The fifth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series has just been published

Hello! It's out there at long, long last - Secrets in the Mountains is the fifth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series. I meant to get it written and published ages ago and it should never have been this long.

Unfortunately, the demands of day-to-day life, not least the growing care needs of our 12-year-old autistic son, lovely boy though he is, are unrelenting and it is a case of squeezing my writing in around other priorities. But what I found while writing Secrets in the Mountains is how great it was to be reunited with my fictional characters, Jack, David, Emily and the irrepressible Louise Elliott. How the Johnson children's poor parents Paul and Liz must worry for their offspring when she's around!

Well no, that's not entirely fair. Lou, now thirteen, is a lovely girl. She's someone who I, as a father of a ten-year-old girl, would be proud to call a daughter. Of course, what's disconcerting about Lou is that lots of strange things seem to happen when she is on the scene.

The children's fifth adventure isn't going to reassure Mr and Mrs Johnson a great deal. Mum and dad rather stick their foot in it with their children this time. They have taken them away camping to a lovely campsite in Snowdonia where Lou, at the start of the book, is poised to join them. Unfortunately, the parents  go and admit to the children that one reason why they've gone camping this year is to keep them well away from those disused manganese mines on the North Wales coast they got stuck down the previous summer. The children love going to the family caravan at Abersoch and weren't very pleased to learn that they had effectively been banned from the place! And all because Jack and David were overheard saying they'd quite like a return visit to the mines.

Mr Johnson seeks to make amends by taking the children out for a treat in Snowdonia and unwittingly sets rolling a chain of events that leads them to what I would say is their most exciting, and at times terrifying adventure so far.

I hope readers of the Lou Elliott series will enjoy the latest addition. It's only available on Kindle at the moment but a paperback version will be coming out shortly. It moves back from the more "mystery detective" thrust of Trouble at Chumley Towers, to very much the "action and adventure" category. It was exciting to write and I hope you will be excited to read it. Do let me know how you get on with it, if you have time! My email address as always is georgechedzoy@hotmail.co.uk

I'll blog some more on the book when time permits.

All the best,

George

The fifth book in my Lou Elliott series is now underway (at last!)

Hello! Yes I know, I only ever seem to write blog entries when I want something but I really do intend to start blogging more regularly (honest!).

Anyway, I have some important news to tell you about: work is now underway on the fifth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series. I know it's been a long while and many of my readers will probably have thought I'd abandoned it but it's not the case. I've just been waylaid with so many other things which have demanded my time.

But it's great to get back to the series and to pick up again with the characters and find out what they've been getting up to. Lou, Jack, David and Emily are all fine and they've been having a great summer holiday in Snowdonia where they've been camping. The parents of the Johnson children are with them this time, and wrongly supposed that they could keep their eye on them and stop them from falling into another adventure. How wrong can you be!

I am hoping that the book will come out in time for Christmas (2017) but it's possible that it may not be ready until early January. The important thing though, is that book five is on its way and it definitely won't be the last. So watch this space, I will post regular updates on this blog.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I better get back to writing it. Things are hotting up!

My new children's detective novel has notched up its very first sale - in Germany!

I was wrong with my post written about an hour or so ago. My children's detective novel is going live on Kindle at midnight tonight and, because of the time difference, is already on sale on Amazon across most of Europe. And this means that the very first person to be able to read Trouble at Chumley Towers (which is in English, of course!) is someone in Germany!

I had one advance order on Amazon.de and that order has already shown up in my account. I presume the remaining ones will go through tonight for UK customers and tomorrow morning for those who bought it on Amazon.com.

So if you live in Britain and would like to be among the very first to read the fourth book in the Lou Elliott mystery adventure series, you've got just over half an hour to put in an advance order. At £1.99 it is the same price exactly as the other full-length books in the series - and is also considerably longer.

Trouble at Chumley Towers is more in the mystery detective genre than its predecessors which were essentially mystery adventures. Lou is spending Christmas with her friends Jack, David and Emily at their home in Malpas, Cheshire. A series of thefts have taken place from the nearby stately home, Chumley Towers, and Lou leads the others in an investigation to find out whodunit!

I hope you enjoy the book and to those of you who have been kind enough to order your copy in advance, many thanks / vielen dank!

Tomorrow - my latest children's book is published

It's all very exciting. The fourth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series will be published on Amazon tomorrow, July 4th, 2015. Trouble at Chumley Towers is supposed to go live (having been available for a month or so for advance orders) at midnight but with the time difference, I am guessing that will be 8am tomorrow Saturday here in Britain.

Perhaps appropriately for a children's book I am almost childishly counting the hours down to lift off! Well, you're never too old to be enthused about something are you, or at least you shouldn't be! I am really looking forward to giving readers another chance to catch up with Lou, Jack, David and Emily, having taken so long to come up with book four in the series.

I went badly off the boil - not only with this series but with writing in general - and also had other things which took up a lot of my time. Also, during my days in the literary wilderness, I lost touch with a number of people with whom I was corresponding via my George Chedzoy hotmail address, which got deleted by Microsoft due to inactivity. So do drop me a line, anyone who has emailed me in recent months and who has not received a reply - and for that matter, anyone else who wishes to get in touch (georgechedzoy@hotmail.co.uk)

I feel very pleased to be back into writing fiction again and looking forward to publishing my next book, which will be a fantasy adventure novella based on the characters from The Mystery of the Misty Woods. So look out for that in the not too distant future. It's already written, but needs quite a lot of editing before it will be ready.

As for the one after that - it might well be book five in the Lou Elliott series because I am so keen to keep going with those children and join them on further adventures and life experiences. I think they're a great bunch and in Trouble at Chumley Towers they enjoy getting together at Christmas with snow falling and tackling the mysterious thefts taking place from the stately home.

It's also my intention to bring out all my books in print format as well in the coming months - not everyone wants to read off an electronic screen, of course!

I hope you enjoy Trouble at Chumley Towers and I look forward to receiving some feedback on it. Remember - if you want to be among the very first to read it, it's available on Amazon for advance orders for a few more hours, before going live at about 8am tomorrow (British Summer Time).

Fourth book in the Lou Elliott mystery adventure series now available for advance orders

Greetings! It's been so long since I wrote a blog entry that I couldn't even remember my password. I just fell out of the habit of blogging and, as I alluded to in my last entry ages ago, I was seized for a long time with writer's block.

Furthermore, I also lost my George Chedzoy hotmail account because it was inadvertently deleted so apologies to anyone who has emailed me in recent months and not had a reply. Please do get in touch again.

I know that a number of people have been hoping that I would write a fourth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series, which began with Smugglers at Whistling Sands. At last, I have! It will be published on Amazon on July 4th, 2015, and is called Trouble at Chumley Towers. You can already buy it as an ebook priced £1.99, or the equivalent in other currencies as an advance order. I submitted the final manuscript to Kindle Direct Publishing yesterday evening at 9pm after working throughout the day on last-minute alterations.

Trouble at Chumley Towers is the longest in the series, at just over 73,500 words. Furthermore the age category for this book is more like 10 to 15 than 8 to 12. This book moves genre slightly into detective fiction and away from mystery adventure. The children, Lou Elliott and siblings Jack, David and Emily Johnson embark on a whodunit. A number of thefts have taken place from Chumley Towers, a stately home just outside Malpas in Cheshire. We join them just days away from celebrating Christmas. Lou - who is facing the prospect of a miserable Christmas at home with her uncaring parents - comes to stay with the Johnsons. She's delighted to have the chance to experience a proper family Christmas and also pleased to help lead the others in the pursuit of the thief or thieves targeting Chumley Towers.

I really enjoyed writing this book and getting to know my main characters a bit better and giving them a chance to take on the baddies once again. The items taken from the Towers are not priceless heirlooms but are nonetheless of great sentimental value to its owners, Lord and Lady Somerset. Lord Henry Somerset is the Ninth Marquess of Chumley and the Towers has been in his family's possession for centuries.

Like many aristocratic families over the years, they are struggling with the upkeep of their huge home and grounds and do not have the wide array of domestic staff which would once have worked in a place like this. They open their doors to the public to bring in vital extra income yet as a result, are vulnerable to some light-fingered person out there coming in and quietly taking away some of their treasured possessions. This could be the last straw which persuades them to sell up and move out altogether, which would be a very sad day, not only for them but the residents of Malpas.

I really hope you will enjoy this addition to the series and a chance to catch up with Lou, Jack, David and Emily again. Lou is a teenager now, she has turned 13 and Jack is not far behind her. David is still 11 and Emily 10.

Over the next few days, I'll bring you more news on the new book and what to expect in it. Remember that you can already order it on Amazon and be among the first to read it from July 4th.

A long overdue update!

It's over a year since I updated this blog. So much for harnessing social media to help promote my books and win more readers. I ought to pen a blog entry on how best to crawl under a stone and not market yourself. I fear I am something of an expert on how not to do things. I haven't touched my Twitter account in months, nor Facebook.

Anyway, I'll beat myself up over this another time. Here I am, the prodigal blogger returning, repentant, to finally give an update on my progress as an author. In one sense, I have more time than ever to write now, having taken redundancy from my newspaper job in January. Unfortunately that decision - more forced upon me than voluntarily made - played havoc with my need to have an untroubled, calm frame of mind in which to write.

As George Orwell once said, through his character Gordon Comstock (an impoverished wannabe novelist) in Keep The Aspidistra Flying, only a writer can say that that he literally cannot work. It' true - you need to have calm both externally and inside your head in order to be able to write fiction well (apart from all the other requirements to writing good fiction, that is).

In more recent weeks, I think that sense of calm and a desire to write has come back to me. Since I last wrote a blog entry in August 2012, I have penned books two and three in what I now call my Lou Elliott Mystery Adventure Series, namely: The Missing Treasure and Something Strange in the Cellar.

I am now embarking on book four in the series which I hope to have published by Christmas this year (2013). I have just published a short story for Halloween (about 20,500 words) called The Mystery of the Misty Woods, which I have currently got on Amazon for free until this Saturday (October 26th) and thereafter at 77p / $1.24 (approx).

It's getting quite a few downloads in America - nearly 200 in the first 24 hours and has already picked up its first review - a 4-star one from a lady who recommends it for readers in second grade through to fourth grade. I think that's aged about eight to 10 or 11. She herself is 70 and enjoyed it a lot so one might infer that the book is suitable for all ages from eight to 70+!

I hope so, anyway. It is an unusual take on Halloween, I believe - seeking to look into the myths and legends behind the festival and touching on the competing claims of Christianity and paganism to 'ownership'. It's my first foray into the fantasy genre and I enjoyed straying into that category.

I will write more very soon on other aspects of my work and also to give updates on book four in the Lou Elliott mystery adventure series. A number of readers have contacted me to ask when they will next hear from Lou, Jack, David and Emily and are keen to find out how they are getting on.

The answer is they are having a great time and looking forward to sharing their latest escapades with you!

I will blog again very soon . . . (now that I've got back into it!)