Chart / May

For the first time in the modest history of this calling card I like to call ‘website’, I missed a monthly chart. Not that it matters, but the reason was as follows: when it was announced that pubs would open in the UK on 17 April, I booked a ticket and flew back to the good Albion of my birth. Since then I’ve been running around supping from the well of social conviviality like a horse that has staggered out of the desert and into town. There is nothing ground-breaking about this sentiment, but the simple ability to sit at a trestle table with a friend and order a four-litre pitcher of beer and drink that beer and order another and then stagger home and dance to Talking Heads is something to cherish. I ain’t gonna be taking things for granted any time soon.

In news: not much. A lovely review for Reality Testing by Jason at This Dad Reads. A short story previously published in The Sea Letter’s anthology and now posted on its website. And finally (a little while back), an essay I wrote about cyberpunk for the polychromatic publication The Abstract Elephant.

Book of the month: All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy. Predictable that I would love this? Yes. Pleasing anyway? Yes.

Music is Queen:

  1. A Prayer For England - Massive Attack

  2. The Glorious Land - PJ Harvey

  3. The Daily Mail - Radiohead

  4. Reigns - IDLES

  5. Shortcummings - Sleaford Mods

  6. London Loves - Blur

  7. Inglan is a Bitch - Linton Kwesi Johnson

impressionizm.

impressionizm.

Chart / March

Is it really March again? Grant’s hot take that literally everyone has uttered recently: it feels both as though no time has passed since entering the first lockdown on 15 March 2020 and that an eternity has elapsed in the meantime. The one (almost) constant in all of this - like a supporting character returning in a movie sequel to establish continuity - is that here in Germany, we are still in lockdown and there is no end in sight.

One interesting development resulting from this, at least linguistically, has been the decision to use the words “Click & Meet” (in English) as shorthand for the process where a person registers online in advance for an appointment at, for example, a boutique store specialising in alpaca wool products and then goes there at 14:45 on a Tuesday to browse all the comfy socks in store. Maybe it’s not interesting for anyone else, actually; I’m just fascinated by how someone managed to sum up the New Normal in two words and an ampersand, and how quickly everyone accepted it. Specifically, it’s the use of ‘meet’ that’s twisting my melon, man. Why not ‘browse’ or ‘collect’ or ‘pick’ or ‘shop’? ‘Meet’ is so active and personal, especially for a country (and a city) that isn’t particularly renowned for its warmth toward strangers. All I can think is that after being starved of random human interaction for so many months, we’ve all learned how much we need other people, and meeting cashiers is the first step toward a more inclusive, harmonious, mutually beneficial society. Yep.

NB: I do not live near a butcher’s shop (thank fuck), but I hope their signs say ‘Click & Meat’.

Announcement time? I was going to do this separately, but it makes little difference, so here goes:

Reality Testing will be published as a paperback by the Texas-based publishing house Black Rose in January 2022.

Fireworks and balloons and so on. Bagged me that prime January slot, when everybody has disposable income lying around and the energy to struggle their way through 289 pages of dystopian fiction. Oh yeah, New York Times bestseller list, come to daddy.

REVIEWS. As mentioned a few days ago, Kirkus gave Reality Testing a starred review. Life goal: tick. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Book Review gave the novel a 4-star review, in which the reviewer casually talks about RT in the same breath as Blade Runner, Margaret Atwood and Judge Dredd. Consider my ego stroked.

We are the music makers:

Viagra Boys - Girls & Boys

Dry Cleaning - Magic of Meghan

Beige Banquet - Wired/Weird

MAZOHA - Protathlitis

Thee Oh Sees - Nite Expo

TVAM - These Are Not Your Memories

Shame - Water in the Well

we’ll sail to the stars

we’ll sail to the stars

Starred review from Kirkus for Reality Testing

Once in a while, in this endless sucking quagmire we call existence, something out of the ordinary occurs that lifts the spirits to heights that tend to be experienced exclusively by fortunate children at Christmas time.

Today I am a fortunate child.

Kirkus, in its strange, infinite reviewing wisdom, has seen fit to award my plucky upstart sci fi novel Reality Testing a starred review. They call it….

A bracing blast of neo-cyberpunk with some smart tweaks to the operating system

Other recent books that have received starred reviews include:

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante

If It Bleeds by Stephen King

Good company to be in. They’re lucky to have me.

Here is the review.

NEONIFY MY LIFE

NEONIFY MY LIFE