Sunday 24 June 2012

A new message from Fergus

Rachael Phillips must be the most prolific writer I have come across.  She writes the Anastasia detective books to be found on Amazon.

These are books for children of all ages from five to one hundred and five.  She has a worldwide following and Anastasia has become the most famous Russian woman on the planet.  She is also the most beautiful Russian woman.

In her latest book Rachael Phillips writes of the last taboo - the American Royal Family.  It has been hidden for seventy years but the truth is revealed in her next book Anastasia and the Three Wise Men.

I cannot wait for it be finished and I know what is in it!  I still can't wait.

Anastasia is an obsession for myself and everyone who reads it.  She has become a cult figure within six months.

Fergus Wilson

Saturday 23 June 2012

Back from my own adventures(!)

Well a well earned holiday in the sun was what we hoped for and we did indeed get the sun with some added adventure thrown in.  No, we didn't have exciting trips that taught us more about the island of Majorca however we did learn a lot! 

We learned:
(1) Never fly with Thomson Airways if you want to arrive with your luggage
(2) How to syringe fluids into our poorly, dehydrated toddler every ten minutes for 2 days
(3) How to queue and queue and queue

I know us Brits like to queue, many people joked about it in the numerous queues we endured.  Our queueing began with arrival at Gatwick airport where technical difficulties meant all flights queued together so what better to do at 4am?  We eventually got pulled out to make our flight but Thomson kindly made sure it left on time by leaving our cases off.  Great fun to arrive miles from home in searing heat with your jeans on and no spare clothes and no cases - not one single case out of our three.  We queued and queued waiting to catch sight of our cases until the conveyor belt finally chugged to a halt and we stood in horrible realisation that all of our cases weren't there.  "Nada?" as the coach driver taking us to our hotel asked in disbelief.  "Nada?"  as the reception staff asked on arrival at the hotel while shaking their heads with wide eyes. 

The holiday advisers were great and got us some essential toiletries however not changing your clothes and not having spare contact lenses is not pleasant. Feeling like people in the resort were looking at you as if to say 'there are those people who haven't changed since yesterday'. Walking around and everything being slightly fuzzy as my contact lenses were in one of the missing suitcases and trying to placate a desperate four year old why she can't go into the swimming pools.

Had to have a mega outburst to finally get the cases 32 hours later.  Our adventures weren't over yet though as we all got a bug and Amy managed to contract a Majorcan virus which hit her hard and that's when we discovered how awful it is to have a sick child when you are miles from home.  We queued to see the Dr who was very helpful and spoke English.  Amy slept a lot and swung between accepting 2ml syringes of rehydrating fluids into her mouth every ten minutes and refusing to have anymore.  We got there eventually.  She had a large lump in her throat and still has a cough now.

We did have some fun in between these awful moments and I do have a bit of colour which is thankfully no longer green!  I never expected to spend so much time in a hotel room though but I am thankful Amy is ok and never ended up in hospital as the Dr in Majorca warned she was very close to doing.  I am still awaiting a response from First Choice about our experiences with the suitcases.  I will keep you all informed what the response is to my complaint.  Needless to say we queued once again to leave Majorca as they too had some 'technical' issues at check in.  It must be one of those bugs doing the rounds!

Anastasia, in my stories, is still very poorly and I got my own taste of sitting at a loved ones bedside urging them to recover.  It can only help me as I continue to write about Anastasia's adventures.  I only wish we'd had our very own extraction team as Anastasia does so we could have got out of an unwanted adventure!

So to brighten things up I want to share more adventures with you all and am running another free ebook promotion for 5 days which will run Sunday 24th June until Thursday 28th June.  I have chosen two more stories from Series I, one from Series II and the first story from Series III.  Series III is aimed at teens upwards.

You can download them on any platform as there is a free Kindle reader available to download in the Kindle Store.  It's good to be back and I hope lots of you enjoy the free ebooks.  Feel free to spread the word :) 

Series I:
Anastasia and the Pony Smugglers  www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007IR2Z1U
Anastasia and the Puppy Farm www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007IRO9FA
Series II:
Anastasia and the Curse of the Romanov's www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007NM2088
Series III:
Anastasia and the Yellow Riband www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B008A4M646

(For US simply replace Amazon.co.uk with Amazon.com in above links)

Happy reading :)



 

Sunday 10 June 2012

Announcement

Important announcement:

It is with much regret that I announce Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanov has been critically wounded whilst leading an extraction team in Scotland to recover two kidnapped children and then fly them across the North Sea to Holland.

Anastasia Romanov led from the front as an example to her extraction team however, she is a chronic haemophiliac and was badly bruised.  This has led to her bleeding profusely as a result of an injury which occurred whilst making her getaway by helicopter.

The mission was a complete success with both children being recovered and returned to their parents.  The four man team returned unharmed and Anastasia was the only casualty.  These are desperate times and it is a life or death situation for her.

She suffers badly from haemophilia and it has been very difficult to stem the bleeding.  Our prayers and those of the entire world are with Anastasia at this time.

Further bulletins will be posted periodically.  Further details can be found on Amazon under the title 'Anastasia Romanov - Private Detective' by Rachael Phillips and Fergus Wilson.

To look back further some books are free.

Children - when you go to bed tonight say a prayer for Anastasia and let's hope she can make it through....

www.tinyurl.com/7pgubvz
www.tinyurl.com/bwu7rtz


Wednesday 6 June 2012

A great few days

Well the Jubilee celebrations are over and we had a great time.  Ella loved it all and it kicked off with a procession from Wickham Common School which went past our house.  As I was taking photos I had a flashback to the Silver Jubilee when I was four years old and I realised I was the same age Ella is now for the Diamond Jubilee!  Amy stood and waved to every single person passing by which was very sweet to see.  She loved it although will never remember it at her age. 

We all donned our red, white and blue clothing and I wore some jubilee flip flops; not quite so 'fun' in the rain!  We went to the fair at the nearby recreation ground and park on Saturday and both girls enjoyed the sounds and sights of the fair.  We had hot dogs when we got home with our giant inflatable Nemo!  Jason did well hooking that duck!  Sadly the weather was not great Sunday so we didn't get as long there.  We had some trips out and did lots of fun things with the girls. 

Ella should remember the Jubilee weekend for the rest of her life as I remember the Silver Jubilee celebrations very clearly.  It was fantastic to see the whole community come together to celebrate the Queen's 60 years.  The Queen must have been exhausted after long days of pomp and pageantry but I'm sure she loved the immense support that was there for her.  Long live the Queen!

My ebook promotion went really well and three of the four free ebooks are back to normal price today.  One is still free, Anastasia and the Mounted Regal Rescue, so I will look at the download numbers more closely tomorrow.  I have been impressed by the interest in Anastasia and intrigued by where the interest is from.  It seems Anastasia has a lot of support in America, as does my blog, along with UK, Russia, Germany, Australia, Canada and France.  It's appropriate that someone as multicultural as Anastasia has a multicultural following!  Thanks for all the support so far on my journey - it's quite amazing and shows that hard work pays off.

I am writing Series III now and have completed two stories so far.  These are longer, around 10,000 words, and move away from the children's genre into a teen, young adult market however I can see adults really enjoying these stories too.  Anastasia becomes fully involved in her role as Private Detective and is fearless; a force to be reckoned with. 

The next story is about the American Royal Family (yes you read that correctly!) and Anastasia is suffering badly with the Curse of the Romanov's: haemophilia.  I will write more about this on another blog soon but keep your eyes peeled as Series III will be coming to Amazon soon.

Long live the Queen.  Long live community spirit.  Long live Anastasia Romanov, if the Romanov Curse doesn't get to her first! 

Friday 1 June 2012

Free ebook promotion to mark the Queen's Diamond Jubilee

Well I have decided to honour the Queen's Diamond Jubilee by running a free ebook promotion on Amazon for the next 5 days.  Four of my stories will be free and I am excited and interested to see what will happen.  Hopefully there will be lots of downloads and people will be excited by the characters and want to read more!  I can hope! 

I can't believe how many stories I have written and the first two are very short introductions to the characters before their adventures begin properly.  The books started out as a girl having adventures on horseback and then she makes a friend.  Then the fun starts and they end up starting Kent's own mounted, police force.  They meet lots of characters along the way who help them, or sometimes hinder them, in solving the crimes and mysteries of Kent.

A lot of research has gone into Series I and II and I have learnt a lot along the way, just as Anastasia has.  Our Royal family has a long and, sometimes, dark history.  As I said before, having some relevance to history makes it much more interesting to me and I have been surprised by some of my discoveries.

Queen Victoria passed on the Curse of the Romanov's; haemophilia.  It was often known as the 'Royal Disease' for this reason and because of the way our Royals married the illness was passed through the Royals of Russia, Spain and Germany.  Anastasia Romanov's mother was a granddaughter of Queen Victoria and her father, Tsar Nicholas II was a cousin of King George V.  All so linked and who knows how many of them carry the Curse of the Romanov's?

If you wanted to download the books for free then it's very easy.  If you have a Kindle then it's a simple download or, if not, then you can download the free Kindle reader for your PC, mobile, iphone, ipad, etc. in the Kindle Store.  The books that are free for the next 5 days are:

www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007IL5OK0 Anastasia and the Horses of Boughton Lodge (free until Tues)

www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007IQYKXM Anastasia and the Mounted Regal Rescue (free until Wed)

www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007J2K43A Anastasia and the White Lady Mist (free until Tues)

www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007KZVWG4 Anastasia and the Imperial Horsemen (free until Tues)

www.tinyurl.com/7pgubvz

If you download them I hope you enjoy them.  Please leave an honest review on Amazon as it will be interesting to know what people thought of them.

We have bought some red, white and blue clothes and accessories for the Jubilee weekend and Ella is very excited about it all. It should be lots of fun and will be nice to see the nation come together in celebration. 

Happy Jubilee weekend and flag waving everyone!