Letters to Africa

Letters to Africa is on sale now from the bookshop at South Lakes Animal Wildlife Park. It can be ordered online and contains letters between children in the UK and the African countries of Kenya and Zambia.  Extracts from my own fiction contributions can be found on the "My Stories" page of this blog. Access it from the link on the top right of this page.
The book contains writing from British and African schoolchildren, authors Lauren St. John, Mary Hoffman,  Ifeoma  Onyefulu and fellow MA in Writing for Children student, Victoria Todd as well as experts on the Massai tribe and their native language. Find out more too about the amazing Sport in Action programme I was fortunate enough to witness on my trip to Zambia while I researched stories and collected letters. Marvel at the stunning photographs and illustrations by Uclan students, discover interesting facts about the Massai warriors and even learn  how to speak their language. The book draws on the talents and knowledge of people from a wide range of diciplines - publishers, authors, illustrators, photographers and linguists included. School children, students, and professionals all worked together to produce a book which is as unique as it is insightful. A lovely gift for yourself or a child, it's both beautiful and educational. Most important of all, as all proceeds go to improve educational reources for children in Africa, you're giving others the gift of education too.
Click on the following link to order your copy now:  www.wildanimalpark.co.uk/wildlifepark_shop.asp

Natterjack want writers!

Natterjack is a fabulous online magazine of new writing in prose and verse. Read and/or submit articles and reviews, poetry and fiction. You can also become a member of the site and contribute to their discussion forum, Natterbox. I've pasted Natterjack'sVision and Philosophy from the site below:


Natterjack is a free independent online polyphonic magazine, which aims to produce unexpected juxtapositions of different kinds of writers and readers and bring them together in an online community of words. I say words because words are where we’re starting. In time we hope to expand into music, visuals, and multimedia presentations. Just give it time.
Essentially there are two sides to it:
The poetry and fiction section will combine poems and stories by established writers with those by obscure writers, new writers, experimental writers, children, and some of the famous names from the past. Sometimes the words are on the screen, sometimes they're in the speakers. There’ll be commentaries exploring links between these pieces, plus a forum (Natterbox) where you can add your own comments and questions. For more detail see the poetry policy page (under the poetry and fiction tab).


The articles and reviews section will feature a wide mix of material. So far we have articles promised on global warming denial; studies of blues guitarists; the fall of the Roman Empire; head lice; God; how to lose money on the horses; schizophrenia; how gypsies get their MOTs; etc. We will also have articles on running a home business, and on education.
Our emphasis is on entertainment, not on hard information, though we have some of that as well. Our content aims to be “quite interesting” (as Stephen Fry would say), even if it’s not always quite factually reliable. Some of our content is straight talking, other parts are spoofs and satires, and we credit our readers with being able to sort out the difference. We believe that laughter, ridicule, parody, the deconstructive, the carnivalesque, are valid vehicles for approaching truths, understandings and insights. Natterjack is not an academic site – though some features may be of interest to students and teachers.
We believe that a very wide range of voices can be worth hearing – though some of them may need a bit of careful editing first – and that some of the resonances of these voices can be brought out by unexpected juxtapositions. So, we aim to combine experienced writers with new writers, the very old with the very young, the mainstream with the marginal, the polished with the raw, and all stages in between. Sometimes we’ll provide commentaries exploring links between pieces we’ve put next to each other. Other times, we’ll leave readers to make their own connections.
While we welcome submissions from experienced writers, part of our purpose is also to encourage new writers who may have less confidence. We can offer various levels of support, ranging from light-touch proofreading to advice on content, style and structure, or editorial help with spelling / punctuation / grammar / layout etc if you want it. We can also offer more fundamental re-writing and ghosting services where appropriate. So if you have something to say but you’re not sure how to say it, we still want to hear from you. See the How to submit work page for more details.
The website itself is FREE to visit, and to read, look at, and listen to. You can download texts and quote from them freely, but we do ask you to acknowledge the author and the source. If you quote us online, please include a link to Natterjack.


Beyond the website, we are developing a series of larger-scale products, as ebooks, CDs and DVDs. There will be information about all these on the site as they progress, and they'll be available in the Natterjack shop.


But the shop's not open yet. Enjoy what's on the site.

Check out the site at http://www.shiftingsands.webs.com/ Whether you're a reader or a writer, you'll find something for you. I adored the seascape picture links too!