The premise of a detective dealing with the boundary between tech billionaires and the occult covers a couple of areas I knew I’d be interested in. What to Expect An interesting case that starts with bodies mutilated with arcane symbol, a former-police-currently-private detective with a shady past, tech moguls with Rampant AI, ancient demons, and […]
News / Blog
Amazon, DRM, Piracy, and a stress-free new year
Amazon just made purchased ebooks downloadable as ebook and PDF, and I’ve been hearing a lot of concerns. Here’s why you shouldn’t worry. The two key concepts you have to understand are that: I think the second point is pretty clear. While Amazon has a “customer focus” that applies to the one with the wallet, […]
2025 in Review
As usual, here are my reflections on the year just gone. The short version is that I have made progress in writing (multiple shorts), though everything else… leaves a lot to be desired. Let’s start with the yuck, to get it out of the way. On the work front I am yet again in the […]
Book Review: Just One Damned Thing After Another, by Jodi Taylor
This came up in the comments following me post on historical fashions, and looked like a fun read at a time I didn’t want anything heavy. What to Expect Expect a crazy roller-coaster of crazy cross-time adventures. The protagonist has studied ancient history and dabbled with archaeology, and gets recruited to a strange institute that […]
Book Review: Stone and Sky (Rivers of London #10), by Ben Aaronovitch
I’ve been following this series for a while (mainly the novels), and it’s pretty decent. What to Expect Another police-procedural case for Peter Grant, working for the “Special Assessment Unit” – London’s Met police unit for cases involving ‘strange bollocks’ (the occult). This time Grant is trying to vacation in Scotland, and we get many […]
Jury Duty
As a devoted reader of my novels*, you know that as Felix or Jack get called to court on occasion, in their pursuit of dealing with offenders. I do love writing a bit of courtroom drama, Cicero long-winded speeches notwithstanding. So, naturally, when I got the summons for jury duty my first thought was “bloody […]
On Screen Adaptations (four reviews in one!)
I’ve read The Survivors by Jane Harper and watched the Netflix TV series at the same time, so — rather than a plain review — I thought I’d do a post on comparative observations about screen adaptation. Ditto with The Thursday Murder Club novel by Richard Osman and the movie. Aaand I’ve covered Jane Harper’s […]
Book Review: Autolycus the thief, by Michail Sidiropoulos
A lesser known bronze-age character as a basis for mythical story – of course I jumped on the chance to read it. What to Expect An embellished telling of the life of the grandfather of Odysseus, told from his own point of view. The story starts with him as a child being dispossessed and growing […]
Writing Old Books
A few weeks ago, the wife and I went to a used-books fair. We came back with a haul of some interesting finds from the “Old Books” tables. While there were too many others we had to leave behind, I’d like to draw your attention to those below, as I’ve bought them with the explicit […]
Book Review: A Natural History of Ghosts, by Roger Clarke
I came across this on The Rest Is History podcast, where the author featured as a guest and reviewed some of the history of ghosts in the UK. What to Expect An attempt to examine if England truly is the most haunted nation, whether it’s the isles’ weather or just the people. After setting the […]