writing
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Sensitive skein
I try to keep up with the modern world, I really do. I read the news headlines every morning, I read a newspaper most days, I subscribe to a few of the weekly magazines, I listen to podcasts. Even so, stuff passes me by. Continue reading
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Time to write
Long ago, when I was young and impressionable, I read a profile of the novelist Graham Greene. His writing routine was mentioned. Greene would write for an hour or so each morning, producing 500 words, and then stop, his day’s work done. Continue reading
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Five years a blockhead
My first blog, These Islands, was five years old last month. Though it’s not exactly my first blog — I had a couple of false starts which are best not mentioned here. In any case, this anniversary seems a good time to consider why I still blog. Continue reading
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Minimalist fiction
Blake Crouch’s 2016 novel Dark Matter is a page-turner, no doubt about that. It uses the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics as a plot device, a tricky matter to handle in fiction. Continue reading
About Me
Writer. Londoner. Wayfarer on the rolling English road.
the other place
I write about British places and history at theseislands.blog.