Thank you to Robbie Cheadle for this thoughtful review of This Is Lockdown for Rosie’s Book Review Team. I truly appreciate her taking the time to read and review.
Thrilled to say that tomorrow is the launch day for This Is Lockdown, a compilation of diaries, flash fiction, poetry and short stories, an anthology: from the ‘isolation writers,’ on the topic of isolation for writers and creatives during COVID19, plus brilliant poetry and writings.
I’m thrilled that Jane Horwood and Melissa Santiago-Val have contributed a piece about their fundraising venture #CommunityMasks4NHSsharing their amazing face masks for the NHS health service and free masks for charities and not for profit organisations.
To date Jane and Melissa have raised a staggering £30,000.
And the masks are really cool! Here I am wearing a sea themed one. Yes, I am missing the wee fishes! No snorkelling for me… No holidays abroad. Sigh. So, I am spreading the word… get yourself a face mask, perhaps one for each day of the week!
The awesome contributing authors are old friends and new…
I’m so glad I started this project, it has connected me to new friends in the author world and strengthened ties with old pals too.
Sweet.
There is such variety in This Is Lockdown… something for everyone.
In fact, Willow referred to it as:
A piece of living history…
Poetry, diaries, writings, humour, thoughts, feelings, fears and hope.
Without hope the human race is lost. Keep hoping for a better world.
I hope you enjoy This Is Lockdown, I truly enjoyed writing, compiling the anthology featuring numerous authors and bringing it all together –it is my first anthology!
Thank you so much to Sally Cronin for taking the time to read and review This Is Lockdown which releases 20th July. The kindle is currently on preorder via Amazon.
Read the thoughtful and detailed review via the following link:
Thank you to Beaton for this wonderful blog tour post for the release of This Is Lockdown. It is currently on preorder and will be released 20th July. Available via Amazon Kindle.
Lorraine writes bestselling crime: The DI Sterling series. There’s no crime in This Is Lockdown but Lorraine features a wide variety of authors in her Friday Fiction Features. She also has a critique and mentoring service plus information for writers on her blog.
19th July – Recap Promo of all the great promos- M J Mallon
Launch week:
20th July – Launch Day Promo M J Mallon – Lockdown Quotes. 21st July – Sharon Wilden of Shaz’s book blog – promo 22nd July – Ritu Kaur BP 23rd July – Richard Dee 24th July – D G Kaye ( Q and A) 25th July – Marian Wood
25th of July is the last day of the tour as I am going on holiday thereafter and taking a break from social media! As this has been a huge project and I reckon I will be exhausted by then.
The fabulous authors, bloggers and creatives who have contributed to This Is Lockdown. I’d like to give a shout out to them all.
Part one includes my personal diaries and poetry during lockdown, the ‘isolation writers’ discussing the impact of this extraordinarily stressful time on their lives, poems and writings from authors, bloggers and a piece from Jane Horwood and Melissa Santiago-Val about their fabulous fundraising mask venture for the NHS.
Look at these:
Part two continues with my writings during lockdown: poetry, short stories, (including my YA short story The Poet’s Club, and flash fiction plus a more mature Love Affair, (short piece set post virus.)
It has been quite a learning curve for me – my first compilation/anthology!
The formatting was a challenge. There are lots and lots of photographs in this collection. The majority are observational photos I’ve taken during allowed walks of all manner of things including concrete frogs hidden below bridges…. and my thoughts about why this fellow is there… So mysterious…
There are also lovely kitty photos from my good friend Samantha Murdoch… Now that’s a face! Poor Charlie, kitty, what is the matter?
As well as fetching author photos… and masked up photos from myself, Beaton, and the Masks4NHS venture.
Anyway, it is a true account of my observations, and the thoughts of authors, bloggers and creatives from the UK, US, Canada, Italy and Zimbabwe.
Wherever we are, we are all feeling it. This time unites us in a way that we could never have imagined.
I created the ebook cover on Canva using a photograph in my own collection of images, a magical gate in Cambridge, you might perhaps have seen it before?
There’s lots of my personal stories, including baking ones…
There’s skype chats and all manner of thoughts and feelings expressed: from serious, sad, anxious meltdowns to humorous glimpses of the bizarre nature of life during COVID19.
And there’s lots of exercise… oddly shared with various members of the insect kingdom.
I share my thoughts on the politics of the moment.
I will continue writing my diaries in case there is a book two in this series. I hope there won’t be! I hope we escape a second wave but the way things are going…
This Is Lockdown is currently in draft stage and is with beta readers. There may be a few changes and some additional writers to the project.
I’m looking for blog tour hosts.
If you’d be interested in joining my street team for the book launch let me know in the comments below.
I have a small but friendly group for this project on Facebook – Isolation For Writers:
Time to catch up on my COVID Diaries… I’ve been very busy of late finishing edits on my second book in my series The Curse of Time Book 2 Golden Healer. They are now finished and I am pleased to say I have now passed my manuscript on to Heena Rathmore Pardeshi https://crazycatwriter.com/ for a critique and proofread service.
So, let’s go back in time…
4th May
I slept badly the night before so I’m feeling tired. My eldest daughter Tasha and I still did our workout session but it was a gentle one. We both thought it would suit a granny! Which is just as well…We finished it off by doing some yoga.
I tidied my office and did some editing of the second book in my Curse of Time series. Later, my hubby and I went to the supermarket. My friend Hanna was in the queue too, so we stopped to chat to each other – following the social distancing rules – of course. You can’t exactly talk quietly due to the distance imposed, so I shouted across the queue about the fire…
What fire?
IVC is the local secondary school that my kids went to. Apparently, a skip lit and the fire spread to the roof of the performing arts block. Strange, sounds like arson to me. A friend of my daughter heard two large explosions, they thought it was an earthquake, or something. Everyone is so on edge at the moment that any loud bangs, or noises would be enough to trigger an attack of the nerves.
I wonder how the fire happened?
Getting back to the shopping trip with hubby. Whilst inside…
We argued down the aisles, in a feisty banter kind of way and I saw one of the local mum’s smirking at us.
Our shopping trip was so distracting. Both hubby and I bought four packs of onions, so we’ve got lots of onions to eat!
Next time I’m going on my own! Hubby’s idea of shopping consists of ample supplies of alcohol, and no treats apart from one bar of chocolate! How to survive lockdown with no crisps, nuts… Mind you, judging by our horrendous food bill perhaps we should start a starvation diet.
Oh, and I had a couple of guests in my Isolation for Writers Series:
It’s been a funny day. Aren’t they all? I finally cleared out my office. I am such a hoarder! I found things stuffed behind things that I didn’t even know were there. Nevertheless, it was interesting. We discovered three large bags of old photos and an airmail letter from my dad when he’d been working abroad in Swaziland. My eldest daughter Natasha has never seen an airmail letter before! What a lovely find. His writing was atrocious though. What a job I had reading it. Basically, it was to congratulate me on the birth of baby Georgina! And to send his love and well wishes to hubby’s dad who was ill at that time. Sadly, hubby’s dad passed away shortly after that letter was sent and Grandpa James never got a chance to see his new grand-daughter in person, which is especially sad as he always wanted lots of grand-children.
Also, I came across an old newspaper cutting of Tasha when she was three years old with her Grandma (my mum, who must have been about my age at that time,) at a hospice event.
How young my mum looked. Time flies by too fast.
I also found some old photos of hubby and I when we were young! That was funny, me draped all over him looking loved up… There was one of me wearing a leopard skin crop top and tight matching leggings. We were going to a fancy dress party. Memories, yes, it was a day of memories.
Other than that we did our gym session in the garden around 11am. Me, and the girls, and then we had lunch afterwards.
Hubby decided to climb up a ladder to sand the outside windows for painting. This made me very nervous as he’s so high up. He decided to wear his bike helmet for protection but at that height if he fell…
At one point, I went upstairs to pass him the sander and I saw this wasp on the window ledge. I was too frightened to tell him it was there in case he fell off the ladder. Later, I realised the wasp was dead!
Then Gina had an almighty melt down brought on by us all making so much noise whilst she’s completing her university assignments. Hubby was making this annoying sound with his sander, or yelling at me to get him something he needed. What a job I had calming her down. She said she wanted to go back to Manchester. No chance of that – no one can go anywhere. So, I suggested we sit in the car for a while. She brought her laptop and we looked at it together, with tears in her eyes. Bless her. Then hubby came out, looking at us as if we were bonkers. He asked why we were sitting in the car! I explained about the noise and he said he’d finish for the day. Thank goodness it’s quiet now. Phew, it’s just as well I used to be a therapist. Sometimes, I need to be to calm this lot down…
Who knows what tomorrow will bring. I hope it is a bit calmer…
6th May.
I had a terrible night’s sleep. Stress of yesterday? Perhaps it was also exacerbated by hubby teasing, saying that he was leaving the long ladder by our bedroom window for a thief, or Romeo to come in. I woke at 3.30am. I thought I heard someone climbing up the ladder. No doubt it was just my imagination! One of the hazards of being a writer is you always imagine the craziest things. I couldn’t get back to sleep so I crept out of bed and started blogging – as you do!
By the time hubby was up, I’d had enough, so I went back to bed and managed a couple of hours sleep before Tasha came looking for me. I didn’t join in with a keep fit, or yoga workout today, or take part in Writing Sprints. Shame. Instead, I edited some of the Curse of Time, beta read and finished a poetry collection for Sarah Northwood, Poetry for The Heart and Soul which I loved. Here is the link to her beta reading group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/877149636124566/
As well, I started working on a blog post about my daughter Georgina’s fashion/social media profile.
Georgina seemed a lot more cheery today. She was all dressed up, make up on and had made excellent progress on her assignment. She even mentioned that it wasn’t as hard as she originally thought! Kids, hey… They give you such grief and then say everything is okay…
Oh, and Tasha and I sneaked out for a ride in the car. What an adventure! We didn’t go too far but it was nice to see neighbouring villages.
What have you been doing during this difficult time. Please share in the comments.