Stonebird

A dear friend sent me a box of old books yesterday - it was explosive. A volume by Richard Wurmbrand  jumped right  out of the box and whacked me around the head, leaving me me reeling , it is so challenging.  This Pastor  , who died in 2001, spent years jailed in solitary confinement, many feet underground, with no light, sound or any stimulation- even the guards wore felt shoes. He was  also subjected  to many years of physical torture  and  intensive brain washing techniques . When this man talks about Church, I have some idea what he means. I am not impressed either by institutional religion, which I measure against Linda's almost total isolation , while living in a national centre , a candle-lit, incense infused holy place that people flock to on retreat. Richard Wurmbrand had a vision once, while in prison, where God pointed him not to Himself or to Christ broken on the Cross, but much, much lower, to the poor, the outcast, the excluded,...

Stonebird Announcing the release of : Care for Someone with Severe ME by Greg Crowhurst RNLD, PgDIP , MA With contributions  from: Simon Lawrence Martin Walker Dr Mary Schweizer Dr Raymond Perrin Catherine Ashenfelter Available to read for free online or to download as an ebook, price £2.99. (Please note : the book will be out in  paperback soon ) Website : http://www.stonebird.co.uk/howtosevereme.html Blog (Story of the Book) : http://www.stonebird.co.uk/severemecare/ "Greg has made a very clear stand in writing this book which really highlights what it is actually like for someone to live every day with severe ME and also what it is like to care for someone every day with severe ME and the reality of coping with a disease that is very rarely recognised or taken as seriously as it ought to be. I would like to thank Greg and Linda who, in the midst of their ongoing struggles, have taken the time to produce  an insightful book about the reality of living with seve...

It’s done, honed, stripped bare, polished like a gem. It’s ready to go out. It’s  my book, it’s my stand, it’s my defiance in the face of 18 years of oppression and my wife’s constant suffering. It’s my shout in the dark, my whistling in the wind,  it’s my hope and my dream . It’s my heart and my soul. It’s all that I am as a man, as a carer, as a nurse. Today is launch day. It’s a good day, a perfect day for that.

There is a church just across the road , within one mile of us there are at least four other churches - and  a National Shrine, for goodness sake, bustling;  there's also several convents of nuns.    A community of priests , what, half a street  away. Come to think of it, there's a priest who lives just behind us, over the garden wall there. We've got  Crosses  on every corner  and today you will be able to hear scared music from our back garden. This Easter, not one Christian in this holy  place  has reached out to Linda. The  neighbours say hello to me, but no one asks about Linda. As far as the Churches here go, the National Shrine, the convents, the priests,this profoundly sick, disabled, woman in total agony , is not on their radar. I am out of my mind worried about Linda ; I have not been well myself recently. It's a struggle. Easter ;  the greatest "feast" day of the Christian Church. Across the road, over...

I 've literally hand-coded every single line of my book in HTML, back and forth I've gone using all manner of conversion processes. It's one thing producing an ebook - that's easy enough - but producing an ebook to the stringent standards required for international distribution- is a nightmare ! You have no choice but to spend days getting your head around arcane rules and regulations that make no apparent sense...how I have been wondering does anyone ever manage to publish anything ? The other day though, I finally cracked it ! I am , however, having serious problems with the printed version. The distribution system is not robust enough- I would hate to put people through the stress of waiting for ages for their book to arrive, so that, sadly, is on hold - for now. Getting the styling of the book right across multiple devices , like the iPad, is my mission right now. The book, however, is just about ready for release - the cover had to be changed....