HEDGEHOG HOTEL WITH PATRICIA SMITH.

Perhaps best known here on Pen and Paper for her books Distant Suns, Distant Suns: The Journey Home and Islands: The Epidemic I'd like to offer a warm welcome once again to author Patricia Smith who we first met way back in 2012 but, first if I may, an extract from her latest book ...

Hedgehog Hotel: Funny, True Stories Of A Family's Time As Hedgehog Carer.

WEEK ONE ... 

Darryl rushed into the house. He had been on one of his walks and came back looking more than a little bit flustered. It was early, rather than late evening, so the whole household was still up. “You won’t believe what I’ve just seen,” he announced to no one in particular in the room. “A little bald hedgehog.”

Joshua had been watching television. He twisted around so that she could see his dad better. “A bald hedgehog?” he said questioningly, convinced he had heard wrong.

“Yes, a bald hedgehog,” Darryl repeated.

“Are you sure it was a hedgehog and not a rat?” I asked.

“Yes, I am. It had no tail. It was definitely a hedgehog.”

“Where is it?” Joshua asked. “A bald hedgehog wouldn’t be able to protect itself and would be easy prey for a predator.”

“It must also be very poorly if it’s lost all of its spines,” I added.

“It ran away and disappeared into the bushes before I got the chance to round it up.”

“Well, there’s nothing you can do if you can’t find it,” I said. “But you will have to keep an eye out for it and try to catch it over the next few days, as it will be vulnerable.”

A couple of nights later Darryl finally managed to capture the little bald hedgehog, very close to the Hedgehog Hotel, and brought it home with him from his walk. “That sprint was not an extraordinary burst of speed for this little one and I nearly lost it again,” he informed us as we gathered in a curious huddle to stare at the spineless hedgehog.

“It’s not completely bald,” Darryl said, tipping the hedgehog back so that its tummy was exposed.

This movement was enough to make the little animal nervous and triggered a series of head dips in a fruitless attempt to activate spines that were not there and protect itself from an attack that was not happening.

Darryl lifted the hedgehog higher so that its underside could be seen. “It does have a thin skirt of fur around its sides, where the base of the spines would have been.” He manoeuvred the hedgehog so that it was closer to the light. “What is it? A boy or a girl?”

“There is a bump in the middle of a very bald tummy,” I informed him, “therefore it’s a boy.”

“He doesn’t look like a hedgehog at all without his spines,” Joshua laughed. “His head looks like it belongs to a rat, but his body makes him look more like a tiny armadillo.”

“He does that,” I chuckled, “or maybe an anteater or an aardvark. Definitely something beginning with ‘A’,” I called as I left the room. “I’ll get him some food.” I headed for the kitchen with Darryl and Joshua immediately behind.

I prepared a plate of cat food, shooed Lucy off as she had already been fed several times that day and stepped back whilst Darryl put the little hedgehog down in front of the dish.

Immediately the poor little creature started eating. Huge mouthfuls were devoured as though he had not eaten for days. This went on for some time with only a couple of brief pauses to check that we, plus one cat, were not going to launch an attack when he was not looking. Still despite this, it was almost as though he did not care if he died, just as long as he could get one more mouthful of food down, before he was killed. It seemed as if he could not get the food down fast enough and when the dish was empty, I filled it again. By now he seemed to have realised he was safe and did not flinch or even pause when I scooped the remaining contents of the tin out onto the plate.

A dish and a half of cat food later, the hedgehog was slowing down. “I’m surprised it can still breathe,” I said, “there can’t be much room left for the lungs. Have you thought of a name?” I asked Joshua.

“I think it will have to be Horace because he’s definitely a hungry one.”

“Hungry Horace,” I laughed. “It’s very fitting.”

Horace was the only hedgehog to stay at the Hedgehog Hotel that year and, as he was so bald and had virtually nothing to keep him warm, he was honoured enough to stay in the ‘Special Guest’ room inside the house.

The first night he slept in a large plastic box, usually used to store blankets, with two small dishes at one end, one for food and the other for water, and at the other end was a fleece to keep him warm.

The following morning Joshua rose early. He went in to check on our little guest and stopped in the doorway, his mouth open, shocked to be confronted by the devastation of poo. 

The cat food was all gone and the small dish, which had originally held meat, now contained a neat pile of hedgehog droppings. He had also dirtied in his blanket and trodden it all over the bottom of the box. Joshua gaped at the wreckage in horror.

Darryl came into the room and looked at the carnage. “I don’t think he has enough space. That’ll be the problem.”

“k

“We could maybe get one of the guinea pig cages from the garage and bring it upstairs,” Joshua suggested.

“Yes,” Darryl said. “That’s a good idea.”

Horace’s sleeping arrangements were changed by Darryl whilst Joshua and I took him to the vets to get a better idea of why he lost his spines. 

The journey in the car gave Horace an opportunity to display more of his personality. Joshua sat in the front, a small box on his knee, with a very alert hedgehog standing on top of his blankets, in the middle of the container. “I’ve never seen a hedgehog do that before,” he said.

“What is he doing?” I asked.

“He’s not hiding under his blanket in the way they usually do. He’s standing in the middle of his box with his body quite high off the ground, trying his best to look around.”I

I turned the car into the vets’ and pulled into a parking space before I peeked inside the box. “He’s a proper little character,” I said, smiling.

The vet confirmed Horace had ringworm and we returned home with a bottle of medicine and instructions for treatment, which would take place over the next few weeks to help him get better.

- Copyright Patricia Smith. This extract was shared with the express permission of the author, to otherwise share it or reproduce it in any form is prohibited.

• Firstly, the question on everyone's lips ... Did Horace get his spines back? Or is that something we're going to have to read Hedgehog Hotel to find out?

Horace did get some spines back, but not all of his spines came back and, although this would make releasing him back into the wild difficult, there was an enclosed garden for hedgehogs that could not be fully released at the rescue centre.

• Just one of many of prickly visitors to check into the Hedgehog Hotel, how many visitors have you had check in now Tricia?

At the time of writing Hedgehog Hotel we had rescued at least 21 hedgehogs over the years. However, due to a busy summer and autumn, since finishing the book early summer, we've had an additional five hedgehogs come through the house; Betty who gave birth in our living room, Sammy who was kind enough, sort of, to pose for the cover of the book, Marge and the two little ones, Sarah (seen on the right weighing in at 240g) and Trevor (our latest arrival) who will both be with us for the winter.

• Obviously an animal lover, what is it about hedgehogs you particularly love?

I love hedgehogs because they are such beautiful little creatures. They have such cute little faces and although people think they are all spiky, in fact they aren't because they have lovely soft fur on their tummies and their little feet are like the softest, warm leather. As I mentioned in the book we had a hedgehog that liked to have her feet touched even though she did not like to interact with us in any other way. They also have their own little personalities. Some want as little to do with us as possible and some are so happy to interact with us they are completely calm, their spines are down and they almost seem happy to see us.

• You mention Lucy in the extract. I know you and Darryl are (and have been) the loving slave to several cats over the years, do any of them feature in the book alongside Lucy?

The only other cat to feature in the book is Jesse, our other tortoiseshell cat. Jesse does not usually pay any attention to the hedgehogs, but Lucy seems to be fascinated by them and will often sit on the cupboard watching the hedgehogs, when they are put in a puppy run whilst they are cleaned out.

• When we spoke here on Pen and Paper in April 2012 you mentioned that one of the earliest books you wrote as a children's book was about a witch, her grandchildren and a cat. Given that you have now dipped your toe into the world of children's literature would you consider this (or any other children's book ... maybe a follow up to Hedgehog Hotel) for publication?

I think I will have to consider another children's story, even if it is another Hedgehog Hotel story. I hope that we will continue to get material for more hedgehog stories (not at all for the material, but for the fact that we know that we are helping out and most importantly, that there are hedgehogs still out there to help) and I think after the summer we've had, I've got enough material for the good start of another book. 

ABOUT PATRICIA ... 

Patricia Smith worked for fourteen years in technical support and as a computer programmer before changing career to help young people to improve their numeracy and English skills.

She has enjoyed writing stories all of her life and her first novel Time Split, which made several best sellers lists, was published in 2011. This was soon followed by her Distant Suns stories, Islands - The Epidemic and more recently the long awaited sequel to Time Split, Time Split - Briggs.

Her choice of genre stems from her passion for astronomy, her love of apocalyptic thrillers and the 'What if?' scenario.

She strives in her writing to give the reader a roller-coaster ride of emotions and excitement, mixed in with a good dash of fear - all from the safety of their armchair.

PATRICIA'S BOOKS ...

• Time Split 
• Time Split II - Briggs 

• Distant Suns 
• Distant Suns II - The Journey Home 
• Distant Suns III - The Silexous
• Distant Suns IIII - Mettle  

• Islands - The Epidemic 

For information about these books or to keep up to date on news and events involving Patricia you can visit her website at  https://www.patriciasmithsfauthor.com/

excitement, m

THE HANGRY HAMSTER.

THE HANGRY HAMSTER by GRACE McCLUSKEY.

MY THOUGHTS ... Not your average author by any means, Grace McCluskey (you may remember my introducing her here) was only 8 years old when she penned The Hangry Hamster for a competition run by Radio 2.

Doubtlessly one of many entries received, whilst the book did not go onto receive any awards, Grace (now aged 11), along with a little help from her author father (Dave McCluskey), went on to see her story (illustrated by the talented Sean Steele) published last month.

A tale of what happens when, having been refused aboard an aeroplane with his human, a hamster runs amok through London. Highly entertaining; action packed and funny, the illustrations colourful and eye-catching, I hope Grace puts pen to paper once more ... who knows what further adventures may await this hangry hamster.

MEET GRACE MCCLUSKEY, AN AUTHOR AT 8 YEARS OLD.

I wanted to tell you, because of how proud I am, and maybe as an inspiration to anyone who is struggling to finish their book, or who wants to bring out the natural talents of a child, sibling, friend, parent, anyone...

Three years ago, my daughter (she is now 11, she was then 8) wrote a 500 word story for the Radio 2 competition. She got a reply back thanking her for her entry but it hadn't been picked or shortlisted or anything. she was devastated as little kids get...

I tried to explain to her that I had NEVER EVER won anything in my entire life, but its through hard work and perseverance that we 'win' things (for win I meant earn).

So, as I write comics and graphic novels as well as novels, I sent a shout out to some of my contacts, and we took her short story, got it illustrated, and I am now happy to say that it is finished.

She had lost a little faith in the project, as she sometimes thinks that the story is babyish, and she is a little embarrassed about it, but I keep telling her that this is ALL her own work, and in the future she will be as proud as Punch of it...

So, anyway, after a few years of tears and editing, laughs and lost faith, but ultimately hard work on her end (and Sean Steele, the illustrator), we can finally say that the book is finished.

I present to you... The Hangry Hamster, by Grace McCluskey.

It will not be available until the end of July, which is a shame as she leave primary school in July for high school, but her teachers are still very interested in it.

I need to thank Tony Higginson of Purple Penguin Books for his help in design and layout...

Thanks for reading this 'gush' from a proud dad!

- Shared with the permission of Grace's rightfully proud father, David.

The story of Billy,  a happy boy who had everything in the world he could wish for except for one thing ... a cute and fluffy hamster.

I've had a sneaky look at The Hangry Hamster -a Damaged Productions Publication (ISBN-13: 978-0993449093) written by Grace McCluskey with illustrations by Sean Steele available July 1st 2019 - which is a delightfully funny story with some truly wonderful full colour illustrations.

Edited ... I've had several people ask me about Grace thinking she was my daughter so feel I need to clarify that not only is Grace not my daughter I'm not related to her in any way. As a member of Book connectors on FaceBook I saw the above article as shared by her father Dave and thinking Grace an amazingly talented young lady sought his permission to share her book here on Pen and Paper. TT

A WARM WELCOME TO CLAYTON GRAHAM, AUTHOR OF MILIJUN.

Today I'd like to offer a warm Pen and Paper welcome to Graham Clayton aka Clayton Graham, author of the hugely readable Milijun, my review of which can be found here.

Thanks to Tracy at Pen and Paper for welcoming me to her marvellous web site. 

My name is Graham Clayton [pen name Clayton Graham] and Milijun is my debut Science Fiction novel. As a teenager I read authors like HG Wells, Jules Verne and John Wyndham. I suppose it was a way of escaping the starkness of post war Britain; an escape to other worlds.The novel started as a short story. The birth of the alien RNasia occurred in the short story, and when they decided to wing their way to Earth I knew it could not end there. They seemed to want their universal journey to be worth something; they wanted their mission fulfilled. So I decided to oblige them.

The book is about more than an alien incursion into the vast Australian outback. It asks questions about our place in the universe, or multiverses (as we are now led to believe may be a possibility).

The novel explores the relationship between a mother and her son. How far can it be stretched before the links break? How far would a mother go to save her son? Would she be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice, or undertake actions she would never have deemed possible prior to the alien incursion?

Above all, Milijun explores the question – what would mankind do when faced with an intelligence it cannot understand? It's a good question, for it may happen someday. We are not currently prepared, of course, we are light years away from understanding how we should behave in such a circumstance. Milijun challenges our mindsets through the eyes of a mother and son, and as such is perhaps more powerful and meaningful than if that challenge was through the eyes of the United Nations or the President of the United States.

In the end, Milijun probably asks more questions than it answers. But it does raise the questions. Laura and Jason Sinclair are just ordinary people, caught in a web of mystery and intrigue with an invisible spider somewhere on the threads.

Writing Milijun was a labour of love. It was not easy, but neither was it hard. Science Fiction is a love of mine, has been since I was a teenager, escaping to new worlds in the back streets of Stockport, England, where I grew up as a child. Halcyon days, when education and school milk were free, and summers were real summers. My childhood was set in a background of cobbled streets, ration books, terraced housing [think Coronation Street], milkman's horses, coal dumped in the cellar, fish and chips [on good days], bread and dripping [on not good days], free school dinners [at lunchtime] and low paid footballers.

I remember the four minute warning, Fylingdales and the ever-present threat of nuclear war. As children, myself and my friends did not have much, nor did we need it. We were content to kick a ball against a wall, play hide and seek for hours on end, explore the countryside on second hand bikes, keep outside until called in when night time descended, and do the best we could at school [probably in that order]. And this was a time when companies and businesses funded education for their own employees. I was a 'Student Apprentice', my company [English Electric Aviation, now BAe Systems] totally funded my degree studies over five years. As a bonus I also got some work experience thrown in.

Have things changed? You bet they have. We know more about some things but we know less about others – the important things. If you have to ask what they are, you're too young to be reading this.

No doubt stemming from my initial reading, I have always had an interest in Science Fiction and where it places humankind within the universe we know and love. Not that we know much about it – it remains as mysterious as ever. But we are getting closer.

I am happily married to Linda. We have two daughters and five grandsons. Enough work for anybody! I love animals, including well behaved pets, and all the natural world, and am a member of Australian Geographic. I'm sure I would like alien animals, too.

Best Wishes
Graham Clayton
http://claytongraham.com.au/
https://www.facebook.com/claytongrahamauthor/ 

 Always fascinating to learn more about the person behind the book. Thanks for taken the time to tell us a little more about your novel and the inspiration behind it.

Milijun can be purchased at ...

Amazon (Paper copy)

Amazon (Kindle Edition) 

Barnes & Noble

Book Depository

Fishpond.com.au

Booktopia

The Nile.co.au

INTRODUCING POETRY SLAM CHAMPION SCOTT TYRRELL.

Today I'm pleased to be featuring poet, comedian and 2015 BBC Edinburgh Fringe Poetry Slam winner Scott Tyrrell whose book, Grown Up, which according to the Apples And Snakes site 

'provides a snapshot of a family man juggling the absurd demands of work and parenthood under the pressure of being normal' 

was published by Red Squirrel Press earlier this year.

Available from InPress Books here or from here at amazon.co.uk, Kate Fox writing for InPress Books has this to say ...

'Scott's poetry is as funny as the finest stand up comedy with razor sharp punch lines that hit just the right places. But it also has heart. The full warmth of life and love are in this book and it is guaranteed cheering up tonic for those who love poetry and those who think they don't but just haven't had the good fortune to encounter Scott's clever, down to earth wit and word wonder. One of the best stand up poets in the country live, but even if you haven't seen him perform (do), this books sings out from the page with a magical music all of it's own.'

But what of Scott's recent triumph at this years BBC Edinburgh Fringe Poetry Slam competition?

*** PRESS RELEASE ***

Newcastle-based poet Scott Tyrrell wins BBC Poetry Slam.

South Shields born Scott Tyrrell, a Stand-Up Poet and Graphic Designer, has just won the BBC Edinburgh Fringe Poetry Slam Grand Final. The BBC Slam is now the most diverse and most coveted Poetry Slam in the UK, with the widest national and regional representation of UK poetry. This year alone the competition featured a World champion, a European champion, 7 national champions and the Roadhouse champion. The competition has been running over the festival in a series of heats to decide which poets would make the final four competitors, who battled it out on Saturday night in a packed BBC Festival tent. The event was streamed live on BBC Arts via the iPlayer. The final featured excellent established performance poets Dan Simpson, Paula Varjack, Toby Campion and of course, Scott Tyrrell. The event was put together by Spoken Word artist and Slam host, Sophia Walker - herself a previous BBC Slam winner.

The Grand Final featured three rounds; in the first each poet had just 3 minutes to wow the judges (who comprised of five esteemed figures from the UK Spoken Word and poetry publishing scene). The judges scored the poets from 1-10 on performance, writing and audience response. In the second round the lowest scoring poet was dropped and the three remaining poets battled it out again, with another 3 minute poem. In the final round Scott and Toby Campion went head to head. It was close but Scott pipped it by just 0.3 of a point.

This has been a great year for Scott - winning both The Great Northern Slam at Northern Stage earlier in the year and the UK Anti-Slam Championship at The Roadhouse in London. (The Anti-Slam is a tongue-in-cheek national competition in which established spoken word artists battle it out to be the worst poet in the UK.) So Scott is now technically one of the best and worst performance poets in Britain!

Scott was also official Blogger for the poetry tent at Glastonbury this year.

The full 2015 BBC Poetry Slam on BBC iPlayer:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/events/ednq2m/acts/abrd2m#p03176hh

A Clip of Scott's performance from the BBC Slam:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03131gv

About Slam and the UK Spoken Word Scene

The UK Spoken Word scene has exploded over the last decade, with vibrant scenes across the whole of the UK including Edinburgh, London, Manchester, Bristol, York and Newcastle, and is growing into a formidable poetry scene. The likes of Kate Tempest (Mercury Prize Winner) and huge talents Hollie McNish, Dizraeli and Luke Wright and Kate Fox have been among those leading the charge to establish Spoken Word as an art form that's here to stay in the UK.

Young poets from all over Britain and Ireland are finding an outlet for their talents as writers and performers, particularly in Slam competitions - an idea which started in Chicago decades ago and has become an international approach to inject real energy and competition into what has traditionally a very bookish art form. Anything to do with Spoken Word goes with Slam. So comedy, rap, drama, beat poetry and storytelling are all allowed - and encouraged - which is why slams nearly always feature a diverse range of literary talent. 

About Scott Tyrrell

Scott is a multiple poetry slam winner, award-winning comedian and graphic designer. He has been writing and performing poetry for 15 years and was a founding member of the legendary Tyneside poetry troupe, the Poetry Vandals. He has represented Newcastle/Gateshead in three major national Poetry Slams and won. He lives and works in Newcastle with his wife, stepdaughter and son.

HISTORICAL RESEARCH IN SONG OF THE SEA MAID.

'The moving story of a young girls emergence into adulthood at the end of the Victorian era. I was particularly impressed by the authors ability to get inside the thoughts and feelings of a deaf-blind girl who, her temper fuelled by frustration, finds herself increasingly isolated until her world is opened up thanks largely to the friendship and tutorship of a young hop picker.'

- A big fan of Rebecca Mascull's The Visitors today I'm honoured and delighted to welcome Rebecca to Pen and Paper to talk about research in Song Of The Sea Maid on the eve of the publication of her second book.

When you sit down and read an historical fiction, with any luck you get swept away in the story and lose yourself in the fictional world. But just like the familiar image of a swan gliding on the water, there is likely to have been all sorts of work going on under the surface. My second novel, SONG OF THE SEA MAID, is set in the mid-C18th and I researched for a good year or more before I even thought about writing the first sentence. Every writer is different, and not all novelists do it that way, but it works for me. It's not only the planning and thought that goes into creating new characters, plots and settings, but with an historical novel, of course, there will be historical fiction to be done. To render an historical period convincingly, a novelist needs to know the obvious, everyday things like the food people ate and the clothes they wore, to the more obscure corners of the narrative such as how one would light a lamp in a cave in 1755.

So, how do we go about it, this historical research business? Here's your handy 5-step guide to how to research an historical novel:

[1] Read some books.

• Books written about the period
• Books written during the period

A simple Google search will reveal a plethora of books about your period. Your challenge is to narrow them down to those that will be must useful to you (as well as those you can afford!) Visit libraries too, of course, to borrow books. and don't forget to read the writing that was produced in the very time you're researching. For SONG OF THE MAID, I read novels by Samuel Richardson and Tobias Smollett and non-fiction by Daniel Defoe and Henry Fielding, to name but a few. It gives you the contemporary writing style, yet also affords an insight into the prevailing opinions of the day.

[2] Visit some places.  

There's nothing like walking into a house or garden built or created in your chosen historical period to suffuse you in the atmosphere of that lost world. For SONG OF THE SEA MAID, I visited Fairfax House in York, an C18th town house, and learnt a lot about period décor, furniture and even toilet arrangements! I also based the kitchen in which Mrs Applebee cooks Dawnay's first proper hot meal on the kitchen at Fairfax. I looked at C18th menus in that kitchen and used them to find out what people Mr Wood's class would have been eating at that time. 

I also visited Dr. Johnson's house in London, another C18th museum, and learnt about wood panelling in the front room, the noise of traffic outside, the books on the shelf and the square spiral staircase leading up to the attic. 

All these details brought the era to life for me in a way no book about the C18th could do in quite the same way.

[3] Go to specialist libraries and read old documents.

I visited the Caird Library at the Greenwich Maritime Museum to look at and handle original C18th documents about a sea battle near Menorca. Seeing that yellowed paper of letters, diaries, books and maps is a precious experience, to touch and hold something an C18th person has touched and held in their time, as well as getting the information from the horses's mouth.

[4] Make a picture wall.

Once you have all your material, you can start blue-tacking stuff up on your wall, so that every time you walk into your study or work area, you can stare at the images of dresses and streets and ships, and walk into that period before you sit down to write.

See some of my C18th picture wall here:

https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/487866572108084453/

[5] Build a time machine.

Oh, if only!

~~~~~~~

Rebecca Mascull's second novel SONG OF THE SEA MAID is published June 18th, Hodder & Stoughton.

You can pre-order here 

in hardback:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Song-Sea-Maid-Rebecca-Mascull/dp/1473604354

or e-book:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Song-Sea-Maid-Recbecca-Mascull-ebook/dp/B00OGLKJZU/ref=tmm kin swatch 0? encoding=UTF8&sr=&qid=

and you can find Rebecca online here:

http://rebeccamascull.tumblr.com/

https://twitter.com/rebeccamascull

https://www.facebook.com/RebeccaMascull

http://uk.pinterest.com/rebeccamascull

https://instagram.com/rebeccamascull

- Rebecca Mascull, June 2015.

My thanks to Rebecca for what I'm sure you'll all agree is a fascinating and insightful post.

A WARM WELCOME TO IAIN READING AUTHOR OF THE KITTY HAWK BOOKS.

A series that is 'one part travel, one part history and five parts history. I think fellow blogger, Kelly, summed up my thoughts perfectly when she commented ...

'I really do think this is a series that, as a young teen, I would have been waiting anxiously for each new instalment'. 

Feisty, resourceful, independent, smart, Kitty Hawk, the intrepid heroine of the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency, is rapidly becoming one of my favourite characters in this wonderfully quirky series that combines some of my favourite genres.

Today I'm delighted to welcome Iain Reading, author of the series, to Pen and Paper.

Why not Kevin Hawk?

Thank you so much to Pen and Paper for letting me come on this blog and share some of my thoughts.  And in particular for getting my brain humming by posing the question: "Why Kitty and not Kevin?"  (IE Why is the main character of my Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency series a girl named Kitty Hawk and not a boy named Kevin Hawk.)

I have to admit that I loved this question.  It really got me thinking.

On the surface of things the answer is obvious.  The name "Kitty Hawk" comes from a small town of the same name in North Carolina which is famous for being the place where the Wright Brothers made the first controlled powered flight of a man-made aircraft.  It's a suitable name for a young pilot who has decided to fly around the world.  It's also a girl's name, not a boy's name.  Sorry Kevin Hawk.

But there's something deeper than that.  Of the three book series I have started writing thus far, all of them have very strong female lead characters.  And I think that is just simply because boys are very boring.  Yawn.  Another boy main character in a book.

Okay, I know there are other female leads out there in book world, but hopefully you get my point.  Boys are blasé.  Girls kick ass.  Boys default to hero status, even when they don't deserve it.  Girls seem to have to earn their stripes as a heroine.  And that's not really fair is it?

Not that ANY of this had anything to do with why I decided on Kitty Hawk instead of Kevin.  At the very heart of everything the simple fact is that Kitty Hawk – girl pilot, kick ass heroine, solver of mysteries – just felt right.

Kevin Hawk, on the other hand....  sounds more like Kitty's annoying younger brother.

- Iain Reading.

Thank you so much Iain for not only taking the time to write this piece but also for giving me the opportunity to read the Kitty Hawk books.

• The Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency website can be found here.
• My reviews of book one, Kitty Hawk And The Curse Of The Yukon Gold, here, books 2: Kitty Hawk And The Hunt for Hemingway's Ghost, 3: Kitty Hawk And The Icelandic Intrigue, and 4: Kitty Hawk And The Tragedy Of R.M.S Titanic here.
• Thanks to Iain and Kelsey over at Book Publicity Services for kindly sending me the fifth instalment, Kitty Hawk And The Mystery Of The Masterpieces, which I shall be reading and reviewing soon. 

REVEALING RIGHT CLICK.

Love. Marriage.  Infidelity. Parenthood. Crises of identity. Death. Cupcakes. The themes in Right Click, the third and final instalment in the Click series, couldn't be more pressing for this group of friends as they navigate through their 30's. Another six months have passed since we last eavesdropped on the hilarious, poignant and often times inappropriate email adventures of Renee and friends. As the light-hearted, slice of life story continues to unfold, relationships are tested and some need to be set "right" before everyone can find their "happily ever after."

-Right Click by Lisa Becker.

They say there is an exception to every rule, right? And Lisa Becker's 'Click' series of books proved to be one of those exceptions.

Not normally a big fan of the letter/diary/email message format of writing the first two books in the series, 'CLICK: AN ONLINE LOVE STORY' and 'DOUBLE CLICK' proved such an enjoyable revelation that I'm really looking forward to the release of .....

Available from stockists Mid-May both here and in the US, in the meantime I'd like to share this extract from a previous interview I did with Lisa who can also be found on .....

~ FACEBOOK ~ GOODREADS ~ AMAZON ~

I first met my husband while wearing my pajamas.  Really!  No, we weren't at some kinky singles party.  I was sitting comfortably in my apartment and he was hanging out in his.  But, I will never forget his email introduction via an online dating service, which invited me to check out his profile.  It was sweet, endearing and intriguing enough for me to log on to learn more about him.  After a week of emails, followed by a week of phone calls, we met for our first date - a traditional dinner and movie outing.  Even before I opened the door to greet him, I knew he was "the one."  Considering he lived 30 miles away, I'm not certain our paths would have typically crossed.  But after nearly 13 years together - including nearly 10 years of marriage (which in Los Angeles is apparently no small feat!) and two beautiful daughters, I have no doubt he is my soul mate. 

After my now-husband and I met online, I was recalling some of the hilarious experiences that I had during the whole online dating experience.  How could I forget the guy who started every story (no joke!) with “My buddies and I were out drinking one night.”   I decided to capture some of them in writing and, from there and based loosely on my own experiences, my novel Click: An Online Love Story emerged.  The entire story is told in emails between our heroine, Renee Greene, her three best friends and the gentlemen suitors she meets online.  The format felt like a modern way to tell the story that fit the topic, and allowed readers to develop an intimate relationship with the characters.

Clearly, I’m a big fan of online dating and find it to be a useful tool for young professionals who are busy working and finding it difficult to make the right connection at the gym, bar, coffee shop or grocery aisle.  I say, people today are “married” to their cell phones and laptops, so why not use that technology to really get married, right?

- Lisa Becker
March 2013.

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