Oh! That's good. The embedded video in the story was so clogged with ads it wouldn't open for me, I was going by the thumbnail

Sure - I say it not as a pedantic fan but because I found it genuinely a bit uncanny

It's a bit disorienting that he has pupils 👀

enough of your tree-crazy prattle, Pope! from this day we are pact brothers no more

Fair enough, but I shall guard my borders carefully

(This isn't a criticism of the pope btw, quite the opposite really)

The pope is composing note-perfect lore text for "Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri". Easy to imagine this narrated by Pravin Lal or Sheng-Ji Yang.

If you want to neuter a previously/potentially troublesome organisation, just put a Labour ex-MP in charge of it. Just look at Index on Censorship.

easy to get numb to how far previous norms have been eroded, but to see a company that our government plans to embed deeply in the UK's key infrastructure release the corporate equivalent of a school shooter manifesto is really something. companies used to have to at least pretend not to be evil!

Said by either my wife or me about once week: "No, Michael, that's not the R.E.M way. Now let's recycle these shards and go."

"I heard about the rugs. Perhaps you would care to explain the rugs."

The mismatched vault at Lincoln Cathedral

Two neighbouring arches, contemporary and different sizes at St Mary Magd Oxford

A misaligned pair of arches at the tower of Universitt Churcy Oxford

Gothic masons were the original vibe coders send skeet

(Eg Tecreli (a place that becomes important in book 2) appears twice 🤔)

Here's part of the awful scribbly continental map covering where book 1 takes place! I do have a more detailed map of the Elith-tenh as the scale here is too fiddly for accurate distances (and there are some unimportant inaccuracies that I would want to smooth out on an "official" map)

No, I'm afraid not! I promise you are not missing out on much, it is purely a sketch for the purposes of keeping track of where everything is in relation to everything else, distances, route planning etc.

Naturally I would like that as well! There IS a map of course - covering not just the Elith-tenh but most of the continent - but it is a very scribbly affair drawn and updated by me.

@angryrobotbooks.bsky.social

TOMORROW, I will be one of many authors taking apart in this all-day event exploring language in SFFH! It starts at 10am, I will be reading from "The Dead Man's Empire" at 11:15, and there are fascinating readings and panels all day, all for £5 (free for @britfantasysoc.bsky.social members).

"But she's a poisoner, she will literally poison and murder you!" Well, nobody's perfect

Nice - don't think I've ever come across the word "coolth" ever before, but just read it in The Anechoic Chamber collection. So I've learned something today.

And it's all stuff that would be wiped off with a damp sponge by a Reform/Tory government.

One of my favourites! And a lot older than might be expected. It should be more used. (I like "gloomth" as well.)

There's a (probably apocryphal) story from the 1960s about the sub-editors at the Telegraph being such sticklers they quoted Liz Taylor saying "I feel like a million dollars (£373,000)!"

THE LAST BLADE PRIEST by W.P. WILES

W. P. Wiles’s (@willwiles.bsky.social) THE LAST BLADE PRIEST has hallmarks of epic fantasy: quests, politics, gods, prophecies, unlikely fellowships, high-stakes conflicts, and fantastical creatures. Yet Wiles defies expectations at every turn. Just a wonderful novel. Highly recommended.

Thank you so much Ben!

As the old rhyme goes, "Logo colours be solid, or user experience be squalid" (West Mids, orig. 17th cent)

Not a coincidence that Bluesky started breaking shortly after they put shading on the app icon. That's the unquiet spirit here. Should've stuck with solid colours.

😬 Sorry! (BTW he can be any hair colour you like, it's not a load-bearing detail!)

Thank you so much!

Paw Patrol. Bing. Chuggington. There comes a day when none of them are spoken of ever again.