The cover of my new novel

My new novel, Arthur´s Eventful Weekend, is due to be published by Ward Wood Publishing early next year. I´ve been working with Mike Fortune-Wood and Adele Ward on planning the cover and it´s now ready. I´m very pleased with it.

I think the title has a slightly quirky ring which I like. I´ll post more details about the themes and story closer to the publication date.

And for those of you who want to know what I do when I´ve just completed a novel, I will tell you: I get to work on my next poetry collection. And that´s what I´m going to do now.

Two favorite recipes

These are two very simple but very tasty recipes. The amounts are slightly flexible and you can vary according to the number of eaters and your own preferences, for example you can vary the amount of stock.

Fennel and Tomato Bake

several potatoes, sliced
1 fennel bulb, sliced
3 tomatoes, skinned and chopped
1 clove of garlic, crushed
1 cup of stock
teaspoon of tomato purée
salt and black pepper

Cook the sliced potatoes and sliced fennel in boiling water for 3 minutes, then drain. Blend the tomatoes, garlic, stock, purée and seasoning. Layer the potato and fennel slices in an oven dish, pour over the stock mixture and cover. Cook in a pre-heated oven at 180C/350F/gas mark 4 for 1 hour.
It´s possible to substitute Jerusalem artichokes for some of the potato, which I would recommend, actually. I use about 25% Jerusalem artichokes and 75% potatoes.


Broccoli with Red Bean Sauce

broccoli florets
olive oil
1 red pepper, chopped
3 spring onions, chopped
1 can of aduki/kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup of stock
cornflour

Steam the broccoli for 8 minutes, drain and keep warm. Heat the olive oil and fry the pepper and spring onions until soft. Add the beans and stock and simmer for 3 minutes. Mix the cornflour with a little water and add to the bean mixture. Cook for one minute more. Pour sauce over broccoli and serve.

From Coiled Roots by Donald Adamson

Donald Adamson is a Tampere-based Scottish poet. He has previously published two pamphlets and his translations from Finnish to English appeared in the anthology How To Address The Fog, published by Carcanet and the Scottish Poetry Library. His full poetry collection, From Coiled Roots, was published this summer by Indigo Dreams Press. The collection as a whole is wide-ranging and eclectic, including a few set in childhood, some that consider aging, some with a historical background and some wonderful, understated love poems that show great sensitivity and delicacy in their use of language; `understated ardour´ is the phrase I came up with to describe the tone. I have added an example of one of the love poems below. There are poems set in Scotland and several set in Finland; some of these name Finnish places, but readers familiar with Finland will recognise a Finnish setting where it is not actually stated as such. There are several versions based on poems by the Finnish poet, Lassi Nummi.


I have read and enjoyed the collection enormously and recommend it highly. The book is available from Amazon or from the publisher´s website

This is a poem from the collection which is reproduced here with Donald´s permission:

What We Found

An hour away from daylight; snow´s
light, blind touching, and the single eye
of a train drawing in.

And all that day, as pine trees
inked themselves on paper fields,
I did not know you

till joking nervously,
we crossed the frontier.
Words were new then, and eyes.

What we found there,
more than from any temperate season, grew

out of the ice and the crystalline
and dangerous purity
of snow.


Donald´s blog is at:
http://donaldadamson.blogspot.com
and has several poems, including one from the new collection, and a link to the publisher´s website.

Donald´s website is at:
http://donaldadamson.co.uk

Magnifying Glass

Since this blog started life as a poetry blog I reckon it´s time to post a poem. This one is from my collection, Midas Touch, published by Ward Wood Publishing. I have played a little trick in line 3. As is well known, there´s a certain kind of language, or diction, I should say, which is outlawed in contemporary poetry. Archaic terminology has no place in poems written in 2013. The basic premise is quite reasonable, of course, but my inner devil loves to break rules. `Greensward´ is a word that would not be accepted by most editors, quite rightly, I have to admit. Lovely, therefore, to smuggle it in as `green sword´. Heh, heh.


Magnifying Glass

At school we´ve all looked into one,
hovered it over a blade of grass
and seen the green sword´s cutting edge.

We´ve peered at the tips of our fingers,
the geography of whorls writ suddenly large,
and followed the Nile across green and yellow
to Abri, El Khandaq, Khartoum.

When the boy at the back raised his to one eye
and winked hugely, we laughed,
but the side of his face
stepped out of itself.

At arm´s length it made trees shrink
and stand on their heads,
a single leg pointing up
into a grassy sky.

Decrepit

Here´s the view at the end of my garden. I call this one `decrepit´, but is it art?

Happy with my new Kindle

I received my Kindle reader last Friday and have been getting used to it. I have to say, I´m dead impressed. I´d heard good things about them from friends who had them so my expectations were quite high, and they haven´t been disappointed. I got the most basic, cheapest model and at the moment I still think it answers all my needs, but I wouldn´t be surprised if I start to hanker after something a bit more sophisticated once I get used to the one I´ve got, and begin to find out more about the extra features on more expensive models. But let´s see.

At the moment I´m reading V.G.Lee´s Diary of a Provincial Lesbian and enjoying it enormously:



A great read. Highly recommended.

I´ve started adding volumes to the Kindle reader. Got my own novel and poetry collection, of course, and a copy of Dickens´ The Old Curiosity Shop and Byron´s Don Juan, both completely free. I haven´t had time to look at them properly yet, but at a first glance the Byron appears to be formatted quite satisfactorily. And I´ve paid for a copy of Vonnegut´s Slaughterhouse Five.

I´ve been amazed by the selection of entirely free books available. In addition, many other books are so cheap that they almost feel free. But not all. There are some titles where the Kindle version is more expensive than the paperback, which I don´t really understand.

Anyway, whilst I´m sure I will still buy and read `real´ books, I´m certainly a convert to the Kindle reader. I´m looking forward to travelling this summer with a couple of dozen books that will fit into a jacket pocket comfortably.

Sampola Monday 15 April

Here is the first part of the topic for our class on Monday April 15. This is another topic which might need a bit of research in order to talk about. There is a second part which I will put up soon.


What´s happening in Britain today?


1. Who is Mick Philpott?
What did you find out about his personality?
Did you find some details that help to give an impression of his character?
What did he do?
Why did he do it?
What was the result?
What was thought to be the first explanation and how was the truth finally discovered?
What is his present situation?


2. How and why has the Philpott case taken on political significance?
What reaction has there been to the case from the media?
How has George Osborne (Chancellor of the Exchequer = Minister of Finance) been involved in the case?
How has David Cameron reacted to Osborne´s involvement?
Why are these issues especially sensitive just now?


3. What is the so-called `bedroom tax´?
How will the new regulations be applied?
Who will it affect?
What controversial change to income taxation was made by the Government in 2012?
What arguments have ministers put forward to justify these changes?
How does the Philpott case fit into these political discussions?
How has the media reacted to this debate?


4. Who is Boris Johnson?
What position does he currently occupy?
What is his background?
What accusations have been made against him?
Would he like to be the Prime Minister one day?


Here´s the second part of Monday´s topic:


Media Issues

For each of the following, explain what the issue is, describe how it affects people, give some examples of each and finally decide how serious you believe the issue to be.

1 Presentation of violence
2 Presentation of women
3 Stereotyping
4 Online Hate and hate campaigns
5 Privacy : And privacy of information
6 Censorship
7 Trivial nature of content and creating a story from very little
8 Bias and misrepresentation
9 Creating panics
10 Dumbing down and loss of concentration
11 Isolation and loneliness
12 Emotional manipulation of audiences
13 Exploitation of audiences
14 Tastelessness
15 Dishonesty
16 Scientific ignorance and cultural ignorance
17 Health and obesity
18 Addiction
19 Crime
20 Access of inappropriate material by the young and easily influenced
Task: Give examples of each issue. Can you add any other issues to the list?