March 2023...

and I'm fairly busy as always.

As 'Mitchell&Melhuish', Keith and I released our 3rd CD earlier this year. Called 'London Diary - Pieces of Eight 1,' it is in physical CD and Digital form, and is available worldwide on many streaming platforms. This release is our best yet; 8 tracks telling a (fictionalised) story of travels across the amazing city that is London.

Then on 1st March 2023 my latest book of poetry was published in paperback format (it'll be on my Amazon Kindle Store in due course). This is 'Messages to No One', my 2022 collection of poems numbering 106 in total. It's a varied tome, with The Queen's Jubilee and subsequent sad passing, the awful Ukraine invasion, our rescue dog Ollie's diagnosis of terminal cancer and a lot more besides. It's in a slightly different format with fewer photos on it than some collections before, and I like the 'clean' format this presents. Plus, it has to be said, it's cheaper to print fewer colour pages when you have close to 150 pages on average in a book!

Of course, I've already started my collection of 2023 The working title is 'In Quiet Tones' and I'm already close to 30 poems. That's not bad going, as long as they are of good quality. It's always a concern for me as one year ends and I'm presented with the year ahead being completely unknown, unknowable and a blank screen - will I have anything to say? Can I continue to see and hear poems around me that require capturing and pinning between the pages of a book? Or will I run dry, sit there; frustrated with nothing to say? Having no real audience is one thing; having nothing to tell them another.

I'm going to also spend time on a book of short stories that I've been tinkering with for years - the elusive 'Past Horrors'. Often spoken about, regularly advertised, but not (as yet) finished. My first collection of short stories ('Dances of Friendship') was published several years ago and it was good to have these 'tween suitable stories make it into print. But I've been allowing other pursuits to occupy me and while they are all worthwhile and highly enjoyable; I need to finish this particular book in order to move on to other works I have in the making ... one of them a story that has risen from the two courses I've enjoyed at the Grimsby Institute - a Scriptwriting Course and then a Creative Writing Course.

These courses have made me even consider an entry into open literary competitions; something I've never contemplated before. For what is there to lose? You either win or you don't. Entering such a situation willingly is not something I'd have thought I'd do, but I'm minded to 'give it a go' (as Mrs P used to say at Laura's Primary School!).

But that's for another day, now I need to turn my mind to the final story in the 'Past Horrors' collection and think on what needs to be done to it to bring it to a state where it can make it into print.

Now, where did I save the latest iteration to... ?

Stay safe and keep reading all.

Alan