» Listings for 2010

1. Tracing Your Medical Ancestors

   Posted on 2:41pm Monday 13th Dec 2010

   I'm getting excited about the publication of my latest book, Tracing Your Medical Ancestors which is due out in February.  I will soon be adding a new page to my website dedicated to the book where you can find out more about it.

    

   In the meantime, check out the news page for a sneak preview of the front cover; I believe it gives a good flavour of what to expect in the book but let me know what you think!

    

2. Why Writing a Book is Like Running a Marathon

   Posted on 10:42am Monday 6th Sep 2010

   It’s been a very long time since I’ve written on this blog – sorry!   My only real excuse is that I was working on Tracing Your Medical Ancestors until April and I’ve found it really difficult to catch up.  I completely underestimated how much physical and mental energy was needed to write the book – you’d think I’d know by now as this was my fifth! 

    ?xml:namespace>

   When I was going through my usual rough patch during the writing and editing process, I realised that the whole thing was a bit like running a marathon, but without the improvement in fitness and weight loss... Not that I’ve ever run a marathon, dodgy knees put paid to that!  It probably sounds crazy but writing a book is like long-distance running because you have to be incredibly disciplined, require lots of stamina to keep going when things get tough, and need bags of energy, both mental and physical.  The publisher’s deadline is the equivalent of the race’s finishing line.  I had to burn the candle at both ends to meet my deadline and afterwards, I was totally exhausted.  Are there any other authors out there who see the similarities, or am I the only one?