I Visited Waterstones Today...

I don't usually go shopping in the city centre at the weekend but I was buying a birthday present, so I popped into my local branch to see what was available for Christmas too.

I was delighted to see the squishy sofa seating had been put in downstairs and some moving around of sections making it seem a little more open.

If you read my blog in October about my difficulties buying romance books then I can tell you that there has been some improvement.

Romance is no longer in an alcove between erotica and horror, it is now at the end of a range of shelving units- much more comfortable in the viewing stakes.

It now comes after the horror books- okay, nothing is perfect. I can ignore the books to my left.

Still a limited choice in romance (compared to the range that the departed Borders held) but that's retail.

I noticed Nora Roberts books ( reissues of many of her category romances that I bought first time round)  have made it into the A-Z Fiction sections rather than being within romance, but with so many shelves to fill it would have unbalanced the romance section if they'd been put there...

I did buy a book though. It was a Shire Library book on Early Firearms 1300-1800 by Michael Spencer. (Research for one of my characters)

I'm a fan of Shire Books and certainly recommend having a look at their website. If you want an overview of a subject then they are very useful, plus there is a list of places to visit and further reading on the subject of the book, so you can follow on from it if you need to.

Right I'm off to read my new book...

Never to be Forgotten

Today we remember the dead of past wars and those that are dying in conflicts now.

I thought that I would bring a particular website to your attention. It's the War Graves Photographic Project.

"The aim of The War Graves Photographic Project is to photograph every war grave, individual memorial, MoD grave, and family memorial of serving military personnel from WWI to the present day and make these available within a searchable database."

Volunteers photograph the graves and memorials for inclusion in the project and it will obviously take quite a while if they are to achieve their aim, "to photograph in excess of 1.75 million graves or memorials from Commonwealth Nations and many from other military forces around the world."

I posted the link for the website on a writers forum I belong to and a member was able to send the link with the picture of a relative's grave to another family member.

Many of us will have had an ancestor in the armed forces during the First or Second World War- in my own family history one of my grandfather's and two great uncles fought. One of those great-uncles lies in Artillery Wood Cemetary in Belguim.

So please support this project...