Wednesday 9 April 2014

The Bairn Books

Jessie the Jumbo is available now online, free to download on Smashwords.Jessie the Jumbo is a selection of tales written originally in English for the hugely popular ‘Nickety Nackety’ children’s programme which was broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland and produced by Frieda Morrison. It drew fan mail letters from children all over the UK, and quite a few adults too, lorry drivers and tractor men amongst them. The format was trialled in Edinburgh nursery settings by Frieda Morrison to assess the reaction from the intended audience. A cast of the finest actors and actresses in Scotland dramatized the stories and brought the scripts to life. The selection of tales in Jessie the Jumbo, drawn from the Nickety Nackety Collection are those written by Sheena Blackhall, and here reset in Scots. The book will be featured on www.ScotsLanguageRadio.com. Frieda Morrison was the first mentor of this much loved North East children’s writer, and commissioned her earliest children’s tales

Sunday 6 April 2014

The Poems: The Mongolian Spot

Title: The Mongolian Spot.Poems & in Scots & English by Sheena Blackhall.Published by Lochlands, Maud, Aberdeenshire.Printed by Thistle Reprographics,55 Holburn Street Aberdeen.Cost: £3.00.Copyright: S. Blackhall 2014 Cover: Mongolian Musician This is a file from the Wikipedia Commons. Information from its description page is shown here:Sambuugiin PĆ¼revjav of Altai Khairkhan (an overtone singing ensemble from Mongolia) playing a morin khuur near Centre Georges Pompidou in 2005.Author : Eric PouhierDate : Octob. 2005 This book is dedicated to Philip & Vicki Watt,Fadlydyke Farm, New Deer. Some of these poems have previously been published on www.poemhunter.com. Other pieces will be published by Forward Poetry in May, 2014, in the following publications: Light up the Dark, Darkest before the Dawn, and Candlelit Thoughts. The extract ‘Fyvie’ was taken from a Doric play written by Les Wheeler and Sheena Blackhall. The poems Smack Heid Debbie and The Warld Accordin tae the Rev Angus Macstrewn were taken from a prizewinning play ‘Nichtshades’ also written by Blackhall & Wheeler. The Commonwealth was written as part of a project on the Aberdeen Reading Bus funded by Fairer Scotland. The Great Tapestry of Scotland was written to perform at an event in Aberdeen’s Tunnels, organized by the National Collective, (artists and creative for Scottish Independence). Several poems were inspired by works in the Scottish National Galleries of Scotland, one of which was short listed in the Inspired? Get Writing! 2014 competition. The House of the Russian Dolls was Blackhall’s response to the Scottish Book Trust’s general invitation for people to write a story about the meaning of home.