Hi
lovelies! It gives me great pleasure
today to host Charles Irwin and his new book, “My Wonderful Wobbly Life”! For other stops on his Goddess Fish
Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the images in
this post.
Be
sure to make it to the end of this post to enter to win a $50 Amazon or Barnes
and Noble Gift Card!!! Also, come back
daily to interact with Charles and to increase your chances of winning!
This book is on sale during the book tour for ONLY $0.99!!! See below for more details.
Thanks
for stopping by! Wishing you lots of
luck in this fabulous giveaway!
My Wonderful Wobbly Life
by Charles Irwin
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GENRE: Memoir (Autobiography)
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BLURB:
Having
survived quite a few birthdays and had some interesting experiences, I wrote
them down. That's how "My Wonderful Wobbly Life" was conceived. It
was nearly born in 2004, but decided to hang on until 2018 to become 'Born
again' Alleluia!!!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
EXCERPT ONE:
Chapter 1 - SURVIVAL
“I’ve
changed my mind! I’ve changed my mind! I don’t want to go.”
I
have a vague memory of making this cry from a railway carriage as I was stolen
from my parents by authoritarians.
I
was five years old when the authorities decreed I had to be placed in a home
for children. Their decision was final and all avenues of appeal against it
were exhausted when my father, to soften the blow of parting, talked me into
what he described as an adventure.
It
was not until the train began to move and the realisation came I was leaving my
parents forever, that I made my plaintive cry:
“I’ve
changed my mind!”
When
I arrived at the home my world changed, never to be the same again. My loving
mother and my fun-filled father were gone and in their place were grown-ups I
did not know. I did not understand what was going on. There were lots of
crippled children, but why was I there with them? Okay, I couldn’t walk very
far without falling over. I shook uncontrollably most of the time for no
apparent reason. I couldn’t speak very clearly. But, I’d been like this all my
life, for me it was normal. So, what was I doing here? “
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
GUEST POST:
ENGLISH GRAMMAR – AN OBITUARY!
English
Grammar’ is dead, or on its death bed.
Today’s so-called educators, responsible for creating school
curriculums, do not recognise its importance in transmitting the meaning and
feeling of the written word.
The
foundation stones of understandable written communication are Paragraphs,
Sentences, Words, Nouns, Verbs, joined together with Punctuation and using
phrases, metaphors, similes, idioms, figures of speech and personal or
technical vocabulary. The lack of the
fundamentals being taught to today’s students often results in unintelligible
communication. It is faceless
bureaucrats who are responsible for killing English grammar. They cannot comprehend why the mass of written
pontification that they issue is not understood. Nor do they understand that computer
programmes, although being able to check writing for spelling or grammatical
errors, are only aids and cannot write their work for them.
Educators
are not totally to blame for the demise of comprehendible written
communication. Today we live in what I
call an ’Instant coffee’ society where the catch cry ‘Can’t wait! Can’t wait!’
is paramount. Very few people seem to
have time to even make a percolated pot of fresh coffee. They would rather make do with a cup of
‘wham, bam, thank you mam!’ instant or
worse still, a pod.
Today,
with the written word being used in conjunction with electronic transmission,
all the punctuation marks before, after or above the letters, don’t mean
much, so they can be left out of messages.
Unfortunately, our educators are following not leading. They are adjusting curriculums down to
accommodate what is being promoted by the electronic communication industry -
save time and cut corners - whereas their brief should be to “Marry
conventional grammar to techno-grammar.”
In
using a computer to write in any genre, a variety of programmes are available
for spell and grammar check functions and are relied upon to correct spelling
and place punctuation marks to comply with grammatical protocol. Hence, a grammatically correct piece of
writing, without spelling errors is produced.
But does it convey the message you want to send?
The
placement of a comma can alter a sentence’s message e.g. “Let’s eat, Granddad”
is less threatening than “Let’s eat Granddad.” The ‘spell check’ programme does
not recognise if a word is a ‘homophone’ unless it has been set-up to do
so. Therefore, writing sentences such as
“The fare on the bus was not fair,” could end up being “The fair on the bus was
not fare,” and does not tell the story as you meant to tell it.
Today
people communicate electronically using acronyms which quickens the
death of grammar in the English language, as does the use of electronic
communication methods - iPhones, iPads and laptops using time-saving tweets and
twitters. All of which have contributed
to killing our ability to convey in writing, the emotions and feelings we have
about life. Only by using written words
in their proper context, with correct punctuation, can this be achieved.
Conventionally
we write in sentences punctuated to help the readers understand what is being
conveyed. Proper usage of those signs,
when reading out loud, will provide prose with pace, pitch, power and pause,
thereby revealing its intended message!
It is
unfortunate that, in today’s society, only a dwindling percentage of the
population read books for the sheer pleasure of reading. Because of the speed with which today’s
technology changes people tend to learn only the short-cuts to using it. Time must not be wasted learning or doing
anything for just the pleasure and joy that is experienced. Everything is minimalised and anything
non-functional or aesthetic is left out, particularly when writing.
Hence,
it is the demise of sentence structure and punctuation, which cancel out the
musical pleasure to be gained from reading aloud a piece of prose. Very soon people will not be advised to ‘Stop
and smell the roses’ when they are feeling overwhelmed by life. Because all the ’roses’ - a metaphor, meaning
the aesthetic things around us - will
have gone. The ability to convey ’roses’
allegorically in writing will have been lost in the quagmire of convenient
abbreviations and figures of speech.
OMG IMHO YMMD SCNR AFAIR
TGIF POETS EOM TQ CU =
Oh my God, in my humble opinion, you made
my day, sorry could not resist, as far as I remember, thanks God its Friday,
piss off early tomorrow’s Saturday, end of message, thank you, see you.
I rest my case.
R. I. P. English grammar!
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AUTHOR BIO:
Charles was born in London U.K. in 1932. During
his birth the forceps slipped, resulting in brain damage to the motor control
nerves of his right side and causing total body spasticity. However, his
intellect was not damaged. Throughout his life the two adversaries,
controllable brain and semi-controllable body, always needed to be balanced.
After several years of work and study he became a Chartered Production
Engineer. In 1971 he emigrated to Australia and became a senior examiner in the
Australian Patent office. This autobiography illustrates the rhyme: “He started
to sing as he tackled the thing, That couldn’t be done - but he DID IT!”
Charles chronicles his journey from useless to useful, with humour and joie de
vie. He pays tribute to friends who only gave him help when it was asked for.
At a young age he recognized his psychic abilities and, by using lessons at the
end of each chapter, shares some insights with readers.
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CONNECT WITH CHARLES:
Website:
Goodreads Author Page:
Goodreads Book Page:
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BOOK BUY LINKS & BOOK SALE INFO:
**My Wonderful Wobby Life is on SALE during the book tour for ONLY
$0.99!!**
Amazon Kindle:
Barnes and Noble:
Kobo:
Google Play:
The Book Depository Paperback:
The Book Depository Paperback:
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GIVEAWAY INFO:
Charles will be awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC
to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.
**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a
purchase made I may receive a small commission to help support this blog. This does not cost you anything, it just
helps pay for all those awesome giveaways on here.**
This contest is sponsored
by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish
Promotions. Prizes are given away by the
sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish
Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.
Charles ~ It is so great to have you here! Congrats on your new book and good luck on the book tour! :)
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed getting to know your book and thanks for the chance to win :)
ReplyDeletePOETS is a new one for me, will have to remember it!
ReplyDeleteForgot, I'm Trix in the Rafflecopter...
DeleteReally great post, I enjoyed reading it - sounds like a great book!
ReplyDeleteSounds great
ReplyDeleteSounds great.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the giveaway; I like the excerpt. :)
ReplyDeleteWhat are your favorite shows to watch on tv. Congrats on the release. Bernie Wallace BWallace1980(at)hotmail(d0t)com
ReplyDelete