Available now

Armistice

Available now in both print and digital editions.


Looks at the Cardiff Pals and other local regiments who fought in the Great War and how the experience of war impacted on the area, from the initial enthusiasm for sorting out the German Kaiser in time for Christmas 1914, to the gradual realization of the enormity of human sacrifice the families of Cardiff were committed to as the war stretched out over the next four years. An important place for Coal export this book looks at how the balance between working and fighting was achieved by the Dockyard workers

The Great War affected everyone. At home there were wounded soldiers in military hospitals, refugees from Belgium and later on German prisoners of war. There were food and fuel shortages and disruption to schooling. The role of women changed dramatically and they undertook a variety of work undreamed of in peacetime. Meanwhile, men serving in the armed forces were scattered far and wide. Extracts from contemporary letters reveal their heroism and give insights into what it was like under battle conditions.



Amazon, Pen and Sword Books, Waterstones and anywhere books are sold.....

Sunlight a hundred years dead

Watching filmed footage of the First World War one gets an odd sensation - we are aware that what we are witnessing are horrific events, and yet there is so much distance between now and then that it is difficult to fully appreciate the enormity of the situation presented in the grainy film. The movements of the men on the screen seems jerky, almost as if they were created by animation and the explosions are merely puffs of smoke, fleeting and seemingly insubstantial. Photography is basically the capture of light and what we are watching is sunlight a hundred years dead.

Prior to starting work on my book, Cardiff and the Valley's In The Great War (published Feb 28th 2015 by Pen and Sword Books), my knowledge of the so called Great War was limited to a list of dates and major battles. But by the time I finished the book I had a far greater understanding of the conflict. It had been brought closer to me, and now I saw it as a very human story. No longer was it some far distant war, the combatants made up of anonymous names and faces, the devastation lessened by the passing of the years, but something very real, something that I felt on a deeply emotional level. There were times when I was writing that I found tears in my eyes - one such instance was when I detailed the eventual fate of the Cardiff Pals, but there were others too. Writing the book had brought me closer to these soldiers who long before I was born took to the foreign fields to protect a way of life for future generations...for you and me, if you like.

The research for the book was immense and I spent many hours going through old newspapers in Cardiff's excellent Central Library, covered many miles traveling up and down the country visiting graveyards and the offices of military records and on several occasions meeting people who had stories to tell of relatives who had fought in the war.

I am immensely proud of this book. 

I do hope many of you pick up a copy.



Cardiff in The Great War - Looks at the Cardiff Pals and other local regiments who fought in the Great War and how the experience of war impacted on the area, from the initial enthusiasm for sorting out the German Kaiser in time for Christmas 1914, to the gradual realization of the enormity of human sacrifice the families of Cardiff were committed to as the war stretched out over the next four years. An important place for Coal export this book looks at how the balance between working and fighting was achieved by the Dockyard workers The Great War affected everyone. At home there were wounded soldiers in military hospitals, refugees from Belgium and later on German prisoners of war. There were food and fuel shortages and disruption to schooling. The role of women changed dramatically and they undertook a variety of work undreamed of in peacetime. Meanwhile, men serving in the armed forces were scattered far and wide. Extracts from contemporary letters reveal their heroism and give insights into what it was like under battle conditions.


The book can be purchased now from any bookshop and there is also a Kindle version available.

This November will see the publication of a companion volume that looks at the second world war.

Keep Calm and Read On

Following the success of my book, Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War , the publishers commissioned a follow up to be entitled Cardiff at War 1939 - 1945. As you can imagine the book requires a lot of careful research and recently while going through news archives I found a newspaper article from January 1940 that I'd like to share here.

It seems that during the early years of the war there was a spike in reading - I'm not sure if this was nationwide but Cardiff library found itself incredibly busy. So much so in fact that the library collected together its data and told the South Wales Echo of its most popular titles.

Black Out Makes Cardiff Read More, the newspaper headlined. which means there must have been a lot of candles burning behind those black out curtains. Though as of yet I've not found an article on the spike in candle sales  - Escapist fiction was understandable extremely popular, as was Richard Llewellyn's beautiful How Green was my Valley - apparently people who saw the hardships of the coal mining industry first hand also enjoyed reading about them. The public were also very keen to educate themselves on the background of the crisis in Europe and books about Germany and Hitler in particular were hired out often. Hitler' s Mein Kampf was eagerly read, as was Hitler Speaks which reproduced a lot of the mad little Charley Chaplin impersonator's speeches.


There was also a revival in classic literature and Wuthering Heights was particularly popular.

As a book lover myself, a constant reader I took great pleasure from reading the article, and it's nice to think of all those people hunched over a book in the dimness of the black out - I wonder what they would have thought of the Kindle Paperwhite?

Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War (Pen and Sword Books) is available now in both print and electronic formats. Check it out by CLICKING HERE

Cardiff at War 1939 - 1945 is scheduled to be published December 2018.

Where the Dead things are.....

Available now in print and eBook -my new crime/mystery thriller.

1940 – France has fallen and Britain stands alone against the might of the German war machine; a fierce battle for supremacy of the air rages in the skies as the Battle of Britain hits full stride.

For Chief Inspector Frank Parade, and his much depleted team there are many challenges to policing the small Welsh mining village of Gilfach Goch, for whilst miles away from the theatres of war the Home Front faces unique challenges of its own. The wartime demands thrown on the country mean that each officer in Parade’s team must do the work of two men – three even.

Soon the already overwhelming workload is increased when not one but two bodies turn up, and Parade finds himself having to investigate two murders as well as cope with everything else thrown his way.

‘Chief Inspector Frank Parade is going to become the new superstar cop. An excellent book.’ *****

'The wartime setting is authentic, the suspense well handled. Highly recommended.' ****

Available from Amazon, iBooks, Playstore

How Cardiff and the surrounding valleys faced the dreaded might of the Nazis.

Today I got the first proof of my forthcoming book, Cardiff and the Valleys At War 1939 - 1945. It's due to be published this November from Pen and Sword Books.

 I love this stage of the book production - of course the indexing can be a bit of a slog, but I enjoy the polishing. It is at this stage that I get to see how the work is going to look as a finished book, and I get to tease out any edits that may have escaped the proofreading team. Though, believe me the proofreaders know the business, and without fail they kick my humble scribblings into shape.

The JPG left shows the PDF proof currently on my desktop - I'm reading through it at the moment, have taken a few minutes to bash out this blog post. I may also have a coffee and some chocolate chip cookies before getting back to the grindstone. Hey, that's the writing life!

My association with Pen and Sword Books is something I'm very proud of - my two previous titles for the company - Cardiff and the Valleys During the Great War and the true crime study, Dark Valleys are doing well for me, and only this week I signed a contract to write another title for 2019 publication; this one will be another true crime study - entitled, A Date with the Hangman it looks at the history of capital punishment in the UK.

Not bad for a snobby nosed kid with little if any formal education!

Check out Dark Valleys

Check out Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War


Cardiff and the Valleys at War 1939 - 45, looks at the Home Front during the dark years of WWII,

and once again I was left feeling amazed at the way ordinary people faced up to the hardships of war, at the way they stood firm against everything the enemy threw at them - this was a time when death could and frequently did come without warning. The blitz was something that spread terror not just in Wales but across the UK - These ordinary people faced all that and in return stuck two fingers up to Adolf Hitler.

Of course the book also contains stories of incredible humour, of people pulling together - there are darker stories of the black market but even so there are heart warming tales within these pages. I was left feeling humbled and deeply proud to do my little bit to preserve these stories for future generations.

The people who lived through this war have often been called the greatest generation, and after researching this book I am inclined to agree with that assessment.

Cardiff and the Valleys at War will be available from December 2019
Find Pen and Sword Books HERE

Rest in Peace Sweet Lady - how one woman became a cultural icon

I spent the best part of last year working on the book, Cardiff and the Valleys at War 1939-1945, which will be published later this year from Pen and Sword Books. The book, like the previous volume Cardiff and the Valleys During the Great War, concentrates on the Home Front during those dark wartime years.

WWII was very much a people's war - with both Britain and Germany waging total war - in other words every man, woman and child did their bit for the war effort. Those not serving in the military carried out essential war work, raised funds for the war effort. And make no mistake about it - World War II was indeed a total war - The conduct of WWII by both sides provides many examples of mass mobilization of industry and civilians into the war effort, and the deliberate infliction of civilian casualties, targeted destruction of civilian property, infrastructure, food, supplies, etc.

Now in one section of the book I look at the way the government used posters to encourage not only recruitment into the armed services but also into many of the civilian organisations needed to ensure the country was able to sustain itself during the long war. There are many examples of these posters in the book, but one that is now particular poignant is an American poster, designed to urge women into the factories during the conflict.

Known as Rose the Riveter, it became a cultural icon of the war years and continues to be so into the modern day. The reason for its poignancy is that the woman who inspired the poster, a California waitress named Naomi Parker Fraley, passed away in January of this year at the age of 96.

Rosie the Riveter became the subject and title of a song and a Hollywood movie during WWII.

Over the years, a welter of American women have been wrongly identified as the model for Rosie, the war worker of 1940s popular culture who became a feminist touchstone in the late 20th century, but it was Mrs. Fraley who staked the most legitimate claim of all. But because her claim was eclipsed by another woman’s, she went unrecognized for more than 70 years. And it wasn't until 2016 that she was officialy recognised as the woman behind the iconic image.

“I didn’t want fame or fortune,” Mrs. Fraley told People magazine in 2016, when her connection to Rosie first became public. “But I did want my own identity.”

Mrs. Fraley, right, in September 2016 with her younger sister, Ada Wyn Parker Loy

The article, published in the People magazine,  brought journalists to Mrs. Fraley’s door at long last.

“The women of this country these days need some icons,” Mrs. Fraley said in the People magazine interview. “If they think I’m one, I’m happy.”

Interviewing Mrs. Fraley in 2016, The World-Herald asked her how it felt to be known publicly as Rosie the Riveter.

“Victory!” she cried. “Victory! Victory!”

Victory indeed for even today the poster continues to inspire and is reproduced over and over- used to promote cause after cause - maybe feminism being the most obvious, but it is heartening to think that in these days of instant fame, quite often underserved, that people like Naomi will eventually be recognised for the role they played. The cultural importance of Rose the Riveter can not be overstated.


THE STORY OF THE SEARCH FOR THE REAL ROSE

Below are more iconic wartime posters.

 

Not banned by Amazon...well, not yet

Available in print and eBook

The eBook version can be read on eReaders, Tablets, Laptops, Smart Phones

Gary M. Dobbs Interview

There's an interview with your truly over at the blog of the noir-master Paul D Brazil - find it HERE

Down Among the Dead is available now in both print and eBook.

The Reluctant Terrorist is about to go live

Get ready for the end of the month when the Reluctant Terrorist is set free. Chaos will ensue.

Set deep within the picturesque Welsh valleys lies the quiet village of Gilfach. Nothing ever happened in the village until - the peacefulness is shattered by a confusion 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. However, John Smith, thanks to a bizarre series of events, most of which were beyond his control, finds himself with the tag of Britain’s most wanted.






John Smith is the reluctant terrorist.

Both in print and eBook.

For Kindle and other electronic reading devices.

More than a century of murder.

AVAILABLE NOW ANYWHERE BOOKS ARE SOLD.....

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.

The real Jack Martin

To celebrate the forthcoming release of my  western Wild Bill Williams in digital format - published this November from Piccadilly Publishing  and available for pre-order NOW, I thought I'd post a little something about the man who gave me my pen name.

And so I present the real Jack Martin

Jack Martin. The man whom I looked up to as a kid, he seemed ten feet tall, and the man whose name I use for my western fiction.

Jack Martin was a coal miner in the South Wales coal fields - indeed it was the dust from this environment that eventually killed him - pneumoconiosis, black lung disease,was common among a certain age group in the village I was raised in. The  sound of chesty coughs would accompany the dawn chorus across the village and sticky mementoes of the coal mines would fill handkerchiefs held in the scarred hands of the old colliers.

The original

 Coal mining, given the then primitive conditions was a  arduous job, and in those days there was only basic safety equipment. Lives were often lost in explosions and one time the level where my grandfather was working flooded and over 20 men were drowned. That was all before I was born. I learned much of this from my grandmother and Gramp never really talked about it.

I was born in 1965 and Gramps had retired by the time I was five so I can't really remember him working, though he was never idle and his garden gave us the best tomatoes around . He was a tall man, always dressed immaculately, even when doing the garden he wore a shirt and tie, as people of his generation did. He grew incredible tasty vegtables  and my first ever paid job was collecting horse manure from the mountain for his garden. I think he gave me something like 10p a bucket which was good money in those far off days when the world was black and white and the sun always shone.

My Grandmother often referred to him as Father Christmas and although they would argue as people did in those days, about anything really - leaving the door open, not wiping your feet and trampling garden over the mat, their relationship was a strong and loving one. They both spoiled me rotten and I always got the latest comics and would go on the annual British Legion day trip to Porthcawl with them. Though often only me and my nan went. Gramps stayed home and probably went for a sneaky pint down the legion. He did so like a sneaky pint or two.

Hey, sorry about the ancient history but I feel almost old enough to remember black and white radio.

My nan and grandfather, possibly the 1930's

Gramps loved the westerns and was always reading a western novel. When there was a western on TV I would watch it with him and he would tell me stories of when he was in the wild west (completely invented, of course. The furthest West he ever went was Tonypandy) and in these stories he would be teamed up with John Wayne or Gary Cooper but never Clint Eastwood - he never really liked him and would refer to him as an unshaven hooligan. As a young boy I believed every word of these wild stories:

That he had been a one legged fighter pilot in the war, that
he had been there when Custer arm-wrestled Wyatt Earp for the price of a drink, that he had smoked the peace pipe with both Geronimo and Sitting Bull.

Jack Martin MK 2

Gramps was a natural storyteller.

Jack Martin - it was his  love of westerns that was passed onto me and apart from the fact that Eastwood is my all time fave, our tastes are very much the same - John Wayne is still the ultimate man's man, and the cowboy creed is a  design for life.

When I published my first western novel, Tarnished Star with Robert Hale LTD (now available as LawMaster)  I was proud that it contained the byline - by Jack Martin. When trying to decide on a pen name to keep my western fiction separate from my other stuff it was only natural to use Gramp's name.

He's been gone now for longer than I care to remember,  and I still miss him but I guess he's still here, inside me - his ideals, his ways, his humour and every one of my westerns that has seen print  is as much his work as mine. For without him I would never have developed my interest and love for the American West.

So saddle up and check out Jack Martin's western page HERE

Bill's back

The lady's got a way with murder

Granny Smith Investigates, originally published in 2012, was the book that introduced the world to Granny Smith - that senior sleuth, that pipe puffing, heavy metal loving force of nature. The book has and continues to be very successful, several times appearing in the top ten listings on various eBooks charts, and receiving some glowing reviews across the untamed wilderness of the world-wide web.
This month saw the publication of the fourth book in the series, Murder Plot but also saw the first Granny Smith launched in an audiobook edition.
The audio book version has been narrated by talented voice actor, Fiona Thraille, and is currently out there for sale at Audible, Amazon and iTunes. Ain't technology wonderful! Now I'm not exactly a Luddite it terms of tech, particularly as it relates to the modern writer, but I find myself amazed at how the Kindle eBook version synchs with the audiobook version. If you own both the eBook and audiobook - and read say 10 pages of the eBook then as soon as you press play on the audiobook it will start from where you have left off in the eBook. This works in reverse too with the eBook synching to the last position in the audiobook. I find that quite amazing! Spooky even - it's witchcraft!

"The story then follows Granny Alice Mary Smith into various stages of the mystery in a humorous but intense way. The book is beautifully written and is a pleasure to read. The Miss Marple references are not only in our mind but the author has made them too, calling Granny Smith as “Miss Marple on steroids”

It is a cozy and wonderful murder mystery, the likes of which, I have not read for a long time. Agatha Christie story lovers must catch this book. It brings back many memories of age old murder mystery classics." Goodreads five star review for Granny Smith Investigates

Q&A session with the creator of Granny Smith

This MARCH a all new Granny Smith adventure will be hitting the digital bookshelves, and in order to celebrate the release of the eagerly awaited fourth book in the Granny Smith series, the first three titles have been reduced to 0.99c on Amazon for the Kindle versions. This offer will continue until 30th March so why not catch up on Granny Smith now. Get yourself in the loop before the publication of, Granny Smith: Murder Plot.

Born in 1965, Gary M. Dobbs (Gary Martin Dobbs) is a British writer and actor. As a writer using the pen name Jack Martin^[1] he is responsible for a string of popular westerns for Robert Hale's Black Horse Western imprint. These include 'Arkansas Smith', 'The Ballad of Delta Rose', and 'The Afterlife of Slim McCord'.
As Gary M. Dobbs he has written the popular series of mysteries featuring the character of Granny Smith - described as Miss Marple on steroids. As an actor Dobbs has appeared (often unaccredited) in many British TV shows, as well as in the films The Reverend^[2] and Risen.^[3] In 2014 Gary wrote the non-fiction historical book, Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War, published in 2015 by Pen and Sword Books.


Q- So what next for Granny Smith?

A-    Well, of course we have just seen Gerald’s wedding,which changes the Granniverse somewhat.  The next full-length novel will be called Murder Plot and concerns murder and intrigue at the allotments society. It's very nearly ready to go and will see publication at the end of March.

Q-Where did the idea for Granny Smith come from?

A- The back of my brain, likely. I’ve a fondness for classic crime fiction and also the old Ealing comedy movies. I think that the Ealing movies and Agatha Christie, particularly her Miss Marple series are the two biggest influences on the Granny Smith series, but there are other influences that all meld together to form the unique universe of the novels, the Granniverse of you like. I love Tom Sharpe for instance and although my writing maybe more PG Tips than PG Wodehouse I do hope there’s a lot of good humour in the books. M C Beaton’s The Agatha Raisin series are also a major influence. I’m aiming for the sky with Granny Smith, but if I only reach the shithouse roof then at least I tried.

Q – The books usually concern a murder and the subsequent investigation. Does humour have a place amongst such dark themes?

A- The novels would fall loosely into the cozy crime category, so yes there is a murder but this takes place off page and there is very little gore or graphic detail. And of course the characters are all so much larger than life. We know we’re not dealing with a real world murder and all the ramifications resulting from such.  It’s all fantasy as

is our detective the very wonderful Granny Smith. Miss Marple on steroids, indeed. In one of the reviews someone called her, Batman with dentures...I think I like that.

Q- Which character from the Granny Smith books would you most compare yourself to?

A-    Gerald, obviously! But no I think there’s a bit of myself in all the characters. I love the way Granny sees political correctness for what it truly is and I hope I share this trait. Also Gerald’s flamboyance, Arthur’s lust for solitude and Twice’s self importance are swirling around in my DNA.

Q- Granny aged ten years from the original draft of the first novel. Why was this?

A-    It’s true when I first wrote Granny Smith she was in her early Sixties, but I always wanted her to be older. I always thought her early Seventies was the correct age for the character but I was worried that it would be too much of a stretch to imagine all the things she does and so I created her as an extremely fit woman in her Sixties – which is not old by modern standards. Of course I soon realised that this was a mistake and that she had to be an older woman – and so I republished the first novel and aged her. That’s the beauty of electronic publishing in that it is so easy to go back and revise a book that’s already been published. I guess I’ll age Granny into her Eighties over maybe ten books.

Q- So you see the series going on for at least ten books?

A-    And more. Granny’s a fun character to play with and I love the way the world looks through her eyes. I’ve become a fan of series characters in cozy crime and especially enjoy the works of Simon Brett, M. C. Beaton and Lesley Cookman and if these guys can continue to come up with ideas for their characters then I’m sure I can for mine.

Q- You have had some success writing westerns as Jack Martin so isn’t cozy crime a big switch?

A-    Not really. My westerns contain a lot of humour. And I see no reason why a writer is expected to stick to one genre. That doesn’t happen in other fields where creators are free to switch genres whenever the fancy or need takes them. Stephen Spielberg doesn’t only make one kind of movie and The Beatles switched genres from track to track. I write the story that takes over my imagination at any given time and the genre is a secondary issue.

Q- So would you write Erotica?

A-    Good God, no. I find it difficult to type one-handed.

Q- Where can people find out more about your writing?

A-    That’s a convenient question – thank you. Well you can follow me on Twitter @garymartindobbs and I keep a Facebook page under the name Gary Martin Dobbs and then there’s my very active blog, The Tainted Archive which you can find at http://tainted-archive.blogspot.co.uk/ . Oh and Granny has her own Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/GrannySmithInvestigates/

Q- Finally where you get your ideas?

A-    Well I do a lot of people watching – well one woman really but the police have told me I’ve got to stop. Where do ideas come from? Anywhere and everywhere – from other books, movies, events in newspapers.

Q- Tell the truth: you made these questions up yourself didn’t you?

A-Yep

           

"The story then follows Granny Alice Mary Smith into various stages of the mystery in a humorous but intense way. The book is beautifully written and is a pleasure to read. The Miss Marple references are not only in our mind but the author has made them too, calling Granny Smith as “Miss Marple on steroids”

It is a cozy and wonderful murder mystery, the likes of which, I have not read for a long time. Agatha Christie story lovers must catch this book. It brings back many memories of age old murder mystery classics." Goodreads five star review for Granny Smith Investigates

           

2015 and all that

2015 was a busy year for me - as well as penning a new western, Riding the Vengeance Trail (out May 2016), I found myself working on two major non fiction projects Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War saw publication from Pen and Sword Books during the summer, while Dark Valleys, a look at historical murders that have taken place in and around the South Wales Valleys will see print during 2016.

I'm still writing and polishing the latter title - my deadline looms a month away, and I'm pleased with the way the work is shaping up. The research threw up some interesting avenues of investigation, and I was able to share some new information with the police regarding a cold case from 1993 - but you'll

be able to read about that later in 2016 when the book sees print. Ive also signed another contract for a follow up to my first world war study, -  Cardiff at War 1939-1945 will likely see print during mid 2017, but I'll be starting the work on this title immediately following the delivery of the manuscript for Dark Valleys to my publisher.

During the summer, May to be precise my western, The Man From Jerusalem saw print, and sadly turned out to be my last western for Robert Hale, the publishing house that first put me into print. In Dec 2015 Robert Hale shut up shop after more than 80 years in the publishing business. They had my forthcoming, Riding the Vengeance Trail under contract and to say I was dismayed is an understatement. Still there was a silver lining in the shape of Crowood Publishing who are to continue the Black Horse Western line and my book is to see publication in May as originally scheduled. Still I'm going to miss Robert Hale and owe them a great deal.

Several of my older titles are to be republished by the wonderful Piccadilly Publishing - Tarnished Star and Wild Bill Williams will be the first two - Tarnished Star now goes under a different name, LawMaster in order to tie into a film version, that director Neil Jones is developing.

I'm pleased to be publishing with Piccadilly Publishing and plan to pen a new western for them during the first few month of 2016. And I'm hoping that the company will be able to put me westerns before a new and larger audience.

Piccadilly Publishing is the brainchild of longtime Western fans and Amazon Kindle Number One bestselling Western writers Mike Stotter and David Whitehead (a.k.a. Ben Bridges). Since 2012 the company has been bringing back into 'e-print' some of the most popular and best-loved Western and action-adventure series fiction of the last forty years.

They certainly have a high profile on the Internet and as you can see from the new cover art for, Wild Bill Williams they  mean business. As soon as the new editions are available I'll let you all know.

What have I enjoyed this year? Well there was a new Bond movie, Spectre and although not as strong as Skyfall it was a damn entertaining ride, Quentin Tarantino delivered a great western in The Hateful Eight and there was another bloody Star Wars movie. I didn't visit the big screen as much as usual in 2015 (Im getting tired of superhero movies) but I did follow some great TV - the second season of Fargo was even better than the excellent first, and The Walking Dead returned for a new season and seemed to be back on form. Hell on Wheels also returned to the small screen and so far the first half of the fifth and final season has been aired - I enjoyed it overall but think the show is starting to power down. Still the mid-season climax was exciting stuff and I'm eager for the conclusion early in the new year. There was also a TV pilot, thanks to Amazon, of Edge, the western character created by George G. Gilman. And whilst not brilliant the pilot did show promise so fingers crossed.

What books stick in my mind? Well I very much enjoyed the new Bond novel, Trigger Mortis by Anthony Horowitz. Stupid title aside it was a bloody good read that managed to feel like Fleming was once again pounding the keyboard. This year also saw Stephen King publishing the first two books in the Bill Hodges Trilogy and I think these books are among the best he's ever written - Mr Mercedes and Finders Keepers kept me turning the pages. A lot was made of the fact that these were straightforward crime thrillers with no supernatural elements, but to me they felt like vintage King and the characters were as good as ever. End of Watch, the final book in the trilogy will be published this coming summer and I can't wait to finish the story.

I also read a fair few westerns this year - going through the entire Lonesome Dove series in chronological order rather than publication order, and found that I was noticing a lot of continuity errors when read in this way. I also caught up with classic westerns thanks to new eBook editions and have especially enjoyed rediscovering Herne the Hunter. I also  read a lot of crime fiction this year - The Girl in the Spider's Web was a worthy continuation of Stieg Larsson's Millenium series. No one could have expected this book to stand up alongside the original classics but author, David Lagerchrantz seems to have managed it. We lost Ruth Rendell this year and Dark Corners was published as a posthumous work. The author had all but completed the book when she died in May and all that remained was for some polishing. I very much enjoyed this book and was deeply saddened by the death of the author. The world of fiction also lost another of its great voices this year, when Terry Pratchett passed away in March. His final Discworld novel, The Shepard's Crown came out during August and although I picked up a copy on publication day I have yet to read it. It sits in my TBR pile and will be tackled soon.

During 2015 eBook sales seem to have levelled off but the industry is still strong - of course the year started with the tremors resonating from the Amazon/Hatchette book pricing row but now that the industry has matured somewhat it was inevitable that sales would even off. Though eBooks are still doing the business and look set to continue doing so. All in all though it was a calm year with Amazon upgrading the excellent paperwhite device, and admitting that their prestige Voyage eBook reader failed to find the market. In truth the Paperwhite device is so good that there is no need to try and top it. And whilst the Voyage may be the best eBook reader out there it is simply too expensive and is, let's face it, not that much better than the Paperwhite.

And so we fast forward into 2016 - on a personal note I've got the birth of my first grandchild to look forward to, and I'm hoping to get a couple more books written. As well as the contracted titles, I've set myself a target of writing at least three novels during the coming year. I certainly need to get the fourth Granny Smith novel done and somewhere in the back of my mind I can feel another Jack Martin novel taking shape-still we'll talk about all that at the end of the year.

Keep Calm and Read On

Following the success of my book, Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War , the publishers commissioned a follow up to be entitled Cardiff at War 1939 - 1945. As you can imagine the book requires a lot of careful research and recently while going through news archives I found a newspaper article from January 1940 that I'd like to share here.

It seems that during the early years of the war there was a spike in reading - I'm not sure if this was nationwide but Cardiff library found itself incredibly busy. So much so in fact that the library collected together its data and told the South Wales Echo of its most popular titles.

Black Out Makes Cardiff Read More, the newspaper headlined. which means there must have been a lot of candles burning behind those black out curtains. Though as of yet I've not found an article on the spike in candle sales  - Escapist fiction was understandable extremely popular, as was Richard Llewellyn's beautiful How Green was my Valley - apparently people who saw the hardships of the coal mining industry first hand also enjoyed reading about them. The public were also very keen to educate themselves on the background of the crisis in Europe and books about Germany and Hitler in particular were hired out often. Hitler' s Mein Kampf was eagerly read, as was Hitler Speaks which reproduced a lot of the mad little Charley Chaplin impersonator's speeches.


There was also a revival in classic literature and Wuthering Heights was particularly popular.

As a book lover myself, a constant reader I took great pleasure from reading the article, and it's nice to think of all those people hunched over a book in the dimness of the black out - I wonder what they would have thought of the Kindle Paperwhite?

Cardiff and the Valleys in the Great War (Pen and Sword Books) is available now in both print and electronic formats. Check it out by CLICKING HERE

Cardiff at War 1939 - 1945 is scheduled to be published December 2018.

Publication is now set for Feb 28th 2015
                                                                          
Looks at the Cardiff Pals and other local regiments who fought in the Great War and how the experience of war impacted on the area, from the initial enthusiasm for sorting out the German Kaiser in time for Christmas 1914, to the gradual realization of the enormity of human sacrifice the families of Cardiff were committed to as the war stretched out over the next four years. An important place for Coal export this book looks at how the balance between working and fighting was achieved by the Dockyard workers The Great War affected everyone. At home there were wounded soldiers in military hospitals, refugees from Belgium and later on German prisoners of war. There were food and fuel shortages and disruption to schooling. The role of women changed dramatically and they undertook a variety of work undreamed of in peacetime. Meanwhile, men serving in the armed forces were scattered far and wide. Extracts from contemporary letters reveal their heroism and give insights into what it was like under battle conditions.

Voices of the Welsh

This weekend I was interviewed by Emil Franzi on radio for the show Voices of the West which broadcasts from Arizona - Voices of the West is a radio program originating in Tucson, AZ over AM 1030 KVOI on Saturday at 4pm.

I enjoyed the chat and find it incredible that here I was, communicating via Skype, sat in wet and windy South Wales while my voice was being broadcast live across the west. I've never set foot in Arizona, though I believe several of my books have made it there and now my voice travels ahead of me. Voices of the West is a great radio show that western fanatics will love and many of the episodes are made available online after broadcast - You can hear my episode by clicking HERE and while you're there you might as well check out all of the old shows in the archive. Western fans are bound to find much of interest.

This weekend also saw the Rememberance Day services across the UK, and the Great War was very much on my mind because at the moment I'm going through the final edits on my book, Cardiff and the Valleys During the Great War which is due out next February from Pen and Sword Books. Add to that several other projects that I'm working on and it's pretty chaotic here at Archive Towers. I've recently gone through the proofs of my next Black Horse Western, The Man From Jurusalem (out next year) and am falling behind on a western novel, Outlaw Fury. I'm also working on the next Granny Smith novel, Murder Plot, which will see a sad loss in Granny's household and a gruesome murder in the vegtable patch. Never fear though because Granny Smith, Miss Marple on steroids, is here to put things right.

As well as all that I need to find time to eat and sleep - ahh well, pipe full of Virginia Flake in mouth, and it's back to the grindstone. No rest for the wicked, I suppose and believe me I can be wicked......