29th September 2014

As promised last week readers, for FIVE days (Wed. 1st October to Sunday 5th October) the above book will appear on Amazon KDP Select at no charge. Yes, I am giving you the chance to read a full length novel FREE. There are no obligations, no ties. These 5 days are the maximum Amazon will allow a book to be promoted on KDP Select. 

 [If you have just come across this entry, just check out my earlier post to glean what it is all about]

 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Worth-All-Your-Tomorrows-McGilvary-ebook/dp/B00EXR5MGS/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1412003174&sr=1-1&keywords=Worth+all+your+tomorrows

or 

 http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Worth%20all%20your%20tomorrows

26th September 2014

 

Something that might be of interest

'Caledonian Voices' - a book of short stories will be free for the two days of Saturday 27th and Sunday 28th September.
The book is a must if you want to hear authentic voices of Scotland.

See:


http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00EZ5D6J8?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

or

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EZ5D6J8

24th September 2014

In a day or so - perhaps even tomorrow - I will be placing my book, entitled Worth All Your Tomorrows in Amazon KDP. It will be FREE for 5 days.

Here is a taste of what it is all about.

 

Worth All Your Tomorrows

Editorial Remarks

Why should you read this book? Well, it's about finding peace of mind and rest for the soul. Solace is widely sought after—and this tale proves it is possible to stumble on it, even in the most unsafe and volatile of regions, such as The Gulf of Aden and the Horn of Africa.

In the easiest of ways—that is, through an absorbing story—the book also provides knowledge of and understanding for the violence in this part of the world during the latter years of the 20th Century. It is still a perilous area where events during the last days of the British Empire continue to affect large swathes of people. These pages go a long way to explain why this is so.

The narrative itself has great value in that it demonstrates how even in the midst of trouble, life goes on: all the everyday personal problems, the fears, hopes, ambitions and longings continue, unabated.

The story-line illustrates what it takes—and how easy it is—to shake off feelings of isolation, to recognise these in others and help drive them off. Making friends and finding lovers is shown to be a perfectly natural state of affairs; that self-pity can be scorned and self-respect regained. It is only then (as the story shows us) that we are able to see ourselves as others see us, and able to laugh at what we once were.

♦

Review of Setting and Theme

The late 1950s and the closing days of the British Empire form the setting for the intricate high suspense novel lavished upon us here. McGilvary depicts locality and involves the reader in a little known theatre of events. It is really hard, for instance, to find any author today who shows us this part of the world as it was then. The nearest is probably The Panther, by Nelson de Mille, which came out in 2012 — and covers a much more recent period and set of circumstances.

McGilvary is particularly skillful and meticulous in describing the wells of loneliness and sense of being alone that affect the three main characters whose lives, inevitably, entwine. Meanwhile, all around them, the safety and assurance of the world they know is crumbling.

♦

The Action

Harry Munro is a drifter whose life becomes, quite unexpectedly, very dangerous. The irresistible physical challenge he is set by the beautiful Laura Smith begins everything.

Through Laura Smith's shady dealings he is brought into the orbit of Ibrahim Sang. This man, both a crook and terrorist, is the long-time arch-enemy of the Protectorate's Intelligence Chief, Norman Abdu Ghalib.

Sang has a secret and deadly itinerary to realize; and fearful of Sang's intentions, Ghalib makes Munro aware of the perilous scenario Mrs Smith has introduced him to.

Ghalib prods him into a spy mission that encompasses Aden, Nairobi, Mombasa and Malindi—the last two both on the fabulous 'Sinbad' coastline.

Everyone is ignorant of Sang's true objectives, Laura Smith included; but Harry Munro and Norman Abdu Ghalib must confront the threat he offers. It is imperative that they uncover and thwart what he has planned; and suspect a horrifying outcome if they fail.

In doing so, Munro is forced to make a decision regarding the dilemma at the heart of his affair with Laura Smith, and chooses a course of action that threatens his very survival.

Will Munro and Ghalib prevail; or will they die? Read the story and find out.

♦

Author Credentials

The author is a professional historian (PhD) with a substantial body of work already published, such as: Guardian of the East India Company: The Life of Laurence Sulivan (London, I. B. Tauris, 2006).

"I am full of admiration for this pathbreaking book. The research is scrupulous, detailed and rigorous...". [Prof Sir T M Devine]

East India Patronage and the British State: The Scottish Elite and Politics in the Eighteenth Century (London, I. B. Tauris, 2008).

"A formidable piece of work...[that] provides a fascinating picture, thoroughly researched and cogently argued...". [Prof C Emsley]

"This important book...a substantive original contribution...argued convincingly...a considerable achievement... unstinting praise for this book. [Prof T J Byres]

For all my works see georgemcgilvary.com

Additional Information

The novelist has personal knowledge and first-hand experience of the period, of the places, the type of people, climate and circumstances related in the story.

As a young man (see first photo below) he stood at the top of the ancient volcano (ShamSham) that dominates Aden and pondered upon the 'End of Empire' scenario he was part of. 

The factual parts of this book stems from his experiences there. The second snap is of a man whose actual name was Norman Ghalib, who operated as an interpreter in the field.

♦

GKM

Ghalib

Worth All Your Tomorrows, therefore, although fiction, is based on reality, on knowledge and experience. It is also excellently written.

♦

       

                                                           

22nd September 2014
I first produced this piece when I opened my website in January this year. It has been very popular with my visitors over the intervening nine months, so much so that I thought I might launch it once again for those new to my site - with one or two slight embellishments. Here goes:

Let me introduce myself by giving out some of the things that make me tick – and in doing so, let you know whether I’m the kind of person you might like to identify with and whose stuff might interest you.
So, here is a list of what I’m interested in and get up to – I hope some of them might strike a bell with lots of you out there.

I like people, especially out of the ordinary ones. What makes them tick?

I enjoy life, family and friends – the external world; sort of concentric circles outwards from who I am and where I live.

Work: this consists of writing and research mainly, but I have had several careers: electrical engineer; RAF service; holiday camp entertainer; licensed hotel owner; private guest house proprietor, among others.
Good health: well, this is a no-brainer – you just got to keep in shape, you owe it to yourself and those who love you and depend on you. I work out, walk and swim.

Humour: having a good laugh with agreeable company or reading a book, seeing a film or stage act that creases you up.

Money: who isn’t interested in that? We never have enough and there’s always someone or some organisation ready to take it away.

Good food: Yeah, I like my share of the ‘fine dining’ if I’m flush. All sorts of cuisines are up for grabs. I’m no picker – just don’t give me boiled onions or raisins! I like a drink - within moderation.

Drugs don't and never have interested me.

Travel and Holidays: Can’t get enough; but I don’t like the one without the other. Unfortunately, airports are not friendly places now and the roads are so crowded; rail stations, however, have been getting their act together and the train is making a comeback. I visit the Med a lot; been many times to the States; even went to Australia for three months.

Good weather: letting me get outside and around different places – well that kind of speaks for itself. Where I live, however, the skies are not always blue – in fact I think the whole world shudders at the mention or thought of what we have to put up with, at times; but we kid you all a lot about that.

Various pursuits, hobbies and such, interest me: Intellectual quests, Art, Literature, Genealogy; music (just about every kind that has a melody, allows me to hear the words, or almost makes me swoon away with the sheer splendour of what I’m hearing. I’m thinking of the standard crooners of the last twenty years: Sinatra, Como, Nat Cole - even Dean Martin; of jazz, Country and Western, through to Puccini, Rimsky Korsakov, and tenors like Pavarotti).

Sport: soccer and golf have (I suppose) been my main interests and where I have shown some talent (well in the first one anyway - I'm still a high handicapper at golf) though swimming and throwing the discus were, still are, other likes.

I am always wondering where the world is going? What will it be like in 200 years? So, science, cosmology, new materials, inventions, discoveries all excite me – and I read and inquire about all this.
I like our world – it’s maybe not much – in the cosmological scale of things, as the man said
 – but its home!
I’m sure none of this is much different from you. It’s in the things that make us most happy, and our ability to avoid what gives us most pain that the differences occur.

I have all the same urges and drives that are common to others: I like to talk; I admire and (covertly) still fancy the opposite sex – don’t tell the wife. I like to be approved of. I like dogs – but don’t have one – like cats and horses too.

Where I might be a little different from some, lies in the fact that as well as writing about people who could be my contemporaries, who have lived and are living in my era, I also write history books; I delve into the past.

This is why I promote my slogan: 'GKM's Unique World View.'

I am best known for my efforts at understanding the present world, and as an historian, the one that has passed away. Where the future will take us is a land to be explored.

A good education and a whole range of life experiences, research and study are the tools used for this approach and intellectual grasp: MA (Honours); M.Litt; PhD.

Of course, what goes in also seeks a way of getting out — after cogitation. Teaching and lecturing have formed channels for this outpouring; as have books (fiction and non-fiction) articles I have written expressing thoughts and opinions I have formed.

I have read, taught, lectured and written about people whose lives are as interesting as those alive. (I wonder if Science Fiction isn’t also just about envisaging the interesting individuals that might be met in the future, just like those you meet in history, the world that has passed away.)

Anyway, what this amounts to is that I have a fair bit of ‘history’ under my belt, so to speak, and an awful lot of it still to write – it lies about my computer in great big slush files, which have still to be raided and formed into lives, subjects, theories – into any sort of project you can think of.

(You can run your eye over all the stuff already written, and I will keep you up to date with what I’m working on at any one moment; maybe even ask your help, on occasion).

I like stories very much, both short stories and novels; I like anecdotes and funny sketches, whether they are made up or real.

I like poetry

I like films

There’s not much I don’t like in the cinematic, written and spoken worlds.

You can let your eyes slide over my fiction stuff – published and available on all the main internet sites – with the links (just as with my history books and articles) provided here on this website.

Finally, I do hope you will wish to continue with this conversation - at times it seems awfully one-sided to me. Nevertheless, at times I can convince myself that it might be of some value to others.
All the best.

19th September 2014

I have just begun my 10th P G Wodehouse book in a row, Ukridge, having just finished Money For Nothing. 

Over the years, I must have read most of his published works.

There is little I can add to the superlatives already laid at the feet of this man: 'genius', 'funniest English novelist who ever wrote', 'stylist', 'sunlit perfection', 'a bask in warmth and splendour'.

Time after time I have turned to Wodehouse when feeling low - as I feel now after the Scottish Referendum result - knowing that in a short time I will feel a lot better.

Try him out sometime - I promise you, a smile will play around your lips in no time.

12th September 2014

Here then, everybody, is the last portion of the little story entitled The Village Concert.

 

(Postscript)

A babble of noise accompanied the villagers as they shuffled their way outside. One or two arguments continued over which had been the best act. Differing opinions regarding the features of some performance or other continued to be expressed; and these were sure to go on for some time. It was a noisy, but satisfied throng; then people began to disappear as they went their separate ways home. 

The old pensioners, ex-miners, Dod and Alex, were no sooner outside than they were contentedly smoking their pipes.

‘Man, it's grand tae feel the fresh air on yer face, Dod. And ye ken, I've been dying tae have a puff at my pipe for ages.’

‘Losh, aye, Alex, yer right about that; but it was worth doin’ without for a wee while, I suppose. That was a grand show.’ 

Bella and Lorna were similarly content. Active participation at the end of the evening had been the very thing for them. They had given way to all their feelings at the appropriate moments during the show, cheering on their favourites. 

‘Weel, Lorna, that's it for anither year I suppose.’

‘Aye, Bella,’ her chum replied, in a resigned voice, ‘Just mucky American films frae noo on; and trashy English yins as weel. Bit never mind, they'll keep the bairns quiet for a wee while at least, and gie us some peace.’

Outside the Welfare Hall, agents Phil and Stan lingered.

‘Well, Stan, I say we talk to the manager here and now. It's the best time.’

‘Happen you're right, Phil. Let's do our sums first, though, and then we'll make our move.’

They returned to their car and started the engine to keep warm—it was a new model, and interior heating had only just been introduced. The pair set to work, making comparisons and calculations, taking notes.

*

Twenty minutes after the curtain was drawn for the last time, the village hall was empty. Now the cast, stagehands and musicians—everyone associated with the show—gathered directly in front of the stage to be paid, as arranged. They waited in little groups, conversing in low voices—worried.

Brian returned from the committee room, where he had checked the pay packets made up by the committee men from the evening's takings, as instructed. In each winner's pay packet, he had placed the additional cash won. But in every envelope, he also added a little more; a token of his feelings now that the concert party had reached the end of the line.

The performers were subdued while receiving their pay packets. Although grateful for Brian’s generosity, which several thanked him for, profusely, the enormity of the fact that this was the last show was striking home. 

Nevertheless, they had still to hear the fateful word directly from their employer. Brian was seated on the right-hand side of the stage, on the very edge, feet placed on the steps that led down to the hall floor. He was preparing himself to utter the dreaded words of closure, which spelt doom to the artistes. There was no other course of action, however, he had to let them go.

It was at this juncture—just when Brian felt capable of saying the few words he had prepared—that there was movement at the far end of the hall, and Jake Russell appeared with Phil Sharpe and Stan Atkins in tow. The group approached the stage area.

‘Two gentlemen wishing to speak to you, Mr Clarke,’ said Jake, in a reserved manner.

Brian looked up and frowned. Having built himself up for his speech, he now wanted to make it; although he wasn't kidding himself that the cast didn't know what was coming. So this interruption was not very welcome. Nevertheless, good manners prevailed. 

Brian stood up and approached Phil and Stan. 

‘Good evening, gentlemen. What can I do for you?’ 

The agents had decided beforehand that Stan would open the proceedings.

‘If we might have a few words in private, Mr Clarke,’ he said, very politely.

‘Of course,’ said Brian, ‘Mr..?’ 

‘Stan Atkins is the name; and this here's my partner, Phil Sharpe.’ 

They shook hands. Brian, however, was still anxious to say his piece.

‘Well, Mr Atkins, if you can allow me a few minutes to say some words to the Company before they go, I'll be right with you.’ 

He began to turn away, but Phil Sharpe, acting quickly, cut in. He had been surveying the dismal countenances surrounding the stage and guessed the reason why.

‘As you wish, Mr Clarke, but what we have to say might involve some of them.’ He jerked his thumb in the direction of the artistes. ‘So, perhaps best just to leave them alone for a few minutes while we talk; if that's alright with you.’ 

This last statement certainly had Brian puzzled. They moved out of ear-shot of the others by clambering up the steps, on to the stage and disappearing behind the curtains. The assembled cast had heard all of this, of course, and were now just as curious as their boss to find out what was up. 

Brian was once more back in his favourite spot, in the wings. He turned towards the two men, a big question mark on his face.

‘I'll do the talking, shall I, Stan?’ His partner shrugged in reply, as if it didn't really matter who should speak, but secretly was a bit miffed. 

‘Right, Mr Clarke, it's like this,’ Phil Sharpe began, 'Stan and I are in the same business as yourself, see. And although times are hard, well, we've managed to get some extra backing...’ Here he found it necessary to cough into his handkerchief in an affected manner. He continued, ‘And, added to the shilling or two we have ourselves...’ This time he took some time wiping his nose. ‘we hope to produce a show at Dunbar this summer...’

Stan seized his chance to interrupt. 

‘Mr Clarke,’ He received a glare from his partner. ‘To come straight to the point, we liked what we saw tonight, especially that new twist you added at the end, the "Make Your Mind Up Time" business.’

Brian looked from one to the other in disbelief.

Phil Atkins broke into the conversation, ponderously, ‘What we would like to do, Mr Clarke, is to offer you the post of Director of our forthcoming show.’ He paused. ‘You would have complete control of stage management for the production, right through the summer. Although, ahem;’ here he paused to wipe his moustache with a large white handkerchief, ‘we both know a fair bit ourselves, in that regard, and might be able to lend a hand, if so desired. What do you say to that then?’

At first, Brian could only gape at the two agents; he felt he should pinch himself hard. He concluded he was not dreaming, but to begin with, he could scarcely stammer a reply.

‘I..., eh..., I don't really know what to say. It certainly sounds very inviting, very inviting indeed.’ He didn't want to admit that this was the last show for his little group, yet didn’t know how to avoid doing so.

‘Listen, Mr Clarke,’ Phil Sharpe said in an urgent tone of voice, ‘I’m sure we can top any money you'll be getting just now. We really wish to use your idea—I take it that it is yours?’ 

Brian nodded in the affirmative, and Phil continued. ‘If you say now that you'll take the job, we can arrange to meet later—say next Thursday, 2 o'clock, in the Caledonian Hotel in Edinburgh. We can discuss wages and other details then. How would that suit you?’

 

Brian had a thought: ‘What about the acts you saw tonight; and the orchestra and stagehands? Are you interested?’ 

‘Well, we are able to say, right now,’ Stan replied, ‘that we liked some of them very much—especially the band and the chorus line—and would like to talk to you about all that as well, when we meet next Thursday. What do you say?’  

Brian stuck out his hand; a large smile wreathed his face. 

‘Gentlemen, it's a deal; and thanks for your confidence in me.’ 

Two smiles matching his own beamed back. Brian made a mental note to himself, that he would do his very best for everyone when next he met Phil and Stan; however, this would not include Ike Wells, the ventriloquist. 

‘Right then,’ said Phil, ‘we'll be off, and let you finish what you were going to say to your Company. Bye for now.’

Phil Sharpe and Stan Atkins doffed their hats very politely to the assembled ladies of the cast, before walking purposely away up the gangway to the main door of the Welfare Hall, where they were to be let out by Big Tam. 

Five minutes later, they might have heard, above the noise of their car engine, the huge whoop that erupted from the assembled concert party artistes, when Brian relayed to them what had transpired. 

Urged by a committee anxious to get home, a very tired, but happy troupe: artistes, band members and stagehands, were throwing kit and personal belongings into the old battered bus that was their home from home. 

Sounds of singing drifted back as the vehicle left the village, making for a nearby good pub, a venue in which to celebrate what remained of a truly remarkable evening.

*

Inside the Welfare Hall, Jake Russell, Andrew Black and Big Tam were closing up for the night: putting out lights, checking that everything was safe. 

Andrew spoke first, as they stood in a group outside the locked front doors, ready to go their separate ways.

‘Whit dae ye think, Jake. Will this kind o' thing stay popular much longer?’

‘Hard to say, Andra. There's a lot more competition nowadays.’

Andrew persisted, ‘But, d'ye think these concert parties would be missed if they faded away?’

‘Naw, a' don't think so,’ Jake answered. ‘There's always something new comin' along. In fifty years time, naebody will remember them.’

Big Tam piped up: ‘Never mind all that. Did we make a bob or two for oorselves the night?’ 

Jake smirked, meaningfully. ‘Whit dae you think?’

♦♦♦

Well, there you have it all, readers, the sort of thing that went on in my childhood - and really enjoyable shows they were - well most of them anyway. 

I particularly remember one where a very inexperienced hypnotist made the people in his care do some very weird (and let's face it) not very hygienic things when assembled on stage.