https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk Bestselling author, scientist, teacher, dance and karate instructor Sun, 15 Aug 2021 01:01:29 +0000 en-GB hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.1 https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/nick-100x100.jpg https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk 32 32 https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/product/autobiography-of-a-short-fat-ugly-man-a-kind-of-immortality/ Sun, 15 Aug 2021 01:01:26 +0000 https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/?post_type=product&p=636 Apologies: I could read when I was three. It’s not unnatural, some children just seem to teach themselves to read, we think it’s by a process of copying adults and interpreting pictures. From the age of about six I was reading a book every day, that is finishing a book every day…a practice I have continued all my life. I’m not saying I read War and Peace in one day but I tend to finish an average sized adult’s book most days. When I was eight I was reading James Bond and books by Alistair McLean and Neville Shute. Mind you I was still reading all the children’s books as well, still do now: Bunter, William, Jennings, The Famous Five and all the others. I read all the heavy stuff in my teens and now regret wasting so much of my time digesting crap like Wuthering Heights and Tom Jones…give me a break. There is nothing in those old fashioned dirges that you cannot find ten times better in a modern book…literary insight my ass. Most of them were written by middle class virgins who knew nothing of life and the only reason they got published was because there were so few people writing during the last century. I took a year to read: The Fall and Decline of the Roman Empire, then there was Boswell’s Life of Johnson both of which were okay. Then there were all the Nordic folk tales and stuff like that. By the age of fourteen I had read the whole of Kingswinford Library half a dozen times. Then when I was thirty eight I was at Exeter University and a professor told us we should read the Aeneid if only in translation, I had always avoided it like the plague because it was in Latin. But I knew about the Aeneid from the Bunter books so I read it and wasn’t that impressed but while I was reading it I had a kind of revelation: I was reading words written by an ordinary bloke some 2000 years ago! A living, breathing man who maybe had just had an argument with his wife or had an upset stomach or was just feeling ticked off with the world. He was communicating with me over huge scans of time and appearing on my page as alive as he had ever been…the thought took my breath away, anything I read or indeed wrote was not limited by the mere lifetime of a man, it could go on forever…it was a Kind of Immortality!]]> All four of these autobiographies in the one book that take the reader right from childhood until the man who is not quite sane runs away around the world on the QE2. The humour and the drama of a man who lives his life a bit differently to most and whose only drive is to write is portrayed in these funny, honest and open books that contain so much action and hilarious happenings from rows with famous Hollywood stars to living with the poorest people in the Middle East. From teaching in the roughest schools in London to the poshest schools in Iraq. The relentless changes of location and beautiful women, the genuine times of real danger where lives are lost to the highest states of luxury…Nick has seen it all!

]]> https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/product/the-autobiography-of-a-short-fat-ugly-man-only-the-brave/ Wed, 16 Sep 2020 01:39:40 +0000 https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/?post_type=product&p=402 Gentle Reader: I have no idea why anyone would want to read my poor autobiography but my agent kept pressing me and finally one miserable winter when I was trapped in Scotland I finally wrote it. Surprisingly it sold remarkably well and I was pushed to produce the follow ups. This is the third in that line and concerns the time when my first marriage had ended and I ran away to University to study for an Education degree though I had no intention of ever becoming a teacher. This is where I met my second wife and it recounts our time at The University of Exeter and particularly our experiences doing our teaching practice in Tower Hamlets in London. The experiences we had there warranted a book all of their own. The fourth I will bring out later this year if the Corona lockdown goes on much longer here in Mallorca. This fourth one will take you right up to where I ran away around the world on the QE2 and while doing so I wrote emails to my clubs back home about the funny incidents that happened. Later on I brought them out as: Going Round The Bend On The QE2 which turned into a best-seller and prompted a number of follow-ups. These are really much funnier than the pathetic stories of my youth so I urge you to read them first!

 

]]> https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/product/kiss-mommy-goodbye-vegas-vegas-vegas/ Mon, 07 Sep 2020 00:44:28 +0000 https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/?post_type=product&p=325 Vega! Vegas! Vegas! is the follow up to Kiss Mommy Goodbye which is about the rock superstar Peter Webb and the seven abused children he adopts. In this novel the children have all become one family and even though they all still suffer from huge problems they all meet them as one! Peter takes on a massive gig at the Bellagio in Vegas and takes his whole family along with him as well as his famous movie star girlfriend, Roberta Capone. The children are all loving their time in Vegas attending Peter’s concerts every evening to watch him a Getz stun the crowds and in the day time exploring the hotels of Vegas in their own particular manner. When Getz falls for the owner of the new Rock and Roll hotel they all disapprove but she insists on seeing him. Then Getz is raped and all the children unite to keep Peter from finding out and to get their revenge on Vince Martin. How they conspire to drive him completely out of business all the time protecting their explosive father from finding out makes for a high powered action packed side story to saga of the Webb family! As always with these novels Vegas is full of drama and trauma with high powered moments of humor when the lives of the super famous and super-rich come into contact with a rough crowd of children from all over the world!

]]> https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/product/kiss-mommy-goodbye/ Mon, 07 Sep 2020 00:36:30 +0000 https://www.nicholaswalker.co.uk/?post_type=product&p=322 How dare you!’ Her voice rose to a shout and she started to struggle, ‘get your hands off me you great bully!’  Peter was at least twice the weight of her and half a dozen times stronger but even he had trouble keeping the furiously kicking Bobby in place. He turned and faced the director, ‘I really am sorry, Wes,’ he said. ‘Penelope Cruz, that’s your girl.’ And ignoring the howls of outrage from Bobby he walked down the steps and through the crowd. No one tried to stop him. No one at all! Whether it was just his fame, or his size, or because people thought it was a publicity stunt, they all just parted in front of him, like a sea. He reached the Ferrari and of course everybody was surging after them, photographers were frantically running their fast forward motors hot, and the two TV camera crews were almost coming to blows over the best position in which to capture this fabulous incident. Suddenly everyone became still as Peter gently eased her back to the ground. She stood there, her face white with anger for about half a second then she unleashed a slap that made the crowd gasp. There was a five second silence then she did exactly the same thing in exactly the same place. Peter leaned forward and kissed her. She didn’t kiss him back, just stood there like a rag doll letting him kiss her. He straightened up and gave her his half smile and she slapped him again. He nodded as though he quite understood then he opened the passenger door and offered her the seat. Bobby eyed him coldly for a very long moment, then still with a livid look on her face she stepped into the car and sat down. Peter closed the door courteously and turned to walk around the front of the car, everyone applauded and he gave them a little bow which made Bobby even more furious. The Ferrari roared off, the two occupants staring straight ahead. The director made as if to go after them, before he realized what he was doing. ‘Oh shit!’ he said.    ]]> Kiss Mommy Goodbye is a major new novel from bestselling author Nicholas Walker. Peter Webb is a rock superstar living in California who has everything, but his failing relationships with women leave him hankering back to when he was a simple schoolteacher and on a whim he adopts a fourteen year old girl. Getz, was removed from abusive parents and placed with foster parents and when the story starts it has just been discovered that the foster Father has been sexually assaulting her for the last three years. She has become a highly disturbed young girl who cannot stand any male touching her in any way, she steals cars and attacks people and completely distrusts Peter’s motives in fostering her. Her only passion is the saxophone which has become a surrogate parent and she is mentally unable to be parted from it for even a second. The story goes on to relate how their music brings them closer and Getz becomes his real daughter in the most important sense of the word. Peter is then presented very suddenly with twin girl orphans from Iraq, who everybody resents, including Getz but it’s only with her help that they finally fit into the family. Peter goes on to adopt Butch, a crippled refugee from Bosnia, then the two sons of an Afghan suicide bomber, an American girl who is total drug addict, then finally his own daughter comes to live with them when Peter’s ex-wife dies. The story is one of strong but very different characters who all have severe problems but who all come to support one another through the many family crises. They have to cope with the suicide attempt of Getz, the drug addiction of Ally, the problems with the police and the school, the death of one of the children and the pressures of the press and rock concerts and Oscar ceremonies. The characters are introduced through the medium of a television program which interviews the children of famous parents. Each character is first spoken to by the interviewer before being inserted into the main storyline. It is not a case of telling each individual’s story, more how their acceptance into the family effects everybody’s life. This heart-warming story is full of both humor and sadness with stunning insights into the normalcy of the lives of the super-rich.

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