This week I am participating in #Must-get Monday in collaboration with blogger Christian Fiction Girl.

As Christian Fiction Girl mentioned non-fiction in her last blog (#110), in the form of Raising Healthy Teenagers I will also suggest a non-fiction book. This isn’t a recent one, but is interesting for those wanting to know about British culture.

Watching the English by Kate Fox

About the book

This is a book for anyone interested in understanding the peculiarities of British Culture and who is interested in sociology. Though, it is heavily England focused (and for our international reader that means Wales, Ireland and Scotland don’t feature much). Perhaps that means there is a market for Watching the Scottish! Fox provides an insight into why the English are reserved, choices of dress, habits which indicate social class, etc. Parts are so good you may find yourself reading parts out to your friends. Other parts are a bit slower, but it’s an easy book to read and dip into when the mood strikes. It’s basically a book to better understand the behavour of others, which cannot be a bad thing as once you understand the intricacies of the British you can negotiate relationships better.

Buy it here on Amazon.

Pluses

• sensitive and humourous writing
• accurate cultural insight
• an insight into English cultural reserve

A fun little game you can play with your English friends to find out what words they use for what items in the house (which may indicate how social class and culture is changing).

What book are you most interested in reading currently?

About Emma

As an introvert haunting the corners of storytelling festivals, it’s incredibly difficult to track Emma down. She’s best known for writing Scottish fiction about working-class women and communities and their misrepresented lives. You can find her recent book about the friendship between a Christian woman and a non-Christian (A Friendship of Thistles) here.

L’article #Must-get Monday est apparu en premier sur Emma Parfitt Proofreading Editing Services.

Cover update! I commissioned a new one for A Friendship of Thistles and have updated the description on Amazon to help people find it. Seems to be working as immediately had six sales and a new review. I shared news on Facebook about the new 4-star book review.

October has been a great month, writing-wise. First, I won second place in the Just Imagine Short Story Competition with A Traveller’s Daughter. You can read it for free if you sign up to my mailing list here. I was impressed by the entries in the children’s and young adult category, enjoyed reading out an extract of my story, and chatting to the winner, Angela, afterwards for the refreshments portion of the evening.

Second, I won first place in a beta-reading contest from @everything.writing on Instagram for my forthcoming book Clashmaeclavers and Fisherlassies.

Here is the blurb for my new book

Can you tell lies from truths? We’ll see.

Scotland, 1815. After her mother’s arrest and father’s abandonment Mairead, a Traveller’s daughter, only has one choice: to marry. She can wed the Gypsy lad, Ned, who’s been courting her, or Lachlan a Scottish fisherman she meets by the campfire.

Impatient to grow roots Mairead agrees to be the fisherman’s bride. She arrives at the village as a Gypsy, a storyteller, and as her in-laws soon make clear an outsider.

Two years later a pair of hands drowns her. Who did it? And why?

Wife, daughter, sister, witch, whore … as the gossip of the village begins to steer her life towards ostracization there are plenty of potential suspects.

 Writing grant

I was awarded a writing grant from Curtis Brown, for a free place on one of their creative writing courses.

Lastly, I had the pleasure of chatting to Pranika Sharma and Aakriti Patni the founders of Saga Fiction about future works and the possibility of republishing my book A Friendship of Thistles with them.

 Beta-reading

So, full of motivation I recommence the edits on my forthcoming work while awaiting @everything.writing’s comments. I am also working on the structure of the book after that, which will be based in a miner’s community in Scotland.

And, if the publisher works out I should probably move this website to a proper one, as blogger keeps introducing different fonts in the same post and getting on my nerves. But, you know us writers, too busy writing to do any social media thingies … or at least that’s my preference.

L’article Creative writing: Autumn dreams est apparu en premier sur Emma Parfitt Proofreading Editing Services.

The story of Heather and Fran brings Edinburgh alive, during lockdown from 2019 to 2020. From a working-class perspective, Parfitt has created a memorable in-depth look at friendship and community. A Friendship of Thistles is also the story of a nation divided. Through the lives of Fran and Heather, Parfitt gives her readers the story of a country and its people undergoing stupendous change to remind us of the importance of community.

The book is about contemporary Scotland, about relationships, about the resilience of friendship, about hope and faith during adversity. A smattering of politics about Brexit and the Covid lockdown in 2020.

About the book A Friendship of Thistles

L’article A Friendship of Thistles. New Publication! est apparu en premier sur Emma Parfitt Proofreading Editing Services.

L’article Raven’s Heart est apparu en premier sur Emma Parfitt Proofreading Editing Services.