In which the Author gives a Writing Course in France…

On Saturday 8th March I’m giving a full-day writing course in Nogaro, a town in the southwestern French

department of the Gers, in the Midi-Pyrenees Region. It’s aimed at English-speakers who want to write either

fiction (novels, short stories) or non-fiction. The cost is €20. If you live in SW France and you see yourself writing a novel or a work of non-fiction, this is for you.

Here’s the details:

The day will cover: Being a writer – writing fiction – writing non-fiction – tips towards publication

       **No previous writing experience necessary**

The course will be in English only.

                             Venue: Communauté de Communes du Bas-Armagnac,

77 Rue Nationale, NOGARO (behind the Tourist Office).

10am-4pm. Fee: 20€

Places are limited – please book early. Free parking nearby. Tea & coffee provided. Wheelchair accessible. Cafés and boulangeries nearby for lunch.

To book, please call 06 48 00 03 06/05 62 09 81 19 or email geoffholder1@mac.com.

In which the Author rants about French driving in The Local…

Like many ex-pats living in France, I am often amazed at the inattentive and selfish driving seen on the roads on a daily basis. I’ve now focused my road rage into a snarky article for the English-language publication

The Local in France. My own version of Le Highway Code for the French  – everything from how to run a

wheelchair user off the road to a philosophical digression on the invisibility of zebra crossings, complete with a

Napoleonic subtext – can be found here.

The Local

 

Thanks to Ben McPartland of The Local.

In which the Author publishes a new book on Scotland…

Little Book of Scotland

My latest book, The Little Book of Scotland, has just been published. Here’s the blurb:

The ultimate compendium of trivia miscellany about Scotland’s unusual history

Take a funny, fast-paced, fact-packed look at the most frivolous, fantastic, or simply strange information that there

is to tell about Scotland. Here we find out about unusual crimes and punishments, eccentric inhabitants, famous

sons and daughters, and literally hundreds of other wacky facts about Scotland. This book contains historic and

contemporary trivia, including such gems as the real story of William “Braveheart” Wallace, which king was

murdered in a barn, and where the World War II Commandos were formed. With subjects ranging from Sir Walter Scott to Sir Sean Connery, Queen Victoria to Mary Queens of Scots, this remarkably engaging compendium is

essential reading for travelers and Scots alike.

scottish sun

The book has already picked up a fair amount of press interest in Scotland: here’s the full-page feature from

Saturday’s Scottish Sun. No doubt more to come.

The Little Book of Scotland can be picked up online here or here or at your favourite bricks-and-mortar bookshop – support bookshops, people, especially independent bookshops, they are Good Things.

In which the author appears in Le Canard Gascon…

Canard Gascon p
Le Canard Gascon is a monthly magazine that covers food, culture, business, politics, history and events in this

part of southwest France (Gascony). Edition 54, January-February 2014, has a full page feature on me and my

work, under the title of ‘British Zombies’.

 

Described as ‘Le spécialiste de l’étrange’ (specialist in the strange) who writes about the paranormal, witchcraft,

ghosts and zombies, I am credited with including in my work a ‘certain British humour’ that ‘our neighbours across the Channel practice with such excellence.’ Merci.  The article also claims that the Holder household is ‘a veritable

chaos of books’. Oh, such lies – the other day I managed to find the sofa without having to move more than fifty

volumes. Pfff!

 

You can read the article online (in French, of course) here. My thanks to Monsieur Jean-Louis le Breton, leading

light of Le Canard Gascon. 

 

In which the author publishes another book (this one’s on witchcraft)…

‘Maggie Wall – The Witch Who Never Was’ is out on December 1st. Telling the story of my investigations into the

famous Maggie Wall Witchcraft Monument in Perthshire, Scotland – the only historic monument to a named witch

in the whole of the UK – it is a non-fiction detective historical story, leading to some very surprising conclusions

about this most enigmatic of monuments. Here’s the blurb:

A remarkable and striking B-listed roadside cross in Perthshire is painted with the words

‘MAGGIE WALL

BURNT HERE

AS A WITCH 1657′

Maggie Wall has subsequently become the most famous witch in Scotland, featuring in folklore, folk history and

modern pagan belief alike.
Which is strange, seeing as she never existed.
This is the story of the Witch Who Never Was.

 

‘Maggie Wall – The Witch Who Never Was’ is  published as an ebook by The New Curiosity Shop out of Edinburgh. It is currently available on Amazon/Kindle, and will soon be downloadable for Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and the Apple iBookstore. The cost is around £2.80 or $3.60. 

Maggie-Wall938x1500

In which the Author discusses Zombies for the Edinburgh Forteans…

On Tuesday 12th November I’m giving a talk on ‘Zombies from History‘ for the Edinburgh

Fortean Society. You can expect:

Archaeological evidence for belief in the walking dead in Romano-British and Anglo-Saxon times

Medieval accounts of plague-spreading, people-battering zombies

People who have returned from the dead after being hanged or buried (or both)

And the exploding corpse of William the Conqueror…

Warning: contains corpses.

Venue: The Counting House, West Nicholson Street, Edinburgh.

Time: 7.30pm, Tuesday 12th November.

Cost: £1.

There’ll be books for sale on the night.

Zombie-Geoff_MONO