Christmas, and beyond...

So, Christmas is almost here, and with it my last blog post of 2024. Merry holidays in general to all. Also, if anyone reading this wants some sci-fi reading, you can not only potentially try my work The Cluster Cycle, (free online samples from each book here and here), but also help support the work of many talented writers including Juliet E. McKenna, Jendia Gammon, Gareth L. Powell, Emily Inkpen, and Tej Turner. Just to name a very few.

But...what comes in 2025. It's now been just a little over a year since my traditional debut, and it has been a wild year. Both personally, and on a global scale. And the next year looks like it's going to be giving 2023-2024 a run for its money for some of the crazier years in world history. I didn't need all this new dark sci-fi speculative material, I really didn't. Good things have happened, pushback has been seen against some of the daftest decisions, but there has also been insanity and cruelty and vanity doing its best to send our people and planet spiraling into terminal chaos.

I also needed to overcome a great big stinking chunk of writer's block that had been infesting me since my debut, a creeping and horrible sense of "I'm never going to write anything descent ever again, so what's the point?" I had to go back and think of something I truly, deeply loved writing within to get a project completed. I've also been going through the first parts of my Open University degree, a BA in English Language and Literature to bolster my possibilities of getting a day job. You know, what authors need if they're not going to be the stereotypical starving dependents in garrets. Except today, garrets are getting pretty expensive too.

I'm in a good position. I've got support, friends, and a publisher (Roan & Weatherford, in case anyone was wondering) who seems to be with me for the long haul. I've also been getting a better grip on my mental health, and as I go into my thirty-first year of existence in this world, I can try to find simple pleasures in things like repairs, education, writing what I really want to write and doing it in a readable way. I also need to remember to actually READ. And I'm counting audiobooks in this too, since one can absorb great literature through one's ears these days.

So yeah. I'm hoping I'll enjoy my upcoming holidays, both with family visiting and after that my first overseas trip to see an exhibition of Yoshitaka Amano in Milan. And when I return in the new year, I hope I shall have some fresh eyes and perspective with which to attack 2025 with what I know I have when I get my head the right way round: verve, humour, and common sense.

My watching experience: Older/classic sci-fi

 I'm a writer. Of sci-fi and fantasy, but my debut and current series The Cluster Cycle is a science fiction space opera spanning a millennium of history. As one might expect, I have actually experienced a goodly amount of classic science fiction films. And a usual allowance of filmic drek. I've seen people recently either recalling memories of older titles they watched way back when or talking about their experience watching them.

Now, disclaimer time, I've not watched EVERY classic sci-fi movie. I've never watched The Thing yet because it didn't look that appealing and I've never clicked with Carpenter. I've just not come across Event Horizon to watch. Others that I can't name off the top of my head... Well, the fact I can't name them off the top of my head should be indication enough that they didn't stick. So here in no particular order are twelve movies I saw back in the day, my memories of first watching them, and what I think of them through older more cynical eyes. Plus opinions on the music for free.



Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country: I'd experienced Star Trek through its series broadcast on TV (Star Trek OG and Next Generation on reruns, and Deep Space Nine and Voyager during their debut UK broadcasts). The Undiscovered Country was my first Star Trek film, I think, and it provided a post for measuring others I came across. Its tone felt right to me, and still feels pertinent when compared to...super soldier shenanigans and time travel. Also that music. Oh, that music...

The Fifth Element: I hadn't seen this film in full for ages, but I'd seen parts of it. When I saw it in full, I knew: instant favourite. Not for Willis's character, terribly bland and bleh IMO, but for everything and everyone else. The art style, the gender-defiant fashion, Eric Serra's delirious score, the blending of grim elements with humour which I still find pretty funny. This has aged well for me, and continues to linger in the back of my mind.

Blade Runner: This is one of the rare instances where I first saw it and wasn't impressed because I was too young and too inexperienced in cyberpunk to get it. I rewatched it years later, and I got it. This isn't a film for everyone, it's grim and fatalistic and deliberately ambiguous. But unlike other titles in this article that play the ambiguity card, Blade Runner pulls it off. It also (eventually) manages to paint a sympathetic portrayal of the antagonists. And for the time it released, that still seems to have been comparatively rare in mainstream films/

Alien (1979): I'd heard vaguely about this through pop culture osmosis, but it hadn't been shown on television yet. Then the original Alien tetralogy was broadcast on Channel 4 during the 2000s. I think it was on a tape recorder or an earlier DVD recorder (I forget which, probably the former), but my sister recorded it, and I watched it the following morning. No need to go into details, just...wow. Still love it. And for my taste, theatrical cut over director's cut. Also, if you can, find Jerry Goldsmith's original cut of the musical score before Scott butchered it. It's an audio revelation.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind: I'm just going to say it, this was one of the most boring film experiences I have ever encountered. It wasn't that I can't take slow movies (I mean, I like the OG Star Trek film, which is commonly dubbed "The Slow-Motion Picture"), but this movie just felt like it had no idea what a plot was. It may be because I wasn't brought up within Roswell culture that the alien elements fell flat (Lindsey Ellis's Axiom's End and Stephen Cox's Child duology are doing a better job of introducing me to that aspect of American culture). I watched to see what all the fuss was about. I still don't get what all the fuss was about. And...the music feels like it's trying to make up for the movie's shortcomings, and because I don't tend to click with John Williams, it fails completely.

Ghost in the Shell: I'd heard about this franchise through references, got a recommendation, and decided to try my luck and watch it. What I got was a film that has only grown more enjoyable with age. It's an enjoyable cyperpunk-style sci-fi title that knows exactly what to do. It doesn't spend too long on scenes unless those scenes need to be long, it balances conversations and contemplation with some grade-A animated action. Yes, it's a little old, and the dub hasn't aged well, but I still find it a great title and a strong sci-fi experience regardless of its animated presentation (yes, the snobbery towards animation was and to a point is very real). Also, Kenji Kawai's score...chef's kiss.

Star Wars: My experience with this film series is odd, because I experienced the prequel trilogy as it was releasing, and my opinions on it have remained soft. Yes, it has problems, but it's not the worst by a long way. I saw the OG trilogy through my oldest sister's VHS versions, and I found them enchanting. I don't like the later re-edits, but thankfully the original films got a DVD release that we own. Do I wholeheartedly like Star Wars? No, but I appreciate it, and I do like the original trilogy as it seems to be saying something. Also Lucas had the restraining hand of other writers, which is where I think the prequel trilogy suffered. The music's...okay.

The Matrix: I saw this when I was...very young. And while I shall always have a soft spot for the first two sequels, the original Matrix is completely appreciable as a standalone experience. The fact that whole schools of scholarship have been dedicated to this film...isn't that surprising. I don't find Neo that great of a lead, but Trinity and Morpheus make up for it, and there is some genuine tension and serious questions about reality and desire that have aged like a fine wine in this era of AI-generated content and virtual reality. I liked it well enough when I saw it as a child. I like it even better now. And, once again, the soundtrack is incredible.

2001: A Space Odyssey: I love Arthur C. Clarke as a writer, A Fall of Moondust is one of my favourite books. But I loathe this film. I think it's because of the Kubrick influence that this whole film feels like it doesn't know what to say from one scene to the next. It jumps about with very little rhyme or reason, every scene is at least five minutes longer than it needs to be, and the ending is a confusing jumble that tries to give you a migraine. As I've said, I can enjoy slow movies, but not movies that seem to be suffering from both ADHD and impaired movement. Also, I can never forgive Kubrick for the fact an excellent original musical score was scrapped for royalty-free classical music. The Blue Danube and Also sprach Zarathustra are forever tainted by this mess of a movie.

Predator: Once again, heard about this through pop osmosis, and I was shocked. Compared to my previous Schwarzenegger experiences, this was quite the tonal whiplash. Having watched it later in life, I still like it, even if I don't watch it for a deep story. I watch it for its unique building dread and vicious deconstruction of the action man archetype that still attempts to infest modern films. I even enjoy the sequel, which takes things to the next level creating a lead that is...difficult to like. Predator isn't a film I'd rewatch often, but it has an appeal when I'm in the mood. Also, while I don't tend to enjoy Alan Silvestri's work, his score here is engaging and genuinely creepy.

The Day the Earth Stood Still: It's shocking how well this movie holds up. I saw this as a kid, remembered it fondly, and still think of it fondly. It has the subtlety of a sledgehammer during its final ten minutes, but then that's forgivable in sci-fi of that era. It paints a still-pointed image of humans as scared and sectarian, and within the production limitations (AKA self-censorship) of the time, it conveys a lot of disturbing messages and warnings. Oh yes, and a tiny note: NOT THE REMAKE! NEVER THE REMAKE! And the music's all right too, though I've never much liked 50s music.

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial: I suppose I should mention this one, as I did think it would be good. But...eh. I suppose I liked it well enough as a child, experiencing its approach to aliens for the first time. But I never wanted to rewatch it. And as I've grown older, that wonder has been replaced by a feeling that this film's story could have been told in 100 minutes rather than the 140-plus the original release used. I get it was aimed at a young audience, or at least I assume it was, but I as a child wasn't impressed. And the latter half is so full of needless dramatic cliches. Also, unlike most of the other films I've covered in this post, I really don't like the music, which wobbles between overdramatic and bland.



So, there we are. Twelve opinions, and depending on the movie hot takes that might get me cancelled. I don't know. Being honest about one's views and opinions is coming back into vogue now, so maybe we can say we don't like something other people do like. Anyway, hope you enjoyed it to a point if you got this far, and take care out there. We might enter a dystopia within the next few years, but let's hope not.

A (reasoned) defence of Ghibli's Tales from Earthsea

 In previous posts on this platform, I have talked about the Earthsea series by Ursula le Guin. The main book series, and the short story collection. They are classics, truly worthy of inclusion in the canon of fantasy and of wider literature. But I was introduced to the world of Earthsea via a route that...well, isn't well liked. Studio Ghibli's 2006 animated movie Tales from Earthsea. It was the directorial debut of Goro Miyazaki, and the stuff he had to endure from his father makes me pity him deeply and has permanently lowered my opinion on the older Miyazaki. But that's beside the point. How does the film adapt le Guin's work, and why do I still like it?

WARNING: THERE ARE SPOILERS FOR THE FILM IN THIS ARTICLE.

As a straight adaptation, it's terrible. It doesn't adapt a single book, but instead blends elements of multiple stories with more original elements. The story of the movie follows the archmage Ged on a journey across Earthsea as magic is fading from the world, and dragons are seen fighting. He takes in the wandering Arren, a young boy tormented by inner demons. The pair eventually find shelter with Ged's old ally Tenar, and her adopted daughter Therru, and eventually confront the evil wizard Cob.

This story blends elements taken from The Farthest Shore and Tehanu, with additional story beats and lore elements traceable to A Wizard of Earthsea, The Other Wind and the short story "Dragonfly". But there are also original elements that for book fans will come out of left field: some chronological elements, the inclusion of a slaver gang as secondary players, the reason and themeing behind Arren's torments, and a whole opening segment that is the furthest from le Guin's style it's possible to get.

As someone who adores the original books, I should find this as unwatchable as I find the film version of Eragon. Even more so given the complete whitewashing of the cast, something that is present in ALL of Studio Ghibli's works TBH. But when I look at this film, when I remember it, I remember that without this film, I wouldn't have been as deep into Earthsea as I have become. Though it strays wildly away from the stories, it keeps true to many of the series' themes and motifs. It preserves Therru's character in some important respects (she's the character most easily butchered) and doesn't go completely over the borderline as it might have done.

It helps that the music and performances help to sell this world. Tamiya Terashima's score is one of my favourite film soundtracks, blending orchestra with Celtic folk music. And the English dub is spellbinding. It sells the world in a way that I wasn't prepared for, and makes some of the...weaker elements of the plot and characters at least bearable.

Le Guin's own opinion was that...it wasn't her world, her Earthsea, but it was a fine film. And for the first work of a director under abusive pressure from a celebrity father holding an iron grip on his studio, it holds up. I like it far better than some other Studio Ghibli efforts. And it was my introduction to Earthsea at a time when my eyesight and reading problems meant the editions of Earthsea we had in the house were a closed book to me.

Should you watch it? Maybe, maybe not. If you're an Earthsea purist, you'd probably be insulted. But it is a good way of getting a feel for this world and these characters, from a culture the author was emulating. So...who knows? You might like it.

Author Talks: Season 2 - Final Episode

 Hi. This will be a very brief post. Today, I decided to release the final episode of my second run of Author Talks, a one-person podcast which features me talking about...well, basically anything that takes my interest within the scope of my profession. It's mainly story-based stuff, such as short story readings and discussions of story-based elements. This final episode looks at how World War I, one of the most notorious conflicts in history, has been portrayed in different works over time. Links below:

Author Talks: S2, Ep7 - WW1 in Fiction: YouTube version

Author Talks: S2, Ep7 - WW1 in Fiction: Spotify version

For anyone who wants, you can check out the rest of the podcast on YouTube and Spotify. Hopefully you enjoy them.

Writing and working for a future beyond sorrow.

Poetic title, I know. But it's the kind of thing I need to write after the events of the American election. I won't dignify the current president elect by mentioning their name (an expletive is the closest I want to get at the moment of writing). Suffice to say, they should never have gotten this far. It appears the world is going through terrible times in more ways than one. I couldn't do anything about it since I live in the UK, but seeing it happen to a country where our family has friends, where my very liberal publisher is based, makes me feel very anxious and depressed. We're going to see four more years of that certifiable person's actions in office, self-serving policies that make everyone suffer.

One might ask: What's the point of writing? But let's remember, people write things because they feel motivated to do so. I'm fortunate as the UK is--relatively speaking--all right. Not perfect, not by a long way, but still okay. There are loads of books that were the better for the writing, even when the country they came from had a vested interest in not letting such books be published. All Quiet on the Western Front released in 1929, its sequel The Road Back in 1931, both when Nazism was beginning to gain ground in Germany. Many anti-nationalist and anti-oligarch pieces of media have seen success in countries which have those institutions engrained within them, like Japan and even China. And when McCarthyism and the so-called "Lavender Scare" were gripping America, fiction was created that pushed back against that reality.

Fiction is a means to vent frustration, but it is also a means for people to see something that could be made into a reality. There are reasons why some books helped galvanise popular movements against something that had previously not seen a consistent and conscious move against it. Film makers broke the Hayes Code, writers can topple and ridicule regimes. It's not going to be easy for anyone. For the moment, a power has appeared in America that taps into the country's worst aspects. Elitist culture, ingrained sexism and xenophobia, unwillingness to change in any meaningful or radical way, a political system just as likely to be a rotting snake eating its own tail as a dragon sailing over the world.

There are possible (perhaps foolish) silver linings. Firstly, this is the second term, so the incoming president legally can't run a second time unless there's some kind of sacrilegious change to the law and constitution. Secondly, it is possible members of the incoming incumbent party will actually restrain the more idiotic decisions (not very probable, but one can hope). Thirdly, most horrifyingly, the new incumbent has a vested interest in not provoking too major a conflict with the other two oligarch-driven world powers currently in the world. Fourthly, cultures and attitudes surrounding sexuality and gender once firmly pushed to the sidelines have become accepted enough to the mainstream that there should be some level of pushback to attempts at censorship (indeed some of the most radical pieces have come out in the most conservative times). Finally, perhaps most hopefully, America managed to survive last time. And of course, it could all go to the deepest and coldest bowls of hell in a hand basket.

I won't say don't rage. You should rage, though not in a way that gets you easily demonised and shut up. There are dark years ahead, but for the sake of people I know in America, I will continue working towards my degree. I will continue writing about worlds where it's completely okay to be LGBTQIA+, to be non-White, to be any gender or gender-nonconforming, to be disabled, to be different in some way, shape, or form. Being different isn't a crime. We need to remember that for the next four years, spread the word for the next four years, try not to trap ourselves in any kind of echo chamber for the next four years. And maybe, during and even at the end of those four years, things can be changed for the better.

Image copyright: Square Enix. Source: SaGa Emerald Beyond

BristolCon 2024 - My Experience, and future plans

This article is complemented by a vlog covering BristolCon 2024, which was meant to be a lot fancier than it ultimately was but I realise I'm gonna be one of those slightly scrappy vlog makers. And I don't mind. Below is an expanded prose version of the originally-planned script.

BristolCon is now fifteen years old. And in celebration of that, it held a two-day event from October 26 to 27th, with the usual Friday "BarCon" where people were social and maybe a little silly. Herein follows my written impressions of that event.

The days prior to my Friday departure were consumed by home affairs, and of course choosing what to take and what to leave behind. A simple train ride, simple meaning one change, brought me to that city of scooters, churches and beautiful views. Bristol. The Friday, of course including meeting old friends and acquaintances including Juliet E McKenna, Stephen Cox, and others I sadly can’t remember offhand (please). I also got my convention paraphernalia, and tried…karaoke. Never again.

Saturday, the first day of BristolCon, was a fun time and in parts an instructive one too. I actually did a reading from my novel Lost Station Circe, and got a good response. I heard later that the first live reading of your work is always the worst, and I think I did alright. After that, the panel on writing non-human characters with Grace Picknett-Powell, one of the guests of honour Peter F Hamilton, S Slottje, and moderator Koel Cornah. I also stayed for the wonderful Anna Smith-Spark’s entertaining reading from her novel A Sword of Bronzes and Ash, which was hilarious. She does grimdark, and I tend not to expect comedy from grimdark. So, good on her, that book’s further up my reading list.

The small group session led by E J Doble, “Good, Bad, Undefined” was a whole load of fun. I even introduced Doble to the original meaning of nihilism when he used it in a context that…I have opinions on. Basically, a whole lot of interesting talk. Stephan Cox’s small bit on “Being Interesting” was also great fun, and it made me feel more confident in myself of being able to bring together a short pitch for different parts of my work. Something I…am not always good at. I caught SOME of the panel “Sex in the Citadel”, before my stomach called time and I had to get some lunch NOT from the hotel. And let me say, Spark, Tej Turner, Danie Ware, and David Cartwright can be truly hilarious about writing… Well, a certain song says it all.

Next was a whole hour of wandering around, and that’s where I got my haul (more on that later) and met up with a couple of other people including Emily Inkpen, who recently successfully kickstarted the third season of her sci-fi radio drama Dex Legacy. I tried capturing a little footage here, but… Well, I'm not good at vloging. After, the glorious Pete Ellis gave us a fascinating talk on Chemistry in Sci-fi and Fantasy. Since my late father was a research chemist, it was interesting getting even a brief overview of how the subject has been used. Which isn’t much, basically a couple of Isaac Azimov short stories, Clarkes’ The Fountains of Paradise, and a few others.

I almost went home after that as I was pretty tired, but decided to stay for Piotr Swietlik’s talk on Dialogue in Genre Fiction, and I’m glad I did. One, because it highlighted some points where my writing can…flag. Two, because it wasn't one-to-one with the previous year's version. And three, because I ended up triggering rounds of recurring giggles due to someone bringing up erotic fiction, there being some dialogue examples, and my brain ran with it…straight into the gutter. After that, I decided to end the day and head back to my hotel.

The Sunday was quiet to start, and I was able to have a long and interesting talk with Joanne Harris, the other guest of honour. Then the Small Group Session I led, “Must Main Characters Be Strong”, was a surprising amount of fun. Partly because I had about six more people than I was expecting, I think eleven or thirteen of us talking through what I felt might be a fairly shallow topic. But, what depths we found.

The attendees of my SGS "Must Main Characters Be Strong". Over double what I expected.

After that, I decided to check in on the panel “Rogues & Ruffians, Pirates & Thieves”. Featuring, when I got there, by Doble, David Green, Bav the co-chair, and Judith Mortimer acting as moderator. I have long wanted to write a specifically roguish character, and it was interesting hearing about some of the panel’s favourites. Sad no-one mentioned my personal favourite rogue character, Varric Tethris. But maybe he’s a bit niche… Then, something initially unplanned when I set out for Bristol on the Friday, Emily Inkpen’s session on audio dramas. Extremely informative, and great to meet her again in person.

After that, I attended Gareth L Powell’s Kaffeeklatsch. If you want to know what that is, a kaffeeklatsch is “an informal gathering over coffee”. There wasn’t any coffee, but it was delightfully informal. I like Gareth, nice guy. And I had a feeling that some of the insecurities I’d been feeling about how I got into wanting to be a writer and author were very common, and… Well, things could well work out in different ways. There is no absolute way to do it.

With Gareth L. Powell at his Kaffeeklatsch

Then I decided to attend the final panel on “Lost Cities And Abandoned Places”. This panel, hosted by Bav and featuring Piotr, Emily, Penny Hill, and Jonathan L. Howard, was a great time. The whole thing was livestreamed, as was everything from Panel Room 1, but I managed to record a section related to a question on the appeal of abandoned places. The audio quality's horrible, but hey ho, I was using a phone. And then the closing ceremony, the first I've ever attended, and…well, I’ll just show you my completed haul.

My complete hoard: Ian M. Banks' Excession, Lindsey Ellis's Axiom's End, Jim Al-Khalili's Sun Fail, Emily H. Wilson's Inanna, IndieBites 10: Tricksters & Treasures, Interzone Magazine issues 239, 263, 290-291, and 295

Now, onto what might be difficult. This two-day BristolCon was a huge amount of fun, but it also threw into perspective some elements of my life and attitude that I needed to rethink. And it's time for me to take a break from BristolCon. Will I never go back? Absolutely not, it's a lovely event and I've met people there I consider colleagues at least and friends I would hope. Will I give it a year's break? Yes. I've been going there or attending in some form for six years running, and it's beginning to lose its lustre. I don't want anything I do to do that. If there is no lustre, there should be comforting familiarity. Also, I have other things to commit to, like my current quest with the Open University to get a degree, and my writing endeavours.

I'll still be doing my best to keep in contact with these people, and keeping an eye on how things go, and finding other things I could attend virtually or otherwise should I choose. But to carry on loving BristolCon as much as I do, I need to take a break. If you want more BristolCon content, and some other comments, here's a vlog of my time down in Bristol and at the event on my YouTube channel.

Coming Soon: I'm at BristolCon

Quick blog post for y'all today. This coming Friday 25 October, I shall be going down to Bristol, and attending BristolCon for...I forget how many times now. I've been attending fairly regularly since 2018 I think. Anyway, over the last couple of years, I've ended up being more of a PART of things, Not that I had to be, it's a great little event regardless, but last year I did a couple of panels, and this year I've ended up doing...several things across the now two-day event across Saturday 26 and Sunday 27.

Saturday: 09:50-10:50 – Panel Room 2 – Reading (planned to be Lost Station Circé), Panel: Writing Non-Human Characters

Sunday: 11:00 – Small Group Session (SGS) Room 2 – SGS: Must Main Characters Be Strong?

I'm also just going to be around from the Friday pre-Con stuff, and attending events, and during some pre-scheduled free time enjoying what the Con has to offer in its stalls and gallery. I FULLY intend to enjoy myself down there, and I hope to run into acquaintances and friends, and if at least one person becomes interested enough to pick up a copy of my work after my reading and everything, I'll be pleased.

For anyone attending, hope to see you there. And I'll be creating a video/post about my experiences there to give a better impression of the vibes. Enjoy, and see ya there!