Ian Fleming killed off James Bond at the end of the fifth novel, From Russia With Love, and then starts the next one with “Phew, that last case was a bit much, I had to spend a few days in bed, anyway back to work…”

Murder in a West End boutique? 🛍️👠 Inspector Charlesworth’s on the case. This month’s Crime Classic, Death in High Heels, dives into fashion, ambition, and fatal secrets. Available today: shop.bl.uk/products/death-in-high-heels Ed: @martinedwardsbooks.bsky.social

A long, long post on the novelisation Doctor Who The Revenge of the Cybermen by Terrance Dicks, the first to feature the bohemian Fourth Doctor: 0tralala.blogspot.com/2025/11/doct... #books #booksky #DoctorWho

To celebrate their birthday, Hammer Films are giving away a generous Quatermass bundle - both of the recent 4K collector’s edition box-sets, plus a t-shirt and a poster. Enter now, BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE! hammerfilms.com/pages/celebr...

From Vanity Fair’s Dictionary for the Motion Pictures, March 1922

And so it was that throughout the lands, as news readers named Watson and Crick as the discoverers of the DNA helix, a rousing chorus of “Rosalind Franklin” was directed towards the news.

A tiny bit of the BBC news piece that’s gone out today ✨🔭 The documentary and full piece is now on BBC Sounds & also airs on BBCR4 tomorrow (8th Nov) at 8pm Featuring the brilliant @proftimob.bsky.social at @jodrellbank.bsky.social #JodrellAt80 #JodrellBank

WAC wrong-headedness (that's the BBC Written Archives Centre) I've brought together the key links for the campaign against the changes which now make independent and exploratory research at WAC impossible - and why this matters. www.illuminationsmedia.co.uk/wac-wrong-he...

Just up: a great contribution to CST's ongoing Defending the WAC series by James Jordan. Thoughts on Cartier, Dimbleby and the unknowns of archive research. cstonline.net/defending-th...

Book Cover of the Day:

Absolutely amazing. OMG. #Traitors #CelebrityTraitors

This is why we got Brexit. #Traitors

Let’s go #Traitors #CelebrityTraitors

My favorite comment on the FT story

Peter Capaldi on Glasgow style, including a visit to a Scottish designer with the Memphis Group in Milan, and some bonkers 80s hairdos from Rita Rusk and Irvine Rusk. youtu.be/54lR3Zs2B7A?...

Wow! 😮🤩 There's a new interactive map of Every Known Road in the Roman Empire!! 🤓 itiner-e.org We might have to have a lie-down.

The long-running ideological war on libraries, education, and government workers is not separate from AI boosterism. It is the same ideological war on human knowledge and expertise. In some cases AI is being used to directly supercharge this effort: www.404media.co/ai-is-superc...

"Love you, scars, screaming and all" Print available now

Hurricane Melissa wreaked havoc in my birth nation of Jamaica. Reported: "The University of Miami with the US NOAA measured wind speeds from start to finish across Jamaica with the weather aircraft named Kermit. The maximum wind gust speeds were 252mph and maximum sustained winds were 185 mph..."

Heading home from that London after an excellent, productive couple of days, laden with new Terrance Dicks related facts.

“Go back, Grandfather!” In the new Doctor Who Magazine, on sale TODAY, you can read my epic 27-page interview with CAROLE ANN FORD – now 85 and still defiantly, magnificently Susan! Also, I take a look at the near-Susans lost to the show’s turbulent pre-history. 🧵 Quotes to follow…

I've written a new audio adaptation of one of Dickens' other Christmas books, The Cricket On The Hearth, and it's available now to buy as a bundle with The Haunted Man scripted by @jonnymorris.bsky.social. Mine stars Graham Fellows, his stars Paterson Joseph! averageromp.com/the-cricket-...

🧵 A remarkable discovery by Portico Library volunteer Rebecca Lamb has revealed that Charles Dickens signed the Library’s Strangers’ Book in May 1844 — confirming that one of the world’s most celebrated novelists once stepped inside Manchester’s oldest subscription library...

🏛️ PODYSSEY SEASON 2 - All the details! 📜 What. Where. When. 🍊 open.spotify.com/episode/6Aw1... 🍏 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/a... @sturdyalex.bsky.social

Even though I know it, that the person who did this poster art also co-founded the KLF (uh-huh, uh-huh) surprises me every time.

An update on Wonders and Visions, my collaborative project with @adamroberts.bsky.social grahamsleight.com/2025/11/03/w...

After a month-long hiatus imposed by the labours of proofing and indexing 'Magic Rays of Light', I have re-booted the Illuminations blog, to continue my notes about pre-war television but also to broaden the focus and interests. Do take a look: www.illuminationsmedia.co.uk/otd-in-early...

A big long post on Massacre in the Hills, the second Mounties novel by Terrance Dicks, featuring bucks, blizzards and - content warning - a racist 19th century term: 0tralala.blogspot.com/2025/11/mass...

I’m amazed at the number and quality of folk who contributed to this podcast (a Doctor! 3 companions! Writers! Actors! Lost Episode Finders! Fans of Yore!) It’s just a bit of fun: a countdown of the most desired missing episodes of Doctor Who. Plus much arcana, natch: www.podbean.com/eas/pb-8epk3...

It's hard to believe, but 2025 means Romanitas has been in print for 20 years. A modern world where the Roman Empire never fell. If that sounds good to you, the ebook's just £0.99 for the anniversary all this month! www.amazon.co.uk/Romanitas-1-...

Now! m.youtube.com/watch?v=JOdy...

Well this is massive. One of the very best. www.bfi.org.uk/features/pet...

Some spooky reprints have appropriately arrived on Halloween. 🎃 The Quatermass Experiment: The Making of TV's First Sci-Fi Classic and Penda's Fen: Scene by Scene are back in stock and could be haunting your bookshelves. Order now from tenacrebooks.co.uk/

Happy Halloween. Also the birthday of John Keats. One of my rare full-color illustrations. (Gouache, colored pencils, ink pens.)

Why the BBC WAC should remain bigger on the inside. An absolutely boffo column from Doctor Who mensch @tobyhadoke.bsky.social about the very silly decision by the BBC to cut off independent and exploratory research at its Written Archives Centre. cstonline.net/defending-th...

Quatermass! The rocket guy! Pew! Excellent, influential movie free on YouTube TONIGHT followed by Nigel Kneale documentary we made with @tobyhadoke.bsky.social @mrgeetsromo.bsky.social @bronteschiltz.bsky.social @drtauk.bsky.social @tommygorilla.bsky.social @eklectics.bsky.social

It's Halloween! @mrgeetsromo.bsky.social and I stagger painfully through post war London before ramming the gates at Hammer's secret base to uncover what monstrous conspiracies it took to get the first two Quatermass film classics out on Blu Ray/UHD. With Steve Rogers and @0tralala.bsky.social.

For Halloween! A bumper BERGCAST looking at the recent BD/UHD releases of The Quatermass Xperiment and Quatermass 2. With Hammer's Steve Rogers and writer/filmmaker @0tralala.bsky.social. Hosted by @mrgeetsromo.bsky.social and myself.

Alien (1979) with 14 year-old son. To begin with, he kept telling me stuff about to happen, which he had absorbed from the Culture. Then (post Kane having breakfast), he had no idea. Totally gripped. Didn’t reach for his phone. Well, maybe once.

Space Unicorns! Behold, the Uncanny Magazine Issue 67 Table of Contents and Paul Lewin cover! buff.ly/D7a2nXG

It is so very exciting to match one of Mary Severn’s letters to a portrait, especially one that was unknown! Read more in a new blog. #womenartists #archives www.debbiechallis.com/post/mary-se...

For this drawing I had in mind all those evocative interior artworks from the earlier Target books. Also I just adore that robot design. #DoctorWho p.s. I've been greatly enjoying @0tralala.bsky.social 's in depth posts on the Target books of Terrance Dicks and you should absolutely check them out.

On the first original, non Doctor Who book by Terrance Dicks: The Mounties - The Great March West (1976) 0tralala.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-...

And today I learned that in 1962 the BBC let Jaquetta Hawkes imagine the archaeology of apocalyptic Britain. As a short film 👀10/10 Will weird your day youtu.be/c8yEIe69M4k?...

This #SpooktasticReads I'm rereading The Time Of The Dark by Barbara Hambly and I've got 10 good reasons you should too

FUCK YEAH! cstonline.net/defending-th...

This is how you blurb

Goodness me, some cracking archive telly recovery news.

It's Episode 17 of The Doctor Who Missing Episodes Podcast - THE HIGHLANDERS With the brilliant Gav Rymill and Rhys Williams. New info and our best to date! All shares much appreciated. Links below 👇

Kin ‘ell. #Traitors