Monday 31 October 2016

Granny Smith FREE BOOK promotion starting 1st November

Granny Smith: Murder Plot, the latest and fourth book in my successful Granny Smith series is free for download from Amazon for the next five days. That's free - not costing a single penny, cent or Euro - now that's got to be a good thing. So please take advantage of this offer and grab yourself a few hours of great entertainment in the company of that heavy metal loving senile delinquent, Granny Smith - all I ask if that you leave a review on Amazon - please, please do that. And maybe, just maybe you'll buy one of the other books in the series. Hey, us writers have got to pay the bills too.

What the reviews say:

Brilliant! This Author has the ability make you you believe you are in the story actually visualizing what is going on! I simply love the character Granny Smith and her family ,
The setting is just right! I have bought all of Mr Dobbs books and can not put them down always thrilling and humorous at the same time.When is the next one out can't wait!!!!! Mr Dobbs has written some really exciting books keep them coming. 


I loved this book, it made me laugh out loud a few times. The characters are believable. Anyone who likes funny, light hearted murder mysteries should read this. I can't wait for the next one, I hope there are more to come.

She's back! I have a soft spot for this pipe smoking granny. The police don't like her, murderers don't like her but the public and media
love her. Back in the spotlight Granny swings into action to solve the body in the water butt. 'Murder Plot' is a hugely entertaining read with Author Gary M Dobbs really getting to grips with his creation. In places I laughed out loud. Full of character and the odd famous name I thoroughly recommend this book. She's back!

I downloaded this book and couldn't put it down its brilliant granny smith is a no nonsense lady that has a way of getting to the truth which is sheer brilliance she really is miss marple on steroids cant wait for the next book in the series 


WHO IS GRANNY SMITH?

Imagine Miss Marple pumped full of steroids and you pretty much have Granny Smith. This pipe smoking, heavy metal loving pensioner sleuth certainly doesn't fit in with the stereotypical amateur detective - she's got more in common with Mike Hammer than she does with Jessica Fletcher. Granny is very much a product of her time...she came of age during the Sixties and her attitudes were forged during that decade of freedom. She claims to have once slept with Keef Richards and insists that Paul McCartney was thinking of her when he wrote the song, Famous Groupies.

On the Origins of Granny Smith



Of course Granny Smith’s real name wasn’t Granny but everyone called her Granny. It wasn’t because she was a grandmother, though she was three times over, but rather because as a child she had loved apples, would take one to school for her lunch each and every day. It seemed that wherever she went an apple went with her and so associated with the fruit had she become that eventually some bright spark had nicknamed her Granny Smith after that popular Australian variety of apple.
She was seventy one years old and her given name was Mary Alice Davies, which meant she had the rather unfortunate initials - M A D, but she had never let that bother her and besides, she had often reasoned; when I marry I will have a totally different surname.  Eventually she had married a local man who went by the name of Arthur Smith, Smith of course, like Davies, being a common enough name, and she did indeed get a new surname, in fact her nickname became her surname. However because most people knew her by the nickname, Granny Smith, no one seemed to notice when she became a Smith for real, and, if truth be told, to many people she would remain forever mad.

The first Granny Smith book was very popular, scoring steady sales and even entering Amazon's top ten for cozy mysteries during the week of publication - the three books that have followed in the series have also scored strong sales and many many glowing reviews. People seem to like Granny.


Granny Smith Investigates is also available as an audiobook from Audible with other books in the series to follow soon. TO GET THE AUDIOBOOK SIMPLY VISIT AUDIBLE AND DO A SEARCH FOR, 'GRANNY SMITH INVETIGATES


The latest book in the series is Murder Plot and from 1st November 2016 the book will be free to download from Amazon worldwide - why not grab a free book and I hope this prompts you to buy the other three books in the series. There'll be another full length, Granny Smith adventure next Spring and this Christmas will see a festive Granny Smith short story available as a Kindle Single.

So some on folks - what are you waiting for? Head on up the Amazon and grab a slice of Granny Smith.....you'll be glad you did.

And remember please support the series by leaving a review on Amazon - nothing shifts books like good reviews. Also share this blog post with all your friends and tell them all about Granny Smith....she's Miss Marple on Steroids, Batman with dentures and a whole lot of fun.








Thursday 27 October 2016

Fox's Lethal Weapon

Generally small screen crime dramas are far more cerebral than their ancestors from the 1970's heyday of TV crime shows - that's not the case with Fox's Lethal Weapon which owes as much to TV's Starskey and Hutch as it does to the movie franchise from which it takes its name and central characters. That's not such a bad thing and the show offers a welcome antidote to the grim and gritty milieu which has become the norm with the genre. The likes of True Detective, the first season at least, may have offered compelling viewing with its mix of great writing and understated acting but sometimes it is nice to put your brain in neutral and watch TV for the sheer spectacle itself.

Lethal Weapon then is in no way realistic but then it doesn't intend to be and certainly doesn't need to be. With a title like Lethal Weapon viewers are not expecting another True Detective but rather a return to the buddy/buddy genre and all the elaborate explosions, car chases and fist fights that entails. And on this score the Lethal Weapon series certainly delivers.

So far I've seen three episodes of the first season and after a piss poor pilot episode which basically revamped the plot of the first movie but with far less class, the show looks like it is finding its feet. Of course it is haunted by the ghosts of Mel Gibson and Danny Glover, not to mention Joe Pesci, but when you get over the fact that this is a new Lethal Weapon with new lead actors then the show starts to make some kind of sense.

The jury is still out on this one and although the show is ridiculous I did enjoy the second episode far more than the pilot and the third episode was pretty solid, if a little daft. There's a genuine chemistry between the two leads which if allowed to develop may even match that displayed by Mel Gibson and Danny Glover, and the secondary cast provide solid support to the mismatched cops.

How do I rate this show then? Well, it's a little early to say but I will be sticking with it for a few more episodes yet.

NEWS - LETHAL WEAPON marked FOX’s highest fall premiere in two years, with a 3.2/12 Live + 7 rating among Adults 18-49 and 12.4 million viewers across all platforms to date, propelling FOX Wednesday to be premiere week’s highest-rated night of entertainment programming.  It is the No. 3 new drama this season (tied with “Bull”), with a 3.0/11 in Live + 7 among Adults 18-49 and the average multi-platform audience for the show is 11.5 million viewers in Live + 7.

Wednesday 26 October 2016

Get ready

Gilfach was a quiet Welsh village set deep within the picturesque valleys – Was, being the operative word since the peacefulness is shattered by a spate of killer clowns and a full scale terrorist hunt.
John Smith is an everyday sort of man with everyday concerns. He spends his time working at the local supermarket, walking his dog and arguing with his domineering wife, Rose.

Soon however John Smith through a series of events completely beyond his control finds himself with the tag of Britain’s most wanted.

John Smith is the reluctant terrorist.

Oscar, BAFTA and now we have the Stiffie

The Erotic Review have announced that they are to introduce an award for writing good sex in fiction. The publishers state that they want to remove the seediness associated with erotic writing and the counter the infamous Bad Sex Award which is held each year by The Literary Review.

Lisa Moylett, publisher, told The Times newspaper: “We are throwing down the gauntlet. No more ‘bad sex’ writing. That is not something we should be celebrating.” The publisher was recently joined by Mariella Frostrup, editor of the recently released Desire: 100 of Literature’s Sexiest Stories,at The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival and backed this point up.

Speaking of the award, Toby Lichtig recently wrote in, The Guardian Newspaper - 'In a sense, my question is: what is good sex in fiction as opposed to mere pornography? (Which also leads me to ask: does good fiction suddenly stop becoming good if it's arousing?) I suppose one problem is that sex is so often idealised in books, as it is in films. Earth-moving, transcendental, simultaneously-orgasmic sex is far more common in the history of the world's storytelling than is an awkward, exhausted and querulous quickie between setting the alarm and getting up to calm the baby. But good bad sex (the embarrassment, the mutual misunderstanding) should be honoured in fiction no more nor less than the real fireworks.'

Personally I take all of the points listed above, and I suppose an award for good sex writing is no different to awards for writing in other genres, The Daggers, for instance given for good crime writing but there will always be an element of sniggering where sex is involved. Hey, it's the British way and the award is not really going to be called A STIFFIE you know. Though, I can't help thinking that maybe it should.

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