Saturday 30 December 2017



FREE until midnight tonight (30/12)



Here's what reviewers say about What I Did Not Say:

A really gripping read!

I was blown away by this novel. 

Part 2 was the trial, where the pace and tension were excellent. The pages seemed to turn themselves. 

Thoroughly recommend this well written and thought provoking book to anyone who likes a good story, regardless of genre.

Highly recommended if you prefer characters with depth.

I'd recommend this if you like complex dramas with undercurrents, secrets and hidden depths. 



Jessica Morley is on her way to meet with a man she hasn’t seen for fifteen years. In her bag there is a package she must deliver. As she travels south, she remembers Jack Banford, a boy who captured her imagination as a child and made her believe in a future that could never happen. Now it is time for her to set the record straight and finally put the past behind her. ‘What I Did Not Say’ is a story of loyalty, cruelty and love at all costs.






Wednesday 13 December 2017

Free until 15th December

Four separate short stories to download free!


and...


an excerpt from my disturbing short story, Peaches in the Attic.


Peaches in the Attic



“Once upon a time there was a little girl, a scamp of a thing.  Inquisitive.  Always prying.  She lived in a house, deep in the forest, with her grandmother, who loved her very, very much. 
“One day, the little girl heard a noise…”

I can still recall my grandmother’s voice.  Its subtle inflections could evoke love, sympathy or terror.  I never knew which to expect.  Sitting sideways on her lap, my five-year-old legs long and scrawny, bruised and cut by swings and see-saws, I could smell her perfume, lavender, and the syrupy golden-bubbled barley sugar that she sucked constantly, moving it around her mouth, clattering it against her teeth, as she told me stories. 
Her face was plump, but had deep lines, or so it seemed to me, close-up as I was and, being young, all-seeing.  As I listened, I mapped her features, with the curiosity of a geologist, following the hilly contours of her soft-powdered cheeks, peering into the ravines that cut deep when she smiled, observing the fine ridges that appeared around her lips when she spoke, and, most of all, wondering how long it would take to count the forests of tiny hairs, invisible from a distance, but infinite and fascinating from my vantage point.  Against my fingers, they were silken, flowing in symmetry, downwards and out towards the skin around her ear, smooth and hairless, pale and delicate, where the powder had missed.  Sometimes, I could make out the boundary where it stopped, like a desert giving way to pale land. 

Grandma!  What is that scratching?  cried the little girl.  What name shall we give her?  Shall we call her Jane?  Or Lorna?”
“No!” I would protest.  “Call her Valerie!”

Tuesday 5 December 2017

Competition ends 25th December - don't miss out!

Hello everyone. I'm running a very easy competition to win a copy of my original paperback edition of Bunny on a Bike - a humorous memoir of my time as a croupier in London working for Playboy.  Living and working in London in the 1980s was fun, but working for Playboy was nothing like I'd imagined it would be.  Glad I did it? Yes.  Carol and I, best friends, were full of youthful optimism and joie de vivre - what could go wrong?  

Follow the link for more details and to enter: http://feedaread.com/p/5965/
Good luck!


New edition also available on Amazon as an ebook or paperback:




Friday 10 November 2017

Goodreads Giveaway! NOW ENDED.



Goodreads Book Giveaway

My Grandfather's Eyes by B.A. Spicer

My Grandfather's Eyes

by B.A. Spicer

Giveaway ends November 29, 2017.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.
Enter Giveaway

Wednesday 8 November 2017

Free short story!

I have two offers running at the moment!  Can I tempt you to something new to read?

'Strings', a vintage sci fi short story, is free until 15th November:

View on Amazon


'My Grandfather's Eyes', mystery/psychological thriller, is just 99p/99c until 12th November:

View on Amazon


And while you're here...

My brand new paperback is now published!  'A Good Day for Jumping' has been described as intelligent, surprising and evocative.  Set in Greece, it follows the misadventures of Stephen Firth, a man of considerable wealth, who jilts his bride and runs to Crete, where he was brought up as a child.  The people he meets become more than just playthings and he begins to see that there is more to life than money and power.  'A Good Day for Jumping' is available as an ebook and in paperback.  

View book and reviews on Amazon

Friday 27 October 2017

Excerpt from Bunny on a Bike - for fans of the 80s









1981


One

‘Why Don’t You Ask Me I Might Say Yes!’



I wanted to be a bunny as soon as I saw the advertisement.  Why wouldn’t I? There was no question that it was the most interesting job prospect I’d seen so far. I thought: casinos, glamour, fast cars and millionaires.  But most of all I thought it would be better than working for a living.  So I told Carol and she said we would go to London together.  Easy.  After all, we didn’t have anything else planned for the rest of our lives.  We had both put in just enough effort to get our degrees and, having got this far, didn’t have a clue what to do with them.  Some of our friends were going to be doctors, solicitors or even teachers.  They knew what they wanted.  I hated them all. 
We met up at King’s Cross, eventually.  Carol had managed to get herself almost arrested for slipping past the toilet attendant but, in a stroke of genius, had invented a relative who worked as a toilet attendant in Exeter station and who had been given an award for the cleanest toilets in the South West of England.  Mary, the London loo keeper, thought that she had heard of auntie Georgina and asked Carol to make sure to pass on her regards, before pressing a free token into her hand and wiping a metaphorical tear from her eye, saying that it had been a great pleasure to make her acquaintance and that, when you got up in the morning, you never knew what was going to happen.

Sunday 8 October 2017


99p/99c Ends 13th October!

Funny, colourful and full of joie de vivre!


Amazon US: Stranded in the Seychelles

Also available in paperback: Stranded in the Seychelles

Thursday 7 September 2017

Why not try your luck? Click on 'giveaway details' for this book.


Goodreads Book Giveaway

Bunny on a Bike by Bev Spicer

Bunny on a Bike

by Bev Spicer

Giveaway ends September 22, 2017.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.
Enter Giveaway

Friday 18 August 2017

Excerpt from my latest mystery-thriller, 'What I Did Not Say'.




99p until 25th August

view book on Amazon


Terry


The atmosphere in the courtroom crept into my bones.  Here I stood, accused of murdering Jack Banford.  The past weeks I’d spent in police custody, appalling as they had been, were as nothing to the chill animosity that now flowed towards me from all directions. 
I took a deep breath and looked up.  I would face what was to come.  I would not crouch and hide.
Melissa took the stand first.  Expert witness.  She would presumably be followed by the pathologist, although I was not privy to the order of witnesses, of course. These were just simple thoughts that ran through my mind. So much clutter, trying to organise itself.   
When Melissa looked at me, I met her gaze. Despite my resolve, I felt my knees weaken.  She was here in her professional capacity, the look said.  She was not here as my ally.

“Good morning, my name is Jonathan Bewley, counsel for the prosecution.  Will you state your full name, please?”

Tuesday 8 August 2017

Just a snippet (comments welcome)



I thought I'd post the occasional excerpt from unpublished pieces.  It could be part of a work in progress or a snippet from one of the many 'ideas' I have for my next book.  Friends is the result of something my mother told me about the farm she grew up on in Shropshire in the 1930s.  It's also inspired by the feelings I have for friends I used to know and have lost contact with.  I've experimented with leaving out speech marks.  Hope you like it.



FRIENDS

'Dear Charlie'.  No.  'Dear Charlotte'. No. 'Hi Charlie'.  Maybe.

Two o'clock.  The afternoon seemed hollow.  The washing machine noise irritated her.  If she switched it off, what else would she hear?

Hi Charlie,

It's been a long time.  I was wondering how you were.

Sunday 6 August 2017

Finding new readers

Last week I ran a promotion on One Summer in France in tandem with a Countdown Deal on the next two books in the series, Bunny on a Bike and Stranded in the Seychelles.
I didn’t pay for any marketing, just used the Amazon features. 
Before long, the free downloads were impressive.  In the end, after a five-day promo, I amassed eight hundred and seventy.  Almost double the number I was expecting.  I posted on Facebook and in We Love Memoirs and tweeted once or twice (don’t want to spam my non-writer friends).  Then I found out that BookSCREAM had included One Summer in France in their newsletter.  I found them on Twitter and they seem like a nice bunch of people. Thank you very much indeed for your help! 
Following the promotion, I’ve had modest but very welcome increases in downloads for all three Carol and Bev books and a couple of extras for my other titles, particularly my Memoir of An Overweight Schoolgirl.  Nothing to shout too loudly about – the royalties would have to roll in tsunami-like to change my financial situation.  But, like the majority of authors who take their art seriously, I’m happy to find new readers and get the occasional feedback in a review.

Happy Days


If you want to use BookScream, here’s a link to their Twitter page: BookSCREAM

Saturday 5 August 2017



There are three books in the humorous Bev and Carol series:

One Summer in France (just 99p for your kindle and £6.99 in paperback) is the first adventure, which takes place, you guessed it, in the South of France, and is based on the author's experiences during a study break from university.  I wanted to write a humorous memoir about the wonderful sense of freedom and possibility we all feel when we are just starting out in life as independent people.  It's true that I had some very strange experiences but I had a lot of fun too.  What's more, I learned a great deal about France, its language and its culture.
Although Carol is an entirely fictitious character, the friendship we share in the book is real.  We don't always agree on everything, and like to get the better of one another from time to time.  Bev and Carol are certainly very different characters.  They see the world in very different ways.
One Summer in France has received many positive reviews from readers who perhaps remember a similar time in their lives, when they took so many things for granted that, in adult life, seem to have all but disappeared.
You can download a free sample to your kindle by following the link below.  Why not relax for a while in the company of Bev and Carol in One Summer in France (two girls in a tent).  I hope it puts a smile on your face and takes you back to a less complicated, more spontaneous time:





Bunny on a Bike is the second in the Bev and Carol series. This time, the author recounts her real life experiences as a Playboy croupier in London in the 80s.  Bev and Carol are eager to stick together after university and find the prospect of the graduate jobs available too dull to contemplate.  They see an advertisement in the newspaper for blackjack dealers and apply.
I think you will be surprised at some of the realities of the less than glamorous lives they lead, always looking on the bright side even when faced with landlords from hell and stringent training schedules at Victor Lownes' mansion in Tring.
Bunny on a Bike has the same light touch as One Summer in France.  It's a humorous memoir which follows the lives of two girls thrown into 80s London, and gives an impression of what happened behind the doors of the Playboy casino.
Again, you can download a free sample by following the link below, where the Bev and Caroladventure continues:







Stranded in the Seychelles is the third and most recently published volume in the Bev and Carol series, although I do have plans for a further book at some point.
Our intrepid heroines have had a few years apart after leaving Playboy and have met up once more for a new adventure, this time in the Seychelles as teachers.
Stranded in the Seychelles is based once more on the author's real life experiences as a teacher on the tiny island of Ste. Anne in the middle of the Indian Ocean, and includes lots of local colour and cultural insights along the way.  Bev and Carol are older, but not particularly wiser.  They savour this new opportunity to duck out of the lives they are leading in England and jet off to somewhere altogether more exotic.  Of course it's not all plain sailing and, as usual, the girls have to cope with the unexpected, such things as giant spiders, insect infested cornflakes, heart-stopping bus rides and accident prone cleaners.  But they enjoy their experiences and learn a lot about expat society.
Stranded in the Seychelles will make you laugh just as much as One Summer in Franceand Bunny on a Bike, but this time, Bev and Carol are faced with rather more sobering choices from time to time, in between the absurd and the hilarious.
Follow the link below to download a free sample and find out what they get up to this time:







So, that's it for my humorous books.  If you would like to look at my other books, please go back to my home page and select Novels by B A Spicer. 

Wednesday 26 July 2017

Bev's books - special offers


Want a free fun read this summer?  From 26th - 28th July you can download One Summer in France FREE.



I've also discounted the other books in the series. From 28th July - 4th August you can download Bunny on a Bike



for just 99p each.




Happy reading! 


Monday 24 July 2017

I read, I write, I watch television, I grow stuff. Oh, and I live in France.


Just back from a holiday in Cap d’Agde (pronunciation varies but reminds Al and I of a song involving pushing a pineapple and shaking a tree…). It’s a jolly little resort made up of a million campsites one of which I chose more or less at random.  Yelloh Village – you may have had the pleasure, as it’s a chain.  Anyway, I foolishly took along and failed to read through the latest draft of my new DCI Alice Candy manuscript.  I got to page ten on the third day, hunched over in bed, trying to ignore the rave that was going on not far enough away from my open window, open due to the online misrepresentation of what was supposed to be ‘air-conditioning’ and which was in fact a wall-mounted fan.

Hot and bothered, I squinted at the bundle of A4 paper and blamed my husband for the print size and spacing.  All to no avail as he quoted my request for a font size of twelve and extra wide margins.  Double spacing hadn’t been specified, apparently.

Three days gone.  And editing barely begun.

We had neighbours with young children on either side of our mobile home.  (Mobile homes, or tin boxes with zero sound or heat insulating properties, are not recommended for authors wishing to add value to a manuscript.)  I wanted to make sure there was continuity and check detail.  My neighbours wanted to vie with each other in a ‘tolerant parents’ contest, calling to their children in increasingly harrassed tones, urging them to stop destroying various toys, washing lines, plastic chairs and wooden deckings.  In the end, with nerves frazzled and wanting to strangle someone, anyone, I knew that going to the beach was the only option.

Ah, the beach.  No, really.  The Mediterranean does it well.  Soft sand, blue skies and water heated to a temperature cool enough to make you squeal and yet just perfectly refreshing once you were ‘in’.  If I couldn’t write, I could read, stretched out on my mat, working on my tan.  What could be nicer?  A pleasant walk along the beach?  An enormous human turd in cross-section?  I stepped around it, wondering where the other half might be, still questioning how it had settled next to a group of oblivious tourists chomping on beignets.

Oh, well.

In a matter of what seemed like minutes, with a number of salads under my belt and a higher number of glasses of wine sloshed down in some of the most chilled out restaurants I’d ever eaten in, built on the beach, with the sea fifty metres away, I eventually forgot about the editing I hadn’t been able to do.  I’d had a great time.  And so had my sons and my husband.

The journey home was fabulous.  Our Peugeot 406 had developped alternator problems which had been easy to ignore until the day we left Cap d’Agde.  As we clanked to reception to hand in our signed inventory, pedestrians looked round in astonishment believing, no doubt, that they were moments away from being killed by a tractor with engine problems.

“It’ll be okay,” would be the mantra of the day.
And the magic of positive thought seemed to be working… 

Then, approaching Toulouse a message flashed up on the dashboard, ‘battery charging fault’.  It was the first of many, each one staying on for a little longer.  I diagnosed the problem, slowed down and it disappeared. 

We limped home, grafeful for every mile covered and momentarily appalled as we almost got taken out by a poids lourds pulling out in front of us at two miles an hour from the hard shoulder.  Al shouted, “go, go, go!” and I did.  Never had I been so focussed – I made for the gap with inches to spare.

We got home in one piece and lugged in the cases.

To celebrate, I went to the butcher's and bought entrecotes which we ate with jacket potatoes and butter.  Bye, bye Caesar salad and café liégeois.

Yesterday and today I’ve been putting the garden to rights.  Tomorrow my friends arrive for a week.  We have no car until Thursday.  Maybe I’ll wait until next week to get Alice Candy by the scruff of the neck and sort her out.

Or, I might get started right away… 


The first DCI Alice Candy book is available here.  It’s a dramatic tale that will have you guessing from the start.


Locked Away by B. A. Spicer








Friday 7 July 2017

Living the dream is not quite so simple for Martha Burton.

My lovely house - a lifetime of renovation!

France is wonderful – the weather, the food, the pace of life.  I have a bakery on my doorstep and the beautiful town of Saintes with its majestic river and colourful cafes a short drive away.  In my garden there are tomatoes re-seeded from last year which will be small and sweet and delicious.  I have an olive tree and a ridiculous number of thriving rose bushes.  But the most precious commodity I have is time.  My children are grown and about to fly the nest.  My husband and I look forward to a simple life and a lot more travelling.  And, best of all, I will be able to devote even more time to my writing.

From 14th - 19th July I’m running a promotion on A Life Lived Twice. Although it is most definitely not autobiographical, it is set in France, with lots of authentic detail.  Of course my experiences here have fuelled the setting and the characters to some extent, although this is primarily a work of fiction - thank goodness.

******

Martha Burton is relatively young and attractive, values her newfound independence, has a very healthy bank balance and, although she wouldn’t admit it, is on the lookout for a new man. She leaves behind a faithless husband and a life that has become routine.  When she moves in to a charming Charentaise house and later meets the handsome and enigmatic Clement Berger it's easy to believe that a new and vibrant future beckons.

But the world is inhabited by all kinds of people, some of whom follow imperatives that are too dark to contemplate.  How could Martha have known the dramatic turn her new life would take?




Thursday 13 April 2017

Bonjour tout le monde!
Sunny again this morning in Charente Maritime. Difficult to stay indoors and write, but I shall get to the garden this afternoon. With two huge sons and a husband to cook for, I'll have to pop out to the market at some point too. Luckily, we have one in the village on a Thursday - fifty metres from my door. Just a little further away than the boulangerie...

In other news - I just wanted to let you know that Bunny on a Bike is free today and tomorrow (13 - 14 April) so if you're looking for something lighthearted and fun you've come to the right place! If you do download and enjoy it, please consider leaving a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads - potential readers prefer to choose books with lots of reviews. Thanks a million, and happy reading x

Friday 7 April 2017

Couch to 5k Week Six



Steps 5663  km 4.72  cal. 451  time 40m

Bonjour!  For those of you who have been reading my journey to 5k you might notice that I’ve jumped to week six…  I have been running three times a week since I last posted, but have had no time to write a post as I was (and still am) heavily involved in revising my second DCI Alice Candy book.  However, I’m currently looking at half an hour of precious free time before I go running for the first time on the road near our French house – it’s a 5k loop, fairly safe apart from local unpredictable drivers, some of whom are well into their nineties and probably visualising the road from memory (I kid you not).

Anyway. I did my run around the garden yesterday (yes, I know I should leave a day between runs, but my husband has promised to come with me today – he’s caught the bug) with a new selection of music on an old MP3 player.  Long overdue – how can we be so easily and quickly bored with our music collections?  As the new selection is my husband, Al’s there’s a lot of rock, some of it fairly violent.  But on a ‘random’ setting, I got an inspired variety including Kate Bush, Ozric Tentacles, Johnny Cash and The Cult.  What’s more the sun was shining, the garden was bursting with shiny leaves and emerging colour and my body was functioning in all the ways it should.  Bliss.

Hang on a minute! This running lark seems to be catching.  My son, back from uni only yesterday, has just come downstairs in his dad’s best shorts, downloaded a superior app (mine is apparently rubbish) and disappeared out of the front door a la jog.  My other son is mocking all present while making a saussison seche baguette with cornichons, onion, butter and mayonnaise.  He’s already eaten a handful of grapes, a banana and an apple.  He runs like a gazelle and is super fit and healthy.  And annoyingly smug.

So.  Anyway.  I shall resist having lunch before I set off on a circuit that I will hopefully be able to accomplish without sinking to my knees or rupturing my enthusiasm.  The plan is to start ten minutes before Al, who will try to catch me up.  I’m sure he’ll cheat, but I’m equally sure he won’t set off in time to finish before me – he’s always the last to leave the house. 

Wish me luck.  I shall have to do without music.  Might be the fatal blow.

I’ll post when I can.

A la prochaine.

Sunday 19 March 2017

Couch to 5k Week Four





Week Four 13.3.17


Steps 3834  km 3.08  cal. 291  time 29m


A brisk five-minute walk, then eight minutes of running, five minutes of walking and eight minutes of running.


Week five!  Over half way through.  I like that.  I like it so much I mess up my timings and only do 29 minutes instead of 31.  Never mind.  Weds will be more exciting for it.

On my own today, so sleep in.  Naughty.  Get up to see Victoria Derbyshire ensconced in a semi circle of people who believe (or not) that dogs can sniff out cancer.  Must be a trend – only the other day, there was a woman who could do the same with Parkinson’s.  Ian Duncan Smith did a good job of undermining the voice of science and good sense by quite reasonably suggesting that if it works, it might be worth a try until something more, well, scientific comes along.  Nothing is, apparently, that simple.  The NHS can’t keep dogs – what about feeding them, walking them?  I feel my brain glazing over.  I say, stop arguing about it and let those who want to be diagnosed by a savvy four-legged friend at least have a try.

Homes under the Hammer is on the other side.  Dare I?  I feel myself being dragged under by the 80s current.  Presenters who echo the fashions and music of a bygone age, entrap me.

I finish my toast.  Drink my tea.  Stare at the screen goldfish-like.

Eventually, when I’ve seen how much profit everyone has made, I curse my luck  and get into my leggings.  Blue sky and a surly breeze.  Perfect washing day for sheets and towels.  Damn!

The sheets blow dry and I run.  Marianne Faithfull is in full flow with some of the most colourful language I’ve heard set to music.  I imagine that some of the (quite ball-shrivelling) accusations are aimed at Mick Jagger, not that he will give a hoot.  I find that I like the narratives more than I thought I would.  Four letter, mainly anatomical words abound, along with ever more cutting recriminations and a slightly contradictory world view.  Go Marianne!

Is it smoking that gives her voice such gravel?

I run.  Almost without noticing.  I have absolutely no shortness of breath, although my legs wouldn’t cope for long with a faster sprint.  I might try next time.

My garden is coming along.  I edged some of it yesterday but was awake all last night, itching.  It’s either cancer of the kidney or an allergic reaction to some of the weeds I strangled.

Fingers crossed.  There are three dogs in the impasse.

Times’s up.  Saunter.  Smug expression.  Lunchtime – does it count as lunchtime if I’ve just had breakfast?

I believe it might.

A mercredi?




Week Four 15.3.17


Steps 4089  km 3.32  cal. 314  time 31m




Blue skies and garden coming to life.  Feeling on top of the world.  No time to write blog.  Too much to do.



Week Four 18.3.17


Steps 4729  km 3.88  cal. 369  time 34m


Missed Friday so just did my run today (Saturday).  I tuned in to the music of Queen and hoped it wouldn’t go on forever.  When the rhythm took me I upped the energy level and was surprised how fast I could go.  Pushed myself.  Actually got out of breath today.  Time was up, but Brian Ferry started singing More than This and I wasn’t going to stop him.  Took me back to the idealism of my youth and made me want to write a book.  I’d call it The Bits that Matter.  In the meantime, I have to practically re-write my second Alice Candy mystery.  I’m up for the challenge, though.  My advice: Get running – there’s nothing like it for boosting those brain cells.

My posts have shrunk.  If anyone is reading them and notices, apologies.  I will probably get back to normal next week.  Probably  But as long as I’m doing the running, that’s the main thing, isn’t it?

A la semaine prochaine  x




























Sunday 12 March 2017

Couch to 5k Week four

Week Four 6.6.17

Steps 3266  km 2.64  cal. 249  time 25m


The new schedule: a brisk 5-minute warm-up walk then 3 minutes of running, 90 seconds walking, 5 minutes running, 2 ½ minutes walking, 3 minutes running, 90 seconds walking, 5 minutes running.

Back to morning running.  Fruit for breakfast – I sometimes feel the need for an apple with my cup of tea.  We watch another episode of Fortitude as the thought of BBC’s Louise and Dan on the couch is just a little underwhelming in comparison to great drama.  The Arctic landscape is bleak and the murders brutal.  The two policewomen are reminiscent of Laurel and Hardy.  The sheriff’s smile makes my blood run cold.

Should I watch another episode?

Got to get moving.

Outside, the weather is blowing a storm.  Trees are down in the village.  But I love the wind.  I set off at a brisk pace and am soon jogging easily.  First up is Gotye with Somebody I Used to Know – I can’t resist singing along.  Then comes Grace Jones and my running takes on a whole new rythmn.

I think of a place I used to work in London, Bond Street.  The mind makes strange connections.  It was a family business dealing in high quality, high tensile bin bags.  Amanda was the boss’s daughter, selling bin bags over the phone with her educated banter and plummy tones.  She and her millionaire boyfriend had gone to see Grace Jones in concert.  It was back in the late 70s and I was a Blondie lookalike who’d never heard of  Pull up to the Bumper.

Mirror Man and Electric Dreams send me into a different, more nostalgic, more romantic mood.  The garden takes on a summer haze and I picture perfect afternoons spent in the arms of perfect men (isn’t imagination a wonderful thing…). 

With Happy Mondays Twisting my Melons, I start to wonder about the rest of my day.  Writing, a lunchtime walk with Al, a dental appointment, shopping, and cooking dinner.  And planning a trip to Berlin.  It could be worse.

Time is up.

A mercredi?




Week Four 8.3.17

Steps 3626  km 2.95  cal. 2.79  time 27.5m


First, let me note that I forgot to progress to week four schedule on Monday.  Just realised!

Today, I’m thrilled to see an increase in my stats.  Almost touching 3k and running is much easier.  Too late for the olympics, but keeps me out of walking netball.  I’m aiming to be able to run for a bus, leap on a moving train or take part in my future grandchildren’s egg and spoon race without flushing purple.  All looks good at the moment.

Only downside today has been the music.  Japan.  Just Japan.  I like a bit of Japan in a bar, as an alternative to jazz, but after 27.5 minutes of David Sylvian droning on, replacing lyrics with dum, dum, dums and la, la, las.  Ad infinitum.  Well, I must say I pulled out my earphones and considered the various methods of pruning my wayward garden, wondering at the same time when I had turned into a person who prunes.

But I didn’t skip ahead on my MP3.

I simply put in an earphone every couple of minutes to see if anything with a bit more life had arrived.  Not a bit of it.  And, as I began to write up this blog I decided to leave the MP3 running, just to flush out the last remaining dirges.  The net result of this is that I shall begin on Friday to the outrageously fabulous Hendrix and his wailing guitar.  Good.

Back in the house I couldn’t be bothered to do the cool down.  I know.  I should have.  Nobody’s perfect.

Instead, I shall shower, listen to Charlton Heston reading The Old Man and the Sea while I concoct a pork curry for the slow cooker.  Requested by my son.

When we are on our own, I tell Al, we will eat at lunchtime and in the evening, we’ll sit by the sea for aperos then come home for romance and cheese. 

A vendredi?




Week Four 10.3.17

Steps 3718  km 3.04  cal. 289  time 27.5m


Woke up to the most beautiful blue sky and sunshine at my bedroom window.  And, yes, the birds were singing their hearts out.

Toast and marmalade for me, peanut butter for Al.

Today, we are being encouraged by the BBC to listen to a very affable man and his adoring colleague.  They want us to count penguins.  More interesting to me is mapping the surface features of Mars.  And wondering why Sally is wearing her grandmother’s lacy blouse.  Oh, and she has a dog on her lap.  There are more dogs.  Ones that behave badly.  Apparently, according to an expert, we shouldn’t reward bad behaviour. Who knew? BBC in depth investigative insight at its best.

In a random universe I shouldn’t have been surprised when Susie Quatro appeared, unchanged in style, if not in physiology.  We switch off.

Round and round the garden.  I’ve actually started to wear a track.  Lots of dew on the grass, but the weather is pure summer bliss.  I fill my lungs and remember the bike ride I had to work in Cambridge in the midst of lorries and cars and untrained cyclists from all over the world.  With my three-year-old son on the back, we would could the different words for rain and snow.  I remember getting to twenty-six.

Hendrix sings in one ear and plays guitar in the other.  He shoots his fickle woman, muddles through a purple haze, before turning up all along the watchtower.  I try to work out why he is such a genius and decide that genius is not something that can be defined.  I just let the music penetrate my soul and take me back to parties, youth, laughing, dancing, joie de vivre.

My track is turning muddy.

My favourite primrose is flowering next to the compost bin.

Daffodils that have survived the storms are brilliant, brilliant yellow.

Madonna injects me with vigour.  She’s a dancy kind of girl.  Good for joggers.  I remember being surprised that such a scraggy, untalented young girl had become so famous when I returned to England after two years in Greece.  Holiday was the song that got her noticed, apparently.  All I saw was a Cindy Lauper lookalike who couldn’t really sing.  Much better now. Hard not to be envious of her jaw and waistline.

Time’s nearly up and I’m not in the least exhausted.  My knees are fine.  No twinges in my muscles.  Alice in Chains delights me with a version of The Man Who Sold the World.  Better than Bowie?  Would that be blasphemous?  I remember my grandmother’s warning: comparison is odious. Where did that come from!

My final seconds.  A perfect start to my morning.  And as Marianne Faithfull begins Broken English, I pull out my ear plugs and go inside.  I’ll switch off my MP3 player when she’s finished.

Happy days!

A la semaine prochaine?








































Sunday 5 March 2017

Couch to 5k Week three



Week Three 27.2.17

Steps 3161  km 2.54  cal. 239  time 25m


Hmm… my stats seem to be a little down on last week.  To the discerning analyst it would perhaps suggest that my fitness level has taken a small hit of the ‘weekend away’ variety.

On the other hand, it could be that the very basic counter is not very accurate on Mondays.

Breakfast was porridge.  TV was dominated by the Oscar Awards mess-up.  Do you think Fay Dunnaway failed to read the nomination properly?  Or at all?  Very entertaining, very gracious, not very bright.  Heads will roll, but only some will care.  Other news was tragic.  Mobile phone users cause road accidents – who knew?  So police it!  Create a device to disable phones in cars?  Or am I being naïve?

On with the kit and out into the white day.  Coolish and drizzle a possibility, but for the moment it’s dry (except for the grass).  I begin with the five-minute warm up.  Then it’s 90 secs running/90 secs walking, followed by 3 mins running/3mins walking.  For total of 25 mins (including warm up).

Music begins with Telegraph Road – a Dire Straits epic.  Can’t say I was thrilled with it in the context of my regime.  Bit ploddy. Went on, and on, and on.  Fabulous, of course, but still a bit ploddy.  No skipping rule remained in force and I listened to the interminable journey through decades and across miles.  Went into a kind of daze. Nice guitar bits. Daze.

Then came an Echo and the Bunnymen selection.  Not much of an improvement – but I did get into People are Strange.  The lyrics can’t be that simple and yet incomprehensible, can they? 

Never mind.

Time is nearly up.  I have a slight twinge in my right shin.  I slow to a walk for the last minute.  This is payback for missing my Friday run. 

Into the house and do my stretches (a bit). 

Week three needs to be taken seriously.  Who can I find to do such a thing?

Life is calling – housework first, then shopping, then writing.  Or I could start the other way round.  

A mercredi x






Week Three 1.3.17

Steps 3202  km 2.56  cal. 241  time 25m


Well.  Breakfast was toast and Marmite (one slice) and marmalade (the other slice) preceded by a glass of green tea and accompanied by a cup of Yorkhire.  Outside, the weather was asking for a derogatory comment, but I went straight to the living room for the latest BBC could offer.

Today we will be fined more for using a mobile phone whilst in our car and will have six points instead of three on our licence.  Newly qualified drivers will potentially lose their licence.  Don’t know whether to be pleased or not.  Sounds like fluff. Why are human beings so difficult to train?

More news about Trump and his new, more stately image.  More news about football.  And lovely Carol brings us giant daffodils, tranquil lakes, another version of the only dress design she possesses, an unstable hair piece and an irresistibly jolly demeanor.  Thank you, Carol, for your everlasting positivity.

Outside, the weather is still vile.  Should I brave it?

******Interlude*****

Four o’clock in the afternoon and it’s stopped raining.  Off I go.  Warm up, brisk five minutes walk and, up to my heels in mud, I break into what can only be described as a dangerously euphoric jog.

Today I have Echo and the Bunnymen in all their forms.  They sound like an 80s band (cue xylophone).  They sound like U2 – nice pipes.  They sound like The Cure.  Maybe they just sound too generic for their own good.  Nice tunes, though.  Pleasant.  Just about right for jogging and thinking about something entirely different. 

I pass the washing line and a wet towel slaps me across the face.

New game of dodge the towel – nice distraction.

The garden is very soggy.  It’s the time of year when roses start to come into leaf only to rot on the stems before being burned to a crisp by the French sunshine.  Every year I get rid of the most susceptible varieties and every year I try another.  Result – more blackspot and yellow leaves.

What we need is astroturf and a pool.

I notice there is a bird’s nest in the Red Robin bush.  It seems that the sacrifice made by previous birds to the cat kingdom is a ritual that will continue.  What to do?  Spray cat deterrent? Build a fence? Frighten away the bird?  Let nature take its course?

Last year the cat did the frightening.  Mother bird fled.  Baby birds got eaten (I presume).

I check my time.  Three minutes left.  I could run for another hour or so…

Inside for stretches and time for a nice coffee – we have a machine!  Al is now officially running on caffeine – locked away in his office being a wage slave. 

I’m running on sauerkraut, grated carrot and boiled ham.  Got to shift a few kilos for the good weather.  Only fair on the neighbours.

A vendredi x






Week Three 3.3.17

Steps 3203  km 2.57  cal. 242  time 25m



Toast, tea, grapefruit juice and, on a sudden whim, a little of the next episode of Fortitude to ease ourselved into the day.  Must say I’m hooked. 

I have a student this morning – exceptionellement.  So running is delayed a little, allowing the sun to establish itself in my French garden.  Nice.  I change, forget to warm up and get outside before someone asks me to do anything. 

Echo and the Bunnymen are Breaking the Back of Love and I’m loving it.  Tones of Bowie.  Energising.  Then comes Frankie with Two Tribes and I up my pace.  It’s time I cut the grass.  Need rabbits or a goat.

The wind blows my hair around and the music keeps coming.  Then, disaster!  Gary Jules and Mad World.  It’s as though I’ve been given chocolates, a good book and a sedative.  I ramp up my resistance and don’t skip the song, punching the air I let the lyrics fly over my head.  Going nowhere, going nowhere…  No expression, no expression… Why does he have to repeat everything.  I’m on a downward spiral.  When people run in circles…My hackles rise.  I will not give in. 

At last, Radar Love!  Memories of university life, a well-stocked juke box, Special Brew and blackcurrant.  I’m back in the smoke, in the dirt and the LIFE.  Keele, with its vibrant students’ union and liberal politics.  Rugby boys bare their bums in the bar, girls keep their distance and smoke demurely (some of them).  There is noise and a sense that anything is possible.

Time’s up.  My cheeks glow.  It’s almost time for lunch.

Happy days!

See you next week?  I’ll try to have some pics next time.