Not that I don’t appreciate the humour of other countries, but there’s just something about the dry, erudite and/or absurd wit of my fellow islanders that speaks to my dyed-in-the-wool British soul. It’s probably not surprising that both Pratchett and Adams were British, as of course was another great influence of mine, PG Wodehouse. Who could forget the classic, “The ships hung in the sky in much the same way as bricks don’t”, a line that on one level, tells you nothing at all, but on another, is a fantastically evocative bit of description? I discovered The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in the library at an early age and proceeded to annoy my poor mother mightily by reading out choice lines whenever she was trying to get on with something else. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” ― Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe “In the beginning the Universe was created.

The late, great, Sir Terry Pratchett is, of course, my idol-there is nothing he didn’t know about comic timing*-and another early influence was Douglas Adams.

I grew up reading all sorts of funny books. Which, obviously, leads to fun squared, and a very happy author. It wasn’t until I started to see a common thread in reviews (“Merrow’s trademark humour” “JL Merrow brings the funny” etc) that I realised that hey, other people were having fun with it too. Whether or not I’ve nevertheless achieved it is up to the individual reader’s judgement, but all I wanted to do at the outset was have fun with my writing. Hi, I’m JL Merrow, and I’m delighted to be here today as part of the blog tour to celebrate the release of Spun!, the fourth of my contemporary MM romantic comedies in the Shamwell Tales series. Rory and David need to make up their minds and take a stand for what they really want-or their love could be over before it’s even begun. Their friends and family think they know all the answers, and David’s office party hookup has his own plans for romance. But while Rory’s world may have turned upside down in the last few years, there’s one thing he’s sure of: he’s straight as a die. Rory finds his new lodger surprisingly fun to be with, and what’s more, David is a hit with Rory’s troubled children. David doesn’t mean to flirt with the recently divorced Rory-just like he doesn’t consciously decide to breathe. But he quickly begs work from his ex-boss and takes a room in Shamwell with easygoing postman Rory Deamer. An ill-advised encounter at the office party leaves David Greenlake jobless and homeless in one heady weekend.

Just Like Santa by J.L. Merrow