Three years ago I was lucky enough to visit BSE (The British School of Egypt) and in particular to meet the wonderful pupils, teachers and parents at the school. Whilst I was there BSE kindly arranged for me to visit the pyramids at Giza – in the photo – and Cairo museum that houses most of the items that were found in Tutankhamun’s tomb. It was unusually quiet at the museum and I had the rare opportunity to stare into the face of King Tut on my own for a short while. Like so many before me I became entranced by his story and the remarkable story of the final discovery of his tomb such an incredibly long time after his death. ‘Sixteenth step’ describes the thoughts of six characters, real and imagined, in the story that spans so many millennia. It’s available from Amazon in book form (£5.00 in the UK) for free download for Kindle through Kindleunlimited or for £3.50 (in the UK). For mature readers.
Bongo the Armadillo Volume One
Surprising things happen to Bongo the Armadillo, usually while he is sitting in his garden having his cup of tea. “Hmm,” he usually ponders as he looks inside his teapot to see if he’s made enough tea. “That didn’t happen yesterday.” Indeed, it didn’t, read on as he’s visited by a frog who has been turned into a prince, an alien looking for the nearest McDonald’s and a wizard who has accidentally turned a city into jelly. Soon after he’ll be visited by the Queen, someone who is two people at once and then some uninspired sky. After that some very unusual things happen…
Available now in book form from Amazon (£4.00) and for Kindle (£2.99 or free on Kindleunlimited.)
After a bit of a break – watch out China! (And South Korea!)
After a bit of a break for one reason or another I’m back at work. The image shows a series I’ve been working on that will get published in China (and STOP PRESS in South Korea as well!) The ‘Magical Maths’ books contain a range of puzzles and challenges aimed at making learning different aspects of mathematics more fun and interesting to learn. I hope they work! Maybe if all the children in China (and South Korea!) begin giggling at once… well… um… something might happen!
Sixth Adventure of Hugh McPearson – Out now!
Hugh McPearson and the Confounding Riddles
In his sixth bizarre adventure Hugh, (and his brother who is also called Hugh) face their nemesis. This mysterious master villain has already stolen all the gold from The Bank of England and all the paintings from Buckingham Palace, but now Hugh (and Hugh) have to prevent the villain… well they don’t know what to prevent unless they can crack the villain’s mysterious coded riddles. According to Hugh (Hugh’s brother) a total twit is needed. Confused… read on…
(Buy story) £0.99
Fifth Adventure of Hugh McPearson – Out now!
Hugh McPearson and the Agreement Gas
In his fifth inconsequential adventure, at the request of the Prime Minister, our hero attempts to save the nation by uncovering the heinous villain behind the production of Agreement Gas, which very dangerously makes everyone agree with each other! In the course of his adventure he becomes the first ostrich to fly – downwards to go upwards as well as upwards – disguises himself as a corner flag and becomes one of the first ever to sit in a spell while it’s being made. To find out more… read the story! How simple could it be!
(Buy story) £0.99
Unusual Results
A new story for 8 to 11 year-olds.
Having eaten some of the wizard’s magic jelly, which was supposed to make him sing better but didn’t, King Popple spends every day making up football results. Meanwhile for a not unrelated reason everyone has purple wax constantly dribbling out of their ears and all the children under 5 think they are cows. Hopefully the chamberlain might have a useful idea… “The poor queen’s nerves were strained to the limit so much of the time that some of her courtiers thought they might spring apart with a (more…)
Superhero Strawberry
An unlikely candidate for a superhero but this seemingly innocuous plant thwarts various nefarious plots, in particular one to take over the drones used by the armed forces. A story aimed at 10 to 13 year old’s.
“It looked like they’d just executed the perfect crime. Being light but agile, the three gymnasts-cum-felons had been able to actually swing along the tops of the frames of the paintings in the gallery. They swung from painting to painting, like apes swinging from tree to tree, without setting off the alarms fixed behind each painting that went off if anyone tried to pull them off the wall. They then formed a triangle around the small sculpture that was the target of their robbery, each of them hanging gracefully from the frame of three different paintings…”
More Creative Writing Ideas
Happy New Year everyone!
Continuing the idea of adding some creative writing ideas, some silly rules! I call these “get the pen moving” ideas – once we get the pen moving that’s when the ideas start coming! Sometimes these then work as warm up exercises, or sometimes as a fun end in themselves!
I don’t know if you’ve ever wanted to rule the world… I don’t think I’d like to since everyone who’s ever tried has made a right mess of it. Still if I did read on…
Get the pen moving ideas.
Crazy Rules.
Rules if I ruled the world
1. All people whose name begins with “S” are to be in charge and everyone has to buy them Magnums all the time or make them cups of tea all the time.
2. Only ostriches can be employed as teachers, not people. The pupils have to do everything the ostriches tell them to do, apart from that they can do what they want.
3. People have to say “Mushroom” to each other when they meet instead of “Hello”. Anyone who disobeys this order has to have a bath in tomato soup.
4. Being a goat will be completely illegal. All goats will have to become sheep instead of goats, otherwise they will have to go to prison for two and a half seconds.
5. People can only drive cars that are completely made out of ice-cream.
6. From now on Sundays can only occur on Saturdays. If they don’t, everybody has to completely ignore them and take a day off after every Saturday.
7. Space is not allowed. From now on the universe must end at Scunthorpe.
8. Anyone who makes up more than eight completely stupid rules must be arrested and covered in elephants immediately.
9. It is…………..aaaaaaaagh……get those elephants out of here!!!!!!!
NB Although these particular rules are for teachers you could make up rules for parents, dinner ladies, dogs, coats, dentists, fish… even ANNOYING YOUNGER BROTHERS!!!
Crazy rules for teachers.
1..Teachers will be allowed to use pupils who don’t do their homework to build their houses with. They can cement them together to make walls with instead of bricks.
2. Teachers can have carpets made out of pupils who don’t do as they are told, by sewing the pupils together.
3. Teachers only have to work on 30th February and they can have the rest of the year off.
4. Every night teachers can give their pupils four years worth of homework.
5. Every day pupils should wash the teachers’ cars, polish their shoes and make them cups of tea all the time.
6. Teachers should be paid at the rate of three million pounds per second.
7. Teachers should only have to teach classes of 0 pupils or less.
8. Teachers should be forced to go on a ten year long training course where they have to learn how to sunbathe on Caribbean beaches.
Creative Writing ideas
Happy Christmas everyone!
Roughly each week from now on I’m aiming to post some examples of a theme for creative writing. As the New Year is coming up how about some…
Nutty New Year Resolutions!
1. I won’t selotape my Dad to the chair while he’s asleep anymore.
2. I won’t play at being an orang-utan anywhere near Mum’s breakable vases anymore.
3. I will stop picking everyone else’s nose and will only pick my own from now on.
4. I won’t wash my hair in the toilet anymore as it seems to upset my Mum for some reason.
5. I won’t paint the stair carpet a lovely orange colour again.
6. I won’t eat 16 bowls of jelly all at the same time again…ugh…
7. I will stop running up and down the street, dressed as a shop, shouting, “Mind out for all the purple elephants!!!”
8. I won’t spread jam all over the dog anymore.
9. I will stop suddenly turning into an enormous cabbage in P.E. because it frightens all the other children.
10. I will never drop an elephant on Grannie again while she’s sleeping, even though it is very funny.
11. I will stop being me and will be the man three houses down with the green car.
12. I will only have eleven New Years Resolutions this year.
13. I will say “Tortoise” to people every time I meet them instead of “Hello”
Wonderful welcome in Hamburg!
The International school in Hamburg is in a delightful setting, opposite a huge botanic garden through which I walked from the tram station to the school. As at Bremen the staff and the children made me very welcome and as I walked in, I saw the announcement on one of the large display screens around the school that some guy called Steve Way was visiting that day. I don’t know where he got to but I had a great time pretending to be him all day long – I think some of the staff and pupils actually thought I wrote some of his stuff!