EXCUSES AND HALF TRUTHS

Things are starting to move. Gradually, blinking in the low watery sunlight like a couple of bears emerging from hibernation, C and I are returning to the world. She’s leading the vanguard in the grounds, pruning, clearing and tidying. I’m under starters orders to retask our home office/crafting room into something more fit for purpose. Which means I get to play with power tools and pointy potentially dangerous objects today. Wish me luck. The endgame is a room we can both use for our creative endeavours when C is not in there bringing in the big bucks.

Progress, of sorts, which has been a long time coming. I can’t wait to get started.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 9

Great news for all readers! I have finally got my sorry ass in gear and stuck some new writing up in place where you lucky sorts can read it. Poems For Monoliths is a novelette comprising six interlinked short stories which, when read as a whole, tell a tale of interconnection and communication between the most unlikely of characters. I’m quite proud of it, and hope you’ll enjoy. Usual rules apply—if you do like Poems, please drop me a review and some stars. It really does make a difference.

Thank you.

Poems For Monoliths

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 8

Busy old week for the religious calendar. Tuesday marked the Lunar New Year and Shrove Tuesday, better known to food fans as an excuse to hoover up all the duck pancakes they can. It was also the start of Ramadan, which meant those who observed had to wait until sundown to get their fix. Pancake day also presaged the first day of Lent, so on the whole it was a giddy mix of feast and fast.

Going back to the Lunar New Year, the advent of The Year Of The Fire Horse holds special significance for me. It’s the first time in 60 years that both my animal and elemental Chinese zodiac signs have aligned. Not that I’m observant of such things, but the conjunction feels somehow pleasing. Here’s a little overview of what I should be able to expect.

On fire!

And as a final note on a wild week, kudos to the patient folks in charge of Bedford Borough Council’s social media accounts. They really aren’t paid enough.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, whatever sign you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 7

Welcome, friends and lovers to this, the officially mandated Smoochy Kiss-Kiss Flower and Card Shop Appreciation Day with extra snuggies for the hospitality sector. It is your job, nay, your solemn duty to spend big on bouquets and choccies because otherwise you will make Cupid cry. And you don’t want that, do you? DO YOU?

At Swipe Towers we will be taking the inevitable introvert option, snagging a meal deal and finding something loud and gory to watch on a streaming service. For C and I, it is the one day of the year when we don’t need to be all Smoochy Kiss-Kiss. Although we probably will. Romance doesn’t take a day off in our house, hells no.

Lord, we must be annoying.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you Smoochy Kiss-Kiss, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 6

C and I rejoined our local library. It took five minutes, was all done online and feels like a sensible thing to do. I grew up in libraries, pretty much. They were where my love of SF and fantasy was kindled and fuelled, the need to read which has helped define my inner life given a sanctuary and launchpad. Reading will be getting a swanky new library this year as part of a big overhaul of our civic centre, so it felt like a good time to show a bit of support. Apps like Libby and CloudLibrary mean you can fill your boots with magazines and all the e-reading your little heart desires without even leaving the house. And all, let me stress, for free. Libraries are an essential public resource which deserve to be venerated, celebrated and above all, used. Snag yourself a card today. You’ll be glad you did.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 5

Apparently I have a doppelgänger. Two separate pals on two separate occasions have sworn, hand on heart, that they have seen a fella with not just my physical appearance but gait and stance striding around the mean streets of Reading. Who is this man? Does he have friends who tell him of the peculiar, haunted-looking stranger with his face scurrying about Dingtown? Are we destined to meet in the future? When we do, will that crack the surface of reality? Whoever you are, mysterious twin, if by some happenstance you come across this message, hit me up and we’ll have a beer together.

Please don’t be a teetotaler. That would be a version of me I wouldn’t want to meet.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, whoever you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 4

I’m under both the clock and the gun a bit this week, so let’s jump straight into the serious business. Enjoy links on dangerous caramel, drone metal, skronky jazz and a Disney movie you really need to rewatch.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 3

Hands up who had ‘actual flippin’ blizzard, ICE murder in Minnesota and a potential annexation of Greenland’ on their scorecards for the first week of 2026. The soap opera of life in the second quarter of the 21st century doesn’t look to be any less balls-out crazy than the last. Honestly, if half of this went into a science fiction novel written in the late 70s, you’d accuse the author of hoarding all the good drugs for themselves.

If I switch my feeds away from the news, this last five days has not been too brain-twisting. The workload has been gentle but steady. I’ve been cooking up a storm, to C’s evident delight, and although little actual writing has been done (apart from the foolishness below, of course), ideas are percolating. A story which brewed up in November now has an ending which, although still absurdly violent, is no longer quite as bleak, nihilist or cannibalistic. Just in case you had any doubts as to my state of mind over the last two months of the year…

Aaanyway. Come get your lovely links and let’s huddle up against the storm together.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you are, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 2

So here we are again. The start of a new year—depending of course on your calendar of choice. Yet again we were lured past midnight on New Year’s Eve by the promise of big fireworks (Caversham, you did not disappoint. House Beast Millie slept through the lot) and actual house guests. Thai takeaway and half a bottle of Kraken is a good way to put 2025 in the rear-view mirror.

Inevitably, even though I know the whole situation is a social and political construct loosely hanging onto seasonal cycles and I really should be doing this on the Winter Solstice, I have an an itch to clean up and get ready for the next twelve-month of challenges. Give Harvette a clean and fettle after our Kentish adventure, de-Christmas the house and begin work on the longer-term plans for C’s lady-shed at the bottom of the garden, the ongoing trash-heap in the garage and improvements to the office.

Who knows, I might even try to squeeze some writing in there somewhere.

We go again. Let’s have it.

Wherever you are, whenever you are, however you plan to spend 2026, welcome to The Swipe.

Continue reading The Swipe Volume 4 Chapter 1