JDCMB

... the writers are going on strike . Go, chaps, go! Tell it like it is! Because today's world doesn't know that without writers the...

In other words, the London International Book Fair. I was going to write a long, philosophical post about how one grows up studying literatu...

Too Much Mozart , a short story I've written to accompany a new CD of the Mozart Sinfonia Concertante, is now available to read online a...

I've done my hand in through excessive hattogate surfing. Not a good idea, especially with lots of deadlines to meet. So I need to stop ...

It's here: the first copy of my new book! As you can see, it's about a little girl with a precocious talent for the piano... Aged th...

1 February is my favourite day of the year, because it's the furthest point away from the next time it's January. I'm one of tho...

I've been basically mute on the matter of dumbing-down in the British media (and elsewhere), because the topic is so huge and so miserab...

I've got a double page spread in The Independent today , a quick look back at 60 years of the Royal Opera. Odd to think that the organis...

An unusual commission, perhaps, but I've written a short story in two parts for Classical Music Magazine 's Christmas and New Year e...

...and this year my special present is seeing in print in The Independent something I've been wanting to write for 20 years. Voila . Ple...

...I've just finished the first draft of my third novel. I thought I'd never get there. Crikey. 540 pages, 145,000 words of...oh dea...

A sleepless night found me surfing the internet around 3am [sad, I know]. I was startled to find a classical music forum in which a bunch of...

What do 13-year-old Liffy Levy (heroine of 'Rites of Spring'), a rare stuffed bird, a missing baby, a Liverpool detective and a smal...

Eh-oop, I'm about to leave for Sheffield, where tomorrow I'm taking part in the Readers' Day at the Off the Shelf Festival of Wr...

... is now available to pre-order from Amazon.co.uk . Treat the blurb there with a little caution - Ali is only three (not four) when the st...

If the pen is mightier than the sword and those that wield ink more intelligent than those with their fingers on the red button, one has to ...

When I was around 14, a few cultural bits & bobs expanded my mental horizons. Or, more accurately, exploded them. 1. Half way up the mus...

... No. Just agony. In other words, proof-reading . ALICIA'S GIFT is done, packaged up & ready to go back to Hodder, covered in pen,...

A quick reminder that this afternoon, Saturday, from 2pm I'll be at Waterstones in Richmond (2-6 Hill Street), Surrey, signing copies of...

A little idle surfing yesterday produced some information that gave me a pleasant surprise: a Google search on 'classical music blog'...