This is what happened when I put the whole text of The Day Parliament Burned Down into Wordle! Click to enlarge…
Publicising the Book
A New Year Progress Update
I’m so excited about recent progress in marching smartly down the road to publication, that I just had to write this update. Excuse the gush that follows (or stop here, if you prefer). Just before Christmas I created a Facebook page for The Day Parliament Burned Down. Do please ‘like’ if you’re on FB! I admit I’ve become a pretty shameless social […]
Cover Story
OUP has now had its editorial and sales meeting and has produced this thrilling cover for my book. I’m really delighted with it, as it is almost the same as the image I’ve had in my head all along. Book covers are often a source of friction between publishers and authors but I couldn’t be more […]
The Day Parliament Burned Down: Live!
Sunday 16 October 2011 is the 177th anniversary of the 1834 fire. Today I’m tweeting a ‘live’ feed of events from 1834 in real time on Twitter. I’ve prescheduled the tweets so I can watch as the come through: it will be fascinating to experience it myself in real time, rather than just writing about […]
The Hard Reality of History Publishing
If you’re writing a history book which is original and scholarly but which you hope has popular appeal too, then the news is pretty grim. The market for such books is extremely tough at the moment. You only have to glance at this photograph to see what I mean. Taken earlier this week at WHSmith in the departure […]
One Year On….
Hooray! This blog is celebrating its first birthday! In the course of the last year I have completed my book, which found a great agent, who found me a great publisher, and as an added bonus I met lots of like-minded folk on Twitter. Thank you all for reading this blog or tweeting me with ideas […]