Last Touch

Dean Jamieson was murdered on 04/04/2006, leaving an irreplaceable void in the lives of those who held him dear. Dean's mother, Josephine, pens a devastating novel that is a deeply intimate and personal examination of the life and death of her child and the grief that accompanies such a loss.Jamieson critiques the landscape following an untimely death; the support of the social sector and the police, the role of the media and reportage and the effect on family.Jamieson's prose, whilst at times visceral, portrays the emotional weight of burying a child but offers, amongst the darkness, hope. This is a work, whilst being intimate, that transcends the personal and offers solidarity to those who have suffered the loss of a loved one.

Don't Worry, He Doesn't Bite

The vets on TV are always depicted as perfect clinicians, with sunshine and rainbows bursting out from their individual patients. But what media companies fail to show you are the more ‘uncommon’ cases, like a dog eating some used condoms, for example. This book aims to rectify this perception, specifically taking the reader on a journey through what life is like graduating as a veterinary surgeon. You will read about some pretty stupid cases my colleagues and I have experienced, all of which are true, though I must admit, I do have a habit of not letting the truth get in the way of a good story. So, sit back, relax, and take a break from this mundane existence we call life, as I show you the world through the eyes of a newly graduated veterinary surgeon.

Maxamillion the Great

Drawing on countless real-life stories from his embattled life, Maxamillion the Great is a captivating and moving autobiography told in the only way it could be, through the eyes of his beloved owner, author Barbara Goodier.

Taking the reader through the lows of his joyless puppyhood into the highs of his new found family, it persuades us to revisit the idea that miracles really do exist and sometimes even more than once.

Creative in its narration and affecting in its story, it will move you to re-evaluate what is important in your own life, will make you cry when you least expect it and lay bare the unbreakable bond between a dog and his mum.

The Dublin Marilyn House

Jackie Devoy, the ‘Dublin Marilyn,’ invites you into her vibrant world filled with color, passion, and a touch of Hollywood glamour. In The Dublin Marilyn House, Jackie shares her inspiring journey of self-discovery, resilience, and the pursuit of dreams.

From her humble beginnings in Dublin’s inner city to her adventures on reality TV and her unique Marilyn Monroe-themed homes, Jackie’s story is a testament to the power of embracing individuality and finding joy in life’s unexpected turns. With heartwarming anecdotes, design tips, and a sprinkle of Irish charm, this book will leave you feeling uplifted, inspired, and ready to create a life as colourful as Jackie’s.

More Than Music

This is the third part of a joint autobiographical trilogy based on the letters and diaries of two professional singers Christopher Davies and Barbara Kendall-Davies. It also relates to their young son, Giles and his blossoming career as a singer.

There is a good deal of music, of course but also many unexpected and divergent paths as well, including a major Hollywood movie. 

Not What The Good Fairy Promised

Twenty-four-year-old Joanna’s life flipped upside down at the taking of a phone call. News of her sister’s near-death in a fire triggered the onset of bipolar disorder, a mental health condition that Joanna would have to manage for the rest of her life.

A scholarship to Cambridge, with three years to get her degree, had ended in this. Joanna’s high hopes, and her father’s fierce ambitions for her, now lay in tatters. A glowing future of any description lay beyond her grasp as she struggled to get to grips with her new and utterly foreign reality. Where was she going in life now?

Not What the Good Fairy Promised is the heart-warming story of a young woman’s experience of terrifying breakdown, psychiatric hospital, and the stigma of mental illness. There is the battle with everyday life, with its frightening demand that she re-discover her identity – her selfhood – while struggling to survive and earn a living, yearning for something worthwhile to fill the hours of nine to five. This is a tale of experiencing, and overcoming, serious mental illness, of driving ahead to forge a new and unlooked for future – and what the Good Fairy did deliver.

Sailing Through Life...

When Nick Ardley asked for a prostate specific antigen (PSA) test, the aftershocks of a prostate cancer diagnosis were momentous. Frightened, he said he was too young to die. Petrified, he understandably broke down. But all was not lost: his family and the boat shared with his wife were soon at work repairing his life.

A life-long sailor, the salt marsh fringed waters of the greater Thames estuary had always enthralled, and it was to them he went for healing. It’s a place where in the free flow of a saline breeze his mind cleared, and he began treating it all as just another little illness. Like a cold, he said, knowing full well it wasn’t! Sailing up the River Thames, he announced to his wife his choice of the medical directions offered. Later, after mooring off Gravesend, both cried together.

Ardley’s treatment overlapped the COVID-19 pandemic. Fortunately, the serious stuff was done and dusted. The pandemic brought new trials. The couple were frighteningly threatened by a fellow yachtsman who disliked an Ardley web blog … the horror of that summer has remained fresh.

Throughout the telling of Ardley’s tales, his story, sailing with family and friends, country walking and living life, he has maintained a normality. Perhaps a familiar story, but it comes with a warning: Men, get yourselves tested before it’s too late!

So, onwards he goes, sailing through life…

Seascapes of a Soul: Wholeness and the Sense of Self

The search for self-knowledge and identity is a common theme in autobiographies these days. So also is the search for a spirituality other than that of the conventional religions. Both are found in Seascapes of a Soul: Wholeness and the Sense of Self. This book is an account of a unique spirit on an often solitary journey. With clear argumentation and transparent honesty, this author presents a story that reaches towards individuation, gained partly through discovering C.G. Jung’s ideas about the psyche.
Several themes recur: the onset of old age, Jungian individuation, solitude and aloneness, mood swings, a rejection of orthodox religion, a love for the natural world, an interest in gnosticism, the inner sense of the Divine. Her relationship with her twin sister is also prominent. There is light and dark here: the ups and downs of living with a twin.
In rejecting the Christianity she grew up with she followed an innate urge to a spirituality that ultimately arose from the strong sense of self she had had from an early age. If this has a name it would be ‘gnostic’ because it is a perception of inner divinity, the God within.
This is a woman’s story with a difference. Although, unlike so many, she did not have to struggle through a life of disadvantage and deprivation, she did have to wrestle with a powerful self that sometimes wandered up blind alleys into ego. But she learned to accept mistakes and incorporate them into what Einstein called a ‘calm and modest life’.
Images of the sea, symbols of the unconscious, run through the book. The ‘seascapes’ at the head of each chapter function in the story as a leitmotif for the modes and moods of the spirit.

Thank You for My Dinner, May I Get Down Please?

The author always enjoyed a sense of freedom, whether roaming around the Somerset countryside as a child or later on, living offshore with her husband and three daughters on a boat. She considers nothing strictly ‘out of bounds’, and for seventy years no-one has stopped her in her tracks. Thank You for My Dinner really sums up the dichotomy of her life – an upbringing steeped in Victorian-based principles and the free license to go her own way, which was generous even by twenty-first century standards.

This is the story of Celia’s early life coupled with a trip down the river, never completely grown up, always looking for adventure, not anticipating danger, but keeping a sense of fun and a smile through various struggles – and surviving enough to say ‘thank you’ at the end.

That Boogie Beat Damn Killed My Soul

I have been involved in the music business in various roles since 1961. I was bought my first guitar when I was 12 years old, on which I slogged away for a year. In 1962, I joined my first band, the Phantoms. Then the Sparticans came for me in 1963, then in 1965, I was invited to join the Nomads, who were local pop stars!

This began a life in which I would meet many of the good and great in the music industry, including a Beatle, with whom we made a record. In 1979, with my friend, old bandmate and future business partner, keyboard player John DaCosta, I decided to open a music shop – the first of many we would open in the coming years. After an epic roller coaster ride of ambition and excess, it all came crashing down for me in 1994 and I was forced to rethink my life. Today I live a complicated but thoroughly enjoyable life in Thailand, still playing the guitar and writing songs, but no longer trying to run music shops…

The Fascinating History of My Direct Royal Ancestors and Their Descendants

The author traces his direct ancestors for 40 generations, commencing with Egbert Saxon, king of Wessex in generation 1. King Edward III is described in generation 18. He was the last monarch in the author’s Direct family tree. He and his wife, Philippa of Hanault, are the author’s 21 times great grandparents. The author narrates the history of his direct ancestors up to his grandparents in generation 39, from English royalty to Scottish nobility, ending with the Krio elite in the former British colony of Sierra Leone. This was as a result of the acting governor of Sierra Leone, the Scottish Kenneth Macaulay, the author’s 4 times great-grandfather, having a relationship with a liberated African, which led to the birth of the author’s 3 times great-grandmother Charlotte Macaulay, who was of mixed race. The book is an entertaining, fascinating and accessible piece of family history with a wide-ranging scope and engaging manner of dialogue, which will be of interest, not only to historians and genealogists, but also to non-fiction readers in general.

Tiffins & Chanawallahs

Oonagh’s story takes us on a vivid journey through her post-colonial childhood in India, full of color, vitality, and unforgettable memories. However, as she leaves her birth country in 1962 to move to England with her family, Oonagh’s cherished childhood recollections take on a surreal quality. Determined to rediscover her roots and emotional identity, she embarks on a poignant quest.

From the roots of her maternal family, where ‘Staying On’ was in her grandmother’s blood, to the adrenaline-fueled excitement of gleaming gun barrels counted and stacked in pillars by the light of hurricane lamps, Oonagh’s journey uncovers both the beauty and harsh realities of her homeland.

Through her Ayah Ruth’s captivating stories, she experiences the intoxicating fragrance of jasmine on the day of Rinqu’s marriage, and the deep bonds of love and loyalty that define family life in India. With rich detail and compelling prose, Oonagh’s tale takes readers on a breathtaking journey of self-discovery and a celebration of the cultural richness of India.