This week I am supporting calls to change the date of Australia Day. 26 January has only been a public holiday in all states and territories since 1994. It marks the proclamation of British sovereignty over what is now New South Wales in 1788. For the next 146 years the newly arrived convicts fought frontier […]

This week my short story “The Crimean Centaur” appeared in the Doctor Who charity anthology, Time Shadows Second Nature. All proceeds benefit CODE. The story features Lord Raglan, the British Commander in the Crimean War, memorably portrayed by Sir John Gielgud in The Charge of the Light Brigade, which is 50 years old this year. […]

Pleased to announce the publication of Doctor Who Time Shadows Second Nature, which includes my story The Crimean Centaur. All proceeds go to CODE, a Canadian NGO that supports literacy.      

Today, 12 January, marks the birthday of Jack London who was born Jack Chaney in San Francisco, 1876. Three of his works have had a profound influence on me. White Fang, first serialised in 1906, and Call of the Wild, 1903, were the most significant works of fiction that inspired my PhD about wolves in […]

Every three years or so I reread the original James Bond novels. Each time their world becomes more and more distant to ours. A world of casual racism where lesbianism could be cured by a strong man. A world where it was possible to smoke seventy a day and drink all night, yet remain physically […]

Today’s blog is dedicated to the HMRC staff at Regent Hill, Brighton, whose office is about to close. I spent the most enjoyable years of my career there and wish everyone there well for the future. It is not their fault that successive governments have attempted to hide fiscal failures by taking the service out […]

  My 53rd short story, Ma Gohardy’s Shop, is in Trump Utopia or Dystopia, an anthology of speculative fiction from Dark Helix Press. Released as an eBook on Christmas Day with print copies available in January.  

Today is the final of the Rugby League World Cup. Australia, ten-times winners, defend their title in their own country which is also the home of a popular domestic league. Everything was set for a successful tournament, but few have bothered to watch. Australia could only attract 30,000 to last week’s semi-final in Brisbane, 16,000 less than for the […]

This week I found myself in the unusual position of agreeing with a politician. It was nothing to do with the Queensland election where candidates and parties prefer criticising opponents to promoting policy. Instead it was Michael Gove, the British environment secretary who said, “There is an unhappy tendency now for people to believe that the raw and authentic […]