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I saw this on Pai‘s blog and felt the need to share my thoughts on the list. The list appears to be a variation on the BBC’s Big Read Top 100 and was voted on by the public. Perhaps the surprising thing is that so many of them are classics or literary, rather than that…
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I’m running behind again (pesky life) and Hub aren’t, so there will be a several reviews posted over the next few days. Issue 73‘s story is Behind Glass by Simon Strantzas.It’s a fairly conventional horror story and is well executed. There’s a claustrophobic atmosphere of isolation and disconnection that is compelling from the start. The…
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Today I set up wireless network in my house and secured it, despite the challenge of non-Vista-compatible software. Now I can blog while watching TV. Sometimes the little things make all the difference.
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Ok, so this was actually released on 5th January and I’m running a bit behind. A quick glance at the Hub website reassures me that they are too. The first issue of the year is always the flash fiction issue and thus has more than one story. Issue 72 has four stories of varying lengths;…
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I’ve been pondering this one for a while. A few weeks ago I stumbled across a radical feminist critique of one of my favourite shows, Firefly. My first reaction was ‘no, say it isn’t so!’ and my second was ‘maybe she’s got a point’. I don’t intend to address the arguments about Firefly, as that’s…
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I went to the British Museum for their Babylon exhibition this week. It was wonderful and very inspiring. The Long Way Home is a fantasy novel I wrote a couple of years ago, still languishing in first draft status, and it has a middle eastern themed world. The pictures and model of the Processional Way…
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This month there’s an article on the pros and cons of websites for aspiring authors. There’s also a handful of competitons, including one for which I got flyers in the post last week. I’m not sure how I feel about non-genre-specific competitions. I have an instinct that genre stories don’t do very well in these…
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Hub Magazine has a new website and it looks great. Issue 71’s story is The Watchers at the Window by Marie Faye Prior. It’s good. The initial hook seems a litte weak but she so effectively creates a character completely ill at ease in his surroundings that it doesn’t matter. The sense of stress, grime…
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I entered an opening paragraph in the Electric Spec mini slush pile game and editor Betsy has commented. I’m really flattered with the comments and I agree with the points about waffly and vague adjectives. When I start a new story, I start with a mood or a scene. Plot comes when I have to…
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Boudica Marginalia 