A-B-Tree begins a new phase

Added on 10 October 2018

I am really excited that the A-B-Tree project is beginning a new phase. Thanks to a Research Scholarship at the University of the Highlands and Islands I shall be exploring the use of my tidbits of knowledge about trees (here) as a tool for learning and creativity. A tree has been painted on the wal...

Clachtoll broch

Added on 22 July 2018

For the past few weeks I've been doing the dig diary for Historic Assynt, at the excavation of Clachtoll broch, the setting for my novel, The Walrus Mutterer. You can read more here. Between the fascinating finds and the various experimental archaeology events - pottery made and fired the Iron ...

Art and poetry hand in glove

Added on 12 July 2018

‘Collaboration’, says Michael Longley, the Irish poet, ‘is the opposite of loneliness.’ He sits with his back to the window, on the sill of which a metal trout, with pennies for scales, swims beneath a fragment of a poem stencilled on the glass: ‘I am the trout ...

Events in August

Added on 12 July 2018

I'll be reading from The Walrus Mutterer at Blackwell's Edinburgh Festival fringe event on Thursday 9 August 2018 at 6pm. Come along for a signed copy, or just to find out about the story of Pytheas and his amazing Iron Age journey to these parts. I'll also be doing an event in Glasgow ...

On foreign shores

Added on 04 June 2018

Wally the wandering walrus has been wending his way back north after my book launch and celebrations. Meanwhile, I have been trickling southwards in our sailing boat, called Each Mara, which is Gaelic for walrus. We have finally washed up on the shores of Rathlin Island, just off the coast of Northe...

Readings this month

Added on 05 May 2018

I'll be reading from The Walrus Mutterer and signing copies on Thursday 10 May, 6pm, at Waterstones Inverness, (see here) and at the Ullapool Book Festival on Friday 11 May at 11.30am (tickets here). If you can't get along to either of these but would like a signed copy, you can get one here...