Helen McClory
@helenmcclory.bsky.social
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Writer, Reader, Hybrid creature
https://linktr.ee/HelenMcClory
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Helen McClory
Dirk Puehl
2 days ago
“I try in vain to be persuaded that the pole is the seat of frost and desolation; it ever presents itself to my imagination as the region of beauty and delight.” (Mary Shelley) 🎨 David Blackwood
#wintersky
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Association for Scottish Literature
3 days ago
“Despite its premise of the distillation of evil through shapeshifting, the anchoring concerns of this gothic tale are profoundly & universally human” Robert Louis Stevenson’s STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL & MR HYDE was first published
#OTD
, 5 Jan, 1886 💙📚
#C19
đź§µ 1/8
theconversation.com/jekyll-and-h...
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Jekyll and Hyde: a tale of doubles, disguises, and our warring desires
Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic forces us to confront uncomfortable questions about morality and responsibility. Do the best of us have a repressed bad side, just waiting to get out?
https://theconversation.com/jekyll-and-hyde-a-tale-of-doubles-disguises-and-our-warring-desires-187173
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Reading On the Calculation of Volume II by Solvej Balle and I think that's it, I'm in for all 8 books
6 days ago
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First book of 2026: Àgota Kristóf's I Don't Care. Bleak spare book, likely more suited to a deep February sort of mood
7 days ago
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Upon some reflection and listening to joyful screams from around my house, it strikes me that Marty Supreme is plotted the same way as children's play. Lots of sudden explosive moments, drama and grandeur all the time
7 days ago
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add a skeleton here at some point
8 days ago
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I once nearly hit Gordon Lish with a bit of fold up furniture, in a lift.
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10 days ago
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Just saw Marty Supreme. Everything happens All at Once and that everything is table tennis (and lying)
10 days ago
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I've watched the BBC ghost story for Christmas and it's a good time to remember Dead of Night (the only Ealing horror film) exists
13 days ago
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Helen McClory
RM
13 days ago
I know I’ve posted a fair amount about Moby-Dick, but I keep coming across astonishing passages, such as the one below when Ishmael visits the site of a an adult sperm whale skeleton given to his “late royal friend.” It’s as if Melville downshifts into eternal-classic mode.
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Merry Christmas to all, and to those of you feeling like everything is getting a little too close, consider (perhaps wistfully) applying for this
share.google/notQKnKsbQ2R...
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New ranger wanted for isolated uninhabited island of Handa
The job comes with a few challenges - including weekly boat trips to mainland for washing and shopping.
https://share.google/notQKnKsbQ2RP48UK
14 days ago
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niina pollari
15 days ago
We're just out here seeking meaning in a material world
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Anna Dent
16 days ago
Not now, haunted Victorian shoes
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It has the odd feel of Trump making a memorial before he is dead. Perhaps he knows something we don't about his own health?
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19 days ago
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Early Christmas present to myself, in very Christmassy colour. How I have never read KristĂłf before now escapes me
21 days ago
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Helen McClory
open.substack.com/pub/laughter...
on Hardy, stars, hedges and having ones heart broken by picture books.
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The light from long ago
Reading Thomas Hardy, among others
https://open.substack.com/pub/laughterfromthenextroom/p/the-light-from-long-ago?r=53ok&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true
23 days ago
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Maybe there is a bit more of Hardy in my planned writing than I say here. Maybe some of Boldwood's whipped up obsessions, now I think of it...
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23 days ago
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open.substack.com/pub/laughter...
on Hardy, stars, hedges and having ones heart broken by picture books.
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The light from long ago
Reading Thomas Hardy, among others
https://open.substack.com/pub/laughterfromthenextroom/p/the-light-from-long-ago?r=53ok&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true
23 days ago
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Helen McClory
Neil Mackay
about 1 month ago
Farage arrives in Scotland today, and it should make our collective stomach heave that this repulsive, dangerous extremist has crossed the border. Amid scapegoating schoolkids and allegations of antisemitism anyone who supports this man is morally in the gutter My
@heraldscotland.bsky.social
column
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"Farage in Falkirk? It should make our stomachs heave to have him in Scotland"
Nigel Farage’s Falkirk visit sparks outrage, with many Scots saying his presence north of the border should make “our stomachs heave”.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/viewpoint/25677369.farage-falkirk-idea-alone-make-us-heave/
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Sara Habein
about 1 month ago
"The Blackness" feels correct.
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Coates is Odd This Day
about 1 month ago
1 December is the day we must mark the sad passing 504 years ago of Giovanni di Lorenzo de’ Medici – or Pope Leo X, as he was also known. Leo was not one of those popes memorable for a sordid life, but is known for two things. Firstly, this:
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Rachel Hands
about 1 month ago
this is quite the detail
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Marie Phillips
about 1 month ago
Happy birthday Gloria! In A Lonely Place is one of my all time favourite films, starts off as a standard noir but moves into something far more truthful and disturbing. Celebrate her birthday by watching it today!
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Euan
about 2 months ago
the nominees were -a campaign to get lifechanging medication for extremely sick children -a campaign to improve access to justice for victims of rape and sexual assault -a transphobic hate campaign that managed to convince some judges to make the worst ruling in Supreme Court history* (*winner)
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Argonaut Books
about 2 months ago
We need your help.
@waterstones.bsky.social
, without any direct communication with us, will be opening their 6th Edinburgh branch less than 100 metres from our front door at the Foot of the Walk in Leith. Please read on for more information
www.heraldscotland.com/news/2562908...
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Anger as Waterstones snaps up prime site on doorstep of independent bookshop
UK's biggest bookselling chain under fire over plans for new store beside Edinburgh tram line.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/25629089.waterstones-open-prime-site-beside-independent-shop/
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Heather McDaid
about 2 months ago
Argonaut Books needs your help 📣 Waterstones are set to open a store less than 100m from the indie bookshop's front door. Full info on
@argonautbooks.bsky.social
's Insta:
www.instagram.com/p/DRMULI1jCI...
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Erika Swyler
about 2 months ago
Thing that rattles around in my head: Fifteen or so years go I attended a book event for two ghost hunters. One of them just casually said, "As we all know, ghosts can't move anything heavier than a five-pound bag of flour." I think about this ALL. THE. TIME.
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Antony Carpen
about 2 months ago
See the full hearing at
www.parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/...
with
@sundersays.bsky.social
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The dream!
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about 2 months ago
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GHC Has Gorra Lorra Fings On (the radio)
about 2 months ago
Fine, I will write the next James Bond. INT: SEX CASINO, NIGHT BOND: Hello I am Bond James Bond my car goes NYOOM CUT TO: ten minutes of a chase in a sports car BOND: Also my watch is a special watch that makes ladies blouses see through EXPLOSION BOND: This film is for grown ups
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Just as I am thinking of writers who play and change things, here:
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about 2 months ago
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Attempting to rally myself and my agent into resending out an (edited, expanded) story collection. I would like my work to persist, even as the heat death of the planet nears. Like making a memento mori and throwing it in the smelter
about 2 months ago
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One of my favourite underappreciated views in Edinburgh. Looking down on St Ninian's row. Dusk, grey stone, a few golden lights in the windows
2 months ago
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Currently reading Turbine 34 by Katherine Clements. Carrying a current of its own across the dusty moors. Part of
@wildhuntbooks.bsky.social
Northern Weird Project, perfectly sized novels for reading, as I am, in lowering light
2 months ago
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I've been reading an otherwise good non fiction book that referred to ivy as "strangling" some trees. A slander! Ivy is a great habitat for birds in its native range!
2 months ago
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Thank you so much Matt! I still remember that night- heard some of the best poetry, in a packed venue. So great!!
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2 months ago
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David Wearing
2 months ago
I recall around 1990 an elderly supply teacher explaining to my class what war is actually like, macho mythology aside. The sound bullets make. Men crying for their mummys as they die on the battlefield. It's haunted me ever since, and certainly played a role in politicising me.
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Frankenstein was campy and the most Catholic it was possible to be, including making St Giles cathedral in Edinburgh into a Catholic church, to my glee. And yet, it was only okay.
2 months ago
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Where to send a v short story that's just one long shriek of despair about everything?
2 months ago
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Maris Kreizman
2 months ago
I’ve gotten like 20 or so of these scam emails about book promotion but I really like “And if you ignore this, just know a small, dramatic bookworm inside me will cry 🥺and probably quote Baldwin while doing it.”
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A Personal Anthology is probably the substance I've most consistently read, and if you're not subscribed you should. You will find much to be inspired by (or argue against)
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3 months ago
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Michael Shallcross
3 months ago
An unhinged literary opinion needs to be like Muriel Spark believing T.S. Eliot was sending her coded messages through his plays, not 'hear me out, I don't like Dickens'. That is simply a literary opinion. The hinges are very much intact.
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Laila Miller
3 months ago
Be Brave! Order Helen McClory's collection! Part of our discussion this week
@electricsheepsf.bsky.social
@helenmcclory.bsky.social
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Marina Benjamin
3 months ago
The future of UK Independent presses hang by a thread. Supporting the sector is vital: this is where ALL the bravery lies. The big houses are risk averse, but copycat small press successes to revitalise their lists. Small presses are the motor!
www.thebookseller.com/comment/open...
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Open letter on the future of small press publishing in the UK
The industry must work together to ensure the longevity of the UK’s independent presses.
https://www.thebookseller.com/comment/open-letter-on-the-future-of-small-press-publishing-in-the-uk?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Morning%20Briefing
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Adam Bienkov
3 months ago
Nigel Farage accuses teachers of "poisoning our kids" on race issues. Here's a reminder of what teachers and fellow pupils at Farage's own school remember of his own views on that subject.
www.adambienkov.co.uk/p/nigel-fara...
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Electric Sheep
3 months ago
This week's guest is Helen McClory! First up is "The Companion" in Wigleaf! "At this time of day, the risk of attack was minimal, and all she had was that noise, that taste, the treachery beneath, and the cold air around."
@helenmcclory.bsky.social
@wigleaf.bsky.social
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McClory: 'The Companion'
Fiction by Helen McClory
https://wigleaf.com/201603companion.htm
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Helen McClory
Electric Sheep
3 months ago
"The sound was high and wrenching. There was a strong, wild smell now. She and I stood watching the second wave of the storm as it broke, droplets spattering, dense as white oil." Love the relationship amid the storm!
@helenmcclory.bsky.social
@wigleaf.bsky.social
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McClory: 'White Rain'
Fiction by Helen McClory
https://wigleaf.com/201811white.htm
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Myna Chang
3 months ago
"None of the snakes were awake, but the music made you think something violent was going to happen. I suppose the violence was in the man, not the snakes." I love this story! All of Helen's stories are full of quirky happenings & gorgeous language.
@helenmcclory.bsky.social
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New-Cleckit Dominie
3 months ago
My dad has turned up this photo from a visit "many years ago" to the Forth Bridge. I think it's taken from what he calls the howff, just below track level, used by the maintenance workers. I guess when you're engaged in a proverbially endless task, you need a wee cup of tea once in a while.
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Rachel Deering
3 months ago
Book Cover of the Day:
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