Sometimes it seems that my entire career was leading me to the point I reached 102 months ago and that for the mathematically minded is eight and a half years.
That was when I launched Hethersett Herald and then followed it up with my daily blog a few years later. I don't pretend that they are easy to do. There's certainly no shortage of news on our village but attending events, writing them up and putting together a publication each month can be a challenge, particular when you factor in family life and all the other things I have to do.
But you could say that it keeps me off the streets but that wouldn't be true as I can often be seen wandering the streets looking for newsy bits and pieces to include.
And now we have the Good News magazine as well which I took on over two years ago and which, while including some of the same pieces as Herald, is its more gentle cousin. I try to stick with the title of that publication -:ie filling it with positive news.
Young reporter Sophie Stanley writes in the Herald and decided recently to find out how young people obtain their news today. Her results were rather unexpected as for many, news is a real turnoff. If they dip into the news online that's as much as they do. It appears their attention span for news is minimal and often they find it too depressing to bother with. One youngster said they might take more interest in news if it was more positive and less depressing. I feel the same way every time I see a politician being interviewed and avoiding answering any questions.
You can read her findings along with my comments in the April edition of Herald which should be out at the end of the month. I think you will find that most of the news and features in edition 102 are positive in nature with the two maiñ pieces being our church farm shop winning a top award for the second year running and the performance by pupils of Hethersett Academy of the musical Legally Blonde.
*. *. *
Today promises to be an exciting one but one filled with trepidation. We are expecting the delivery of our book "Hell in Paradise" which as you all know is about a massacre in France in the Second World War. It's rather scary to think that we will at last have a physical book in our hands.
It's taken a long time to bring this to fruition and to be honest there were times I wondered if it would ever come out. Time plays tricks as we all know and it is difficult to remember how long ago we first suggested turning our official website into a physical book.
The trepidation comes in hoping that the books look and feel right. We have an initial run of 500 with the option of a reprint which I'm pretty sure we are going to need- possibly sooner than later.
The initial idea of the book was accepted by a major publisher of history who subsequently changed their mind and pulled out of the project which didn't please me to say the least.
At that point we decided to self publish, having been turned down by a number of other publishers one of whom initially told us that if the original publisher's pulled out for any reason we should contact them. This we did but a number of months later we got another rejection letter.
I have to say that this was a bad decision by these publishers. To my mind they should have three criteria for publishing a book - does it fit in with our ethos, is it well written and will it sell?
Obviously in self publishing we only have to fit two of these. Is it well written? Well obviously I like to think so and will it sell? The answer to this is a resounding yes as members of our Le Paradis Commemoration Group have a huge number of contacts and undertake regular presentations where we can sell the books.
Four of us will be initially financing the project, safe in the knowledge that we will get our money back. We have worked with a print broker on this project - Paul Youngs- who we regard as one of our team.
Paul has been hugely helpful. I had never heard the term print broker before, but essentially Paul has acted as an intermediary in getting us the best deal for printing the books.
We also wanted to ensure we could sell the books as cheaply as possible. After all the primary reason for producing them is to bring details of the massacre to a wider audience and raise awareness of what took place in that small village in Northern France in May 1940 as troops retreated to Dunkirk. Oh and a bit of egotism as well.
The men we write about were those left behind in an attempt to hold back the German advance.
But back to the pricing. We will be selling the books for £10 at presentations and events but will also post them out for a price still to be determined (this should be at a meeting held later this week).
Myself and fellow author John Head and other members of Le Paradis Commemoration Group will also be happy to deliver to parts of Norfolk and copies will be available at our presentations as I've already mentioned.
We are at an early stage of distribution so still have to work out the best way to do this.
For me personally, the publication of the book fulfills one of my dreams - to have a book published with my name on the cover. That might be a bit egotistical but come on I'm allowed that sometimes aren't I?
We are pleased with the book. It contains diaries and information never before seen in published format. I won't say never before seen because some of the information is on our website.
I am wondering where to go next with our project? I have tentatively started trying to turn it into some form of drama which will prove quite difficult as there are so many strands but I have some ideas. I'm never short of ideas as you will have gathered. I would love to see this turned into a drama and be on the stage somewhere.
I would love to write a screen play as well. This is such a powerful story and would make a wonderful film. So why not reach for the skies as they say. Does anyone have Christopher Nolan or Stephen Spielberg's contact details?
OK laugh away, but I believe in what we are doing and I also believe that this story needs to go to an even wider audience than can be achieved through the book.
We have a story of war, heroism, love, hate, redemption, revenge, families and much much. Come to think of it does anyone know how we can contact Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice?
I will be doing social media on the book shortly and will let you know in this blog how you can get hold of copies and how much post and packaging will be.
Books can be picked up from Hethersett and I will have details of when, how and where.
*. *. *
I've said it before and I'm sure I will say it again. When I'm writing I completely lose track of time. I started writing this blog on Sunday morning at 8 am. I then started to write a piece for the next Hethersett Herald. Looked at the clock and two hours had gone by - ridiculous.
*. *. *
And talking of the stage. Yesterday we travelled back from North Norfolk to see granddaughter Poppy in her latest show, The Little Mermaid at the Hewett School in Norwich.
It was very good, full of colour and fun and once again I realised the difference between people who are natural onstage and people who aren't and just sound wooden. I should know a thing about bad acting after my performance many years ago in Sheringham Little Theatre. I was firmly in the wooden category.
When it comes to musicals I know when I'm watching something special as I get shivers of enjoyment down my spine.
It happened during the Little Mermaid with the main female character who not only had a lovely voice but seemed a natural onstage.
I love the shiver down the backbone thing as it happens involuntarily. I have no control over it. It just happens.
Incidentally, granddaughter Poppy's Zebbit story is now on the latest edition of the Wymondham and Attleborough Talking Newspaper's magazine edition which is available online.