Doctor Who is back! And I’ve reviewed it over at Hodderscape: Hero or madman? Warrior or healer? Wanderer or planner? Alien or human? The Doctor is all of these, and each regeneration gives the opportunity to twist the dials, remix the levels of the different elements of his character. David Tennant and Matt Smith shared […]
My article on Captain America 2, Agents of Shield and the challenges of telling stories in a shared fictional universe is now up on the Hodderscape blog! Beware of spoilers for the film and tv show. Nick Fury Must Die: Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD vs the Franchise on Hodderscape.
Over the last few months, I’ve started getting involved in Morphe Arts group, especially the writers’ group that meets in the Southbank Centre twice a month. They recently produced the first issue of their literary magazine Margins and I’ve contributed a short story, The Wordless to the website. Morphe also has monthly meetings covering a […]
Neil Postman, who wrote Amusing Ourselves to Death, might have been grimly amused to see Sir Howard Stringer recommending that BBC News online emulate Buzzfeed. Now there may be some very general principles that the BBC can learn from about creating engaging, sharable content. But the news should be very different from cat photos and […]
Aided and abetted by the use of my Cineworld Unlimited Card, I saw a lot of films at the cinema in 2013. Here’s the first part of my round-up of what I thought of them.
Neil Gaiman is one of my favourite authors, so I was really excited to get chance to see the man himself talking with Mariella Frostrup about his new book, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, at the Apple Store on Regent’s Street on Thursday night. Tweet of the evening has to be this: Arrived […]
Sophie Scholl: The Real Story of the Woman who Defied Hitler by Frank McDonough My rating: 4 of 5 stars I recently finished this moving account of the life of Sophie Scholl, a German student who bravely resisted the Nazis. The book does a good job of telling the story of Sophie’s life and the […]
So many books, so little time! I’m enjoying having more time for reading for pleasure now I’ve finished my MA. It’s sometimes possible to feel guilty about going back to reread books, when I’ve got so many unread books waiting for me. But you never actually read the same book twice. You never have the […]
One of the modules I’m studying this semester is Tolkien’s Medievalism. J R R Tolkien was not only a fantasy writer, but also a distinguished scholar of medieval literature. His essay Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics remains influential to this day. The rich depth of his writing comes from his love of language and […]
Some of the books I’m reading or have read in the last few months: Boundaries – Cloud & Townsend – generally very helpful, a few reservations Starcross – Philip Reeve – just riproaringly good fun Fever Crumb – Philip Reeve – mostly good, but feels incomplete Perelandra – C S Lewis – brilliant, an all-time […]
