Two bits of news today.

My story The Perfect Bakewell is in the current issue of The People’s Friend. You’ll not be astounded to learn it’s about making the perfect Bakewell tart. I do bake these myself, and they taste pretty good, but mine are nowhere as perfect as the one Clara creates in the story. As you can see from the picture, I’m better at writing about them than cooking them. What I’m the very best at though is eating them!

The other thing I have to report is that my latest short story collection A Way With Words is currently on special offer at 99p (99c).

Here’s the blurb –

We may choose our words carefully or use them without thought. They might be employed to get our message across, or hide what we’re feeling. They can be tools, gifts or weapons. We need them for the games we play, the work we do and the excuses we make.

Words are written or typed, texted, emailed, signed or spoken. They’re heard, misheard, remembered forever or forgotten in an instant. Strung together they create fact or fiction, tell lies or the truth.

Whether compliments or taunts, hard to spell or difficult to say, formal, familiar or foreign, long or short, the words we use all influence the stories we tell. This book contains 25 of them.

You can buy it (or read free with Kindle unlimited) here.