The illustration is a branch of our plum blossom in Portugal. Unfortunately we had heavy rain, which the bees hated, and I suspect there will be a poor fruit crop. But the blossom was pretty…

We’re back in UK and I’m enjoying being online again for much longer!

My mood has lightened considerably in the last few days. Spring would appear to have reached England and there are actually signs of green on a few trees. There is quite a bit of sunshine, too, no longer accompanied by freezing temperatures.

I was really thrilled to get good reviews of my novellas in the April issue of Wilde Oats, an online zine that specialises in gay short stories but also has, every time, a number of in-depth and thoughtful reviews. I have often bought books following their recommendations. If you’d like to see what Matt Brooks had to say about my writing, go to http://www.wildeoats.com/review_ThreeNovellasByJayMountney.html
After that, stay to explore the other reviews! For those of you who have Kindles, bear in mind that my novellas are now available from Amazon, too, in mobi format.

I have been struggling with my laptop recently. The cursor has a mind of its own and jumps around all over the place, worse in some applications (like email) than others. A few days ago it got so bad I could barely use the keyboard. I’m told this is a fairly common laptop problem and has something to do with the thumbpad. A build-up of static is one suggested cause… I’ve cleaned the thumbpad assiduously (and used a cloth intended for spectacles) and things are more or less back to normal – not perfect, but acceptable.  At least I will be able to write again, something that simply wasn’t possible last week!

So, I have no poetry, no news on my novels, and no real news at all. But I thought it was time I posted!