14 Lady | INDEX | 16 Gangly Self-imposed constraint: Use the letters of the prompt word inside a 2-inch square to illustrate its meaning. Hongdian Black Forest fountain pen, EF, black ink on 120 gsm paper.

The Melburys – Bill, Susan, and their mother – have been living in a crowded London flat until Mrs. Melbury’s Cousin Fay dies and unexpectedly leaves her a cottage in Cumberland, in the Lake District. There’s a catch: they must live there for five years running or it will be sold and Fay’s son would get the proceeds. Bill has just made his school’s second team (Rugby? Cricket?) but swallows his disappointment, and he and Susan encourage their mother to make the move, which happens quickly. Read…

In my last post, I described some of my prep for a Chronicles of Darkness / Fate Core game about ghosts, necromancers, and the use of history for political ends. The players gave me permission to share their notes, so here they are. I'm not sure how much sense they'll make to you, but maybe you can reconstruct something between the notes, the prep, and the posts associated with it? At least, maybe you'll be able to extract something useful for your own games. Source: Massimiliano Sarno, 2022…

As my long time readers might recall, I’m a Boris Karloff fan, and lately I’ve been rewatching Colonel March of Scotland Yard (1955-56), an old British TV series starring Karloff as Colonel March. The other night, I got to the episode “Present Tense.” In the episode, Colonel March comes to check on his widowed niece, Emily, whose late husband died in a plane crash right before her eyes. But Emily doesn’t seem to believe that husband Ernest is gone, going so far as to talk about him in the…

I am proud to publish these excerpts from GRAVE STORIES by a graduate of my writing course. The author, known as ‘Gravedigger’ invites you to visit the graveyard with the promise that ‘all of human life is here’ and tells the stories of the inhabitants. Follow GRAVE STORIES I am taking bookings for the next writing course, HOW TO WRITE A BLOG THAT PEOPLE WILL WANT TO READ on February 6th & 7th. Come to Spitalfields and spend a winter weekend with me in an eighteenth century weaver’s house in…

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book. Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Hanif Abdurraqib, Andrew Sean Greer, Roxane Gay, and many others. Will Maclean’s Solace House melds a gothic novel with dark academia brilliantly. Kirkus wrote of the book: “Maclean proves to be a master at pacing, creating suspense with ease; nothing is…

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book. Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Hanif Abdurraqib, Andrew Sean Greer, Roxane Gay, and many others. Lance Olsen’s reimagining of the life of artist Henry Darger, An Inventory of Benevolent Butterflies, is at once both tragic and transcendent. Publishers Weekly wrote of the book: “Olsen…

To me, fair friend, you never can be old,For as you were when first your eye I ey'd,Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold,Have from the forests shook three summers' pride,Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn'd,In process of the seasons have I seen,Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burn'd,Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green.Ah! yet doth beauty like a dial-hand,Steal from his figure, and no pace perceiv'd;So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth…

This surprised me as being one of my favorite books. The writing style is peculiar. There are no chapters. There are no quotation marks, yet characters speak and you know when they're speaking. This book is extremely descriptive about a lot of seemingly mundane things, and it builds a really vivid world in my mind. So, the world has burned, I think 10 years or so prior. Wild fires I think? They don't really get into the details. We very much are just traveling Dad and Boy as they travel south…

There’s much to discuss with Pressure Magic, but what’s really the big sell (at least up front) is a very large magical animal. It’s not just me who thinks so: author William C. Tracy is super-excited to tell you all about it too! WILLIAM C. TRACY: This is a story about a giant sea otter. That was the main idea I came up with when drafting Pressure Magic, the third book in my Shifting Lands series, which contains a protagonist with only one arm, martial arts magic, and fast-moving islands. (You…

🎨 Impressions Before I finally decided to read this book, it had been on my list for many years. It first entered my radar when it was recommended by Ali Abdaal, the productivity YouTuber. I heard about it a few more times in different contexts and now felt like it was time. It’s a long book with way over 500 pages, which made me hesitate. Apparently, in the UK the author Derren Brown is a household name who had a few successful television shows to his name. He started out as a performance…

My Top 10 PI Novels, by Tony Baer. — One per author; private = no police detectives: The Maltese Falcon Long Goodbye Galton Case 8th Circle (Ellin) No Good from a Corpse (Brackett) Solomon’s Vineyard (Latimer) Death in a Bowl (Whitfield) Last Good Kiss (Crumley) Taste of Ashes (Browne) I, the Jury

What have you recently finished reading? I think the last thing I finished was Yuta Yagi’s Why I Adopted My Husband, which is about the practicalities of getting around the fact that gay marriage isn’t legal in Japan. I don’t think it’s super useful for most people outside of Japan, honestly, because the issue (and solution) is pretty specific to Japan. Still, if you’re researching and if you want to read some commentary about what it’s like to be a gay couple in Japan, this could work. What…

I’m delighted to announce the details for the launch of my new book, Confessions of a London River Hunter which will be at Housmans Bookshop, Kings Cross on Monday 9th November at 7.30pm. Booking is required on a pay-what-you-can sliding scale or you can purchase the book in advance which grants entry (free tickets can be requested by emailing: shop@housmans.com) https://housmans.com/event/book-launch-confessions-of-a-london-river-hunter-by-john-rogers/ Join us for an evening with celebrated…

Wednesday, October 14, 2026 - 10:00 The Lesbian Historic Motif Project I could have sworn I'd finished posting all the chapters of DeVun, but I went to start the next book and found this one still in queue. I have my second book on intersexuality all written up and will start posting it tomorrow. And the related podcast will come out this weekend. Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP LHMP #581g DeVun 2020 The Shape of Sex Chapter 6 About LHMP Full citation: DeVun, Leah. 2020. The Shape of Sex:…

Why Productivity Is Broken (Interviewed by My Daughter) – YouTube I really enjoyed this video of my friend Mike Vardy being interviewed by his daughter about his new book and productivity and the creative process in general. Also, a reminder: I’m a regular guest on his podcast.

Batman, Vol. 1 #227D Facsimile Foil Variant Release: Oct 14, 2026Cover: Dec 2026 A CHILLING BATMAN STORY FROM COMIC BOOK LEGENDS! When a disturbing letter from Alfred’s niece, Daphne, raises concern for her safety, Batman takes it upon himself to investigate her new position at far-off Gothos Mansion–ancestral home of the mysterious Clifton Heathrow. There, the Dark Knight comes face-to-face with the terrifying secret kept by six generations of the Heathrow family and the dark purpose for which…

An email sent on the SHARP listserv by Dr Giles Bergel alerts us to the release of The Traherne Digital Collator 3.0. The collator was produced jointly by The Oxford Traherne and the Visual Geometry Group at the University of Oxford. The Oxford Traherne, as their website is named, is the homepage of the project to edit and publish a critical edition of the works of Thomas Traherne (c.1637–1674). The 16-volume edition has been commissioned by Oxford University Press, and claims it will be the…

I’m swiping through and setting up an old Kindle Fire for a kid to try out. It’s interesting to see what shows up in their “Appstore” top free list. BYU TV, Yippee TV, Hallmark channel, Hi-Yah! the martial arts channel, Old Westerns TV. Not passing judgment. Just interesting to observe and consider who is mainly using these devices.

i used to talk a ton. not that i loved the sound of my voice or anything like that. it is just that i truly believed i had a lot to say. as i age, it has turned out i don't really have much to say, or maybe i have learned to say more with less. my language is %%red%%scrap language%%. sometimes non-verbal, non-literal, and gesticular-based, or fragmented, aphoristic, idiomatic, composted, and recycled little something's. nada fancy. my forties have seen a great quieting. my louder revolutionary…

I distinctly remember last year I suddenly started hearing about this book everywhere I went: online, among peers, someone at the university mentioned it etc. And everyone only had good things to say about it. So when I started looking for my next read, I picked this up on my Kindle. I remember reading the first dozen or so pages before pausing the book in favour of work and eventually forgetting all about it. This was no fault of the book of course. When Nadja Bester proposed this book for the…

back in 2024, a few of my friends and i started a small book club, choosing a book each month and meeting online to discuss it. over time, it became harder to find a time that worked for everyone, so we decided to call it a day this month. we'll still keep in touch, of course, just without the monthly reading commitment. i didn't want to let go of the idea entirely, though. one of my favorite things about the club was choosing a new author or exploring a different country each month. it gave me…

Who are you?Tunisia WilliamsI am a middle school counselor and kidlit author. I live in Augusta, Georgia.What do you write?I mainly write picture books; however, I do plan on writing in other kidlit categories.I started out as a journalism major in college then switched to public relations. My career began as a public relations professional at my alma mater, Augusta University. I worked in the university’s PR department writing articles and pitching stories for about 10 years before becoming a…

The Story Shen Jia Lan, the eldest granddaughter of Grand Secretary Shen, is betrothed to Lin Jin Qi, the eldest grandson of the Minister of Personnel. But when turmoil strikes the imperial court, her grandfather is accused of treason and her entire family is massacred. Jia Lan is secretly saved by Xu Wan Quan and his wife, who give her the identity of their recently deceased daughter. Now living as Xu Lan Xiang, she becomes a low-ranking maid in the very household her adoptive family serves,…

About a month out from PulpFest, the sixth Thomas Adam Grey thriller by Duane Laflin, The Ancient Bones, came out. As I’ve been enjoying this series, I quickly got and read it. This series continues to be great, and I look forward to the next one. Laflin is a retired professional magician who now writes […]

Last week I started my October look at the short-lived occult horror magazine Coven 13. Issue #1 came out in September of 1969 and established what editor Arthur H. Landis wanted the magazine to be: a modern successor to magazines like Weird Tales and Unknown Worlds, but one firmly grounded in the contemporary world with modern takes on horror and the occult. This week we move on to Issue #2.Coven 13, Issue #2, Nov. 1969Our second issue is dated November 1969 and still has the 60-cent cover…

One of the pleasures of my boyhood was going round to my grandmother's flat to watch TV (we didn't have a set at home at the time). On Saturday afternoons my brother and I would join her to watch the wrestling (Kent Walton ringside), and on weekend evenings there would be such delights as Danger Man, starring the very cool Patrick McGoohan, and The Saint, based on Leslie Charteris's stories, and starring Roger Moore. As it happens, today is Roger Moore's 99th birthday, though he isn't around to…