December 2018 – Grimly Darkwood

Fun for All Ages

Well, we’re in the pre- Christmas rush period now, so everyone’s rushing round to get everything ready for Christmas. This is very important. If everything wasn’t ready for Christmas then people would have to sit around pretending to open invisible presents and wondering who had run off with the Christmas tree. So, it’s very important that all these things get done, including putting in the bit that goes bang in the Christmas crackers. Otherwise they might go pop instead of bang and you might have to somehow struggle through the next twelve months without a tiny screwdriver set or a joke about a reindeer.

Then there’s remembering to order in enough snow and making sure the chimney’s unlocked so that Santa can get down it with all the presents, none of which leaves very much time left over for writing book reviews on Amazon. So after the first gush of five-star responses to ‘The Shop on Peculiar Hill’, there’s been a bit of a quiet time. But a new review arrived just the other day, and the person who wrote it has left some very useful thoughts to share with the other Amazon customers. Here’s what she had to say:

“Question: What amuses a seven-year-old and a seventy-year old for hours? Answer: The Shop on Peculiar Hill. My 7 year old granddaughter and her 70 year old grandfather both loved it. It’s a brilliant book, suitable for 7 year olds and upwards.”

We love that review, especially the bit about it being “a brilliant book”, but it’s also really helpful that this reader has explained how the book can be enjoyed by a very wide age range of people. This is what Grimly and the rest of the team have been saying all along. So if you can’t find a copy of ‘The Shop on Peculiar Hill’ around the house to read, it might be because you or your parents have accidentally forgotten to buy one (possibly because you were too busy ordering some other bit of Christmas) or it may be that your seventy year old grandfather or similarly aged relative have come across the book and have now found a spot to hide quietly away in and read it themselves. In which case you may just have to politely suggest that they get their own copy at Amazon UK, Amazon USA, or some other online bookshop of their choice. Or better still, why don’t you suggest that you read it together? That way you can share all the funny and scary bits, chuckling at the antics of Uncle Bob and Aunt Maggie, then hiding under the sofa together when the bogeys come out.

But whether you read it alone or in company, we hope these Christmas holidays provide you with time to read the book if you haven’t already had chance. After Christmas, we’ll be having lots of entertaining chats about the book here on the blog and we think you’ll enjoy those a lot more if you already know the story.

Right then, I hear the jingling of reindeer bells. Grimly says “Ho ho ho!” but he can’t stop and chat right now because we’re doing our test run with the sleigh we’ll be using to distribute the ‘Shop on Peculiar Hill’ flyers planetary wide this evening. Don’t worry – they’re made out of biodegradable Christmas Cake and they burst into flames as soon as you’ve read them anyway. All environmentally sound. “Hey, Mr Darkwoood! Wait for me!”

Merry Christmas, everybody!

(Thanks to Sarah Helen Booth for the photograph.)

Shop on Peculiar Hill – Official Flyer

Hello Everyone – The real Grimly Darkwood here again. I’m pleased to report that the unfortunate commotion of last week has died down nicely. The sprinkler system’s been put back to bed, we’ve had a whip round to pay for the excess on the fire insurance, and if we pass the pot round a few more times, we should just about have enough to settle it. So now we can turn our attention to the official promotional leaflet for The Shop on Peculiar Hill which you can see here on the screen.

As you see, it has impressive quotations from some of our favourite authors and perceptive observations from many of our discerning readers, so all we need now is to get it out there amongst the public and wait for the books to fly off the shelves. Unless they’re the electronic version, in which case they will presumably do whatever electric things do and slide around in their weird sort of way. I’ve never understood electricity but it seems to work all right– remarkable really for something that just sort of sits there and crackles.

Anyway, if you people at home can think of something to do with these flyers – something useful, I mean, those of you sniggering at the back – then you’re more than welcome to download it here as a pdf (whatever that may be): peculiar-flyer-1.pdf

Meanwhile, those of us here in the office will find a home for the rest of them. Now, you might think that time is against us but we’ve made enquiries and there’s a surefire proven way to get all these flyers distributed planet-wide by Christmas.

So the reindeer and the sleigh will be delivered here on Christmas Eve and all leave till after Christmas Day will be cancelled. I shall be Santa Claus of course. Who’s going to volunteer to be gnomes?

The Books Have Arrived!

Ha, ha! This is actually Grimly Darkwood here. They let me near the typing device at last!

What are they afraid I’ll do? Set fire to it or something?

Probably the most likely pending catastrophe is I’ll shatter the glass, because the picture up there now is of my chief assistant, accountant, typist, and odd job man Simon Ounsley, who is proudly holding up two copies of ‘The Shop on Peculiar Hill’ for all the world as if he’d written them himself. The trumped up hoo-hah!

What I want to know is exactly how he got that paint on the wall of the hovel he lives in such a similar shade to the backdrop of this glorious blog of ours. I wouldn’t be surprised if he hasn’t taken a can of the paint we used for the blog off home with him when no one was looking.

Eh, what’s that? What do you mean: you don’t use paint on a blog? How’s else do you get it that colour? You must think I was born yesterday. And no, I am not colour blind!

Anyway, forgetting about Ounsley for once, though he does rather spoil things, the books themselves look rather magnificent, don’t they? The glorious Pete Lyon illustration looks splendid even at this distance and the glossy green surround, which I believe was my idea, shows it off to perfection.

Eh? What’s that? The surround was Pete’s idea? Oh well, maybe. It’s very fine at any rate. But how come we haven’t even mentioned Pete Lyon on this blog yet when his painting’s the best thing in the book – well, apart from all that stuff I wrote inside, that is.

What? We have a feature coming up on Pete? About time too! Better stay tuned to this blog then, everyone. You don’t want to miss that.

Now then, are my sausages done yet? They were down there on the camping stove, just by the photocopying machine. Oh dear! Where are all those flames coming from?

Is that the time? I’d better be off then. No, no, I don’t want my sausages. They look a bit on the overdone side. You can have them yourself if you like.

Oh, now there seem to be flames coming out of the typing device as well. Better switch it off and on again. That usually does the trick.

I’ll see you all tomorrow then. Bye for now!

PS If you would like a copy of ‘The Shop on Peculiar Hill’, complete with almost 300 pages of scary, hilarious story, Pete Lyon’s wonderful cover illustration, and only a few slightly singed pages in the wake of the fire (joking about that bit) go to Amazon UK, Amazon.com, or other appropriate online store to purchase your copy (either paper or electronic).

With very best wishes till the next time,

– Grimly and The surviving members of the Team

PPS We now have two five star reviews on Amazon UK!

Five Stars

Hi Everyone – If you have read ‘The Shop on Peculiar Hill’ and would like to let other people know what you think about it, you can leave a review on Amazon. Here are the Amazon listings for the book. Scroll down and you will see a button on the left inviting you to leave a review.

Amazon UK site

Amazon US site

Speaking of which, we just got our first review on the Amazon UK site and it’s a good one, giving us a maximum five stars!

This is what the customer who left the review said:

“This is a thoroughly delightful tale about Peter who goes to live with his Uncle and Aunt on the edge of the Vale of Strange – a valley where strangeness oozes through cracks in the earth, engendering all sorts of weird creatures to terrify and, on occasion, consume tourists. The writer, Grimly Darkwood, skilfully treads the fine line between laugh out loud funny and disturbingly creepy to great effect. Despite reassuringly daft names like Bogeys and Heeble-greebs, the bizarre monsters that Peter and his friend Amanda encounter while trying to rescue a missing child, are often genuinely frightening. Darkwood builds up the suspense in the first half of the book very effectively, so that when the two adventurers are finally plunged into the depths of the Vale of Strange there’s a real sense of desperate peril. The sheer scope and barminess of the author’s imagination places this story firmly at the pioneering end of children’s fantasy, and I can heartily recommend it to both younger and older readers alike.”

Pretty good, eh? The review has the title ‘utterly charming and completely bonkers in equal measure’ though we’re not sure if that refers to the book or to the author Grimly Darkwood himself. (Note to Mr Darkwood: “I was only joking. Please don’t sack me, sir!”)

We look forward to speaking with you again soon.

Grimly and the Team