Oberland - new fantasy thriller

Although my main business is writing science books, I've always enjoyed writing fiction and I've recently had the chance to revisit a title I made a first draft of about 30 years ago. It's now finished and available (if you use Kindle, you can get a copy free of charge if you download it by Friday 5 October 2018 at the latest - see Kindle links here).

Called Oberland, the book is set in the Swiss alps, centring on the beautiful Lauterbrunnen valley. I wrote parts of that first draft while on holiday there, so the locations were still very fresh in my mind.

In the story, when English twenty-something Jo Fuller takes a summer job on a campsite in the Swiss alpine valley of Lauterbrunnen, she does not expect her whole understanding of the world to be turned upside down. A camper dies in suspicious circumstances. With three broken individuals - Bob from America, Paula from Australia and Werner from Germany - Jo discovers a strange alternative world at the top of the Schilthorn mountain.

Each of the four faces death at the hands of the inhabitants of the alternate world, intent on preserving their secret. But Bob has something that may keep them alive. Amongst the beautiful Swiss mountains, each must face up to their fears and survive. This fast-paced fantasy thriller leaves Jo, Bob, Paula and Werner unsure who to trust as they attempt to uncover the secret of the mountain before it is too late.

It was a lot of fun writing it - I hope it's just as enjoyable to read.

You can find more details and links to buy either the paperback version (direct from me, or from Amazon), plus the Kindle ebook on this web page.

Comments

Why I hate opera

If I'm honest, the title of this post is an exaggeration to make a point. I don't really hate opera. There are a couple of operas - notably Monteverdi's Incoranazione di Poppea and Purcell's Dido & Aeneas - that I quite like. But what I do find truly sickening is the reverence with which opera is treated, as if it were some particularly great art form. Nowhere was this more obvious than in ITV's recent gut-wrenchingly awful series Pop Star to Opera Star , where the likes of Alan Tichmarsh treated the real opera singers as if they were fragile pieces on Antiques Roadshow, and the music as if it were a gift of the gods. In my opinion - and I know not everyone agrees - opera is: Mediocre music Melodramatic plots Amateurishly hammy acting A forced and unpleasant singing style Ridiculously over-supported by public funds I won't even bother to go into any detail on the plots and the acting - this is just self-evident. But the other aspects need some ex

Is 5x3 the same as 3x5?

The Internet has gone mildly bonkers over a child in America who was marked down in a test because when asked to work out 5x3 by repeated addition he/she used 5+5+5 instead of 3+3+3+3+3. Those who support the teacher say that 5x3 means 'five lots of 3' where the complainants say that 'times' is commutative (reversible) so the distinction is meaningless as 5x3 and 3x5 are indistinguishable. It's certainly true that not all mathematical operations are commutative. I think we are all comfortable that 5-3 is not the same as 3-5. However. This not true of multiplication (of numbers). And so if there is to be any distinction, it has to be in the use of English to interpret the 'x' sign. Unfortunately, even here there is no logical way of coming up with a definitive answer. I suspect most primary school teachers would expands 'times' as 'lots of' as mentioned above. So we get 5 x 3 as '5 lots of 3'. Unfortunately that only wor

Which idiot came up with percentage-based gradient signs

Rant warning: the contents of this post could sound like something produced by UKIP. I wish to make it clear that I do not in any way support or endorse that political party. In fact it gives me the creeps. Once upon a time, the signs for a steep hill on British roads displayed the gradient in a simple, easy-to-understand form. If the hill went up, say, one yard for every three yards forward it said '1 in 3'. Then some bureaucrat came along and decided that it would be a good idea to state the slope as a percentage. So now the sign for (say) a 1 in 10 slope says 10% (I think). That 'I think' is because the percentage-based slope is so unnatural. There are two ways we conventionally measure slopes. Either on X/Y coordiates (as in 1 in 4) or using degrees - say at a 15° angle. We don't measure them in percentages. It's easy to visualize a 1 in 3 slope, or a 30 degree angle. Much less obvious what a 33.333 recurring percent slope is. And what's a 100% slope

Search This Blog