Tag Archives: Green Man

Looking Forward to Live Book Events

In common with other authors, with the imminent easing of lockdown, I am looking forward to live book events and meeting readers. Another Life, available in hardcover and paperback from all good bookshops, including Essex booksellers Red Lion Books, Wivenhoe Bookshop and Maldon Boanooks. Also available as a Kindle edition.

The Challenges Of Book Cover Design

The cover design of my latest novel, Another Life, has been praised by reviewers, bookshops and readers. Undoubtedly, most of the credit must go to my publisher, Burton Mayers Books, for their accurate interpretation of the story and creation of a compelling image. Cover design is both an art and a science. The objective is […]

The Green Man Appears in Many Forms

I have discussed in earlier posts how the expressions of English representations of the Green Man changed over the centuries. They were sculpted at their jovial peak from around 1300, before declining through merry, smiling, serene, worried, distressed, tormented and finally to resignation. A distinctly menacing image can be found in Bamberg Cathedral, Germany, supporting […]

The Challenges of Writing Another Life

My speculative fiction novel, Another Life, combines themes of family life, myths and legends, a quest and cutting-edge science. These elements are introduced in a natural, uncomplicated way, avoiding technical explanations, so as not to alienate the reader. To bring these disparate elements together, I had to overcome several challenges, the biggest being how to […]

Under The Hill

Before I started working on my speculative fiction novel, Another Life, I had the idea for a story that followed the sequence and narrative of T S Eliot’s Four Quartets. This was not to be: Faber restricts ‘fair use’ to a maximum of 800 words in multiple extracts for inclusion in academic works or reviews. […]

The Quest for a Hidden Village

My novel, Another Life, is centred on a quest by the main protagonist, Oliver, to find a woman who waved to him from a window of a village cottage thirty years ago. Oliver begins with no motive, other than to understand a moment from his past when he glimpsed the prospect of happiness in an […]

Solomon’s Knot

Several people have asked me about the significance of the cover image of Another Life, in particular, the design that encloses the image of the Green Man. The main protagonist, Oliver, decides to seek a woman he saw, fleetingly, thirty years ago, a woman whom he will encounter in various guises in the present time. […]