midnight and to the north a dogged sun still burns loath to shed her blazing harness and to the south a pale and thwarted moon now yearns for her lover’s cloak of darkness and I I hold the middle in this boundless arctic tundra where I’ll make my bed for a night that will not come…

At some point while writing my second novel, it felt as if I was no longer the one controlling the story. Somehow, the three main characters had taken over, each one of them relentlessly tugging at my sleeve for their voices to be heard, to have me think what they…

of Michelangelo fame — David, my dearest friend, These are dangerous times for us. Even here, in what is supposed to be a sanctuary of democracy, the barbarians are on the rise again. Poor David, be careful, seek cover. Your outspoken beauty and grace offends them, and in their intellectual poverty and insecurity all they manage…

wallpapered layer after wallpapered layer I peel away the glued-on generations that dwelled in this old house till finally I reach the writing on the whitewashed walls measurements and sums in fat black pencil and sprouting from a triangle mildewed and dark a craftsman’s Freudian graffiti puerile and lewd and so these walls do talk gossip and whisper of creation and construction and long gone lusts until one…

If you are new to this story, you might want to start here: Most People Live and Die Where They Are Born But I won’t.medium.com You’re a bloody fool, monk! They drowned his brother because he was a retard. I let that sink in, let it find its place among the dozens of similar stories I’ve been told of infanticide perpetrated in…

Dear friends, readers and writers, it’s official — within just a few months from its launch, some two hundred new books are for sale on Amazon, all of them written by ChatGPT. And that’s only counting those that openly name the Bot as the author or co-author. God, sorry…, Bot knows…

Most People Live and Die Where They Are Born But I won’t.medium.com Most People Live and Die… Episode 2 … where they are born. But I won’t.medium.com What it is to drown ‘Well then, we’d better get going with my story, scribbler. Not much time left before a sheer drop down a hatch will break my neck. At least, that’s what I hope for — a decent gallows with a trap door. I don’t particularly fancy a…

when you feel you have gathered too much dust — have a seat and for once forget that I’m rickety and old with a spider’s playground stretched between the backrest and my legs quite perfect for the web of ancient tales I weave if only you will listen for a while grab a seat and for once don’t mind the woodworm and the mould the musty whiff of all the tired asses large and small I comforted and suffered while their tales grew tall and their yarns gained length if only you will listen for a spell

Recently, I was told by a local independent bookstore they wouldn’t carry my books because they were self-published. I understand the plight of the indie bookstore, as they are flooded by the massive roll-out of books from mainstream publishers. Been there, done that, as I ran my own indie store for twenty years. Still, I thought one of the main tenets of the indie bookstore was to make a difference in their choice of books and guiding readers to new and unexpected discoveries, otherwise, they end up offering nothing but the “same…same” as the big players. And to be clear, mainstream publishers don’t really give a … whether the indies survive or not. They have plenty of other sales channels to choose from.