Today my book on Russell Hoban is published. Thank you to the friends, family, and colleagues who helped get me here, and thank you especially to my wonderful wife! @russellhoban.bsky.social @mcfarland.bsky.social @txst.edu

Congrats to author Graeme Wend-Walker on the arrival of his brand-new book about Russ! The book is entitled "Russell Hoban: Faithful to the Strange" and it's already available at booksellers. The cover features a painting Russ loved—the head of Orpheus with his lyre as depicted by Odilon Redon.

Author copies have arrived! @russellhoban.bsky.social @txst.edu @mcfarland.bsky.social

In 2023, wordsSHIFTminds released a 22-track double album inspired by author Russell Hoban's 1996 science fiction novel 'Fremder'. (**)+<0>% #music #instrumental #synthwave #synths #downtempo #electronica #distrokid #youtube #bandcamp #applemusic #itunes #Hoban100

What a book for a child to read

'Still the child stared, and saw between the dots of color blank white space, emptiness that seemed to flow back toward him from the smallest dog out through the largest. “Nothing,” said the mouse child. “I can see the nothing between the dots"'

Annals of half-remembered children's tales: "there was an old story I read as a child about a toy that had a windup mechanism, and the story revolved around how this toy could end up winding itself. Any ideas?" There is a scene which has stuck with me over the decades...

A group of artists are staging a performance inspired by Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker in Canterbury, UK on 12th June. Participants in the project include Russ's son Wieland Hoban. Find out more (and check out a video clip) on the official Hoban site. #Hoban100

Very exciting!

Old poster for Russell Hoban’s The Carrier Frequency (1984) spotted in a band practice space in Leeds (Mook in Meanwood) @russellhoban.bsky.social

If someone twisted my arm and forced my to choose a favourite book, this would be right up there. It was such a perfect reading experience that I've not read it again. And that's not my usual strategy. I've read and reread my other book loves so much I often know what the next sentence will be.

So we're on the Book Shepherd with our favourite books about niche London... @mattfromlondon.bsky.social and @lloydshepherd.com are both on the list... shepherd.com/best-books/t...

Looking forward to this book!

And many thanks to @backlisted.bsky.social for the inspiration for the purchase. ‘New old episode up now. Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban’ www.backlisted.fm/episodes/232

Imagine getting to hear Audre Lorde reading from "Bedtime for Frances!"

The Mouse and His Child (1977) is one of my favorite obscure animated films. It was produced/distributed by Sanrio and co-directed by Fred Wolf. Wolf also directed "The Point (1971)" but is most famous for his "Mr. Owl" Tootsie Roll commercial. The 70's was full of weird, experimental gems like this

(several decades late to it, but Riddley Walker is incredible)

O what we ben! And what we come to!

Turtle Diary - Russell Hoban Stream from BBC Radio 4.

Best book I’ve read so far this year

This was fun and the recording will make its way to the @russellhoban.bsky.social site soon.

Just hours away! The free #Hoban100 panel discussion of Riddley Walker (featuring Wieland Hoban, among others) takes place via Zoom on Sunday, Feb 16 at 7:30 pm GMT (UK time). That's 2:30 pm Eastern time in the US, and 8:30 am on Monday Feb 17 in New Zealand. Full info: russellhoban.org/hoban100/

I’m excited that this event is just over 24 hours away! Trubba not: it’s online and free.

🧵 Meet our panel for the free Riddley Walker Zoom event this Sunday the 16th! (Or Monday morning the 17th if you're in Australia/New Zealand.) Bios for each of the panelists and moderator are in the thread below; for full info about the event visit russellhoban.org/hoban100/ 1/6

A reminder that in three days there's a FREE #Hoban100 panel discussion of 'Riddley Walker' (featuring Wieland Hoban, among others) taking place online. Sunday 16 Feb at 7:30 pm GMT (UK), which is 2:30 pm Eastern (US) and 08:30am Monday 17 February NZ time. Full info: russellhoban.org/hoban100/

If you'd like to spend time on Sunday thinking about more pleasant things, like how puppet shows will be part of the government in radioactive post-apocalyptic England, I'll be in this online panel talking about the classic novel RIDDLEY WALKER. I'm the amateur on the panel; I'll try not to babble.

Just 3 days away ... No rumpa no dum when Riddley Walker Zoom panel come! The free #Hoban100 panel discussion of Riddley Walker (featuring Wieland Hoban, among others) takes place online this Sunday, Feb 16 at 7:30 pm GMT (UK), which is 2:30 pm Eastern (US). Full info: russellhoban.org/hoban100/

🧵 Photos from last week's #Hoban100 reading from the books of Russell Hoban at the Hopleaf bar in Chicago, with Diana Slickman, Eli Bishop, Dave Awl, and Graeme Wend-Walker. See alt text for captions and thread below for more pics.

6 days away! No rumpa no dum when Riddley Zoom panel come ...

Riddley Walker is hands down my favorite postapocalyptic narrative in any medium. Some others that would make that list: Lilith's Brood (and then every other Butler) Children of Men Station Eleven (book & show) Mr. Burns Watership Down The Last of Us (games & show) The Passage (first book only)

🧵 Trubba not! The first online event for the #Hoban100 celebration will be a free Zoom panel discussion of Riddley Walker featuring Wieland Hoban—composer, translator, and the son of Russell Hoban to whom the book is dedicated. Full details in the thread below, or visit russellhoban.org/hoban100/

This is in my top 10 books! "The Mouse and His Child" Russell Hoban. #BookSky

Honoring Russell Hoban, American writer of many genres. “It has been my aim to be as strange as I can be, & I’ve never been as strange as I’d like to be.” Best known for his Frances the Badger series. #ChildrensBooks #kidlit

Malachy O'Neill shared this photo of Putney Bridge taken on 4/2/25 as part of a visit to various Russell Hoban spots in London. The yellow paper reads: "It is the longing for what cannot be that moves the world from night to morning" - quoted from The Second Mrs Kong #Hoban100

Sharing a link to the @booksforkeeps.bsky.social Authorgraph interview (1982): 'There’s a stillness about Russell Hoban which draws you in and makes you want to know more about him.' #KidLit booksforkeeps.co.uk/article/auth...

If you're in or near Chicago ...

Huge thanks to everyone who's posted about Russ's 100th today — it's been wonderful to hear from and connect with so many Hoban readers on Bluesky!

Russell Hoban is still the only writer with books I loved at ages 4 (Bread & Jam for Frances), 10 (The Mouse & His Child), 19 (Turtle Diary) & 33 (Riddley Walker). Also The Mouse & His Child has one of the world's best parodies of Beckett's Endgame as performed by a troupe of theatrical birds.

Russell Hoban was born 100 years ago. Riddley Walker, his post-apocalyptic novel from 1980, is a stunning work, its dialect poetry--a book that teaches you to read it as you go along. That's just the start; see also Kleinzeit (1974), Pilgermann (1983), & Emmett Otter!

highly recommend kleinzeit and the medusa frequency, which are very different books but both meditate on death/renewal and the orpheus myth. both beautifully lyrical too

[Born 100 years ago today, Russell Hoban, creator of Frances the Badger, author of The Mouse and his Child, Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas, and the post-apocalyptic Riddley Walker. He painted Joan Baez for the cover of Time in 1962. These illustrations for Poe were published in 1963.]

I nearly missed it - Russell Hoban's 100th birthday. I knew nothing of him until the 1985 film of Turtle Diary. I was enchanted by the oddness of rescuing the turtles from their "bedsitter of ocean". I think The Mouse and His Child was the next book; I could hardly believe it was the same author.

Russell Hoban (1925-2011) was born on this day. My pen name comes from his spectacular novel The Lion of Boaz-Jachin and Jachin-Boaz (1973). Bibliography: www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.c... Cover: John Hurford, 1974 #scifi #sciencefiction #fantasy #books

"The worl is ful of things waiting to happen. Thats the meat and boan of it right there. You myt think you can jus go here and there doing nothing. Happening nothing. You cant tho you bleeding cant." Happy 100th birthday to Russell Hoban.

Freeing a turtle for Russell Hoban’s 100th! @russellhoban.bsky.social

Today would have been Russell Hoban’s 100th. This year is also the 50th anniversary of Turtle Diary. I’m celebrating by freeing a turtle. Happy birthday, Russ! @russellhoban.bsky.social

I look forward to celebrating Russell Hoban’s centenary all 2025 but the day itself has snuck up on me. If you’re yet to discover his wry, melancholy, surreal, philosophical and magic work, try this reading of (maybe) my favourite book of his #Hoban100

Turtle Diary was my gateway to Russell Hoban, and I'm very much looking forward to revisiting it through this series. #Hoban100

No writer like him, before or since. And he passed away the day before our very own George Whitman, so their waves and particles are probably partying together somewhere out there...

The Frances books were vital to my childhood, and ‘Riddley Walker’ is one of the greatest books I have ever read as an adult, just a phenomenal, linguistically astonishing piece if sustained imaginative brilliance.