Blog 7

What a fantastically romantic example Tom Daley is to everybody. Who cares whether the person he loves is a man or a woman.

It's so lovely to see someone young, successful and in the public eye come out and say how he truly feels. fantastic Tom.  Many many congrats.

A M Cridland. xxxx

Blog 6
'Something unexpectedly nice is always just around the corner.'
My homemade motto certainly works in looking back over 2013.
Wow, what a year!

When you write a book, run your own bakery and try and get them both out there and off the ground with gusto it's going to take a lot of work, penny pinching, scrimping and going without.

 It may take such a huge financial whack out of you that you take a couple of years to recover and actually start earning again, but it's worth it.

   What I've missed out on in physical riches recently, I've gained in every other way. Working for yourself and following your dreams is truly a great thing. Since the age of ten I've been writing and drawing and now both are starting to produce results.

Look at my personal gain in experience and happiness this year, just in terms of the book:

'Nathan and Alex,' goes into: 'Illum' bookshop, Copenhagen.
I have a book signing at Legends, Brighton and meet lots of fabulous people.
'Nathan and Alex' is featured in the VIP area at Brighton Pride and the organiser
takes a signed copy.
I take the book to Clapham Street Party and meet tonnes of fabulous gay men
who chat to me about their own fantastic love stories.
I meet the wonderful people at Clone Zone Soho and am
invited to London Pride on their Monster Truck float.
I'm written about in Darling Magazine, Wimbledon, a whole right page feature about the book
for 3 months.
'Nathan and Alex' goes into all 4 branches of Clone Zone.
I'm invited by the fab Paul Burston of Polari and TimeOut to read from 'Nathan and Alex'
at the Royal Festival Hall, London.
I meet wonderful fellow authors and we become friends.
Prowler Soho take 5 orders of the book and Clapham Books take their first two.
I get invited to join an Author day for 'Books are my Bag' event at Barton's books Leatherhead,
where I meet lovely new author friends again.
I'm invited to a second and third author event via Barton's.
I'm interviewed on Gaydio Breakfast radio show about 'Nathan and Alex.'
I sell several hundred copies of the book on Kindle...not bad for an unknown and makes me smile.
I get great personal reviews from people who love the book on Goodreads and Amazon.
I learn how to blog for the first time!
I meet wonderful people both here and abroad via the web who stand up and make a difference
for same sex couples, it's truly inspiring.

And that's the best thing of all, what ever my day, my week or month...however hard that particular period may have been, my circle of friends has widened and I feel truly blessed. And while they often say that what I'm doing is quite inspiring - and I never thought I'd hear THAT from anyone! - they also give me something money can't buy...their unconditional love and support.
See, it really has been a pretty fabulous year. xxxx

Blog 5
Nathan and Alex.

Hello again everyone, apologies that it's taken me a couple of weeks to get my 5th blog written, as I've been busy with some cake orders for my online business, 'Antonia's Bakery,' as well as another lovely author event at Barton's Bookshop in Leatherhead.

     If you've never been can I just say please go!.

 This isn't to shamelessly plug their shop, it's because I want as many people as possible to 'experience' Barton's.
     Remember the elderly gentleman who's house Susan, Peter, Edmund and Lucy are sent to in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe? - there's something magical about him, he knows that Narnia exists somewhere in his house or at least he doesn't disbelieve it....Ok..., now head down to Barton's and meet Peter who runs the shop...they're cut from the same cloth. :-)

So, back to the book: I said in my last blog that I was going to write about my real life story behind the 'incident,' in chapter 10, but I've changed my mind, I don't really want to go into minute detail about the pain and horror I went through at the time. I was only 11 when it happened but I can remember everything after the event as if it were yesterday. The only thing I will say is that like Nathan, there really was a night when I thought I might die. I lay there watching the second hand of the clock tick round and round, hoping and praying I would make it till morning. When the pain got too bad I tried to press the button the nurses had put into my hands but even with both thumbs on top of it I had no strength and couldn't depress it.

    So I just had to wait.....All night.

But hooray, - I'm here! I DID make it,  I got better and I've travelled the world, completed bike marathons and 30 charity runs, built my own cake business, sold my drawings, achieved a degree and been thrice engaged...even better than that, because of and in spite of everything in my life, I have stayed the incurable romantic...and that's why I wrote Nathan and Alex.
Have a wonderful week everybody. :-) A M Cridland. xxxx

Blog 4. Nathan and Alex

Yesterday I started to re read my original story from 1989 that inspired 'Nathan and Alex,' all these years later, and I could remember where I sat in my Mum and Dad's house on a red velvet sofa with long tassels all around the bottom edge which draped to the floor.

I remembered sitting with my dark blue A-4 lined notepad with its smart leather effect front, I had really, really long hair and I could see white apple blossom out of the window as I wrote. No one else was at home and I got completely taken into the world I was creating.

Just holding that notepad again is in itself remarkable - because look at all the memories it evokes...

I can literally remember how my body felt to be 17, how food tasted, what the weather 'smelled like'  - yes I know that sounds odd but I think some people will know what I mean.

All I can say is wow! It still astounds me that I found it again and now the book's out there and I love it like mad.

Enough reminiscing....next week, how I came to write the dramatic 'INCIDENT' in Chapter 10. It's based on real life experience and was pretty horrific at the time. If you haven't read that far yet or don't want to spoil the story, DON'T READ NEXT WEEK'S BLOG!!!!

You've been warned....
Have a wonderful week everybody.
A M Cridland. xxxx

Nathan and Alex
Blog 3.
The best seven months of my life and writing....THE SEX SCENES!!!

Imagine if tomorrow you could wake up and instantly have your dream job?

Well that's how I felt when I found my manuscript again after 20 years lost.
   Sitting down to write once more with the same passion that I hadn't really felt since 1989 was incredible. By day I was a cake designer and decorator and by night I turned into a word crazed writing demon.
   Something took hold of me and I couldn't stop, it really was as if Nathan and I had met and he'd told me all about Alex and their incredible love story. Each night I was completely absorbed in their world, I've never felt such utter contentment in my life and I always knew where the next part of the story was going. If I had to stop and fall into bed, I'd write a quick bold type faced synopsis of the next part so that I wouldn't lose the process and ideas.
   I wish that writers could scan the images in their minds into a video or camera roll of pictures because the hillside village and school that I created for my boys to live in are incredibly picturesque and impossible to do adequate justice to.

So onto the sizzling scenes....how do you write the SEX???!!!😳

Well first of all you just write it. If you've had sex, especially both hot and loving, then give it a crack...you're unlikely to go wrong.

Secondly, never EVER imagine your family reading it! Shudder.....

And thirdly,  - if in any kind of doubt or you just want to double check stuff that maybe you're less familiar with....one word...GOOGLE!

I also had the back up of a great gay friend who steered me to several rather 'revealing' and retina stingingly hot sites....Sorry where was I,....distracted for a mo....😃! Ha ha.

Lastly,...get into bed, switch out the light and close your eyes. With no one around, in this quiet little world of your imagination, remember being desperately in love yourself, think of your stomach full of butterflies and your skin electrified by their touch...then the rest will come.

Until next time...and always with my love,

A M Cridland. xx

....Spine tingling...that's how I left my last blog, and it truly was to find my story after all that time!

So you know how the idea of Nathan and Alex jumped with both feet into my head now, but what you don't know is the depth of passion it created in me. When I say that if felt as if Nathan were standing beside me telling me how he met the love of his life, it really did. I run my own online bakery and it's been hard getting it off the ground in its first couple of years, but now, I had something to reward myself with, time alone with my computer at the end of every day where I would write and write.
   The most incredible thing about having a story that really grabs you around the heart like this one did for me, is that you can't not write it. It just has to come out. So much so that in the course of a particularly intense few weeks of writing, I sat down each night at 6.30pm to do a few pages. 'Hollyoaks' was on, low in the background, my tummy rumbling a little and I could see the black winter evening skies through my tall balcony doors, and then I was away. My fingers would literally fly across the keys, - it was just there in my head, Nathan's love, Alex's intensity back,....the 'incident!' - all of it!
   Some while later I would realise that my body suddenly felt truly shattered, I knew I'd written much longer than I'd planned to and as I looked up toward the clock, expecting to see midnight at the very worst, on FIVE separate occasions I was dumbstruck to see that it was now 6.30am the following morning. I was so absorbed and entwined with the boys story that I completely lost myself to it on many occasions. The last time it happened was even later, I snapped back to reality by someone banging on the door, it was the FedEx man. As I blearily signed for my parcel he said 'good morning,' - I turned my wrist over, saw 8.10am, replied 'goodnight,' and fell into bed.....


NB Look out for my next blog...the best 7 months of my life and writing 'the sex scenes!' - just remember NOT to think of your parents or friends while you're writing them.....!

One day in the school holidays, at the age of 17, I flicked on the tv and saw a gorgeous young guy on a beach gazing out to sea at the surfers having fun on the waves. Suddenly I was struck by the idea that he fell in love with one of them and began to write a fantastically romantic tale of first love. I reached about the 30 page or so mark and then horror of horrors, I lost the manuscript....for TWENTY YEARS !

2011 came and delving into the bottom of an old writing box I suddenly came across it again....serendipity stepped in. How did that happen ? I'd moved house no less than 30 times for work in the intervening years, and never came across it and yet here it was, my cherished story, back in my hands again !

I started writing immediately, words flew from my finger tips and 3 other ideas popped into my head.
One morning, as I typed away on the 3rd, it was as if Nathan stepped up beside me and said 'hey, here's the story of how I met the love of my life, would you like to hear it?' - so I began to write Nathan and Alex. I could see every single detail, every hair on their heads, every stitch of clothing and hear their voices as if I'd known them forever.....it was spine tingling.....