The extinction of a whole species isn’t as rare as you think. It happens all the time. However, the extinction of a prominent and popular species, now that doesn’t happen so often. The Humulus lupulus, or hop plant, first started to encounter difficulties after a series of freak weather incidents led to several major crop failures. Read the rest of this entry »
Hello folks. I’m turning the editorial direction of this place over to you. For a bit. You, the reader, can post any idea for a post, blog post title, or other sort of inspiration for a post such as a video or a song and I will endeavour to write at least 500 words on said subject/title/point of inspiration. I will also, where appropriate, choose a relevant Creative Commons image and/or YouTube video to accompany the post. What an offer, eh? Read the rest of this entry »
This week I have been reading/planning to read/pretending to read the following. Hopefully you’ll find something of interest amongst it all.
Potentially rather exciting news for fans of Richard Ford with reports of him reading from a new Frank Bascombe story. Ford has written three books focusing on the character, and I am a huge fan of them. Read the rest of this entry »
There was an interesting article on the Guardian website the other day from one of the judges of the Granta list of best British novelists under 40. Now, as this list is collated every ten years and I’m now in my thirties, unfortunately I will never be a Great Young Novelist as decreed by Granta. We shall overlook the fact that I haven’t written a novel, or anything approaching one, and probably never will, and perhaps focus for a moment on yet another sign of me slowly getting old. I was just about willing to accept that I was never going to be a professional footballer, but I figured being an acclaimed novelist was less time-dependant. Little did I know. I guess I better aim for a Nobel now. Anyway, back to that article… Read the rest of this entry »
Wait until next year 