Since it clearly needs to be said: If you used an AI cover for your handcrafted selfpub novel, it's not too late to change it! Please do! We all want to read your work - and that won't happen while you use AI. You can find 1000s of free stock images online. Consider this an industry PSA.

It's not a conspiracy theory - the worst actors in British politics are being paid huge sums of money by foreign powers to undermine and destabilise our democracy

Most of the really sinister shit in UK politics at the moment (ID cards, arresting protesters) is being pushed by think tanks and tame politicians (Tony Blair Institute, Richard Dannatt) who are funded by big US tech firms (Oracle, Teledyne). Labour are selling our democracy down the river.

3. ⁠this is not the moment for an incredibly expensive increase in state surveillance infrastructure to be run for profit by private tech firms just before Labour ushers in an (even more) authoritarian right wing government. FIX THE GODDAMN COST OF LIVING INSTEAD YOU FREAKS.

I'm delighted to share the cover reveal trailer for SOLITARY AGENTS from @headlinebooks.bsky.social! Huge thanks also to @harryillingworth.bsky.social and @dhhlitagency.bsky.social Available to pre-order from all major retailers (and local independents), Solitary Agents is out on June 4th 2026.

Keir Starmer's aides are reportedly telling him not to go to the COP30 climate conference, because Reform would attack him for it. Yes, they might. And he should wear it as a badge of honour. Standing up for humanity, for science and a habitable planet. Where's the hazard in that?

One of the unexpected things I've learned from my advocacy for trans people is how malignant parts of the State can be, how it can misuse data for positively evil purposes. It's taught me people can't be safe with a digital ID card and so I've signed this. petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

Every home in the UK has a gender neutral bathroom. Many pubs and restaurants now just have a row of individual bathrooms with a toilet, sink and dryer in each of them. This is a complete non-issue. The only people making it an issue are Wes Streeting, JK Rowling, and a bunch of weird transphobes.

LANDMARK MOMENT - the Greens now have more members across Great Britain than the Lib Dems! Let's keep it going! 👇🏼👇🏾👇🏽 join.greenparty.org.uk Latest stats available: 85,800 @greenparty.org.uk (England & Wales) + @scottishgreens.org combined membership 83,174 @libdems.org.uk (a single party across GB)

Unfortunately, we've had to cancel this event. A new date will be posted as soon as we can reschedule. Apologies to all who planned to attend.

Power is the rock on which truth founders. The mainstream media, with a few exceptions, is a single-issue lobby group, whose purpose is to assert the rights of capital. Here's what I've learnt about the industry in 40 years in journalism. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I've just handed in the copyedits for MY NEXT BOOK! It's a book about the Knights of the Round Table killing Nazis whilst living messy queer afterlives and trying to be better people to each other, even in dark times. I'm very proud of it, and I can't wait for everyone to be able to read it.

Opportunity here for a writer on a low income to get access to a nine week novel writing course taught by the great @silvanhistorian.bsky.social www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/course/break...

Raskin to Patel: "In a few short months, how did you go from being a crusader for accountability and transparency with the Epstein files to being part of the conspiracy and coverup? The answer is simple. You said it yourself -- because of who is on that list."

This coming Sunday at 7pm I'll be taking a trip to Manchester & heading to Waterstones for a fantasy panel alongside @danhanks.bsky.social @thomasdlee.bsky.social @alethearlyons.bsky.social tickets available below www.waterstones.com/events/fanta...

update: male loneliness epidemic solved

Shot, chaser Young men more likely to vote Green than Reform. Young men second most progressive group of any demographic. Combined right-wing vote barely bigger than Green vote alone for young men

Two weeks from today I'll be at Waterstones in the Trafford Centre with @stephenaryan.bsky.social and @danhanks.bsky.social discussing alternate earths and fantasy fiction. Thanks to the the BFS and @alethearlyons.bsky.social for organising! Tickets below: www.waterstones.com/events/fanta...

praise for Kirk from liberal pundits is one of the clearest distillations of how ill-equipped they are for this fascist moment, & how devoted they are to a West Wing fantasy of a respectable right/conservative movement that does not exist, and which - like Kirk - almost never operates in good faith

Still not sure why this man is being tearfully memorialised by figures in the British media, unless of course they agree with him

@zackpolanski.bsky.social has convinced me to join @greenparty.org.uk I trusted Labour to make things better. Instead they've made things worse for refugees & trans folks, cosied up to Trump, and sided with tech bros against UK writers & artists. I don't see why I should ever vote for them again.

This is why I've been using the term Vichy Labour. Grovelling to power - no matter the nature of that power or the human costs of collaborating with it - is in the political DNA of the whole faction. John Cruddas once used another good term for their politics: "kiss-up-kick-down".

This is my year of cancelling everything. Began with Spotify and Netflix in January. Amazon next. Audible can go soon too. There are other ways to listen to audiobooks. None of it is easy to walk away from. All of it is a cleverly set trap. But I know I want a different way forward.

What is THE MIDLIST? 🤔 Ep. 171 airs tomorrow, with guest author @davewragg.com and co-hosts @adrianmgibson.bsky.social @mjkuhnbooks.bsky.social & Greta Kelly clarifying what it means to be a midlist author and book. Available Sept. 9 in audio/video: linktr.ee/SFFAddicts youtube.com/@FanFiAddict

Under the 1948 Genocide Convention, states are (a) prohibited from carrying out genocide, and (b) obliged to work actively to prevent genocide being carried out, and to punish those who perpetrate it. The UK is likely in violation of (b) by virtue of its continued support for Israel

Using this piece by @reallygoodwizard.bsky.social in my introductory lectures for my design students.

Come join authors Thomas D. Lee, Stephen Aryan, and Dan Hanks as they discuss their novels set Earths not quite like this one. Author Q&A plus book signings after the panel. @stephenaryan.bsky.social @danhanks.bsky.social @thomasdlee.bsky.social @alethearlyons.bsky.social

Two weeks from today I'll be at Waterstones in the Trafford Centre with @stephenaryan.bsky.social and @danhanks.bsky.social discussing alternate earths and fantasy fiction. Thanks to the the BFS and @alethearlyons.bsky.social for organising! Tickets below: www.waterstones.com/events/fanta...

Very important info for eg women in violent relationships who maintain a secret phone. Please pass along.

What the hell even is this article? Lower bills. Tax the Rich. Stop the genocide. And stop obsessing about my teeth, my beard and my boyfriend!

I was approached in St Peter's Square a while ago by enforcers working for the city council who accused me of dropping a cigarette butt. I don't smoke either, and I offered to let them search my pockets for cigarettes or a lighter, at which point they sheepishly left me alone. What's going on here?

The closer I get to the end of my PhD, the more I feel like the well-known character Jesus Christ, from the popular musical Jesus Christ Superstar (as played by Ted Neeley)

I often think about this letter to the New Statesman. It's from a 1960s Tory, and neatly summarises how British politics has shifted massively to the right, and taken Starmer's Labour party with it. #PoliticsLive

"Drop an old person you're going to turn into in the future"

If you want to protect vulnerable young people then banning AI chatbots and making sure they have access to mental health services is much more important than invasive age verification barriers (which teens can easily bypass anyway)

Almost certainly the best thing I was ever told about owls was when I met an owl handler at an owl sanctuary and he told me that the wild owls who lived near the sanctuary worried about the tame show owls there and sometimes stopped by to leave them shrews and mice as presents.

re: generative AI I have finally fully and accurately explained my problem with how it’s marketed and used. And now, you can use it, too.

A useful resource: anthonymoser.github.io/writing/ai/h...

We built a calculator that doesn't work, but don't worry, it's also a plagiarism machine that will tell you to kill yourself. It runs on the world's oceans and costs 10 trillion dollars.

Make no mistake. Refugees, protesters and trans folks are the thin end of the wedge.

This, from the Quakers, is a pretty good example of how to resist pressure from bigot lobbying groups. Effectively “we legally can allow trans people to use the loo, we morally should, and we tried it and nothing bad happened”

Ban these bots

Hi authors! Please remember to file a claim!

5. Keir Starmer, who hilariously claims to be leader of the Labour Party, yields to every sally by the far right, seeking to compete with Reform on cruelty and intolerance, while ruthlessly purging from the party anyone to the left of Vlad the Impaler.

I’d add: again, it is not the public who have decided they want mass deportation, or that this should be an acceptable idea within the mainstream. It is our horrifying political/media class, who have roasted each other’s brains on social media. It is *elite radicalisation*, not popular politics.

No, authors aren't burnt out because "writing without AI is slow" We're burnt out because we're paid dirt so we need day jobs to survive

I'm a suicide survivor. This story is enough to make my blood boil. Adam should still be here - and if there were no other reasons to ban ChatGPT, this would be more than enough. In fact there are thousands of reasons, and millions of vulnerable people who need to be protected.

I wonder whether Sydney Anglo has ever been bibliographically sandwiched between two Wolfenstein games, before now.

@lindzmcleod.bsky.social When are you writing *this* queer retelling?

It's really fucked up the news media at large is searching so hard for humanity in machines, while systematically denying humanity to Palestinians, trans people, immigrants, and other persecuted people