Reading For Pleasure in Cambodia
Wat Damnak is one of my favourite places on earth. It is a an expanse of land on the east side of the Siem Reap River housing the wat, a school, an NGO which teaches poor women to sew, a dormitory for the monks, and the Center for Khmer Studies. The Center is...
Monkeys and Horses and Dragons – Oh My!
It started ten years ago as a good idea. Now the annual Giant Puppet Parade is one of the highlights of the Siem Reap calendar. I watched it last year from the sidelines and wrote about that experience here. But this year, I was a part of it. The project is the...
Bringing Dylan to Cambodia
Believe it or not, today is the last day of this year's Anjali House Writing Workshop. The theme was change, and we used David Bowie's song, Changes, as the starting point for our two weeks of writing and discussion. But these kids know me and the process so well now...
Made in Cambodia
Many of the hotels in Siem Reap find ways of helping the local NGO's do the good work that they do. Many have specific programs that they champion or even run themselves. The Shinta Mani Hotel started running a Made in Cambodia Market last year which has grown both in...
Week 1: Writing and Thinking with the Kids
It's hard to believe that today is the end of the first week of the Anjali House Writing Workshop. It always goes so fast. But already we accomplished a great deal. I decided to have this year's theme be about change. I started off by playing David Bowie's song,...
My First Post from Cambodia: Changes
I've now been here for 36 hours. Back at my old guest house, Horizons. Back with people who have already become my old friends. But most importantly, back to Anjali House. Anjali House moved a few months ago and I was eager to see what the new building was like. I...
To and From Afar
Today, I'm running around like crazy. Tomorrow I fly off to SE Asia for two months! Right now, it feels like two months is too long to be away. There is so much I'll be missing when I'm gone. But I know that once I get there, the time will fly by and it won't seem...
Chatting with Colin
I'm still coming down after the high that was the weekend of THE book launch. Out of the Ruins is now properly on its way. It will get into as many hands as it will get into, be read by as many people as will read it. I'm putting it that way because, although Ward...
Out of the Ruins: 3,2,1,Take Off!
The day has finally come, the publication day of my new novel, Out of the Ruins. I think you know how exciting this is for me -- obviously, I've been talking about little else for weeks! The party is this evening at the Brunei Gallery of SOAS (University of London's...
With Nik Perring
The launch of Out of the Ruins is tomorrow. There's been a lot of excitement and jumping up and down, but now is a good time for some more thoughtful reflection. Fellow writer, Nik Perring, has allowed me to do just that on his blog here. I hope you take a look. I...
Shouting Out from Vanessa Gebbie's Rooftop
It won't be long now... Three days until the launch of Out of the Ruins and the generous and gifted writer, Vanessa Gebbie, is hosting me right now, letting me shout it to the rooftops. You can hear me over here.
Lynda Renham's The Dog's Bollocks
And now for something completely different. A mutual connection to Cambodia brought me together with the comedy writer, Lynda Renham. Knowing her has been a real education to me. We write different sorts of work. We promote it in different ways. The nuts and bolts of...
I'm With Shauna
The first stop on my short blog tour announcing the arrival of Out of the Ruins starts today! I am over on the blog, A Girl's Writing is Never Done, by Shauna Gilligan. Shauna is a very special writer with a real gift for prose, and so I was delighted to have the...
Cambodia and Ireland Together, via Philippines
Over the past month, Mel u has featured the student writers of Anjali House in his blog, The Reading Life. He was so moved by the work of these students, their experiences and the reaction of his followers, that he also asked the Irish poet, Alan Patrick Traynor, to...
The T S Eliot Prize
I'm not a great fan of competitions, to be honest. Although everyone says they know that the results are necessarily subjective, people do still take them as gospel. X won such-and-such a prize and so it must be the best and so that's the one I'll buy." A...
From Contract to Shelf: Final Edits
First off, let me be the last to wish you all a Happy New Year. My holiday was good and long, and that was important, because the holiday also coincided with my doing the final edits on the new novel. While I was out and about in the world (i.e. away from my desk)...
Anjali House Workshop: The Last Story
Here is the last in the series of posts on the blog, The Reading Life, highlighting the work of the last Anjali House Writing Workshop. In less than 6 weeks, I will be back in Siem Reap and leading the next workshop with these amazing students, and more. Thanks to Mel...
Change is Coming to Cambodia
I have always believed that when people find their voice, they change their lives. This has been the foundation of my Cambodian-based writing workshop, and the work which has been highlighted over the past weeks on Mel u's blog, The Reading Life, illustrates this....
Chara's Story
I hope everyone has had a good few days, whether celebrating Christmas was a part of it or not. Mel u has now resumed his series of posts on The Reading Life featuring writers from my Anjali House Writing Workshop. You can find the latest story here. The Master link...
What I Read in 2013
It's been quite a year, in many ways, but one good way was the amount of reading I was able to do. Varied, both in subject matter, style and skill, with a good smattering of new authors, old favourites and the long-overlooked. I love year-end lists. I've always been a...
Sunday's Reading
Please see here for today's Anjali House reading on Mel u's The Reading Life blog. This is story is by a teenage boy we are calling "Robert." Unfortunately, we don't have a recent photo or memoir from him, but I can tell you that he was one of my original Writing...
New Work from the Children
We are now nearly done with the series of Anjali House Writing Workshop posts being highlighted on Mel u's blog called The Reading Life. We are all very grateful to Mel for using his blog in this way, and we hope everyone is enjoying reading the work from these...
Meet "Victor" From the Anjali House Writing Workshop
"Victor's" work and all The Reading Life posts highlighting the Anjali House student work can be found here. Happy reading....
Some More Very Moving Work from Anjali House
Please take a look at "Tory's" piece here. And do continue to scroll down for the other contributions. Thanks from all of us!
A New Poem From Anjali House
You can now read "Soupie's" poem and meet him here. And you can see all the other Reading Life posts from the Anjali House Writing Workshop via this master link. All the other posts will be laid out for you just below Soupie's. Enjoy today's reading.
Some More Writings from Cambodia
The Reading Life series of posts featuring the work of the Anjali House Writing Workshop students continues. We can now read three new posts of stories and poems from "Toots", "Kent" and "Peter". And thanks to Mel u, we now have a master list which will make it easier...
Today's Anjali House Student Story
Sorry to be brief, but I'm about to board another airplane. But before I do, I want to point you in this direction, to read the next instalment of the series on The Reading Life ! http://rereadinglives.blogspot.co.uk
A Beautiful, Heartbreaking Story from Anjali House
Sonya has been one of my students at Anjali House since the very first workshop. Today on Mel u's The Reading Life blog, you can read her latest story, one which, quite honestly, broke my heart and then mended it back together again. Sonya's story The previous...
A New Poem from Anjali House
Please go here to read today's poem from Donna, one of the students of the Anjali House Writing Workshop. The previous posts on The Reading Life can be found via my blogs as below: "Max's" work "Carmen's" story and memoir "Victoria’s" poem and memoir “Sally’s”...
Two New Anjali House Stories
Today, I can direct you to two new posts on Mel u's The Reading Life which feature the work of two Anjali House students, one called Carmen, here, and one we are calling Max, here. Previous posts can all be found below. Victoria's poem and memoir “Sally’s” story...
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