About Me

I’ve put a little update below as I was on the television and radio around the world in August on several occasions due to having no work since February and the British government excluding me from any support for the duration of the Coronavirus crisis.

From January until October 23rd my income has been only £490 and yet the government doesn’t care one bit despite the entirely obvious impact this would have.

I’ve been asked by a few people to set up a donation page so that I may not be so reliant on food banks and help pay bills, let alone essential issues like my leaking roof.

If you’d like to help, you have my sincere thanks and gratitude and you can click on the graphic below.

Screenshot 2020-10-23 at 13.53.03

Alternatively you can graciously donate via Paypal and send a payment to stephenliddell@gmail.com horizontal_solution_pp2

I don’t generally get the time to follow any of my interests as much as I would like to particularly as most of them are time-consuming.  I opted out of the conventional world of work in 2013 and started my own travel tours company (Ye Olde England Tours…. see the top level menu) which is now so successful I’m now also an employer!

Most visitors to my blog are here due to my writing and over the years I have written numerous magazine and newspaper articles, TV manuscripts, film reviews, novels and some non-fiction including my recent Amazon #1 section best-seller Secret Gardens of the City of London.

Obviously my blog is still going strong after over 500 posts and I get around 110-120k readers most years.  Blogging has not just introduced me into a wonderful circle of people but also got me lucky breaks in the world of writing, radio and television.  The thought that I might be an expert in anything is quite staggering but there you go.

My oldest love is that of football and particularly the ever underperforming Newcastle United but living hundreds of miles away means I rarely get to see them live.

Following that I enjoy travelling and particularly backpacking a visiting none-touristic places.  I have travelled throughout Eastern Europe, North Africa and parts of the Middle East having crossed the Sahara several times and the Sinai once.  One day I’d like to travel overland along the silk roads to China.

I also enjoy history and historic places both in the U.K and in Europe, Asia and Africa and seeing how different cultures and religions and politics interact and influence each other.  I don’t claim to be an expert on anything except perhaps the Middle East and Central Asia… oh and Star Trek.

I have always enjoyed most sci-fi and particularly Star Trek with the 23rd Century being my particular favourite flavour.  That’s also where my burgeoning autograph collection had its origins.

177 comments

  1. Great works. I enjoyed very much so your blog and topics of interest. You have done much of what I am in the pursuit of right now. I am actually hoping to move to London for my studies. Great encouragement.

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    1. Thank-you. I am glad that you enjoyed my blog. I hope that you get to move to London for your studies. I studied there for 4 years and have never before or since met such diverse and wonderful people and ideas.

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  5. Thanks for visiting The Blog Identity. You have some very interesting posts. I would be more than happy to feature one of your most inspiration or best posts! The Blog Identity is here to discover and feature great blogs and blog posts!

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  7. Stephen, Thank you for your recent visit to my blog and liking my post paying tribute to my mom. I do appreciate your time and visit. Continued much success in your career. Take care, Bill

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  9. Thank you for dropping by my blog, darling. Best wishes to you! Drop in again when I’m feeling better for a laugh.

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  13. Thank you for visiting and liking my blog. I greatly appreciate that, especially since it allowed me the opportunity to find yours here. This is wonderful, and I am following it now.

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  15. Stephen, Thanks for taking the time to visit and like the Mind.Set.Go. Blog. It is greatly appreciated! Best of luck to you with whatever journey you choose to pursue throughout life. Just remember to keep a positive outlook and all will workout.

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  16. Thank you for posting a liking on my poem “Bohemian Rhapsody”
    London holds a fascination for me and I had written a poem “London beckons”
    i very much want to visit this city and glad to note that you are having a place to stay. i would make use of it ,once i plan..
    t

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  17. Stephen,
    Glad you liked my post. I’m new to this environment and appreciate that I’m writing something people might read.
    I’m following you, now–how could I not? You like Star Trek and history: good combo, if you ask me.

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  18. Thank you for your visit and like. I was originally from Asia as a child and have traveled a bit. Been to West Africa…Ghana. Looking forward to read more of your blog.

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  20. Thanks for checking out my blog. Your tribute to your mother is beautiful. I am sure you will have plenty of wonderful memories to cherish.

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  21. You had liked one of my blog entries, thank you, which led me to your blog … which made your liking it even more valuable coming from a writer like you. I think you are doing “a lot of living” to borrow lyrics from an old Broadway hit song. Thank you for chronicling your living and for sharing. Great idea on opening your home to airbnb. It’s like learning about their country and their thoughts by bringing the traveler in, aside from your own travels too.

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  22. Hello Stephen: Thanks so much for liking my “Chapter 41” blog…I really enjoyed reading yours and loved the photos…all the best, Rose

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    1. I haven’t unfortunately although it is something I would very much like to do and maybe combine it with the Camino de Santiago but I expect I will have to do them both separately. Thanks for stopping by my blog.

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  25. hi stephen, thanks for reading and following my blog. yours looks really interesting and i look forward to reading more. by the way, one of the places i look forward to visiting in the future is cuba, a bit challenging for us americans. i know i’ll find my way there somehow though ) beth

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    1. Hiya Beth! you’re very welcome. Yes Cuba looks amazing. I know some people who have gone there and they really enjoyed it. I know what you mean, for different reasons some of the places I would most like to visit are warzones or countries with “unfriendly” governments. It is such a shame that you can’t actually go to it. We in the U.K. can visit any country although some such as Iraq or North Korea are at your own risk. I think the only country that isn’t easy to get into is Saudi Arabia but apparently if you turn up at the border with a car and say you want to drive to Dubai or Oman then you get a 5 day transit visa and you can go where you like. Thanks for your comments.

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  32. I also like that you open your home to travelers. We do that also if you ever want to see Disney and drive a bit further to see the real old Florida, or my family’s naturist resort that was the first in the state started in 1964. 🙂

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    1. Thank-you! Our home is quite full at the moment, we have a French student staying with us for a month doing an internship and she asked that her sister and friend come for a long weekend here.

      That is a real kind offer, thank-you. I would love to take you up on that one day 🙂

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  35. Thank you for the like on “Comfort Women”. If you haven’t had the chance, a leisurely trek through China and South Korea would give you the chance to see wondrous places, meet amazing people and dine on some of the best food in the world. From the Great Wall and the Chinese Science and Technology Museum in China to King Sejong the Great Memorial Museum and Admiral Yi Soon Sin’s Museum in Korea, you will see how Asia was so far advanced than the rest for many centuries. I would also recommend the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall in Nanjing, China. There are also temples in Asia that have stood for over a thousand years to see. But what will stay with you the most will be the people and the food. The vast majority of the common people will treat you with friendliness and kindness as long as you reciprocate. Eating at an Asian restaurant outside of Asia is like getting welsh rarebit at a McDonald’s, it just isn’t right. Anyway, I wish you fair winds and following seas on your travels and writing.

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    1. Thanks for your great comment. China and South Korea are definitely places I would like to see. I think you are correct about the people and foods. Wherever you go, the people make or break the visit for me. You remember them and the local foods after you have got home and the impact of the sights have lessened.

      I know lots of people say that Prague is very beautiful and in some ways it is but it will forever be the most disappointing place I have visited as the people there with one exception were unfriendly and unpleasant.

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  36. Hi there – just dropped by to say thank you for the “like” and now I’m going to have a nose around your site. 🙂

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  37. Thanks for visiting and liking my blog and, in the course of so doing, introducing me to yours. The UK is a favorite palce of mine to visit, so your photos allow me to enjoy it even when I can’t be there in person.

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  39. Thanks for coming to my blog, which led me to yours. I was surprised that we both read an amazingly long list of the same blogs… did you notice that? And I also had my first novel published by a publisher that almost immediately went out of business, for which I accept no blame at all! 🙂

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    1. I did noticed we both read many of the same blogs and many of those that read our blogs are familiar to us both. It’s strange we never met before today.

      That’s so funny about your publisher. It’s them, not us 🙂

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  40. Hi Stephen! Firstly, I apologize for misspelling your name over on LinkedIn. Secondly, thank you for coming over to my blog, I hope you enjoyed your visit. It’s great to meet people like this via other social networking sites and then to discover that we are part of the same WordPress family!

    I am really interested in your blog so I’ve signed up to follow. My eldest son and his girlfriend (they live in Brighton) use Airbnb all the time and have introduced us to it. We used it when we went to London last year. So I am definitely interested in knowing that you participate and will be in touch about that!

    I enjoyed reading your comment over on LinkedIn and I appreciated you reading mine. I have had a few articles published in magazines, working on more submissions and also on my book and I love blogging!

    Great to meet you 🙂

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  44. Hi Stephen
    I read, with interest, your article on the Liddells. My great, great grandfather was a Liddell who left the UK to become a missionary in South Africa. Hence, we are, as far as I know, the only Liddell branch in South Africa.

    We do have a family tree in our possession that began from his parents until today. I recently visited Ravensworth, the village/hamlet, only to find a fraction of the ruin in your picture. After speaking to some locals, it became clear that there is no local knowledge of the Liddells.

    Do you, perhaps, have any further information that might be useful e.g. Who owns the fields in Ravensworth? What happened to the family that lived there? Why are there no relics of the family in the neighbouring village church?
    Love to hear from you!

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  47. Thanks for visiting The Escritorium recently, I didn’t get around to saying hello and you seem to be prodigiously productive in your novel writing. I can’t think why you visited, but thank you. I do poetry on Sundays if you ever wanted to take a look. Best, ~ P ~

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      1. It’s Channel 4 actually 🙂 I have been on the BBC Radio several times to do with my Airbnb book and a few other things. Each time I believe they found me through my blog.

        Blogging seems to have gained me a few opportunities including freelance articles and media lucky-breaks.

        For the drama… when I was about 16 I went to a Star Trek convention and attended a writing class given by 3 of their writers. Later on I had several scripts that got to final selection (they even have the producers notes and costings on them) which all stood me in good stead. I think one of my scripts is on my blog.

        Anyway about a year ago I a blogging friend told me about a small London-based film company who were looking for 10 minute short stories, preferably horror or suspenseful like the old Twilight Zone. I sent off my script and it was accepted so I went to have a meeting with the producers and they loved it and me…. so now they have just obtained funding and one or two quite prominent actors so we’re ready to go 🙂 The script is a non-snowy version of my short story The Silence Fell.

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        1. Wow, thank you for that comprehensive response. Amazing that you could get funding, as far as I know, the film I was Script Supervisor on went out to get the Tourist Board’s support but may be in the waiting room when it comes to finance. Lucky breaks indeed. Live long and prosper. Thanks for your time. ~ P ~

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