated to a new web hosting provider and this is the story of its journey.
Nicola Talbot 2019-09-15 📂 Site 🔖 Migration

Recent Posts

Tales for Our Times Book Launch
Tales for Our TimesThe book launch for the anthology Tales for Our Times, written by Norfolk writing group Ex-Cathedra and published by Smokehouse Press, took place in the Norfolk and Norwich Millennium Library at noon on World Homeless Day (10th October 2024). All profits from the sale of this book will be used to help raise funds to support Norwich-based St Martins Housing Trust in their work to help the homeless into independent living. The book launch included a talk from Dr Jan Sheldon, SEO of St Martins, two readings by authors of the book, and a presentation to the library.
Tales for Our Times: Raising Funds and Awareness for St Martins Housing Trust
Tales for Our TimesTales for Our Times is an anthology of forty stories featuring loss and hope, dreams of love and belonging, biography and science fiction and adventure. Written by Norfolk-based writing group Ex-Cathedra and published by Smokehouse Press, the book will be launched on World Homeless Day 10th October 2024 midday at the Norwich and Norfolk Millennium Library. All profits from the sale of this book will be used to help raise funds to support Norwich-based St Martins Housing Trust in their work to help the homeless into independent living.
The Briefcase: a crime fiction short story
The Briefcase book coverConvinced that his secretive wife, Annie, is cheating on him, Aide meets an attractive young goth at the pub who helps him pick the lock of Annie’s briefcase to search for incriminating evidence.
Smile for the Camera: a cybercrime story
Smile for the Camera book cover.Evelyn, a CCTV operator, sees too much information while she monitors a store’s self-service checkout tills in this cybercrime short story about identity theft.
Nicola Talbot 2024-04-12 (updated 2024-10-31) 📂 Crime Fiction 🔖 News Smile for the Camera
Read an Ebook Week Sale 2024
Ebook coversThe DRM-free ebook retailer SmashWords “Read an Ebook Week” Sale is on from 3rd–9th March 2024. My crime novel “The Private Enemy” and children’s illustrated story “The Foolish Hedgehog” both have a 50% discount and my crime fiction short story “I’ve Heard the Mermaid Sing” and cybercrime fiction short story “Unsocial Media” both have a 100% discount (i.e. free!) for the duration of the sale. Did you know that you can gift ebooks on SmashWords?
End of Year Ebook Sale
Book coversThe DRM-free ebook retailer SmashWords has their end of year sale from 15th December 2023 to 1st January 2024. My crime novel “The Private Enemy” and children’s illustrated story “The Foolish Hedgehog” both have a 50% discount and my crime fiction short story “I’ve Heard the Mermaid Sing” and cybercrime fiction short story “Unsocial Media” both have a 100% discount (i.e. free!) for the duration of the sale. Did you know that you can gift ebooks on SmashWords?
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Illustrated fiction for young children: The Foolish Hedgehog and Quack, Quack, Quack. Give My Hat Back!
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The speculative fiction category includes the novel The Private Enemy (set in the future), the alternative history novel The Fourth Protectorate, and the fantasy novel Muirgealia.

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Sub-genre of speculative fiction, alternative history is “what if?” fiction.
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A part of the creative writing process, conservation of detail essentially means that only significant information should be added to a work of fiction.
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I’ve Heard the Mermaid Sing
A crime fiction short story (available as an ebook) set in the late 1920s on the RMS Aquitania. See the story’s main page for further details.
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Smile for the Camera
A cybercrime short story about CCTV operator monitoring a store’s self-service tills who sees too much information.
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The Briefcase
A crime fiction short story (available as an ebook). See the story’s main page for further details.
The Foolish Hedgehog
Information about the illustrated children’s book. See the book’s main page for further details.
The Fourth Protectorate
Alternative history novel set in 1980s/90s London. See the book’s main page for further details.
The Private Enemy
A crime/speculative fiction novel set in a future Norfolk run by gangsters. See the book’s main page for further details.
Unsocial Media
A cybercrime fiction short story (available as an ebook). See the story’s main page for further details.
World Book Day
World Book Day (UK and Ireland) is an annual charity event held in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland on the first Thursday in March. It’s a local version of the global UNESCO World Book Day.
World Homeless Day
World Homeless Day is marked every year on 10 October to draw attention to the needs of people experiencing homelessness.