ANDREW BISS

The End of the World is today's Frugal Find of the Day over at The Frugal eReader site. Are you prepared for what comes next? Accustomed to a life of cosseted seclusion at home with his parents, Valentine is suddenly faced with making his own way in the world. His new life is quickly upended, however, when he's mugged at gunpoint. Finding shelter at a mysterious inn run by the dour Mrs. Anna, he soon encounters a Bosnian woman with a hole where her stomach used to be, an American entrepreneur with a scheme to implant televisions into people's foreheads, and a Catholic priest who attempts to lure him down inside a kitchen sink. Then things start getting strange... In this story based loosely around the state of Bardo from The Tibetan Book of the Dead - an intermediate state where the dead arrive prior to rebirth - dying is the easy part. Getting out of Bardo and returning to the land of the living is a far more perilous proposition, and unless you know what you're doi...

Yes it is. My so-called ‘secret writing project’ is just about complete. The reason I’ve been keeping it under wraps from almost everyone I know is because I wasn’t sure it would work. But I think it has and it’s now time for me to push it out into the world. I have written my first novel. A short novel (about 27,000 words). More precisely – and this is why I thought it a little tricky – I have adapted one of my plays into a novel. Yes, strange indeed, as it’s the wrong way around. Novels are adapted into plays, but virtually never the reverse. However, I had strong feeling several months ago that this particular play could possibly work quite well as a novel. Encouraged by my e-friend, the excellent writer Helen Smith , I took the plunge and went to work. This was like learning a whole new language for me, as the mediums are very different in their execution. However, after a lot of research and a leap of faith I began the process. And I have to say I enjoyed it greatly. I do like wri...