10th October 2016
Homelessness
Today I published my essay about homelessness in the UK. It focuses on what it means to have a home and why this is important.
Read my article about Homelessness.
4th December 2015
Housing policy
My book on housing policy in the UK, taking into account some of the changes that took place earlier this year in the autumn statement and new policies emerging as a result of the political changes, particularly in the Labour party.
This book has been published on this blog.
Novel – Holiday
My novel Holiday (working title) is now in its final draft. I plan to seek a publisher for it early next year. Or a literary agent.
The novel tells the story of a group of English teenagers who go on a package holiday to Italy in 1966. Holiday mixes moments of humour with poignancy, light-hearted frivolity with catharsis, and silliness with seriousness, into a heady cocktail of anecdotes, images and stories. It unravels the complexities of youth, the struggles of adolescence and the clash of cultures with the adventure of discovery in a foreign land. It deals with sexual awakening and the start of the transition from childhood to adulthood. The novel is now ready for publication.
18th August 2015
I am writing about …
I write about a lot of different things. During August and September I am doing the following work:
House Bricks: I am revising and updating the series of four articles I wrote for Arts in Leicestershire magazine on the history of house building and current housing policy issues. The new version is being completely revised and updated. When finished, I hope to have this published as book by a publisher. Read my introduction to the original series. (now completed)
The Trench is my second novel. Its story is about a live music venue, in the 1980s, the bands that play there and the people who go to it. It is a work of fiction but melts together a range of experiences that I have had in venues across Europe. When it is finished I will offer it to literary agents for publication. (awaiting publication)
Holiday: is my first novel. Set in the 1960s, it tells the story of a group of teenagers who go on a packaged holiday in Italy. It dwells on various themes: adolescence, the clash of cultures, European art and religion, the age-gap, and the experience of growing up, sexual awakening and adventure. When it is finished I will offer it for publication. (awaiting publication)
The History of Music in Leicester: is intended eventually to be a book, this is currently being published in chapters on Arts in Leicester magazine. The first chapter is already available online. This was followed by chapter two which deals with the period from 1990 to 2005. I am now working on the third part of the series, which looks at music between the end of the second world world and the beginning of the 1990s. I hope to publish this in October. (preview installments have been published by Music in Leicester magazine.)
The History of Leicester, my magnum opus, covers the history of Leicester from the present day back to Roman times. Its perspective is the built environment and it looks at two thousand years of habitation through the buildings that people constructed and the houses in which they lived. This will eventually become a book; before then a variety of articles will be published to supplement those already on Arts in Leicestershire magazine. {a long-term work in progress)
The History of Food: is an article intended for publication in Arts in Leicester magazine. It traces the development of food, farming, distribution and the economics of food production and how cooking is a vital part of the local history of a community. It is part of the History of Leicester series. (various articles published on this blog.
The Economics of live music: having already written on this subject before [Locke, 2010] I am preparing a follow-up article which delves more deeply into the economics of the local music business. In this article I look at how live music venues are struggling to survive in an age of digital music consumption. See my article on the economics of live music, from 2010. (various articles published on this blog and on Music in Leicester magazine.)