Roman taxing times

As I sit down to fill in my tax return, I’m looking for any distraction. I wondered how the ancient Romans were taxed. Today we have income tax, company/corporation tax, sales taxes/VAT, excise duties (road fund licence (UK), alcohol, cigarettes), local taxation, inheritance tax, to name but a few. But how similar are our taxes […]

Meet Sue Cook

I am delighted to welcome a very special guest to my blog today, somebody who has supported Roma Nova since its earliest days. Sue Cook is one of the UK’s most experienced and popular broadcasters: You and Yours, Nationwide, Breakfast Time, Children in Need, Holiday, Crimewatch and most recently Making History and The Write Lines. […]

How to get the reader to read your book

Unless you write for the sole purpose of personal fulfilment (no bad thing in itself), you probably hope other people will read your work. When you publish a story, either as a freebie or commercially on multiple channels (Amazon, Kobo, Waterstones, iBooks, etc.) and in multiple formats (paperback, hardback, ebook, audio), you’re not only putting […]

A pre-London Book Fair meet-up

Glynis Smy, Jessica Bell, me, Talli Roland

Energised by meeting a terrific group of other writers last night. No, ‘energised’ is not a euphemism for hangover. The atmosphere really did fizz. Writers are used to listening, observing and absorbing, and they are genuinely interested in each others’ progress. And, of course, their problems […]

On the way to the 2014 London Book Fair

Although I have a guest as usual on Thursday, I’m going to be posting pictures when I can of my trip this week to LBF. It’s going to be a mix, but this is posting ‘on the hoof’ or if you want to be arty, ‘performance posting’.

I flew in today on Ryanair from Poitiers. […]