Just finished “The Swords” and “The Hospice” by Robert Aickman. I came to him late, but the refusal to make sense, horror filtered through British banality and polite speech, is deeply unsettling. Pinter at his best comes to mind (“The Dumb Waiter”, “The Birthday Party”).

Photos from Illinois, 2019. Cold, open skies. 1/2

The peer I’m sharing this week is Francesca Leader, a writer from Montana who is published in multiple venues, and a Best Small Fictions Winner. This piece was in Wigleaf, and wonderfully communicates the breakdown in a daughter/mother-in-law relationship scene by scene. wigleaf.com/202205phrase...

As a rule I generally avoid political posts, but I’m a bit disturbed by friends I respect on social media cheerleading an attack on another country and the capture of its leader.

I’m going to thank all the editors and venues who accepted my work in 2025 – which looks generous, but is really just a way of telling you where I got published this year: Catamaran, @southeastreview.bsky.social ,Los Angeles Review, @maudlinhouse.bsky.social, Marrow, Oyster River Pages and Euphony.

Wishing everyone who celebrates it a Happy Christmas; and if you don’t, a peaceful New Year to you and your loved ones.

This week a short fiction of mine came out with Maudlin House @maudlinhouse.bsky.social – it’s called “Fish Tank People”. maudlinhouse.net/fish-tank-pe...

Photos from England, 2020. (no filters). 1/2

Not sure if ‘flash fiction’ is an anachronism for a short story written in 1962, but here’s an amazing piece from the Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz: “The Answer is No”, excellent translation by Denys Johnson-Davies.

Yesterday a short fiction I wrote came out on Oyster River Pages @oysterriverpages.bsky.social . It’s called “The Two Bookshops” and was featured in a special issue on ‘apophenia’ (the tendency to see patterns in random phenomena). www.oysterriverpages.com/fiction-82/2...

I liked this story by Mengyin Lin in Epiphany. I’m not sure if it quite escapes the Orientalist traps that lay in wait for any of us who write about these places, but I loved the idea of a divorce taking place against the Medina of Marrakesh. epiphanyzine.com/features/mag...

Two nice things happened today: my piece “On The Outside of Something” in the Southeast Review @southeastreview.bsky.social got nominated for a Pushcart Prize; and I had a short story accepted [email protected]. Big thankyou to both sets of editors. www.southeastreview.org/single-post/...

“Duvidha” is a 1973 Indian film about a ghost who falls in love with a merchant’s wife –and when the merchant goes away on business, it becomes his double and “returns” to live with her. Eerie, beautiful blend of a ghost story with a love story. Directed by Mani Kaul. www.youtube.com/watch?v=-u_b...

Really enjoyed this Nightjar piece “Signals” by Amanda Huggins @troutiemcfish.bsky.social . A new neighbor moves in next door. Very quiet and sinister. I don’t know why, but I always love this use of the mundane and the banal to infer an absolute darkness. @nightjarpress.bsky.social

Reading “The Program Era” at the moment by Mark McGurl. Disturbing reading if (like me) you were thinking of doing an MFA. I had no idea the Creative Writing Program industry had its origins in such a Cold War mentality. It was written in 2010– I wonder if the MFA scene has changed much since then.

Photos from Serbia, 2021. 1/2

Sharing this haunting micro-fiction by Cheryl Pappas @cherylpappas.bsky.social , an American poet based in Boston. I think it moved me partly because it reminded me of William Carlos Williams, and also that poem by Heaney (if you know it), “Midterm Break”. Beautifully sad piece.

In one week: a librarian friend says she barely reads six books a year; a writer friend’s pre-orders are dismal; half of U.S. 18–25s “hardly read” at all. Are we in a post-book world—definitively, or just a lull before rediscovery? These days I feel more like a handloom weaver than a fiction writer.

Although it’s Halloween, I’m afraid the flash fiction piece I’m sharing is not even remotely supernatural. Apologies in advance. It’s called “The End of Craftmanship”, and just came out in the Euphony Journal. euphonyjournal.org/2025/10/22/p...

I’m following the dark, precise cinema of Georgian director Dea Kulumbegashvilli. I recently watched “April” (2024), a tale of a doctor doing local abortions. There is “Beginning” (2020), about a Christian evangelical church. She films with absolute, spellbinding control. mubi.com/en/qa/films/...

This week’s writer is Mehreen Ahmed, a gifted Bangladeshi-born novelist now based in Australia. Won multiple prizes. I’m reading her Incandescence (2023) and really enjoying it—maybe because I visited Dhaka 3 years ago and recognise some of the places. www.goodreads.com/book/show/64...

Photos from Berlin – die schoenste Stadt der Welt.

My short story “Hymn to Sri Devi” came out last week in Catamaran (link in first comment). I’m sharing a photo of the first page – sorry I can’t share the whole thing. Honored to be on the same cover as Percival Everett.

I thought I was numb to Epstein stuff by now, but this one really hit. Not just that the woman who wrote it killed herself, or that predators target working-class women with family trauma—but that their clients will die peacefully in their beds. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

As Western societies politically unravel, I wonder about the future of horror—which always relied on First World “normality” to create its weirdness and angst. Now that such stability (which never really existed elsewhere) is dissolving, how will we scare ourselves when so many are scared already?

Sharing one of my favourite short stories this week—from perhaps the greatest Turkish writer of the 20th century, Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar. A gentle, sharp satire on Turkey’s modernization. Brilliant translation by film critic Fatih Ozguven. wordswithoutborders.org/read/article...

Had three short fictions accepted in @thebrusselsreview.bsky.social today. In other news: Karen Schauber from Vancouver Flash Fiction kindly asked me to provide a “writing tip” for their FB page, so here it is. It’s not Seneca or La Rochefoucauld, but you’re getting it for free so don’t complain.

Huge congratulations to Imogen Reid @imogenreid.bsky.social for getting her story “Fabrication” into Best British Short Stories 2025 alongside Ian Critchley, Alison Moore, Pippa Goldschmidt and others. Will definitely buy a copy when I’m back in the UK.

More photos from Turkey - this time eastern Turkey. 1/2

Just watched the indie horror Milk & Serial (2024). Started half-bored, ended impressed: yes, some formulaic turns, but the young director nails the atmosphere and gives us a genuinely disturbing protagonist. Strange age when a phone can outdo a $50m studio. www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbzG...

Beautiful piece by the California poet Natalie Marino this week. I loved how the closing lines of this text communicate through images the remembered bigness of everything in childhood without actually saying it.

A short fiction of mine, “On the Outside of Something”, came out in the Southeast Review this week. @southeastreview.bsky.social . www.southeastreview.org/single-post/...

The peer I’m sharing this week is Megan A. Schikora, a Michigan writer based in Michigan who has a novel out next year. The story below will resonate with anyone who’s had to negotiate the odd, sometimes awkward space of the children’s playground. frictionlit.org/sticks-and-s...

I’ve tried a couple of Rachel Cusk novels in the past and not been able to get very far. I’m a quarter of the way into this one – “Outline” – and its odd, monotone, weirdly detached narrator has me absolutely hooked.

We visited Brighton in the UK for a couple of days in the summer. I had Graham Greene on my mind, and tried my hardest to find the seedy, dilapidated, fifties seaside resort – but to no avail. Tescos, organic cafés, overpriced wine bars and ubiquitous London English was my superficial impression.

Finally got my paper copy of the Quarterl(y) journal today. When a suitable stretch of time has passed, I’ll share the complete story. Many thanks to Chris Smith for accepting the piece. @quarterpress.bsky.social

One of my favourite stories: Raymond Carver’s Cathedral. A masterclass in turning a grumpy, unlikeable narrator into the vehicle of an epiphany. I read it reluctantly a year ago, but it pulled me in like a black hole—into its dark, silent centre. thelondonmagazine.org/cathedral-by...

Last year I got a tax refund from the US gov for $1,400. We spent it straightaway. This week, I got another letter, saying this had been an error and, with no trace of an apology, demanding immediate repayment with a self-addressed envelope for the purpose. It’s the little things that count, right?

This week a curious piece that I really liked by @andrewbertaina.bsky.social Andrew Bertaina in The Forge @theforge.bsky.social . I think I was intrigued by the disparity between the calm, reflective tone of the narrator and the aggressive episodes he describes. forgelitmag.com/2025/08/04/p...

Tunisia, 2020. 1/2

Today I sat down by the window and spent an uninterrupted two hours just reading paper books: a Bengali short story, half an hour of Schopenhauer, a horror novel by Ramsay Campbell and a history of medieval Spanish Jews. I feel rejuvenated.

I’ve been posting my top ten favourite pieces of literary criticism(see first comment for entire list). Number one position goes to: Walter Benjamin’s “The Task of the Translator”. This essay is a pearl of poetry in itself …one of the most lyrical things ever written on what it means to translate.

Just had a story accepted in Catamaran! It’s a long one, too, 7000 words – something I thought would be difficult to place.

Reading this at the moment. A collection of stories by Ben Pester @benpester.bsky.social with Boilerhouse Press. Absolute cracker of a title story – dark and sad, but beautifully written.

The peer I’m sharing this week is Noemi Schering-Olah, @itssonoemi.bsky.social a Hungarian writer who is a Best Small Fictions Winner and a SmokeLong Quarterly contributor. A selection of her pieces is here, and I think my favorite is “The Possessive Form” – very disturbing. noemiwrites.com

As I hardly ever try to get my creative non-fiction published, I’ve no qualms about putting this one up online for people to read. It’s about a year I spent working the night shift at a gas station in Scotland.

More photos from Ladakh. 1/2

Sharing the most recent issue of The Lincoln Review @thelincolnreview.bsky.social , which has the beautiful prints of Imogen Reid @imogenreid.bsky.social featured in it (link in first comment).

Looking forward to starting these three I bought today. Amit Chaudhuri, “Sweet Shop”; Banu Mushtaq, Heart Lamp (which won the International Booker); and one of these ghost/horror collections that Penguin are starting, clustered around a single idea – this one is on myth, edited by Katy Soar.

In the midst of these turbulent times, I will monastically continue to list my top ten list of literary criticism – no. 2: “Literary Theory” by Terry Eagleton (1983). It’s hard to write ‘funny’ literary theory, but Eagleton on the fascism of British modernism is just exquisite.