Today I visited Bramall Hall south of Manchester. It’s a ‘Cheshire black and white’ timber house, one of my favourite styles of architecture. The ballroom walls are covered with colourful and strangely cartoonish medieval wall paintings including a horse with the head of a cockerel. Bramall Hall has been altered a lot since it was built in the late 14th century – it is mostly 15th century – but the additions such as Elizabethan vast arrays of leaded windows, a green man carving and oriel window just make it more fascinating. It is without symmetry or clear design – it is a maze of staircases leading to narrow, twisting passages.

The servant’s quarters in the attic gave a good insight into their hierarchy and the cramped, poor conditions they endured compared to the family they served. However Bramall didn’t have enough smell – there was no patina of atmosphere of polish, dust and old metal. I suppose it has been too long since it was lived in. Hall i’ th’ Wood and Little Moreton Hall are probably better examples of the ‘black and white’ style.

In the Fourlands two of the Plainslands manor houses – Eske and Fescue – are timbered houses and look much like this. They have lots of decoration – quatrefoils and carved barge boards. They have gatehouses like that of Stokesay Castle. Eske is moated, and inside the ceilings are open timber and the furniture is heavy, dark wood. Shivel Manor, however, is one of the older Fourlands manor houses; it is also moated but is built of brick, much like Rosenholm in Denmark or Markenfield Hall in Yorkshire.Bramall Halleast front

I've had some requests for signed copies. Signed copies of the hardbacks are available from Goldsboro Books and Cold Tonnage.

However, if you want a dedication or have any other query please feel free to get in touch with me through the contact form and I'll give you further details. Thanks!

Went gliding with The Vale of the White Horse Gliding school. Two sessions in the air - no thermals so when we were towed up to 2000m we had twenty minutes to glide back down but I tried a few turns and some flying on the straight.

It was a one-off birthday present left over from last February (thanks, Brian). This was the first chance I had, owing to writing The Modern World. It was well worth the wait.

The best bit is being released from the tug plane - sudden silence and a wonderful feeling of lightness. I could tell from the strain in the instructor's voice that I was making the turns rather too steep. Oh, and the way the ground kept tilting up.

I love being airborne - balloons, helicopters, parachuting, anything - and I've always used the experiences to help describe Jant's flight in the Castle books.

In the glider cockpit, waiting for the tug plane

I am going to Fantasycon in Nottingham, on Saturday 22 September.

Went to Chamonix for a week - essential research for the fourth Castle novel. Substantial parts of the next book will be set in the Darkling Mountains; the glacier-clad Alps were a great inspiration for it. After a week walking up and down the slopes I almost felt like a Rhydanne.

Bellachat: After a long walk over Brevent, a welcome coffee at Bellachat refuge.

La Floria: One of the best places in the world to write