Flandyke Shore

Here's a clip from a new little thing I'm doing - videoing a few songs and popping them on Youtube.

Flandyke Shore is a traditional song and this version is most similar to the arrangement by Nic Jones.

I learnt this years ago and have never really played it, so I think there are a few changes that aren't quite right - either way I was never able to play it to Nic Jones' standard so those limitations have created this arrangement.

Anyone interested in the tuning will want to tune their guitar to what I believe is called Cmodal - CGCGCD.

And for anyone else interested, to my knowledge (and probably defective memory) this song is a variation of Flanders Shore which came from a tune called The Ploughman's Love For The Farmer's Daughter, though the war that it features was a good hundred years before so it is probably older.

I have no idea why the light is 'springing from her clothes'

That new book smell...

Copies of my first novels, The Cold Highways Trilogy have turned up today.

It's quite exciting unpacking a big box full of your own work, though it has taken a while to get this far and it's still a long way from a career.

It's also strange as I'm nearly at the end of my newest novel and I feel I've come a long long way from the kind of writer I was when obsessing over those books.

Anyhow, to preserve the memory, here are a few pictures of the unpacking.

Cold Highways is available from most online book retailers.