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2 November 2015

....yes it's NaNoWriMo time again.

I haven't done much in writing, updating my blogs or anything along those lines for the last couple of months.

Mainly this has been due to real world events completely taking over my life - we've decided to move house. 

House move aside I've been looking for a reason to get back into the groove of writing and what better reason can their be than the annual National Novel Writing Month challenge.


That's right 50,000 words in 30 days.  Or roughly 1,666 words per day for the whole month of November.

So how am I doing? Well I'm not where I wanted to be on day 2 but I'm not doing badly either.

I got off to a great start and managed just under 500 words just after midnight on 1 November. However, I only managed about another 400 throughout the whole of Sunday. There's always a lot going on at home and between the kids homework, re-plumbing the waste from the bath and going our for lunch there wasn't really much time for writing. 

Day 1: 868 words.

That's 798 words short of the daily total. Not a great start when it pays to try and get ahead early on. Going behind so early means you are in a position of playing catch up from the outset. You're putting pressure on yourself from the word go.

This isn't my first NaNoWriMo, it's actually my fourth, and so I'm experienced enough now to know not to panic.  There's plenty of time and I'm a dab hand at pacing myself across the month and hitting my target with a day or two to spare.

This morning was a new day and I'm back at work. Armed with my laptop and and just under an hour on the train it was time to get back into the groove.

At Cannon Street station I checked my word count before saving the doc and closing the laptop; 1966 words. That's 1096 words written on the train. A big boost to my word count indeed. But I'm aware that's really only 300 words out of today's word count.  Another big total on the way home and I can expect to be closer to 3000 words. If I get a chance I may write a little at lunch and when I get home tonight. 

3333 words is today's total target. I think I'll get there but time will tell. Even if I don't 2000 words a day will put me back on track before the end of the week and see me finish well before the end of the month.

Wish me luck.

Phil








6 August 2015

...and what more I've learnt.

The first thing I've found out since my last post is what page count Amazon are using for purposes of calculating my pages read.

To find this value out you log into Kind Direct Publishing and select the Bookshelf.


Click on the Ellipses (...) button and select Promote and Advertise.



You'll find the page count at the bottom left hand corner of the screen.

For George and the Dragon this reads: 

Kindle Edition Normalized Page Count (KENPC) v1.0: 563

So now I know that my page count is 563 and that helps a lot.

According to Morris Rosenthal's back of the envelope calculation:

"An estimate for the Kindle Select royalty system that starts today is $0.0058, or 0.58 cents per page read. This is based on Amazon’s announcement that the global pool for July will be at least $11 million, and that last month, the number of pages read was almost 1.9 billion."

I believe the pot has been increased since this calculation but it does give us a good value to work with and that's 1/2 cent/page,


So here's my latest rather erratic chart showing the number of pages read/day for George and the Dragon.

Armed with the above I can start to make some sense of it.

Firstly what are they paying me per book?

563 x 0.5c = $2.815

So each book completely read pays me $2.81 that's a reasonable amount higher than the $2.04 I would get paid from a Kindle eBook sale on a $2.99 eBook.

Next what do my stats tell me?

Total pages read so far:          1255
Number of books equivilent:  2.23
Expected royalty payment:     $6.28

What it still doesn't tell me is the number of people who have loaned a copy of the book or the percentage of the book that is being read per person. I'm sure there are other stats that I would like to have at my disposal that I haven't thought of yet.

I also now understand why Amazon HAD to make this change. Too many people were releasing too many short stories, serialising novels etc. If I serialised George and the Dragon into say 5 parts and these all got rented via KDP Selected I'd get 5 payments whether the book was read or not. This would have been of financial benefit to the author but must have been breaking Amazon's bank.

So there you have it; everything I have discovered about the new payment system in a nutshell.

I still think I'm going to switch back to not being Amazon exclusive.

Phil



4 August 2015

...and what I did this last weekend.

The weekend just gone I took the family off up to Norwich.  It's not a bad drive but it's still a good 3 hour drive, luckily I'm blessed with kids who sleep in the car.

The reason for this trip was two-fold:

1. I was doing my first ever reading of George and the Dragon

2. Norwich has been the host of GoGoDragons. Which is a two month long interactive arts sculpture trail bringing 84 large dragon sculptures and 120 school dragons to the City of Norwich.

I have to confess I was little disappointed with the turn out for the reading.  However I did love the park in which it took place. It's got a fantastic little amphitheater built in to it. Also the owners of the opticians who had arranged the reading had also arranged for an amazing piece of artwork to be included on the wall over-looking the park.




I have to say I was nervous so it's maybe a blessing the audience was small. I'll know what to expect next time.

Before then and for a large part of the weekend we spent time look at all of the dragons on display in the city centre. We didn't get to see all of them but those we did see were fantastic.

Here are some of my personal favorites:


 Draco


Patch                                                          Morgan



Sherlock                                                            Biggles


Hoard


Rosie



Argon


The Mother of Dragons


Twilight

So there you go, even my weekends are taken up with dragons!

Phil

17 July 2015

...and what I dislike about it already.


For those out of the loop if people now if people borrow George and the Dragon via Kindle Unlimited the way I get recompensed for this is via the number of pages red.

Here's a look at the chart I'm presented with that shows my Kindle Edition Normalized Pages (KENP) Read.



There are two huge spike, one over 500 and the most recent is 149. In between this there is a tiny blip of 5 pages on 13 July.

Now I'll be the first to admit sales of George and the Dragon aren't huge but this data is so incomplete I find it hard to be able to extrapolate anything from it.

It doesn't tell me how many pages it considers George to be. On the Amazon website it shows:

Length: 248 pages



So let's go with that.

How many people have borrowed George and the Dragon? I have no idea the data isn't available to me.

How many people have read the book in its entirety? Again I have no idea.

Does this data represent pages read that day or pages read over any kind of time or, as I suspect, pages read since the reader's Kindle device last connected to the internet.

Does this represent 60 people having read 10 pages each who then read no more of the book or 3 people who have all finished it but the data hasn't quite caught up with one or more of them.

Another issue I have is that I still have no idea how to consolidate this data along with my standard sales figures so I can get some idea of how well the book is doing when I look back over time.

All-in-all I can't use this data and have no idea how many people this is reaching.

George and the Dragon will be Free for all on Kindle on 1-3 August.

Once this promotion has completed and my 3 months initial subscription to Kindle Unlimited expires I don't think I will be continuing with it.

It was something I had to try for myself and it was unfortunate that Amazon changed things while I was doing it but I have learnt from it and that was important.

Phil
6 July 2015

...or use an alternative?" he queried.



This weekend just gone I was scrolling through Facebook and came across a group where someone had posted something like this:

The reaction it sparked I thought was both eye opening and hugely divisive. On one hand you had people arguing that these alternatives were perfectly acceptable. On the other were the group that would state any editor worth their salt would suggest replacing them with said, or asked in the case of a question.

There was even one comment where the poster said they would not read a book where the author used anything other than said or asked.

This evening I've just finished reading The Long War by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter - the first book I've finished in ages.  These are a pair of best selling authors working on a collaborative project. I'd like to think they and their editor/s know what they are about.

I have to admit they don't use said, asked or any of the alternatives that often. They are happy to leave speech to stand on it's own as part of the dialogue.

However there are plenty of times when they do.

There are examples of asked and said like:

Roberta asked, "Birds, or Dinosaurs?"

"There are other sorts here too," Yue-Sai said softly.

They also often write sentences like:

Joshua grunted. "Makes you proud."

But they also write sentences such as this:

"Are you sure?" Captain Chen murmured.

or elsewhere:

"Here, Captain," the engineer replied promptly.

So they are happy mixing up the way they handle their dialogues depending on the narrative. I'd like to think I treat my works similarly. Although I have to say I'm more aware of not over using alternatives to said and asked just for the sake of it especially as a lot of my dialog is telepathic and not spoken.

I would be more than interested to here people's thoughts on this.

Phil

23 June 2015


...does anyone really know?


George Atkins is the eponymous hero of my novel George and the Dragon. Throughout the early stages of the narrative we get little clues as to what he looks like

Obviously I, as the author and creator of George, have my own idea of what he should look like. 

And I am sure people who have read the book each have their own idea of what he might look like. Many times I have found my idea of a given character challenged when I watch a film of a book or see a drawing of a character in that book.

Here I present to you the first ever drawing, that I am aware of, of George himself.
I actually think the artist has done a great job from my brief, although I think his head could be a stronger shade of ginger. That apart I'm so chuffed expect to see images of many of the other characters from George and the Dragon appear on my blog in the future.

What do you think? Have you attempted to draw him yourself? Fancy a go yourself let me know I may even let you have a copy of the novel for free! 

Phil


16 June 2015


...or how big is your dragon?


I recently posted this picture of a series of dragons onto the Facebook group Dragons are not just for Christmas.


If you're curious the link comes from here: 


This got me thinking. I've always maintained that Spitfire is a little bit bigger than Draco (No 9. above). With the regal dragons being a bit smaller.  I've also often though that Spitfire should have a wingspan of about twice that of a Spitfire.

The author of the blog post linked above puts Draco at about 5m tall when stood on all fours. But that didn't help me to size him that easily.  I needed more data and that came from here: 


I'm respecting the wish for the images not to be copied so pop on over have a look and come back.

What it tells me is that Draco has a wingspan of 73 ft and that converts to 22.25 m.

Here are the three main fighters from the Battle of Britain (as close to scale as I can get them) for comparison:
Spitfire - wingspan 11m

 Hurricane - wingspan 12m
Messerschmidt BF-109 - wingspan 9.9m

I was quite astonished by this revelation. Draco from Dragonheart has almost exactly twice the wingspan of a Spitfire fighter plane.

Spitfire the dragon is a little bigger than that and, drawn to scale, would look something like this:

If you compare him to the two allied fighters (Spitfire on the left, Hurricane on the right) they look something like this:


At least this is how I imagine him to be in my head.  It also gives me a good start when I try to figure out how big some of the characters in the second book in the Knights of the Sky series are.

Hope you found that enlightening.

Phil

1 June 2015

...or getting the words onto the page.


Stephen King makes a valid point in this quote.  I prefer to try and think of it as write a 1000 words a day and in 3 months you'll have written a novel.

At moment the still unnamed sequel to George and the Dragon has a word count of 71,879. George and the Dragon is around 105,000 words. I found these great info-graphics and just had to share them with you.






Back on subject my plan is to finish the first draft of the sequel before the end of the month. I expect it to be about the same length as my first novel so I've got about 35,000 words to write or about a 1000 a day.

I've come to the conclusion it's almost impossible for me to write at the weekends. I simply don't get a break from the family. It makes it impossible to get into the story and start to type it in to Scrivener.
So my usual time to write is on the train to and from work, that's about 40 minutes each way or 1hr 20 in total. I can hit 800 words on a good day in 40 minutes. However, as I've discussed before in this blog I find it really hard to write when I'm tired.

This evening I managed 148 words and then fell asleep on the train. Not a good way to start the month and to hit my target. So if you take out the weekends

I've got about twenty days and 1,500 words a day to complete. It's like a mini NaNoWriMo :)

Wish me luck.

 Phil
25 May 2015

..or 'How do you go about naming a book?'


If I'm honest I'll admit that George and the Dragon pretty much named itself.

It's obviously a play on the legend of St George and the Dragon and as the main character is called George precisely because of this legend the title was easy to come up with.

There were other considerations as well. I wanted the book to 'catch' passing traffic so the title ticked this particular box as well.

The title is also simple and should give the reader an idea that the book quite heavily features dragons. When you factor in the cover design it becomes clear that the book is also set during World War II.



There are other things that have come out of this that I have also found equally useful. I get to ride on the back of the hash tag fervor for St George's day for example.

So all in all I'm very happy with the title of my debut novel but it's lead to a bigger problem!

What do I call the sequel?


NOTE: THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS SPOILERS!




The working title for the sequel has always been:

George and the Griffins of Malta.  

The main reason for this is there were going to be three Griffins born on Malta and called Faith, Hope and Charity.


They were to be named after a mythical trio of Gloucester Gladiators who were responsible for the defense of the island during the Siege of Malta.

However, I just found that the story with the three Griffins in it didn't work and took the focus away from other developments in the story line.  So if I kept this title it would now be George and the Griffin of Malta.

However, the story of the Griffin is not George's so the title is a little misleading.

This novel is really the story of several different main characters on both sides of the war so any title named George and is only really selling part of the narrative to the reader.

I'm also not sure I want to go do the "Harry Potter and the...." type title. After all it's already been done.

Next up was an attempt to keep the same style/pattern so I came up with:

Excalibur and the Ark.

For me this is ticks a couple of important boxes.  It would attract searches for both 'The Ark' and 'Excalibur' and both feature in the novel. Although the Ark isn't the Ark you think it is!

It also set a precedence that all books in the series are going to be named in the same way; A and the B

I'm not sure but I think that's going to be a little restrictive in the future as I'm already tripping over it now.

So next up I changed it up slightly and made an attempt to factor in keys from the main stories of the book. So I came up with something like

The Griffin, the Ark and the Queen.

or alternatively.

The Griffin, the Island and the Throne.

More recently one of the three main narratives has changed a lot, partly due to the three Griffins but there are other reasons as well. What it means is that there is a different element of evil that features as part of each of these stories.

Given this I went all the way back to:

George and the Unveiling of Evil.

Not quite liking the use of 'George and...' I've also considered:

Evil Unleashed 

and

Evil Unveiled

Evil Unleashed rang a bell but it turns out it's a rather poorly rated move. A search for the term Evil Unveiled reveals it is used as part of an anti-pedophile online campaign.

So I'm still no further forward in my quest for a title of the book. Time will, I hope, provide me with the answer.

Phil


11 May 2015

...dragons


So I've been trying to figure out Goodreads and have discovered that you can add books to certain lists.

Once a book is added to a list it can then be voted for by other people which in turn raises it up the list increasing its profile in the process.

Add a book to enough lists and you should be able to see it included in multiple lists like this:

This is where you come in. What I hoping I can persuade a few of you to do is vote for George and the Dragon so that it moves up these lists and into a more favorable position.

If you click on the following link, or the image above, it will take you to the list of lists that George and the Dragon has been added to.

https://www.goodreads.com/list/book/22967575

Any likes on any of the lists will be gratefully appreciated.

Thanks

Phil
4 May 2015

...well not quite all.

Sorry, I couldn't resist given that the General Election is imminent and it's May the 4th.

Back on subject it gives me great pleasure to announce that the five lucky winners of a signed copy of George and the Dragon have been selected.

Goodreads officially provided me with the details a little earlier today and the lucky five are:

Shayla Kettlewood, US

Sabrina Wilson, GB

Whitney Jordaan, NL

Lisa Baker, GB 

and

John Hausrath, GB

Over 1100 people entered the competition, a figure I am, quite honestly, overwhelmed by.

Once I think of something choice to write in each book I shall be popping a copy into the post for each of the lucky winners!



For those that didn't win don't forget there are many different ways to purchase your own copy of the book.

I've now set it up so that people who buy the physical copy of the book from Amazon get get a totally free copy of George and the Dragon as a Kindle eBook.

You can buy it on the iStore if you have an iPad or iPhone.



If you've got an Android phone or tablet you can also fin it on the Play store:


You can also buy the book via Barnes & Noble in both paperback and eBook formats.

If you're in the UK then it's also available on KOBO.

If you do read it and enjoy it the please leave me a review.

Thanks

Phil






28 April 2015

...Eureka moments.

That's what it takes to write a book.

The first of those is often the most crucial, it's the point at which you get an idea that can be made into a fully fleshed out story.

Get one of those and you really do jump out of the bath and run down the street naked.


From that point of course it's all easy. Isn't it? Well no it's not. While it may seem like everyone these days is writing a book. Writing a book that has the length and depth to be worth reading is a lot harder than I suspect anyone just starting out truly realises.

But every step of the way. Every new character you create. Every interaction you give them. Every plot device you come up with. They are all eureka moments. Each spark of inspiration that drives your quest to complete that first draft or fill that plot hole is a Eureka moment.

Take the sequel to George and the Dragon that I'm currently working on. There are at least ten new characters all with their part to play in the narrative.  Naming them all was not easy and I sought help on that part but even with help when the right name came up I knew it and at that moment another little part of the novel fell into place.

The ending of the novel had me stumped for sometime and then a series of ideas I had tumbling around inside my skull unraveled themselves and led to the perfect ending for the book.

 One particular moment resolves the issue of what to do with Major Evans, Captain Atkins and Dawn Raider. When we left them the the Dawn Raider was just of the French Mediterranean coastline. To return home they have to sail around Spain and Portugal then along the French Atlantic coastline before finally reaching the British Isles.  That's a long and boring trip so something else had to happen with them.

Another part of the plot provided the answer and again when that little spark flickered of inspiration I just knew it worked, it all fit nicely into place.....Eureka!

I'm still only about half way into writing the first draft of the sequel and some way behind the schedule I had set myself but it's forming into something I will be proud to publish when it's ready.

You will all just have to wait a little longer until I have had all the Eureka moments it needs.

Phil






23 April 2015
...but never made the final cut.

Today is the day we celebrate the cowardly knight St George killing a baby dragon, what a heroic deed that was. Spitfire certainly doesn't think so!



To celebrate this I thought I would share with you 10 things that could have happened in George and the Dragon but never made it past the editing stage.

1. George aged unnaturally so he could bond romantically with Emily.  He ended up tearing out of his clothes but it didn't really work and was vetoed by my sister who was heavily involved in the early editing of the novel.

2. There was a coven formed of mystics, shamans, warlocks etc from different nationalities there were responsible for summoning Spitfire.  Except for the spell the coven were largely in the way and their roles otherwise in the book were easily filled by the two scientists on their own.

3. Originally a French female spy went on the trip with George and Emily to London.  She was to have a German rival but anything she offered the narrative could easily be distributed to Squadron Leader Andy McKnight and Section Officer Caroline King.

4. The shopkeeper was Chinese. He was called Bai Hu and was the personification of the White Tiger of the West. He was a master with the spear amongst other abilities. In the end I felt it was better not to mix eastern and western mythologies. Although looking forward to the introduction of the Japanese into the war and I guess it becomes inevitable in some way.


5. Group Captain Ford was an expert fencer, having won awards during his time spent at Cambridge. I guess this never changed but the fight in which he demonstrates his prowess was removed as it served no purpose to the overall narrative.

6. The original message between George and his mother overwhelms her and she is taken to the medical room at Camelot.  The coven then seek to revive her.  It was a clumsy attempt to make the coven more useful and was removed when they were removed.

7. The original coven survives the attack on George's uncle's mansion via teleportation.  Teleportation was a magical device I used a few times but it felt like an easy way to solve various situations and the tunnel concept I used in this scene has a much more realistic feel to it,

8. There was a fight on the train home from London which resulted in half a carriage being destroyed. George unleashes his full powers and it's the first time you get a glimpse of what he can do but again it just felt unnecessary and was removed at the beta reading stage.

9. The Dawn Raider encountered a German torpedo boat and destroyed it before it could act.  It was nice bit of action but unnecessary in the overall narrative of the book.

10. The armoured coffins that the German pilots ride in where a very late addition to the novel. A beta reader pointed out the pilots survival rates would be minimal otherwise as they have no magical protection.  The Silver dragons already had their armoured shells so the change seemed logical. It's also an attempt to show a difference between how the allies and the axis treat their dragons.

So there you go 10 things that never made the final cut.

Don't forget if you are interested I'm currently running a give away in celebration of the fact George and the Dragon is 1.  There are 5 signed copies of George and the Dragon I'm giving away.


All you have to do is get yourself over to Goodreads and enter the competition. Easy!

If you know anyone else that might like to win one of the books let them know too!

Phil
20 April 2015



...George and the Dragon

That's right, George and the Dragon has officially been out a year. Although I announced it's release on St George's day, 23 April 2014, the official publication date on Amazon is 19 April 2014, today!

To celebrate this momentous occasion I have decided to be a little reckless and give away five signed copies of George and the Dragon to five lucky people.

All you have to do is enter the book giveaway on Goodreads. There are no catches, it doesn't matter where you live so long as I can post the book to you then you can enter.

So why not let your friends know. Get them to let their friends know. Spread the word and maybe just maybe they can find out what happens when the mythical clash with the legendary during World War 2.

Thank you in advance for entering and I wish each and everyone one of you good luck :)

Phil


Goodreads Book Giveaway

George and the Dragon by Philip Tolhurst

George and the Dragon

by Philip Tolhurst

Giveaway ends May 03, 2015.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.
Enter to Win
29 March 2015

..of a writer.



"How far must a man have travelled towards the light to unleash such bloody violence upon another?" the priest questioned as he dabbed his perspiring forehead with his kerchief.


I was answer a random, probably pointless survey earlier for another writer and one of the questions that popped up was this:

"What do you think about all day?"

Now I suspect this particular survey was geared toward a writer of erotica, sometimes it feels like that includes just about every indie-author on the planet, and so I believe my response to this question may have been of little use.

What was my response? Fantasy and Sci-Fi and I suspect my kind of fantasy with dragons, wizards and such like isn't the hand-cuffs, whips and nipple clamps kind the poser of the questionnaire might have been looking for.

However, it's true if I'm not thinking about ideas for my current works-in-progress, like the sequel to George and the Dragon, then I'm probably thinking up new ideas for new works,

The above is the encapsulation of an idea that's been floating around in my head for ages. It stems from this:

Lucifer

Means "bringing light", derived from Latin lux "light" and ferre "to bring". In Latin this name originally referred to the morning star, Venus, but later became associated with the chief angel who rebelled against God's rule in heaven (see Isaiah 14:12). Even later it became associated with Satan himself.




So if the bringer of light is associated with Satan himself then surely light is a representation of temptation. Much a moth is drawn to a flame mortal man can also be tempted by the light.

It is therefore better to live one's life darkness. 

Obviously this is just an author's mind at play but I love the fact with just a slight change, and it could be argued a plausible change, to current Christian thinking you could still have a religion in a fictional work based on the similar belief set but with just one slight difference.

It maybe something I work into a future volume in some way or another, and I have an idea about how to do it, but who knows that particular tome may never get written.

Like I said at the start my thoughts are quiet often random.

Phil
24 February 2015

...write?






People often ask me how I write and the best answer I can give is that I write in conversations.

But what does that really mean?

Well on Monday morning on the way in to work, as I often do, I wrote some more of the sequel to George and the Dragon. This is what I managed to write:

“Hauptmann Steinhuaser are you out of your mind?”

“Good afternoon General von Vogler I wasn't expecting you to be here.”

“Clearly not and I doubt you expected to have to explain your actions either but here I am and I am still waiting.”

“You were gone, the mission to render London into ashes had had limited success and our forces had been defeated by the British.  It seemed prudent that I should act to replenish our dragon numbers while we awaited your return.”

“Indeed, and the attack on our forces?”

“They attacked us and quite frankly if they weren't prepared to win that fight they never should have started it. And besides now I have a much better idea of Eissturm’s combat capabilities. This, as I am sure you will agree, will us a more effective combat unit for future engagements.”

“We shall see about that. I have a mission for you and given your recent actions I shall be making you the mission commander.”

“I get to engage the enemy dragons so soon?”

“No. There is another enemy asset I wish for you and your new companion to destroy.”

“But what is the point of having command of a regal dragon if not to attack the British and their dragon Spitfire?”

“Do not rush to seek out your enemy Hauptmann they will seek you out soon enough and then you will have your chance.”

This is a conversation between the main antagonist in George and the Dragon, General von Voglar and a new antagonist character Hauptmann Steinhauser. Hauptmann if you are curious is the Luftwaffe equivalent rank to Flight Officer, the same rank that Alexandr Sokol holds. It is the rank immediately junior to Squadron Leader.

You'll notice there's no descriptives in that at all.  Not a single said, bridled, glared, commanded, advised or any other word and nothing written about what the two characters are doing.

All that I will fill in at a later point when I work my way back over their words and work out more fully in my mind how the two antagonists react to each other.

This is how it turned out after the second pass:

“Hauptmann Steinhuaser are you out of your mind?” General von Vogler demanded as he appeared in the keep doorway.

“Good afternoon General von Vogler I wasn't expecting you to be here,” Liesl responded as she made her way across the court yard.  Even from a distance the General could hear that her voice was laden with sarcasm.

“Clearly not and I doubt you expected to have to explain your actions either. But here I am and I am still waiting for a explanation and I am unaccustomed to waiting for anything,” the General responded. He was more lenient with the young officer than he would have been with any man under his command.  It wasn't because of her sex, he had been hard enough on her while she proved herself to him.  No he had plans for her and while she proved herself to be useful it didn't hurt to extend her a little leeway now and then.

“You were gone,” she shrugged as she spoke, “the mission to render London into ashes had met with limited success and our forces had been routed by the British.  It seemed prudent that I should act to replenish our dragon numbers while we awaited your return.”

“Is that so? Well I find I cannot fault your logic and might even be tempted to command your use of your own initiative. So tell me what of the attack on our forces?”

“In truth the pilots attacked us and quite frankly if they weren't prepared to win that fight they should have kept their feet on the ground. Besides now I have a much better idea of Eissturm’s combat capabilities it will make us a more effective unit for future engagements.”

“I look forward to a time when the evidence corroborates that statement. Where is the Zauberbuch?” as he asked the General held out his hand waiting expectantly.

Liesl fished the leather bound book from within her flight jacket. It was smaller than she had expected it to be when she had learnt of its existence and the General easily held it in one hand.
“Thank you. I trust that it will never leave this castle without my permission again,” he said and without waiting for a response added, “I have a mission for you and given your recent actions I have decided that you will be the mission commander.”

“I get to engage the enemy dragons so soon?” Liesl asked finding it to suppress he excitement welling inside her.

“No. There is another enemy asset I wish for you and your new companion to destroy,” the General said as they entered his office and he scooped a file up from off of his desk.

“But what is the point of having command of a regal dragon if not to attack the British and their dragon Spitfire?” Liesl asked a whine almost perceptible in her voice.

“Do not rush to seek out your enemy Hauptmann they will seek you out soon enough and then you will have your chance,” the General said hoping that she may accept his wisdom but suspecting she would seek out the first chance to engage the boy, George and his Dragon, Spitfire. “Close the door on your way out,” he said dismissing her at the same time as he handed her the file containing her orders.

It's not perfect yet but that will come in time when the first draft is complete and I start revising the manuscript etc.

Hopefully that's also whet your appetite for the next instalment in the Knights of the Sky series.

Phil


21 February 2015

...I don't just write!



I know it may come as a surprise but there are other things I like to do as well.

I play Magic the Gathering, which is a collectible card game (if you're bored already skip this bit) and have recently started blogging about playing a particular variant of the game called Commander.

You can find my new blog here: http://commandingthoughts.blogspot.co.uk/

I've also, more recently, started to learn program in Python using Pygame.

I'm not the most accomplished programmer but I have been pleased with my efforts so far.

So far I've written an algorithm to randomly generate a complete island including adding caves and villages.


You can explore this island, discover the caves and enter them


The caves themselves are also randomly created when the island is generated.

As you explore the caves your vision is limited by your light source so, while you know where you've been, you can't see too far ahead and you never know what might be behind you.

So far all you can do is move around and uncover the locations on the island and explore the caves.

There's a huge list of jobs that still need to be completed to get it close to playable as a simple game.

Caves need to be populated with traps, treasure and monsters.

Once monsters have been added combat needs to be added.

An inventory for the hero needs to be added.

Villages need to be created and populated with people, shops etc.

A magic system needs to be created.

Experience and levelling needs to be worked on.

These are just a few of the things I can think of as I sit here and update my blog there's probably a lot more that I'll discover as time progresses.

Oh and what is more Chloe, my daughter, is desperate for me to add dragons to the game. And who am I to refuse!

So what do you get up to in your spare time.

Let me know.

Phil

16 February 2015
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening where ever you are.

Priya J Sridhar nominated me along with Corissa GlasheenMorgan Dragonwillow,Terrie Leigh Relf and Kathryn Phillips for a Liebster award, after she got nominated for one. To get the award, I am going to answer eleven questions that she has posed, provide eleven random facts about myself, and then nominate five friends to answer eleven random questions about themselves.

So without further a do here are my questions and answers.

1. Why do you write?

Because I have a fertile imagination full of stories and adventures that I think other people will enjoy. I can't make them into movies so I write about them instead.

2. What do you fear the most when reading a new book?

That I'll spend the whole book looking at the way it's been written rather than just enjoying the story.

3. Dragons, vampires, or mermaids? 

Well when you consider my debut novel is called George and the Dragon and I'm also the creator and admin for the Facebook group Dragons Are Not Just For Christmas then I think you have your answer.



4. What do you love the most when reading a new book?

Meeting new characters and joining them on their adventures. If there's no adventure in the book I'm reading the wrong one!

5. Do you listen to background music while writing?

I believe I may be in odd in that I prefer to write with no other distractions. If I'm listening to music then my mind will concentrate on that and any attempt I make at writing will come to naught.

6. Stephen King believes writing about scary things means they'll never happen in real life. Diana Wynne Jones had events from her books happening to her after she wrote them. Do you think writing about an event stops or causes it from happening?

I hope not in one story I wrote, 2012's NaNoWriMo project as it happens, the protagonist's house burnt down, his daughter broke her leg and he got himself arrested after punching a reporter!

7. Favorite genre?

Fantasy followed by Science Fiction.

8. Least-favourite genre?

Erotica!

9. Ideal vacation? 

Somewhere very cold with lots of snow.

10. How powerful can books be, in the right or wrong hands?

Extremely great evil can be perpetuated on the basis of the words, or the interpretation of the words, in a book!

11.  What book will you read over and over again?

With the exception of my own manuscripts, the answer is none. There are too many books to read any of them multiple times.  Even some of the greatest Discworld stories do not lend themselves to reading more than once.

So there you have it and now I need to nominate several others to answer 11 questions I pose.  As I don't know that many people with blogs I'm going to nominate 5 Twitter followers instead and they are: Ciara Ballintyne, Matthew Munson, Dusty Lynn Holloway, Tamra Ferguson and Rachael Thompson

Oh and if anyone else wants to give me their answers please leave a comment below :)

Phil

So here are my questions:

1. Which of your characters are you most fond of and why?

2. If you had to pick a pop song to be the theme tune to one of your books which would it be?

3. When did you start writing?

4. Why did you start writing?

5. Do you have another job as well as being an author and if so what do you do?

6. Who has been the greatest influence on your work as an author?

7. Who is your favourite fictional character and why?

8. Italian or Chinese? (Food that is!)

9. Do you play games as an adult and if so which ones? And I mean board games etc not bedroom games!

10.  Who is your favourite dragon from TV, Movies and Literature?

11.  What would you call a dragon if you befriended one?
8 February 2015

...sports personalities or authors?


This is something I found myself discussing with my colleagues earlier this week and the answer to be honest surprised me.

Before I continue I have to be clear that the figures I sourced on-line can be taken with only a modicum of accuracy.  For example:

Terry Pratchett, the creator of the Disc world, Death and Binky among other amazing characters, on one site is reported as having a personal wealth of $40 million on another the figure is $65 million.  That's over a 50% increase from one site to the next, quite a staggering difference.

So back to the question.  It started, as a lot of things do with talk in my office about football, no not the American version proper football, and how much certain premier league players earn.

What developed from there was a comparison with stars in other sports and before long one of us had turned to the internet to see who earns what in the sports world.

Before looking have a guess yourself, who is the top earning sportsman?

The answer is Ion Tiria.  Who? Yep I've never heard of him either. Apparently he was quite a good tennis and ice hokey player way back before I was born and is currently worth a cool $2 billion.

Second up is a certain Michael Jordan who is reportedly worth $1 billion.



Third is Formula 1 mega star Michael Schumacher and my thoughts go out to him and his family.

Fourth on the list is Vince McMahon - who is, let's face it, a successful pantomime producer and has nothing to do with sports what-so-ever.  So I'm scratching him from list as I do not recognise his validity to be on the list in the first place.

Fifth on the list? Arnold Palmer, venerable golfer and with a staggering $675 million.

Sixth on the list, and I'm including sixth because I booted Vince to the curb, is former NFL quarterback Roger Staubach with a worth of $600 million.

So there you have it the top earning sportsman and one thing I would say is that several of them have earned a large part of their amassed wealth as entrepreneurs.

So how about the authors?

Well there are no prizes for guessing who is sitting top of the list.

Author of the Harry Potter books herself, J.K. Rowling with an estimated net worth of a cool $1 billion.

Sun Myung Moon was a Korean religious leader, businessman, and media mogul who had a net worth of $900 million before his death and is listed 2nd on the list.

3rd is creator of Garfield and Odie, Jim Davies, with a cool $800 million.


4th on the list is Candy Spelling widow of Aaron Spelling the famous TV producer.  I'd question her inclusion just because she wrote her autobiography.

J. R. R. Tolkien, a personal hero of mine, comes in 5th with an estate worth $500 million.

If I'm discounting Candy Spelling much like I did Vince McMahon then sixth on the list is Paulo Coelho, a Brazilian novelist, musician, and lyricist who has a net worth of $500 million.

So right at the top there's not much difference in the figures which surprised me a little. What does happen though is that the authors list gets 'poorer' more rapidly. I say poorer I should probably just say less wealthy.

Ronaldo, he with the precocious talent at football, is at #50 on the sports star rich list with a personal wealth of $150 million.

That position on the authors list is occupied by Ken Follet with a worth of $45 million.

I hope you found this interesting, I certainly did and would love to earn even a fraction of what some of the authors have managed.

Phil



2 February 2015

...to the world




I've tried lots of different methods to try and sell George and the Dragon to people, but none of them have been more successful than just connecting with people.

Which is all well and good but the number of people I see and speak to on a daily basis can probably be counted on both hands and feet.

So in order to find people intrigued by the idea of Nazi Dragons fighting RAF dragons during the Battle of Britain wrapped up in a fantasy adventure I need to be able to cast my net further afield.

To date nothing has done that better for me than Twitter. The greatest thing about Social Media in general is that it is truly global. However, it is far harder to find people outside of your immediate circle of friends on Facebook, for example, than it is on Twitter.

You only have to look at my Facebook Page likes (625) vs my Twitter Followers (33,174) to see how extreme the difference is.

But this post is more about the global breadth of connections I've made than the differences between Facebook and Twitter.

This is a map of where my followers are located around the world courtesy of Tweepsmap.


Close inspection will show you the majority, almost 50% of my followers are in the USA.  I've never been to the USA and know only a couple of people how actually live there.  Yet 15,000+ people who follow me on Twitter come from the USA.

Now a large number of them aren't going to be interested in my book but the more people I can reach out to the more chance I have of selling my novel and any further works I also choose to self publish.

This is why I've set myself the goal of gaining 200,000 Twitter followers by the end of this year.

I then set a target of 2,000,000 for the following year but as you can only follow 365,000 people in one year that may be a bit of a stretch but still I intend to try.

Wish me luck :)

Phil