My books

I've written two books: one's a non-fiction spiritual travel memoir adventure thing called Discovering Beautiful and the other's a collection of short stories and poems called in the land of the balloon-shaped monkeys. Both are available on Amazon though no one really bothers with the second one. The first one does okay though: I get some lovely emails from people telling me it's changed their life and the way they see the world and stuff. Nice one: some people even say it's the best book they've ever read. Not bragging: just trying to make you buy it. I self-published both these books 'cos proper publishers and agents didn't want me. Oh well. But one day I dream of making it for real.

Clicking here will take you to excerpts from Discovering Beautiful.

And if you want you can buy it from Amazon here: UK | US | CA | DE

The Book Depository is also good 'cos they offer free shipping to loads of different countries.

Here's a synopsis of what it's about:

Part One

In which I fly to America on a whim, bored and depressed and never having left England before. I do general travellers’ things – see the sights, have a little road trip – and then at the end of my month I think, to hell with England, and throw my lot in with a dubious Israeli furniture moving company and go and live on a roof. I buy a car and crash it after six days. I get arrested and almost beaten up (and worse) in jail. I live a miserable, tramping, ghost-like existence – and then I leave it all behind, in a new car, and drive across country, getting involved in various shenanigans and scrapes along the way. Somewhere along the line I realise that I’ve barely met any actual Americans – having been stuck in those teeny, tiny travellers’ circles – and make a resolve to move to a small town somewhere. And I do.

Parts Two and Three

In which I unleash myself on Charlottesville, Virginia, where my best intentions are soon left in tatters once I hook up with a crew of semi-alcoholic gutterpunks and cause all manner of disturbance by crashing yet more cars and sort of stealing my best friend’s girlfriend, and also getting arrested again. Except this time it’s serious and I’m on bail and looking at six months behind bars. Ostracised and alone, and pennilessly sleeping in my car, I get real low and have a long hard think about life, and decide the best thing to do would be to hitch-hike to Arizona. And so I do.

Part Four

In which I hitch across the country in the cold and snow and rain, encountering blowjob-wanting Vietnam vets, generous drunken frat boys, outrageously gay Texan cowboys, and dozens and dozens of kindly American truckers. And somewhere in there I start to realise some things about life, that there’s a sort of perfection about it, and even a goodness in the world. I start to think that if others are good then why can’t I be? I battle with the demon drink and barely touch a drop for four months. I start to feel healthy and wonder if maybe there isn’t more to life than just drinking and being naughty. I reach Arizona and weirdly get offered a job as ranch-hand and stunt cowboy near Tombstone.

Part Five

In which I spend three months learning how to fall off horses under the tutelage of an old Hollywood stunt cowboy legend, along with a bunch of other young dudes in preparation for an upcoming Wild West Extravaganza. Except it never happens because they’re all too busy getting drunk and being useless and, instead, I win a donkey in a bet and plan a donkey-assisted 600-mile hike through the desert. I try and train her but she’s far too clever for me. I give up and put myself back in the road.

Part Six

In which I hitch the glorious American west of Arizona, Utah, Colorado, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Montana, meeting unbelievably fantastic people, being put up and fed over and over again by a series of kind and wonderful people, and getting to sample the joys of a nature that is almost out of this world. I hike the Grand Canyon, and walk 43 miles through one of America’s most inhospitable terrains, the Superstition Mountains, and all this time in nature and in goodness does something to me. After riding a freight train across the Rockies I have something of a life-changing epiphany in a smalltown Montana diner, and commit myself to goodness.

Part Seven

In which I grow totally bored of hitch-hiking and decide there must be more to life. I think I’ll go home to England and be normal. But then, on a beach in San Diego, I bump into a guy I’d met four months and several thousand miles previous, and he says, “why don’t you come to Mexico with me?” So I go to Mexico, and stumble upon paradise – a hot springs river canyon with palm trees and swimming holes and cool, cool waters and waterfalls – and I camp there seven weeks and have my life totally transformed. I discover a mystical ‘higher power’. I meet all these spiritual types that I learn from. And then I meet a shaman and spiritual teacher who blows my mind and sends me travelling in an altogether new way. I find happiness. I become emotionally well. And life is wonderful.

Part Eight

In which I throw myself headfirst into this journey of the spirit, criss-crossing America like a modern-day sadhu, penniless and living on trust alone, and never wanting for anything. I meet saints and healers, and do a month-long vision quest alone in the bear-infested mountains of Colorado, and I discover a peace and joy which would have been entirely inconceivable to the me that started out. Finally, a miracle happens and I go home.

in the land of the balloon-shaped monkeys