Re-Connections Launches on 15th October 2025

Re-Connections by Miriam Drori is a collection of thirty-seven stories of connecting, disconnecting and reconnecting, which will be published with Ocelot Press on 15th October 2025. The book will be available as an ebook and as a paperback.

From now until launch day, the ebook will be available for pre-order on Amazon at a bargain price (depending on where you are). Here’s the link.

Miriam writes:

Written over all the years of my writing career, these stories show how much this topic has interested me. I’ve often wondered how some people make friends easily while others struggle to find any, and why so many marriages and partnerships break up, often after many years. Even more surprising are relationships and friendships that resume after a breakup.

Some of the stories are wholly or partly biographical while others are totally fictional. Moods range from sad to uplifting to humorous. Story lengths also vary.

A few of the stories have been published in various anthologies and are republished in this collection with permission. Most are seeing the light for the first time. I’m delighted to see them linked together in this new collection.

Re-Connections for your enjoyment.

Tailored Truths Launches on the 12th September 2025!

Nancy Jardine is delighted to announce that Tailored Truths, Book 2 of her Silver Sampler Series, set in Victorian Era Scotland, will launch in eBook format on the 12th September 2025. eBook copies can be Pre-Ordered from Amazon before the launch date at the special bargain price of £1.99! (Since this second part of Margaret Law’s life story is a lovely long read, the price after the launch will normally be much higher.)

Tailored Truths, Book 2, follows on from when Margaret’s job as a private tutor in Edinburgh tragically ends, different traumas having lately occurred which have left the almost sixteen-year-old Margaret reeling. Little Rachel Duncan, whom Margaret had been tutoring for more than three years, has died but so has Margaret’s mother in Perth, a mother she hasn’t seen much of since she moved to Edinburgh as a twelve-year-old, to work in the Duncan house.

Tailored Truths, Book 2, unfolds with Margaret in Dundee , Scotland, staying in the same lodging house as her best friend Jessie. Jessie has moved to Dundee to locate her degenerate father and since she can no longer work as a kitchen maid at the Duncan House in Edinburgh, Jessie has decided to remain in Dundee and seek employment.

Margaret needs to find a new job, quite desperately, since her savings are meagre. Another tutoring job will be ideal but can she secure such a wonderful post as she had before? If not tutoring again, what kind of job can she find – because her survival depends on her earning her own money?

Tailored Truths meanders through Margaret’s next decade as she forges a life of self-sufficiency relying on her own initiatives since she has no parents to fall back on, and no family home to live in. Sometimes her educational aspirations are almost fulfilled but at other times she falls back on other practical skills to survive.

Does Margaret remain in Dundee? Can she shed her reticence to trust in a personal relationship with a potential husband, since her upbringing hasn’t exactly given her confidence regarding loving adult partnerships? And how can she maintain her sisterly bond with Jessie if they are not living near each other?

Readers of Book 2 will find answers to the above… and a whole lot more!

Copies of Tailored Truths can be Pre-ordered using the link HERE

Wishing you happy reading!

Welcome to New Ocelot, David W Robinson!

We’re excited to announce that David W Robinson is joining Ocelot Press.

Born a Yorkshireman, David lives in Manchester and writes humorous whodunits and occasional psychological crime thrillers.

David’s light-hearted Sanford 3rd Age Club Mysteries and Mrs Capper’s Casebooks series are perennially popular. He also writes psychological crime thrillers under the pen-name Robert Devine.

Find out more about David on his author page, which gives his social media links.

Welcome to Ocelot Press, David!

The Silver Sampler Series is launching soon!

The first book of a brand new series- The Silver Sampler Series – is coming soon from the pen of Ocelot Press author Nancy Jardine!

Look out for the eBook launch of Novice Threads on May 15th 2024. The novel is currently on Pre-Order at Amazon and can be ordered at the special launch price of £1,99 (equiv.) using this link HERE

[paperback details to follow]

The setting for Nancy’s new Silver Sampler Series is Scotland, during the Victorian period. This is quite a departure from her Celtic Fervour Series set in 1st Century Roman Britain. Researching the Victorian era has been a joy and Nancy has also had the satisfaction of writing in a slightly different style. The Celtic Fervour Series is largely historical adventure fiction, whereas the new Silver Sampler Series is historical saga fiction, with Book 1 also being a coming of age novel.

Meet Margaret Law.

A thirst for education.  Shattered dreams. Fragile relations.

1840s Scotland

Being sent to school is the most exhilarating thing that’s ever happened to young Margaret Law. She sharpens her newly-acquired education on her best friend, Jessie Morison, till Jessie is spirited away to become a scullery maid. But how can Margaret fulfil her visions of becoming a schoolteacher when her parents’ tailoring and drapery business suddenly collapses and she must find a job?

Salvation from domestic drudgery – or never-ending seamstress work – comes via Jessie whose employer seeks a tutor for his daughter. Free time exploring Edinburgh with Jessie is great fun, but increasing tension in the household claws at Margaret’s nerves.

Margaret also worries about her parents’ estrangement, and the mystery of Jessie’s unknown father. When tragedy befalls the household in Edinburgh, Margaret must forge a new pathway for the future – though where will that be?

***

Nancy is absolutely delighted with the cover for Novice Threads and hopes you love it, too!

by Nancy Jardine

That’s Not Me! Vanessa Couchman Talks About Her Characters

Ocelot author Miriam Drori has started a super series on her blog, in which authors discuss whether (or not) their characters are based on them or on people they know.

Fellow Ocelot Vanessa Couchman appears today, talking about her historical fiction, how she finds and develops her characters and why readers she knows sometimes see her in them

Read more here:

More Ocelot authors will be appearing on Miriam’s blog over the next few weeks.

Copyright © Vanessa Couchman, Miriam Drori, Ocelot Press 2023. All rights reserved.