For quite a long time now, Tina and I have been working on a book about handbell ringing. I had been planning to keep quiet until it was actually published, but we received a printed proof copy today and we were so excited that Tina posted it on Facebook, so the cat's out of the bag.

I think we started in about 2013, so it really has been a long time. There have been periods of intensive writing, and periods of many months with no progress at all. But since Christmas it has felt very close to completion, and during the last week we have taken advantage of the coronavirus lockdown to give it a final push.

We're publishing it with Amazon, so it will be available to order using a print-on-demand service. We are also planning to do an e-book edition. The price will be £20 in the UK, and corresponding prices in other markets.

One thing we need to work on after checking the first printed proof copy is the cover. We're happy with the basic design, but the image needs to be sharper, and we're making the colour a little paler. But the interior looks beautiful.

The book is subtitled "Volume 1: Basic Techniques". It goes up to treble bob major, with a chapter on Double Norwich at the end in order to discuss different ways of learning more complicated methods. There will be a Volume 2, dealing with surprise methods, ringing on higher numbers, and Grandsire and Stedman (which are not in Volume 1). We hope it won't take another 7 years to finish Volume 2. Actually, the lockdown should give us an opportunity to make faster progress. We have a lot of draft text already, some of which might be recognisable to readers of the blog, and I've already done all the coding necessary to produce the diagrams.

So, look out for the announcement that the book is available from Amazon, and if the blog still has any readers, we hope that some of you will buy the book!