Shores of Night

As I think I've mentioned, I'm looking at applying for PhD this year (though it's slipped back a bit to take into account my other work, my tendency to fart arse about on the internet - yes I know, I need to vanquish that - and the fact that the black bug room's* doors have been flapping about like the entrance to a saloon in a cheap spaghetti western). In the meantime I've done some reading, though not enough to feel I can commit to the actual creation of anything official. This blog post sort of serves as a way to throw my ideas up and see if they stick, so please bear with me. At the heart of my theory is the thought that fairy tale and the Gothic are intimately connected. In fact they are in many ways the same genre, sharing a great deal of their forms and conventions. They contain ideas like 'topsy turvey', to misquote the film based on Gilbert and Sullivan's works; that is to say that within the bounds of both fairy tale and the Gothic the real w...

Yesterday was Edge Lit 3 up in Derby at the Quad. Its a nice little convention and always worth a visit and this year was especially attractive as one of my favourite authors, Charles Stross, was going to be there. I can't write about everything as there's always a lot going on and because a night of bad sleep and the bad weather led to us leaving early (at about 4.00pm). We got there a little late and slipped into the first panel, which was about ghost in modern horror. The panel talked about the ghost story in general, and felt that short stories were the ghost's natural environment; struggling to sustain suspense for a whole novel as they work with one single trick. The authors also felt that mood was the most important part of the story and that a sign of a good writing session was if they had creeped themselves out. There was some discussion about the ways the different writers founded their stories; some working from images and working around them whilst characters ...

Something that occurred to me recently is that there are three versions of every roleplaying game in existence. First there's the game as written. This takes the form of the main rules, supplements, adventures and so on. In many cases, there will be some sort of discussion of tone, mood and so on (especially in games after the 1980s). This is where the game designers vision of how the game will be run is laid out and is perhaps the most artistic part of the proceedings. Then there is the game as envisaged by the GM, how they put their interpretation on the rules and setting. Again this can be quite artistic, certain parts of the game will call out to the GM for exploration and those are the bits they'll focus on. This (usually) involves creating a story or at least situations and having an idea of where the game will go. In truth this is probably the most tenuous part of the process because the game here only exists as notes and ideas as opposed to a rulebook or someth...

No real reason for this, just fancy doing it. Professor Elemental: Cup of Brown Joy Cup of Brown Joy is great - and it always makes me think of my friends Geof and Emma, who love tea as much as the Prof. Mr B: Just Like a Chap I love the juxtaposition at the heart of Chap Hop and Mr B is just stupendous. Scary Bitches: Lycanthrope on the Bus Scary Bitches aren't a huge band and only have a few videos. Sadly I couldn't find a video for this song - so only posted the link. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oy2hsDxo9nA The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing: Brunel So raucous and unadulterated and fun. Mitch Benn: Bouncy Druids I love Mitch Benn at the best of times and this just makes me laugh.

As with so many things this year feels like its a case of one step forward and two steps back. The last few days have been pretty bleak, because for reasons that I don't fully understand all my self loathing decided to unpack itself and I found myself staring at a situation where I've achieved very few of my life goals and, at 37 (nearly 38) I feel like my life has pretty much been a waste for the past twenty odd years. This isn't helped by the fact that I keep saying I'm going to do things and then failing to. I know this isn't an uncommon feeling, but I must admit to looking at pretty much my entire life with a sense of disappointment; and feel that I can count the successes on one hand. Obviously, things have to change, I'm just not sure how and frankly I'm getting tired of this dance. In an attempt to make changes I'm going to set myself 3 tasks for this time next year - using my birthday as the very end point. The goals have to be things I can...

A devastated world, an outbreak of something that drives people to become horrific, cannibalistic monsters; a society that has through stupidity and ineptitude managed to engineer its own collapse. A group of plucky individuals who have to survive against all costs. These are the stock ingredients of the zombie apocalypse novel, so frequently used now that they have become cliches in their own right across all of post apocalypse fiction but especially for stories concerning zombies. Many people have tried to do something different with them, few have succeeded. Carey, with Girl with All the Gifts may well have done. This novel has all these elements within it and works within their boundaries, but its no common zombie apocalypse story; indeed the word 'zombie' never appears, even though the monsters - the 'Hungrys' - are obviously that.  Despite this the story is skillfully told, keeping a tight on the characters, initially at the military base they inhabit ...