2026 will see: The publication of my odd memoir ‘Capture Spiral’ My appearance as one of the Locals in the Limelight at the 2026 Granite Noir festival Another audio version of one of my stories on the Nocturnal Transmissions podcast Maybe a release of The Dark Narratives short story collection

#HorrorWritersChat Merry Chr*stmas, one and all. Here’s a heart-warming tale that I wrote for this time of year. It’s called ‘Christmassy’. Reader advisory: a) it’s gruesome and sick b) it’s British-centric, so apologies if you don’t get many of the references. www.patreon.com/posts/christ...

#HorrorWritersChat Baubles, donkeys and hatred.

#HorrorWritersChat That’d be my pro/antigonist in my story Nuggets. He’s filthy, so my gift to him would be a bath. He’d be appalled, the dirty old man.

Woefully late again. #HorrorWritersChat Jez, British, ‘kitchen sink horror’. I honestly can’t think of a short story written by somebody else that I’d recommend. Just one of my own, which I’ll mention later…

In the spirit of Chr*stmas, may I even wish good tidings of comfort and joy to that fat orange cunt in the White House. Happy Chr*stmas, fuckhead. May it be your last.

Oooh God, this is *so* good. youtu.be/rADCj485tqg?...

Here’s a suggestion for a new parlour game this Christmas: what’s the very best thing you can say about a Reform UK supporter? Go on, have a go.

Christ, where does he find these molluscs?

Here’s a playlist featuring tracks mentioned in or relevant to my new book Capture Spiral. open.spotify.com/playlist/65g...

My absolute favourite bit of the Epstein files release. Proof that on Little St. James they have black cats in cellars.

@melodyeverafter.bsky.social bsky.app/profile/tale...

#HorrorWritersChat I’ll be reading my poem The Witch’s Hat at a spoken word event called Into The Dark, at the Lemon Tree in Aberdeen on 19 February, as part of next year’s Granite Noir crime literature festival. Come see me!

#HorrorWritersChat My sins take shape. My sins gain sight. They turn towards me. But that’s okay. I’m good at chroming. I know how much to inhale. Too much and I’m dead. Just as well. She fucked me off today. So now I’m going to inhale too much. Let her find me dead. See how she likes that.

#HorrorWritersChat They’re not going to earn it.

#HorrorWritersChat I refer you to my answer to question one. I don’t depict regret.

Running very late tonight… #HorrorWritersChat Jez - short horror fiction / horror film nonfiction My stories are far too mean-spirited to have redemption arcs. I’d even say it’s important for me to consciously *avoid* writing them. Je ne regret rien.

#WriterShareWednesday My new book Capture Spiral is available for preorder: temporalboundary.bigcartel.com/product/capt...

If Nandy and the Beeb are looking for ideas on funding, I can say that the only way I’d pay for more than the licence fee would be if they made vast swathes of their archive available as a massive subscription annex to iPlayer. That history is precisely what streamers lack. It’s the BBC’s USP. 1/2

I’m not sending out Christmas cards this year. Because I never do. Because I hate Christmas. I’m a childless atheist, I’d be a hypocrite if I was ‘into’ Christmas. So, please stop wasting money on each other. If you really want to spend your money, agree among yourselves then give some to charity.

Show me how your 2025 went:

A reminder that my new book ‘Capture Spiral’ can be preordered. Print copies are expected to start shipping later in January. Podcasters of BlueSky: I’d be very happy to talk about it! Drop me a DM… #HorrorSky temporalboundary.bigcartel.com/product/capt...

Christmas has become the most horrific orgy of waste. I haven’t ’celebrated’ it in years. I probably never will again. I’m already looking forward to January. I shudder to think of the levels of domestic abuse that takes place over the holiday season.

Name an actor who you think has an iconic voice.

I always love the annual awarding of the Turner Prize. I particularly enjoying warming my feet on the hate. It’s pretty hot this year, that’s for sure.

Each chapter in Capture Spiral comes with its own vignette. Here’s a glimpse of them.

I have a character in my current WIP say: “Who needs libraries these days anyway? We have Google for that now”. I’m happy to provide you with a spoiler and reveal that by the end of the story this character will be skinned alive.

It fascinates me how he’s obsessed with emptying out ‘mental institutions’, considering he belongs in one.

Thank you @erynmccee.bsky.social and #HorrorWritersChat for another fun session. Matt would be proud… As it was my birthday on Saturday (42), I’m going to shamelessly ask for my works to be shared. Read, review, ravish them with praise to others! www.amazon.co.uk/stores/Oli-J...

#HorrorWritersChat Thanks Eryn! 2 links today: 1) I’ll be one of the Locals in the Limelight at next year’s Granite Noir Festival in Aberdeen, reading my poem The Witch’s Hat at this event: www.aberdeenperformingarts.com/whats-on/gra... 2) My end of year playlist: open.spotify.com/playlist/2Si...

#HorrorWritersChat The sun dies. So the song then becomes the repeating threnody to the end of reality. It’s quite the ear worm. He gets to love it. Then he ceases to exist. At the very end, after everything else has gone, it’s still playing.

#HorrorWritersChat Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings destroyed me the first time I heard it (at the end of The Elephant Man in 1980) and continues to reduce me to a blubbering heap of emotional rubble to this day.

#HorrorWritersChat Characters’ ability to hear (or not hear so well) has featured in my stories. Their non-responsiveness to a story’s narrator speaking to them has been a clue of sorts more than once…

#HorrorWritersChat Jez, 60, kitchen sink horror. I listen to a fairly specific type of female vocals/hard electronic music, frequently Scandinavian. Spotify Wrapped clocked listening age at 22 this week!

As they’ve now posted the Granite Noir 2026 programme, I can now say that I’ve been picked as one of the Locals in the Limelight! I’ll be at the Into the Dark event at the Lemon Tree, reading my poem ‘The Witch’s Hat’. www.aberdeenperformingarts.com/whats-on/gra...

Hey! It’s #HumanRightsDay ! Time to stop play, just for today, Andy and Teddy must now go away. Time to stop play, just for today Andy is waving goodbye …, goodbye …, goodbye

Hi USA! Waving from Europe, your new enemy. When you get a moment, could you possibly please unfuck your government so that we can be friends again? I have some really creative ideas for ways of dispatching your leaders. Involving an industrial meat grinder and some pigs. Call me.

Given the numerous, admitted and now-documented instances of Sandie Peggie’s workplace behaviour that came to light during the tribunal, NHS Fife would surely now have no alternative but to sack her for misconduct. That way, she’d then be free to be a star guest at the next Reform UK conference.

Allied to this, there’s something that took me a long time to grasp, but once I did, it explained a lot. There are many people who vote Trump/Reform/etc., not especially because they agree with the ‘policies’, but because they vote for the party/individual who they think is going to *win*. (1/2)

Nobody cares what I think, but FWIW I consider ‘voting for/supporting Reform UK’ to be a hate crime. I don’t care about the ‘reasons’. Don’t claim ignorance. If you support them, you’re overlooking an awful lot of bad stuff. You’d have to be thick to the point of brain-injured to be that unaware.

A little victory

If you’re Spotifyphobic, I totally get it, so here’s my Christmas Kitchen Disco playlist on YouTube instead. 24 tracks, one a day, or just play it all whenever you like. Or don’t play it at all. It’s a free country, nobody’s making you. Calm down. Jesus. youtube.com/playlist?lis...

Wednesday… www.instagram.com/p/DSAAEx4E16...

I’ve only been partly following the Sandie Peggie case, but it seems to me that the thing that matters most to those supporting her case/cause is that the outcome demonstrates that it’s not illegal to be unpleasant. Basically they want to have the right/freedom to be arseholes enshrined in law.

That’s okay, I already regard Trump’s USA as the enemy.

He’s settled eight wars apparently. Does anyone have a definitive list of these eight conflicts? I don’t think I’ve seen one.