The curious occurence of coincidence

My life seems to be surrounded by coincidences - I think I've made mention of this before. Here's the latest one.
One of the people I follow on the ubiquitous Twitter is one Commander Hadfield, astronaut, space-walker, and general scourge of the spaceways. He's back on Terra-firma after a stint in the International Space Station. He's enjoying life traveling around and telling people about his adventures.
Ok. So where's the coincidence? He's just posted a picture of himself standing on the glass floor of the CN Tower in Toronto. I'm writing the latest adventures of the two Saskias at the moment. Where have they just been? Toronto. What have they been looking at? The CN Tower.
Normally I wouldn't have paid much attention to Commander Hadfield's tweet, after all, you can stand on the glass floor of the Great North Tower in Manchester, just a handful of miles from where I live, or even the Tower in Blackpool. But having just spent a little time thinking about the CN Tower, the posted picture hit me like a brick!
Oh, by the way, don't worry, I have a license to use long words like 'ubiquitous'. Hmm, need to go and check it's up to date.......
Ian B

A little history

The girls have persuaded me that I should reiterate why I seem to be able to write books almost as fast as Barbara Cartland. First, I have to make clear that 'the girls' are the characters in my books. I've taken to letting them speak for themselves on their Facebook pages. You will either think this is cute and quite good fun - or that I'm potty. Either way, I've been able to fight off feelings of schizophrenia - for the moment at least.
So, lots of book, so little time. I began writing quite a few years ago, basically just to see if I could. About four or so years ago I decided that maybe I could get stuff published, make a fortune, and retire to the Bahamas. Then began the submission process with lots of rejections, until about three years ago around this time, just before Christmas, I got accepted by a publisher called Little Acorn Press. Flushed with sucess, I continued writing. 'Lisa' expanded to a trilogy, and 'Saskia' spilled over into 'Saskias' and then 'Valley of Light'. As these new books were finished I sent them to LAP one by one and got back very encouraging messages - but the original books didn't appear in print. Eventually it began to be obvious that all wasn't as it seemed. It also became apparent that there were others in the same boat I was in, books submitted but nothing published. We all gave the benfit of the doubt and continued to wait, apart from a couple of writers who got cross and wanted to cancel contracts. At that point it all got a little ugly, involving Trading Standards and even the police at one point. Thankfully, I managed to get contracts cancelled and all the rights to the books reasigned to me. Despite having burned fingers, I tried again. This time the books are out there for everyone to read. Because I'd continued to write while waiting for the original publisher, I had a backlog of books more or less ready for the off. I've 'released' them quite slowly really, but still rather quicker than would have been the case if I'd been writing from scratch, so to speak. The upshot of all this is that it will now take longer for each new book to appear as after 'America' (almost done) I have to write the things first.
And the fortune and the retirement plan to the Bahamas? Still waiting and hoping.
Ian B.

Waiting (again)

So what am I waiting for? Aside from Christmas (more on that in a minute), I'm waiting for my next two books to appear. The way these are published means I have no idea when they'll appear in the various virtual bookshops scattered all over the web (and so the whole world - wow). However, I do know that the contracts have been signed, the actual copies should be back with me anytime now, Christmas post permitting. I actually have no idea if they'll appear both together or one at a time. Both together would be nice as the first bit of each book is the same 'adventure' - but told from a different point of view. In 'The Twins' it's told by Saskia Chandler, as is usual for the 'Saskia' books, but in 'Rio' it's told by Rio herself. I had a go at doing this a little while ago. On the Saskia website is a story called 'Saskia Hunt'. This is the initial part of the whole Saskia story - but told by Saskia Hunt rather than Saskia Chandler. If you want to see how it goes, look at www.saskia.me.uk and navigate to 'Stories' and 'Saskia Hunt'.
Now then, Christmas. People who know me will already be aware that we don't really celebrate Christmas. That's not because we're foreigners, muslim or whatever, but simply because we think the whole Christmas 'thing' is completely over the top. Aside from which, most of my family will be working on the 25th anyway, so for us Christmas is a bit of a non-event. But don't let that stop you enjoying yourselves, and it won't stop me wishing you a Merry Christmas, whoever and wherever you are.
Ian B

Updates (and about time too)

No, not about Time, not this time anyway, just an update about books and stuff. I've had several books pre-written, so to speak, from the years (years!) spent waiting for the original 'publisher' to get her act together. I've released these into the wild one at a time oven the past year and a half or more, and the time has now come to send the last two of these earlier books to the publisher. I've done these both together because they sort of run side by side. To find out why you'll have to read the books when they appear, 'The Twins' and 'Rio' are both part of the 'Saskia' series.
Now, because the last of the earlier novels are now gone, I'm going to have to actually do some creative writing. Not too much of a problem, 'Saskia' book eight, 'America', is almost done anyway. And then, of course, there's the idea for a fourth book in the 'Lisa, Jody, and Holly' series. That was supposed to be a trilogy. Now I'm going to have to look up the word for a four-book series, thank goodness for Google.
So that's the dark Winter nights spoken for. Still, keeps me off the streets.
Ian B