This month's list was put together with the help of Heather Lynn. (Skywatcher_HL on socials) https://linktr.ee/HeatherLynn_author. Author of the Skywatcher series. There are four books so far with a fifth on the way.

Tell me about your books. Following the Future World Prize shortlisting, I was contracted to write for the popular children’s series The Magical Unicorn Society and wrote eight short stories for their 5th book, The Dark Heart Unicorns edition in 2024. The book is filled with beautiful illustrations, fact pages and a quiz for readers aged 8 upwards.

This is everyone’s favourite story from Sandcastles … Love, Andy which was originally written for an online magazine.

These small presses were recommended to me. I am defining Small Press as presses that you submit to who publish in a similar traditional manner to the big five whose human numbers (as far as I can tell) are in single figures. It’s only my definition but I sometimes say if you fit in one regular sized car.

Yesterday I found out Sandcastles, my short story collection, had been awarded a red ribbon being one point shy of being a finalist.

As an Indie author and a fan of Indie and Small Press books I am always keen to encourage others to read them. Throughout 2026 I will be sending a monthly newsletter with some examples you might want to take a look at. I have read or am reading the novels listed below. Having looked at this list I think I need to say I don’t always need a dead body in it to enjoy fiction!

This is an updated version of a previous blog post with an updated list of books. I have read a lot of books in my life and some of them...