In the beginning, back in the 1970's I came here to Greece almost annually to visit my wife's family in Athens. We'd usually also squeeze in a brief visit to an island while in Athens and thus my Greek experience began to widen. For details about how to obtain the books, see further down this page.
Back in the 1990's I read Peter Mayle's "Provence" books (probably on a Greek beach at the time) and thoroughly enjoyed them. The fact that I was in the same trade as Peter Mayle was not lost on me either. This spawned in me an interest in travel writing in general and thus my first Bill Bryson, "The Lost Continent", soon followed. Some time around 2000 the idea occurred to me that my experiences in Greece would make as good a read as the works of messrs Mayle and Bryson. Nothing like setting the bar high, now, is there?
I began writing the first book [Feta Compli!] with the working title of "Lela's Daughter", since my mother-in-law, although Christened Eleni, was nicknamed Lela and I'd married her daughter. Smart eh? I'd written probably 50,000 words before we moved out here to Rhodes. I just didn't have the time in the UK to finish the project, since my life was just too busy. I have to declare here with some pride that, apart from Art, English was my next best subject at school; both language and literature. My teachers at school had commended me on my command of the language and I do like to think that I have a bit of the wit demonstrated by the two illustrious authors referred to above.
So, after our move out here to Rhodes in August of 2005, I finally had the time to set about finishing "Lela's Daughter", which subsequently became "Feta Compli!" - a title which I felt had a slightly more punchy ring to it, demonstrating as it does a strong Greek connection with the use of the word "feta" and, for those who understand the French phrase of which it's a corruption, it aptly described where my wife and I were in life. Our move out here had been planned, executed and was now indeed a fait accompli.
Following the release of the first book of "Ramblings" I sent a copy to the excellent, but sadly now extinct, "GREECE" magazine in the UK for review. GREECE magazine was a glossy which many Grecophiles used to read and keep all their back issues for reference purposes too. Before its demise I not only received a very positive review of "Feta Compli!" (see right down at the bottom of the "What They've Said" page), but I became quite a regular contributor, writing pieces which they were kind enough to publish. Just when I was starting to enjoy this aspect of my writing, the property market for UK citizens in Greece bombed following the 2008 crash and the disastrous effect it had on the exchange rate between the Pound and the Euro brought about a complete drying up of the magazine's advertising revenue, which was almost entirely from estate agents selling Greek properties to UK buyers. Thus GREECE Magazine disappeared from the shelves at the end of 2008, but not before it had been instrumental in raising my profile and that of the blog quite considerably and for this I shall always be grateful to it.
I always thought that I had just the one book in me and so it came as a surprise as much to me as to others that I still had a long way to go when I'd reached almost 80,000 words and I'd really only covered the experiences during the years between my first visit to Greece and our move out here. Thus "Feta" contains some stuff about our first few months here, but mainly deals with my wife's quirky relatives in Athens and the Peloponnese, plus all kinds of funny things that happened in diverse parts of the country over some thirty years or so, plus the journey over here, which was made in a fifteen-year-old white van.
The second book, "Moussaka to My Ears" continues on from where "Feta" leaves off. The amount of the book's content which deals with life here on Rhodes grows percentage-wise in comparison with the first book, in relation to our experiences from the previous three decades, but still the book contains a lot of stuff from visits which we've made to areas all over Greece.
"Tzatziki For You to Say" marks a decidedly evident switch in the balance between past experiences and our life here on Rhodes. Twenty one of its twenty seven chapters deal with life here on Rhodes, including the characters we've befriended and the nitty-gritty of carving out a life here, warts and all. Whilst perhaps book two (Moussaka T.M.E.) was a little shorter than book one, Tzatziki is quite a bit longer and I feel probably the strongest of the first three. Critics and commentators suggest that my writing style had developed in the right direction too, for which I'm flattered and grateful.
The fourth tome, "A Plethora of Posts" is almost exclusively about living on Rhodes and although, as with the preceding three books, each chapter is still a stand-alone tale in its own right, it kind of follows a chronology through the rhythm of the seasons, which one adopts subtly over time when living here. Much of its content started out as posts on the blog, hence the title. Anyway, I was getting fed up of people thinking that my books were about cookery!
Why a novel now?
Quite a lot of readers have commented that they liked my writing style and I've often been asked, "Why haven't you written a novel?" The simple answer up until now has been that I couldn't think of a plot that would engage the reader sufficiently. Having been an avid reader for many decades I've read my fair share of awful books and didn't want to add another to that list. There's nothing worse than reaching the end of a novel and thinking, "Well, huh. Is that it? What a waste of time."Finally, in early 2012 the germ of an idea for "The View From Kleoboulos" began to sprout as I remembered a young couple that we'd known many years ago when we'd been living in South Wales whose situation was the same as that into which I place Dean and Alyson. I won't say more about that here because it would be a "spoiler". Finally I felt that I had something which would touch the heart and mind, even challenge the beliefs or morals of a reader and so I began formulating the dates of the events, dates of birth of the main characters and locations etc. The homework one has to do in order to make something believable is far more involved for a work of fiction than it is for a simple memoir, where all you need is a good memory and a few notes and photographs.
Judging from the initial reactions I've received to the novel I believe that I've achieved a measure of success. There is a growing list of reviews on Amazon, all of which appear to show that the story does indeed grip you. There are plenty of twists in there as well. Hope you'll give it a try.
To purchase the books...
(For "The View From Kleoboulos", see a little further down)
(For "The View From Kleoboulos", see a little further down)
All four of the "Ramblings from Rhodes" books can be purchased in paperback or KINDLE format on Amazon through these links:
Click HERE for Feta Compli
Click HERE for Moussaka to My Ears
Click HERE for Tzatziki For You to Say
Once you get to each book's respective page, you can select which format you require, you'll see the box entitled "Formats". Amazon provide a superb service and they include free postage within the country in which the purchaser resides. The paperback versions aren't the cheapest around it's true, but the quality of the product, as mentioned above, is excellent and I'd like to say - all modesty aside - that the quality of the content is likewise! Judging from the feedback I get from readers I do seem to not only raise a laugh, but also touch "the spot" for Grecophiles, which is what I set out to do.
Click HERE for A Plethora of Posts
Once you get to each book's respective page, you can select which format you require, you'll see the box entitled "Formats". Amazon provide a superb service and they include free postage within the country in which the purchaser resides. The paperback versions aren't the cheapest around it's true, but the quality of the product, as mentioned above, is excellent and I'd like to say - all modesty aside - that the quality of the content is likewise! Judging from the feedback I get from readers I do seem to not only raise a laugh, but also touch "the spot" for Grecophiles, which is what I set out to do.
- Any of the four books direct from lulu.com. On the lulu website (lulu is the publisher) you can also buy the books as simple PDF downloads if you so prefer.
To order through this site:
If you do want to order from me directly, which you may of course do if you wish, simply send me an e-mail and I'll give you details on the procedure.
To buy the novel:
Click HERE for the ePub/eBook version direct from the publisher.
You can also obtain a simple PDF file of the new novel, along with a JPG file of the cover in the format shown here, simply by lodging the sum of £1.99 with my PayPal account, using the e-mail address you'll find under my profile (see the left-hand column, under "The Culprit/View my Complete Profile"). Once I have received notification from PayPal of the cash having been deposited, the files will be e-mailed to you directly.
• Buy the paperback from "The Book Depository", who deliver to Greece and price in Euros. Click Here.
• Australian On-Line book store Fishpond.com.au page for "The View From Kleoboulos" - HERE.
• Booktopia's VFK page (Australia) - HERE.
"The View From Kleoboulos" on Facebook.
And the A5 poster...
My Mum's Book
My mother, who was born in 1927, has written a brief but very touching essay about her life as a teenage girl and one of ten siblings in the UK both before & during the Second World War. It is now available as a short 44 page book, including some amazing photographs of Bath (UK) during the blitz, and is available for order from this page.
"One in Ten" is now available for purchase from lulu.com where it costs (inc. carriage) about £9, but it can be purchased directly from this site in the same way as the author's own four books, if so desired.
"One in Ten" is also available through Amazon, click HERE to go to the amazon.co.uk page for "One in Ten."
Click HERE and scroll down the page a while to purchase as a download.
My mother, who was born in 1927, has written a brief but very touching essay about her life as a teenage girl and one of ten siblings in the UK both before & during the Second World War. It is now available as a short 44 page book, including some amazing photographs of Bath (UK) during the blitz, and is available for order from this page.
Mum gave the essay (which it's best described as) to me as a handwritten piece and I was so enthralled that I decided to publish it for her as a complete surprise. So, when she received her first copy she had no idea it was coming. It totally thrilled her and she couldn't believe how I'd done it, so it was very gratifying and decided that all the preparation was well worthwhile.
If you go to the publisher's web page for the book, which is HERE, you can preview some of the inside pages, plus also read the back cover.
For those who would like to hear from the "horse's mouth" as it were, what it was like to be a teenager during the 1940's, there is no better way than to read Olive Manuel's snapshot of life as one of ten children growing up in England during the most turbulent times in this world's history.
"One in Ten" is now available for purchase from lulu.com where it costs (inc. carriage) about £9, but it can be purchased directly from this site in the same way as the author's own four books, if so desired.
"One in Ten" is also available through Amazon, click HERE to go to the amazon.co.uk page for "One in Ten."
Click HERE and scroll down the page a while to purchase as a download.
