Book is published in memory of dear friend

The book, ‘Clever Knickers’, is crammed full of interesting facts and general knowledge and will definitely help readers to achieve the goal of ‘learn something new every day’.

“I always felt that for a day to be successful something new has to be learnt regardless of how random it is,” explained Elsmere.

“In the words of Aristotle “all men by nature desire knowledge”, however, having knowledge teaches that the more we learn the more there is to actually learn about.”

Elsmere was inspired by long conversations with his friend Elaine, as they explored random facts and little known general knowledge.

“My good friend Elaine and I were kindred spirits and spent hours just discussing ideas, facts, and knowledge,” he continued.

“At the end of 2014 I decided that my new year’s resolution would be to compile a book of all our facts; Elaine’s job would be to proofread it once it was complete.

Tragically Elaine passed away suddenly in September without seeing the finished product. It is written in her memory.

“Discussions that we had such as ancient torture methods, human and animal experiments, inventions originating in Northern Ireland, the scientific breakthrough of the communication method used by bees, death-row execution fails, and other facts about people, places, products, birds, animals, and aquatic reptiles are included in the book but my favourite section is that of famous people’s last words.

“Writing the book was a journey and with any challenge in life it is taking it one step at a time. A journey to be enjoyed with the intrinsic reward when the task is completed. It is a journey that I would like to take again at some stage.”

The name of the book - a spin on the phrase ‘smarty pants’ - was inspired by a member of Elsmere’s family. “When he was at school was called a smarty pants by the teacher,” explained Elsmere. “Being young and innocent he couldn’t remember exactly what it was and later told us he had been called ‘Clever Knickers’.

“I thought this was a good title for the book as it aims to promote the average smarty pants into the next rank with a higher level of general knowledge.”

‘Clever Knickers’ is available to buy from Amazon in both paperback and for Kindle.