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babybel implies the existence of scarybel, sportybel, gingerbel and poshbel

I’m walking to my physio appointment and I think I just saw a man in a velvet coat carrying a bag of live pigeons

"Hard times are coming, when we'll be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now, can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine real grounds for hope...realists of a larger reality." Ursula K. Le Guin

Doing some reading for my PhD and who do I see quoted but @davidmbarnett.bsky.social! (Genre Worlds by Wilkins, Driscoll and Fletcher, 2022)

"Why joining the local library is the best thing you can do in 2026" H/T: @j2bryson.bsky.social

I have had a LOT of new followers over the past weeks…are you real, or are you bots? If you are real, say hi! What book are you reading? I’m reading Chasing the Dark, by Ben Machell.

HEY! Did you know you can buy someone a gift subscription at Bert's? It's the PERFECT present - just choose from 3 months, 6 months or 12 months and we'll send the first books out next week! bertsbooks.co.uk/product/gift...

Oh dear, what a shock, she says, not at all shocked www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/12...

Trans rights are human rights, in the most profound and fundamental way.

Yesterday I sat in front of my Christmas tree and read a book for my PhD. And it was so nice that today I’m going to do exactly the same thing.

Meg.

Rob Reiner directed my favourite film of all time. Sleep well and thank you, Mr Reiner. As you wish.

Mass shooting at my Alma mater, Brown University, yesterday. My heart breaks for the victims and their families. I can’t imagine the agony. The only lesson from these senseless deaths, again and again and again, is that the US government cares more about guns than innocent people.

'Every good novelist is a reader first' 📚 Award-winning author @juliecohen.bsky.social shares her thoughts on genre classifications like 'commercial fiction' and 'women's fiction' as well as her top tips for budding romance and commercial fiction authors. Read the full interview:

Such a loss. Maddy/Sophie was a champion of her genre, generous to fellow writers and all around a good egg. apple.news/A8YcuwrK1QjG...

In my next book, my serial killer Saffy poisons everyone who does not give her enough chips

Today, my parents are moving out of the house where they’ve lived for 54 years (it is across the street from the house where my dad grew up). There are a lot of stories. Here is one:

Statement from @transactualuk.bsky.social about the GG and WI exclusions.

Join bestselling romance novelist @juliecohen.bsky.social for our Writing Romantic & Commercial Fiction course! 💕 Write a heart-warming novel with emotional depth, characters to fall in love with and a plot to make readers desperate to turn the page. Enrol now:

I’ve been helping my parents move from a 5-bed Victorian detached house to a 2-bed new-build condo. They’ve lived in this place for 54 years, so they’ve built up a lot of stuff. For example this is a mere fraction of my mother’s collection of empty used jars. 🧵

I have been in the US for three weeks and last night I made tater tots hot dish. Have I changed

Sometimes I think it’s going to be the librarians who will save us all.

Sort of interesting that my spellcheck doesn’t flag up the word ‘shitbaggery’

Can they have a future when only one of them remembers the past? My evocative, emotional novel PARADISE is published today by Orion books! It’s about memory, found family, friendship, love and sexuality, set on a lake in Maine. Get it here: uk.bookshop.org/p/books/para...

Well thank fuck for that

This ladybird has been hanging out with me every day as I write the last chapters of my book. Her name is ‘Psycho Killer Qu’est-ce Que C’est’

I saw a meme recently that said everyone who owns two cats has one cat who is a brainless doofus and one cat who is an evil genius. I present to you: my parents’ two cats.

I saw this Good Dog on Sunday. Her name is Rosie

A reminder that this anti-trans panic is 100% bullshit and exactly none of our country’s problems are related to someone expressing their gender identity and everyone who isn’t a hate-filled weirdo knows it.

I’m on 5

I have a story in this week’s My Weekly magazine. It is a prequel to my novel EAT SLAY LOVE and it details the exploits of Godzilla the hamster. The illustration is epic, 10 out of 10, could not ask for better.

This morning I was walking the dog when I saw a man just off the towpath with his hands down his trousers. Last spring, a man exposed himself to me on the same path. So I stopped dead. My instinct after last time was to snap a photo and call the police. Instead I called ‘What are you doing?’

The world’s first trillionaire initiated a move that has left more than half a million people dead, most of whom are children.

My plotting dilemmas at the moment are all like, yes this person is a psychopath killer but would doing this or this or that make them TOO MUCH of a psychopath killer??? @benwillisuk.bsky.social

The only way Meg can get through the fireworks is to have her own personal speaker playing white noise and/or opera music on a loop

If you would like a novel full of love, loss, bisexual longing and gorgeous settings (oh and amnesia) my new paperback PARADISE is available to pre-order: uk.bookshop.org/p/books/para...

Bloody foreigners coming over here and saving peoples lives.

This is a horrible measure that would discriminate against the elderly, the disabled, overseas voters (eg the military), and anyone who finds it difficult to get to the polls (eg prople who don’t drive, people with more than one job, or people with children with special needs) #Maine

Oh @bertsbooks.bsky.social never change

So far, I have probably harvested 2.5 kilos (5 lbs) of olives off my olive tree this year. Today, I was out in my garden on a ladder, with a sheet under the tree, pulling down olives with a rake. This is in England!!! Insane. They’re in brine and will be ready to eat in a few months. 🫒

Our best trick or treater last night was a kid in a rumpled suit using a cane and wearing a Hugh Laurie mask. I said ‘Hey doctor my stomach hurts’ and they said ‘It’s lupus’

Currently reading 👻

15 million Americans are going to lose their health care.

Amazon is helping fund a $300 million build of a ballroom for the White House. Independent bookstores are donating to food banks and organizations that help with food insecurity. They are not the same.

Every now and then it’s fun to search the internet for someone I used to have a crush on or go out with and then go HOLY CRAP REALLY???

My trampoline exercise class had a Halloween special tonight. So I dressed like a bunny.

I've no idea if AI can help, but my list of writers who admit they didn't believe in writer's block till it happened to them includes @juliecohen.bsky.social @sarahhilary.bsky.social @freyanorthauthor.bsky.social @jennashworth.bsky.social. More help here: emmadarwin.substack.com/p/twelve-ide...

This wood pigeon has been hanging out in my garden quite frequently, and I learned yesterday that it had been raised from a chick by one of my neighbours.

Someone has left a framed poster commemorating their anniversary outside their house on the curb. There is a story there…