Transport: Premium Children's Colouring Books

Well, it's arrived. "Animals" has done so well, that my wife and I thought we'd speed up the production of our second colouring book together.

This one's called "Transport: Premium Children's Colouring Books":

Cars, bikes, planes, tanks, horses, boats... If your child loves all the different ways we get around, and they love colouring, what are you waiting for? ;-)

Get it at Lulu.

Book Review: The Traveler's Companion by Christopher John Chater

About the Book

After the death of his wife, Dr. Ryan Iverson turned love into a weapon. His creation, Angela, is an android that fools her targets into falling helplessly in love with her. As Deputy Director of Science and Technology at the CIA, his mission is to use Angela to seduce and destroy internationally wanted playboy and illicit travel book writer C.C. Go. His series of books,The Traveler's Companion, is an infamous guide for wealthy hedonists to indulge their every whim. The newest edition, however, only has one destination: the Zone, a place where mind creates matter, where the sick can be healed with a thought, and where a man's fantasies are made manifest. Dr. Iverson may be the only one who understands the potential dangers in a place C.C. Go calls the womb of creation: Reality doesn't stand a chance. 

"Solaris" meets "The Thomas Crown Affair."

My Review (4 / 5 Stars)

Pretty early on in this book, one of the characters postulates that God exists, and announces that he's going to prove it using M Theory.

There are some complicated topics around quantum physics discussed in this book, but I didn't once feel out of my depth - even though quantum physics is a subject that normally confuses the stuffing out of me! I think that's because the author researched his topic extremely well (or he's a physicist himself), and he's extremely good at explaining things in layman's terms.

I won't tell you whether this character succeeded or not, but the basic premise of this book is that a rift has been found between reality and another dimension called The Zone. 

At the same time, the protagonist, a CIA scientist by the name of Dr Iverson is working on an android woman, an artificial intelligence which he hopes to use to capture some of the CIA's most wanted criminals... by making them fall in love with her and divulge all their secrets.

It may sound a bit silly, but I actually found it quite plausible, and the situations quite believable. Other than the odd typo or grammatical faux pas, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The characters have depth, the settings are well defined, and the plots and subplots are just intricate enough to keep you thinking, but not so much as to bog you down and confuse you.

If you're into science fiction and thrillers (i.e. technothrillers), you won't be disappointed in this book.

Buy the Book

Click here to buy the book from your favourite online retailer.

"Animals: Premium Children's Colouring Books" has Arrived. And it is Beautiful!

Way back in June, I announced that my wife and I had published a colouring book for children, called Animals: Premium Children's Colouring Books.

I published it through the print-on-demand service, Lulu.com, and ordered proofs.

The proofs finally arrived this past Thursday, and I took some photos. Aren't they beautiful?

I sold one to one of my work colleagues on Friday, for his four-year-old son. He came back to me yesterday (Monday), to say that his son loved it, and has in fact already coloured in two pictures!

Want a Copy?

If you've got young children (up to, I would say, about seven) who enjoy colouring, I urge you to consider picking up a copy.

Right now, you can order copies from Lulu, but in the coming weeks I'm hoping that it will start showing up in more and more online retailers' catalogues, so with any luck you'll be finding it in your favourite store soon!

Who is Shaun du Plessis, and what is Shaun's Table?

Two weeks ago, I posted a giveaway on this blog. Readers could win a free e-book copy of Tales From Virdura.

The giveaway was a success with three entries, and last week I posted the winner on my Twitter account:

The winner of my Tales From Virdura #giveaway is @shauns_table. 🙌 I'll be e-mailing you shortly! :-) https://t.co/YnIhpVNNbI #books

— Graham Downs (@GrahamDowns) August 31, 2016

The winner is chef Shaun du Plessis, a chef from Gauteng. He runs a website called Shaun's Table, where you can sign up for cooking classes. If you own (or are thinking of starting) a restaurant, he also offers consultations to help your business with kitchen planning, menu costing, and the like.

If you're in Gauteng or Mpumulanga, you should definitely go check him out.

I can't personally vouch for his cooking skills, but anyone who reads my books has got to be an amazing person, right?

Anyway, I am honoured that a chef with his own business chose to enter a giveaway by an insignificant author like me. It seems like things are looking up.

Thanks for your entry, chef!