E-BOOKS : In 2011 I have had several e-books  appear.

“Blue Poppies” and “Poor Mercy” are both now available from their original publishers as Kindle e-editions. 

“Topokana Martyrs’ Day”  was the play that began my professional writing career back in 1982. At the prompting of a former colleague now teaching at Brandeis University, who needed an edition for teaching, the play is now available as a Stupor Mundi e-book from Amazon.

“A Petite Serenande & other stories” is a collection of twenty years of short story writing. Many of these have been published in magazines or read on the radio, but have not been collected elsewhere. These also can now be had as a Stupor Mundi e-book from Amazon.

ALSO PUBLISHED IN 2011 :

THE CRAFT OF FICTION: How to become a novelist.

A guide to the major techniques of fiction writing, based on my experience teaching for the Open University, St Andrews and the Arvon Foundation. The book looks at examples ranging from Chaucer (1385) to Orhan Pamuk (2010), by way of narrative poems, film, and even paintings. It will be published in the “Aber” series (www.aber-publishing.co.uk.).  An extensive comparison of Craft of Fiction with another writing handbook recently appeared in the Scottish Review of Books. Please see the ‘Reviews’ page.

TWENTY ONE POEMS by Ramon Lopez Velarde, translated by JF.

Velarde (who died in 1921) was a founder of modernist poetry in Mexico. He died very young, having spent his short life in trying to come to terms with the country’s revolution, and his own love for three beautiful and remote women.  This little book of translations has drawings by my old friend Chris Chapman. I’ll be giving a presentation of the poems at StAnza, the festival of poetry in St Andrews, Fife (Scotland) at 11.30 a.m. on March 15th 2012.    Please see the special ‘Velarde’ page for details.  

THE LUCK OF THE DEVIL – My father, Robert Le Page, later became a distinguished sociolinguist, but as a young man he served in the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm, from 1941-45. This is a newly edited memoir, a vivid account of the dangerous life of the FAA’s Swordfish squadrons. It is generously illustrated by Robert’s own photographs, and is published by Pen & Sword (www.pen-and-sword.co.uk.)