Alexander wrote this poem ‘Only One Home’ for the World Wildlife Fund Scotland to mark Earth Hour, which will take place this year on 23rd March. ‘Only One Home’ It’s always useful, we’re told, To ensure a spare is ready to hand: About the house an extra pair Of spectacles may come in useful, A […]
This poem, perfect for the month of love, is the seventh sonnet in Alexander’s collection In A Time of Distance. In his introduction, Alexander writes ‘The conclusion in the final two lines of the following poem is that we will never get another to love us by revealing to the one we love that we are […]
In the following extract from The Perfect Passion Company, Katie has agreed to take over her cousin’s matchmaking bureau in Edinburgh while Ness goes travelling. Katie made her way along the back lane with its neat progression of mews houses. It was not a street that she was familiar with, being tucked away at the […]
Dear Readers, I think we might all be forgiven for thinking that the world at the moment is a somewhat difficult place. And there are many, I suspect, who would feel that is putting it mildly! This year has not been the most peaceful year for many, but – and this is an important but […]
When I wrote the opening chapter of the first 44 Scotland Street novel, I had no idea how the book was going to develop or how long it would turn out to be. I had responded to an invitation from the then editor of The Scotsman, Iain Martin, to write a serial novel for daily […]
September 2023 They were sitting in the office of the Perfect Passion Company, Scotland’s only non-virtual dating agency, as the local paper had called it, or, in the words of an article in a lifestyle magazine, ‘a place where you go if you want to meet other people who don’t know how to use a […]
The Sun on Princes Street On Saturday we stopped and gazed On Princes Street, on Princes Street, As unexpected came the sun And kissed the stone of Princes Street, And up above us, all the flags Fluttered brave on Princes Street, In semaphore they made the claim Of freedom there on Princes Street. And somewhere, […]
July 2023 Ulf looked at his in-tray and sighed. This was not because it was piled high with pressing matters; it was not – it was empty, apart from a memorandum about micro-aggressions in the workplace that the Human Resources department had recirculated. Ulf had heard that they felt people were not paying sufficient attention […]
An early summer treat. Alexander says of this poem, ‘Every journey must end, and that may be at home – the most glorious ending of all.’ Homecoming If there is one story that we, in our need for narrative, Persistently ask for, it is a tale of homecoming; The journey of a classical hero coming […]
Enter Galactica McFie. Alexander is writing the next volume of Scotland Street at the moment and is keen to share the goings-on of his favourite characters. In this novel, we are back in the world of Angus and Domenico, Bruce, Matthew and Elspeth, and, of course, Bertie and his friend Ranald Braveheart Macpherson. There is […]
His name was Fergus Andrew Mactavish and he was a farmer in a remote part of Argyll. He went to his grave, unexposed, in 2003. At that simple ceremony of farewell, conducted under a West Highland sky filled with sharp, April light, only two of those present were aware of any claim that Fergus might […]
‘Cook For Me’ – taken from the first eBook novella in the new, The Perfect Passion Company series They were two young women, lingering over a cup of coffee in a slightly shabby Edinburgh bistro. Both were thirty, or thereabouts; both were dressed, unintentionally, in matching outfits: well-cut jeans and white linen blouses. There were differences, though: Katie […]
