Guy Portman's Blog, page 36

7 Satirical Books about War

I likesatire. My 2nd novel, Necropolis, is a satirical, black comedy about the politically correct, safety-obsessed world in which we live. I have also read a lot of books that could be described as satirical. My recent satirical reading exploits have included 2 famous and controversial satires about war. Earlier this week I was researching other war satires that might be of interest when it occurred to me that this would makea good topic for a blog post.

Here are 7 famous satirical books abo...

7 Famous Authors’ Favourite Foods

This is the 23rd instalment of my popular famous author series. The title of this post is admittedly rather presumptuous. However, after diligent research, I am confident that at the very least the given author was extremely fond of the foodstuff listed here as their favourite.

Here are 7 famous authors’ alleged favourite foods:

Emily Dickinson (December 10th 1830 – May 15th 1886)

Emily Dickinson was a prolific poet with over 1700 poems to her name, who is today remembered as being one of the...

10 Writers Who Went To Prison

This blog was founded back in March 2012. I have posted every Friday at 16:03 (I’m a creature of habit) without fail since then, and plan to continue doing so until such time as my efforts are halted by death, disease or detention, which brings me on to the subject of this week’s post. 10 Writers Who Went To Prison is the 22nd instalment of my popular famous author series. They are presented in chronological order.

Sir Thomas More (February 7th 1478– July 6th 1535)

Sir Thomas More was an Engl...

Future of the Book

The first e-book readers (Rocket eBook & SoftBook Reader) were launched in Silicon Valley in 1998. November 2007 saw Amazon release the Amazon Kindle (Cost: $399). It sold out in 5 1/2 hours. Today, 7 generations of Kindle later, there are 3.6m e-books (including my 2 novels) on the Amazon Kindle Store.

Approximately 30% of books are now sold as e-books. However, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that the demise of the paper book is not imminent. Nielsen BookScan (tracks what readers are...

10 Famous Alcoholic Authors

This week sees the return of my customary author/book related theme. I will be providing updates about my forthcoming third novel (Charles Middleworth & Necropolis) over the coming months

Back in 2013 I wrote a number of lengthy blog posts about famous alcoholic authors. As these proved to quite popular I have written this more succinct piece. I hope you find it interesting.

Here are 10 famous alcoholic authors and their favourite beverages:

Truman Capote

(September 30th 1924 – August 25th 1...

Vienna Part 2 – My Whistle-Stop Tour

Last week’s post was dedicated to my tour of Zentralfriedhof (Central Cemetery) in Vienna. This week my book/author related weekly blog post sabbatical concludes with Vienna part 2 – My Whistle-Stop Tour.

The day started with a visit to Schönbrunn Palace, the Baroque, 1,441 room, former imperial residence (see below).

No photography is permitted inside the palace. Below is a picture of the water feature in Schönbrunn’s back garden.

Last week you saw Mozart’s grave. Here is his statue. Vienn...

My Tour of Zentralfriedhof

I am fascinated by cemeteries. Previously on this blog I have written posts about the Brompton Cemetery in London and Recoleta in Buenos Aires.

The protagonist in my second novel, the satirical black comedyNecropolis, works for the burials and cemeteries department in his local council. Necropolis features a number of fictional cemeteries.

This week’s blog post is dedicated to my recent trip to Zentralfriedhof (Central Cemetery) in Vienna. At 620 acres (2.5 km sq)Zentralfriedhof is one of the...

10 Famous Self-Educated Authors

This week sees the latest instalment in my famous author series. It is dedicated to famous authors who received little or no formal education.

The following 10 authors were largely self-taught:

Jane Austen (December 16th 1775 – July 18th 1817)

Jane Austen lived in an era when women’s education was not viewed as a priority. In addition to her own self-education in the form of voracious reading, she received some tuition from her father and older brothers. By her teenage years Austen was experim...

My Top 5 Novellas

Last week I transferred my blog from wordpress.com to wordpress.org. Unfortunately this entailed losing my original design (colours/fonts etc.), resulting in my blog having a black background with black font. It is now looking a lot better. I hope to get my blog professionally designed at some point in the not too distant future.

This week’s blog post is dedicated to my top 5 novellas. For anyone not familiar with this literary form, anovella is a fictional, prose narrative that is longer tha...

10 Best-Sellers Initially Rejected

This week’s blog post is dedicated to best-selling books that were initially rejected by publishers. It is a subject that I thought might interest my fellow authors and book lovers. The following 10 books are presented in chronological order.

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The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells (1898) – This science fiction classic is about an unnamed protagonist and his younger brother, who are in London when the Earth is invaded by aliens. It was initially snubbed by a number of publishers, including one w...