“Sometimes death is the easy way out. Fighting for our life is often much more difficult, but we all do it, and when I opened my eyes, that’s exactly what I was doing. I was truly fighting for my life”

‘Dead of July’ is set in Germany in 1982.

Sheila move to Germany with her husband, a British Soldier.

On a hot Sunday afternoon in July, Sheila met a young German girl called Anna. Anna was bruised and obviously beaten, but refused any help.

After a second meeting Sheila persuaded the abused young girl to run away from the evil man who held her captive. A man called Viktor, who had won her confidence, only to destroy her life.

This story has many twists and turns,  but there are some laughs along the way as you read about the antics of the British Army stationed in Germany.

‘Dead of July’ should be available in Spring 2012.

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Below are links to my first two short stories.

‘Girl on the Beach’ is available to download as an e-Book for FREE from Amazon (US Only) and for  £0.86 in the UK.

‘Guy at the Bar’ is a bargain at $0.99.

• Girl on the Beach (UK)
• Girl on the Beach (US)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK

Both books are now available in Germany, Italy, France and Spain.

It is an uncomfortable month for me and I don’t know the real reason. I live in Colorado, so it can’t be lack of sun. January in Colorado is beautiful, even when its cold.

January is a quiet month, maybe that is the problem. My house is quiet. No unexplained footsteps, no premonitions, no shadows on the stairs. I miss my uninvited visitors!

Why don’t they visit me in January?

To read about my premonitions and visitations, click on the links below.

• Follow me on Facebook
• Girl on the Beach (UK)
• Girl on the Beach (US) (free E-book)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK

Watch out for my upcoming novel ‘Dead of July’ which will be released in late Spring. 

The family who lived in this house was very good to my mum, they treated her more as an equal than an employee and we felt like we were part of the family. It took my mum a little longer to be accepted by the rest of the villagers as she was going through divorce. In a small village in County Durham, in the early sixties, that was quite a scandal.

There weren’t many young people living in that village, so I didn’t have many playmates. I spent a lot of time alone. I used to walk Simon, the black lab. I would mix with the farm workers, who always had time for me.

I often went for long walks on my own, picking mushrooms, which flourished in the  field where the cow grazed.

I loved to sit in the field next to our house and imagine I was in fairyland.

This wasn’t difficult because the field was full of cowslips, milkmaids, soldiers buttons and  cowslips, to name but a few of the wild flowers that bloomed in spring and summer each year.

Milkmaids

Soldiers Buttons

Buttercups

The other thing that made it easy for me to imagine I was in Fairyland, was the light that flitted around that field at night. I tried to see it during the day, but it was never there. At night, from my bedroom window, I saw it often. 

The light wasn’t bright, but it was there, dancing across the field leaving ribbons of pink in its wake. The dancing light made me think of ‘Tinkerbell’ from the Peter Pan, and I wished I could fly. It was a happy light and when I saw it I didn’t feel so alone. I wish I could still see it now.
To read more about Sheila and her adventures growing up, click on the links below and read my two short stories.

• Girl on the Beach (UK) (around eighty pence)
• Girl on the Beach (US) (free E-book)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon ($0.99)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK (around eighty pence)

These book are available in paperback and as E-books in France, Italy, Spain and Germany as well as the US and the UK.

Follow me on Facebook  for updates on my upcoming novel ‘Dead of July’, a story about a Sheila in her mid twenties, and the trouble she got into in 1982 whilst married to a British Solder living in Germany.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 8,400 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 3 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

The first major catastrophe was in 1991 when the Americans launched a devastating air assault on Iraq and Kuwait. I know it needed to happen, but it scared me. I thought it meant the beginning of another world war. The air assault was on January 16, 1991. The day before my Birthday. I couldn’t get it out of my mind.

Not sure if it was the following year, but the next awful thing I heard about on my birthday
was the death of my husband’s aunt. Not sure if she died on January 17th, but that is when we got the phone call.

In 2003 I attended the funeral of my best friend’s husband on January 17th. It was an emotional
Military funeral. A wonderful memory of his life! 

So you see I am always a little apprehensive when my birthday rolls around.

I have had some wonderful birthday’s too, made special by my quirky husband and incredible daughter, so I am thinking positively from now on.

Fantastic people were born in January. David Bowie, Elvis, even Jesus is a Capricorn, so I need to stop worrying about bad birthdays and concentrate on having good ones.

After I was married in 1977 I experienced a different type of haunting. It was something I couldn’t see and it affected those around me, including animals.

If you read my last blog you will know that things started happening in our house. Our cat  started acting strangely and saw things we could not. She made strange noises and would hide whenever she got the chance. What happened with the neighbors dogs was a little more obvious.

I hosted a girls night at my house and invited my neighbors. After a couple of drinks, one of them asked me if I knew our house was haunted.

“What”I asked surprised.

I wasn’t surprised the house was haunted, but surprised that she knew about it. She went on to tell me that her dog would not pass our house without making her cross to the other side of the road. It was obviously terrified.

I asked her over for coffee the following day, inviting her to bring her dog too.

She came reluctantly, but didn’t stay long. She had to carry her dog into our house and it sat on her lap, terrified, for the whole visit.

I had to make sure it wasn’t something that only happened to her pet, so I invited another friend to bring her puppy. Again the puppy had to be carried into our house. This animal hid under the chair and whimpered for the whole visit.

I didn’t invite anyone else, not wanting any other dogs to suffer. My husband joked about it and said that it was our kitten scaring the dogs. We both knew different. We had attracted a ghost. We just needed to find out who it was.

I have written two short stories based on my life, visitations and premonitions. They are both available on Amazon in print and as E-books:

• Follow me on Facebook
• Girl on the Beach (UK) (e-book eighty-six pence)
• Girl on the Beach (US) (free e-book)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon (e-book $0.99)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK (e-book eighty-six pence)

My novel ‘Dead of July’ will be available in the late Spring.  

We had been married a year or less, and lived in Dorset. A beautiful county steeped in History.

We loved living there, but being newly married and young, there was obviously the odd argument. I can’t remember what we argued about on this particular night, but we went to bed without making up. This is never a good thing, and something I hate doing. On this particular night it was indeed a bad idea.

As we laid in bed we heard things move about downstairs, and then pictures fall off the wall one by one.

Back in those days there was no heating in our bedroom and the cold room felt icy. We hid under the covers of course.

We may have stayed in bed without moving until morning if it wasn’t for our black cat. Yes, my new husband agreed to let me have a cat. I know he regretted it later as he and the cat did NOT get along and tormented each other in all sorts of ways, but that’s a story for another blog too.

As we snuggled together under the bed covers a little afraid, and wondering what was going on downstairs, we heard another noise. It sounded like a child shouting “mamma, mamma” and it was coming from the top of the stairs.

We didn’t know if we needed to run because some Devil Child was coming to get us, or get on our knees and pray.

Cautiously we got out of bed and crept across the room to see where the noise was coming from.

There at the top of the stairs was our Black Manx Cat. It’s eyes were huge and crazy and were fixed on something at the bottom of the stairs. It was making a noise I had never head a cat make before “mamma, mamma”.

Our cat ran and hid under the bed, the way cats do, leaving my husband and I to go downstairs and tackle what ever was there.

We switched on every light in the house and walked from room to room. There was no-one to be seen, but the damage was done. Several photos had slid down from the wall and onto the floor.

My husband’s mother died when he was young, and I wondered if she was with us and maybe watching out for him. She may have been warning me to be nice to her son. Who knows? I will let you judge for yourselves as I share more of these stories with you.

 I have published two short stories which you can read as e-books or in print by going to the links below.

• Girl on the Beach (UK) (E-Book eighty-six pence)
• Girl on the Beach (US) (Free E-Book)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon (E-Book $0.99)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK (E-Book eighty-six pence)
• Follow me on Facebook
• These books are also available on Amazon in Italy, France, Germany and Spain.

Watch out for ‘Dead of July’ my first full length novel – Coming Soon.

January – Published ‘Girl on the Beach’ as and e-book

February – ‘Girl on the Beach’ published in print

March – “Guy at the Bar” re-launched as an e-book

April – “Guy at the Bar” published in print, took up snowboarding again.

May – Flew to England, marketed my book a little, had a little fun, visited family, ate curried goat and other delicious Jamaican food as well as good old fish and chips.

June – A little time in London, visited Gordon Ramsay’s wonderful restaurant ‘Maze’

July – Celebrated the fourth at the Gonzales residence with Fireworks aplenty.

August – Holy Moses – been married 34 years – I am getting OLD.

September – My lovely daughter turned 27.

October – Worked on my book as often as I could – it’s almost finished.

November – Celebrated Thanksgiving and my husband’s birthday in Vail, my daughter came along too.

December – A month of Christmas parties and getting together with friends and a lovely quiet Christmas together.

I am starting the New Year by relaxing a little. I wore myself out last year. I blogged and tweeted and wrote and worked and worked out and did chores and did classes and so on and so on and so on.

Even my vacation was a rush, two fun weeks in England, but during those weeks I visited family in London, Birmingham, Darlington, North Yorkshire, Berwick-upon-Tweed and then back to London. It was fun, but it was not restful.

Yes I know, that’s life, but this year I am going to prioritize a little better and relax a little more. Life should not be so stressful. We are only on this earth for a short while so we need to stop and smell the roses!

There is no doubt I will finish my book ‘Dead of July’ this year. I will most likely be finished with the writing this month. I will then re-read it before forwarding it to the editor.

I think I have found and editor I can work with for copy and content editing as well as proof reading. Next comes the lay-out  for print and for my E-book.

Lots to do, but I am going to pace myself and enjoy the process rather than rush through it. With that I wish you all a VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR.

• Follow me on Facebook
• Girl on the Beach (UK)
• Girl on the Beach (US)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK

I had never heard of the British Forces Broadcasting Service until my husband was posted to Dortmund, Germany in 1982.

When we first moved there we had to live with a friend as there were no available army quarters. On my second night in Dortmund I got drunk as a skunk. It wasn’t all my fault. I blame a certain Staff Sargeant (who will remain nameless), but I mixed red wine and white wine, which I know better than to do now. I was having the time of my life as  I was 25 and  it was the first time I had lived in a foreign country.

I tried them all

When I was eventually persuaded I should not drink anymore, we left the bar and my husband drove me to the apartment we would be staying in with his friend. I did a good job of acting sober (at least I thought I did) and after being introduced to Bob and Gisela (not their real names) I went to bed and passed out.

When I awoke the next morning my husband was gone, he was playing football. I was left at the mercy of Gisela, who may not have realized how drunk I was the night before, but she certainly did in the morning. I could barely see, my hangover was so bad. I only threw up once though (at first).

I think Gisela decided to punish me and for lunch made me a plate of spinach and potatoes. Imagine trying to eat that when you are hung over!!

Not a hangover cure!

It had the desired effect and she gave me a smug smile as I ran to the bathroom and parted company with this horrific food. When I could safely get off my knees I went back into the livingroom where she was watching German television. I was truly being punished. I had no idea what these loud people were talking about. My head was pounding and I was miserable. At that point her husband returned home (my hero) and immediately changes channels to something called BFBS. He looked at me and smiled “a little big of England for you love”. His wife went into the kitchen and made him something to eat and I sat and watched the wonderful programming provided by BFBS. It became my life line whilst living in Germany. As my German was not good, BFBS kept me in touch with the rest of the World.

To download and read my two short storied, click on the links below. ‘Girl on the Beach’ is currently free in France and the US and $0.99 (around eighty-six pence) everywhere else. ‘Guy at the Bar’ is $0.99. My upcoming novel Dead of July is set in Dortmund in 1982 and will be available sometime in the Spring. This story is about the adventures of a young Army wife in Dortmund in 1982. I think you will enjoy it.

• Girl on the Beach (UK)
• Girl on the Beach (US)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK
• Follow me on Facebook

Evil Viktor

It’s been a while since I posted an update on ‘Dead of July’ my German Ghost Story. It has not faded into the background. It is still very much alive and almost finished.

Sheila is in a very bad place right now and needs all of her sense of humor and courage to pull through.

THE STORY CONTINUES 

Sheila had just been scared badly by an innocent young soldier who unfortunately had a Russian look about him.  She managed to laugh about it, but realized she needed help. She decided to talk to the Military Police. It was a step in the right direction.

One of the young MP’s I had just served pulled a chair out for me and then went and sat behind his desk.  I told him that for the last couple of days, a man who looked Russian, and smelled bad (yes this made him laugh) had been following me. I didn’t go into details, but told him that a friend of mine (slight lie) had been dating this man, and although I had never met him, I knew he was bad news and I helped her get out-of-town and away from him for good.

Corporal Bradley (the young MP) listened to me and took notes. He knew that the van hand been vandalized earlier in the week, and thought there was probably a connection. It certainly gave my story more credibility. He said he hadn’t seen anyone on camp, that fit the description of my Evil Cossack, but it didn’t mean he wasn’t lurking around somewhere, staying out of sight. He asked me when I would be making the next tea and sandwich delivery and I told him not until Monday. We agreed that on Monday, I would stop off at the MP HQ and one of the Military Police vehicles would follow me around camp, keeping his distance, so as not to be noticed, but close enough to apprehend this smelly thug if he showed up again.

I felt better knowing they were taking me seriously. For a while we made small talk and chatted about the upcoming World Cup games. Corporal Bradley followed me back to my van for another doughnut and cuppa, on the house of course.  I felt a little now, sharing a problem always made me feel better, but sharing a problem with the Military Police meant I could be well on the way to getting the situation resolved. Hopefully with the help of the Military Police, I would be able to determine if I was dealing with the Russian Mafia, a nasty individual or a mischievous spirit. The Russian Mafia may be more dangerous, but at least I would get help with them, the latter was something I would have to deal with on my own.  Oh well, nothing I hadn’t dealt with before, although, this particular spirit was a little more persistent and may require the church to intervene. Could I ask a priest to help me when I didn’t even go to church? Of course I could. I am sure an Army Chaplain would enjoy the challenge.

My first two short stories are available on Amazon as e-books and in print. ‘Dead of July’ will be available in the spring.

• Girl on the Beach (UK) (eighty six pence)
• Girl on the Beach (US) (Free)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon ($0.99)
• Guy at the Bar Amazon UK (eighty six pence)
• Follow me on Facebook