Reflections

Number four has landed!

I am now the proud mama – oops, AUTHOR – of four published books. As of today, my latest book, A Newfound Land is available “everywhere where good books are sold”. (I rather like that. It also makes me wonder where the bad books are sold. More to the point, it makes me consider what […]

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Get ye gone, ye evil spirits

Samain. All Saints Eve. Hallowe’en. A night to be wary of, a short moment in time when the thin veil that separates the living from the dead can be breached, when restless souls wander the dark in search a new abode. Well, assuming you believe in stuff like that, right? I’m not sure I do.

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“On argent background, a lion – nope, a beaver – rampant”

My husband’s family has a coat of arms. His family goes back for yonks, and he can count both the Stuarts of Scotland and the Vasas of Sweden among his ancestors. Not sure the Vasa strain is all that much to brag about, given that his family is related to Erik XIV of Sweden, a

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John Ball – a man of rhyme and plenty of reason

We all have our particular favourites among historical people. Quite often, the people we idolise will be vilified by others – history, just like pretty much everything in life, is a matter of perception and opinion. After all, none of us knew the people who took central stage during the preceding centuries. (Well; I would

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Smart phones, smart machines and smart sons

The other day, the Swedish phone company announced that it was going to do away with the remaining 1 200 phone booths that stand dotted through our elongated country. Why? Because no one uses them anymore – well, at least not to make phone calls from. Phone booths can, as I am sure you can

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Of moose, apples and freedom fighters

When we came up to our country house this weekend, the apples were gone. Puts väck, as one says in Swedish. Where only last week our two apple trees had bowed under the weight of the as yet unripe but beautiful winter apples, now they stood denuded, not as much as a single apple on

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When sitting in an armchair isn’t enough…

… I write. What I mean is that when it no longer suffices to sit and dream about travelling to other times, other places, I write about them instead.  A most economical and safe form of time travel. When I was a child, I ran around with a wooden shield and sword, pretending to be

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By the sea, by the beautiful sea

This post is my contribution to the Nautical Blog Hop, organised by Helen Hollick. Please do not miss out on all the other posts on this blog hop  – right at the bottom of this post you will find a list of all participants. Further to this, why not participate in my little give-away –

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What’s wrong with a little self-deception?

Most of the time, I wander around entirely unaware of my age. Okay, so of course I know how old I am – I’m not senile yet – but mostly I put myself in a vague age bracket that could be denominated “middle-aged”, with a mental qualification that I am of course still a very

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