Dubai, UAE travel advice: is it safe to visit right now?
Britons have been advised to stay indoors due to risk of missile attacks in the wake of US/Israel attack on Iran ⬇️
Dubai, UAE travel advice: is it safe to visit right now?
Britons have been advised to stay indoors due to risk of missile attacks in the wake of US/Israel attack on Iran ⬇️
Check out www.inkwellwriters.ie and www.writing.ie - a huge part of what I've been doing for the last 20 years is helping new authors to get published
05.02.2026 12:50 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0Book 1: I thought I'd written a brilliant bestseller so sent it to every agent everywhere and was rejected everywhere, I kept writing, book 3 got interest from a editor (long story) met my agent through networking ultimately but was on book 5 and had learned the craft by then.
05.02.2026 12:48 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
SoA Chair Vanessa Fox O’Loughlin, writing as @samblakebooks.bsky.social experienced first hand the damage that AI Generated content can do.
An Al-generated dark romantasy trilogy was published on Amazon under her name without consent.
Brave New World? Justice for creators in the age of GenAI | #JusticeForCreators samblakebooks.com/brave-new-wo...
via @samblakebooks.bsky.social
Have you read the groundbreaking report launched by the SoA and partners about the impact of Gen AI - Brave New World? Justice for creators in the age of GenAI? If you're a creator, you need to - and join your union to add your voice...
03.02.2026 14:01 — 👍 5 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 0I had a feeling he might be!! Can he fit us in when he's got a gap? We should have called last year!! Ongoing problem, even if it's November, would be fab!
28.01.2026 22:59 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
The Legislation Upon winning a general election, a Reform government under Prime Minister Nigel Farage will: 1) Leave the ECHR 2.) Repeal the Human Rights Act and replace it with a British Bill of Rights. 3.) Pass The Illegal Migration (Mass Deportation) Bill: This Bill will: Create a legal duty to remove illegal migrants for the Home Secretary The Bill opens with a blunt obligation for the Home Secretary: "The Secretary of State shall ensure the removal from the United Kingdom of each person who does not have extant leave to remain and is not an Irish citizen or otherwise protected by regulations made under this Act." The following parts of the legislation are introduced on an emergency basis, with an in-built sunset clause after 5 years: Disapply the 1951 Refugee Convention, the UN Convention Against Torture, the Council of Europe Anti-Trafficking Convention (ECAT) Derogation is justified under the Vienna Convention doctrine of state of necessity: Britain faces a national emergency in which uncontrolled illegal migration undermines public order. These treaties will otherwise be used by activist judges to frustrate deportations, even after the repeals of the HRA and ECHR. Create Detention Power Without Hardial Singh Constraints This means illegal migrants can be detained until they are deported. Activist lawyers routinely use Hardial Singh to secure their client's bail, after which the client absconds. If you came to the UK illegally, you are ineligible for asylum. End of story All asylum claims will become inadmissible if made by a person within the Act's scope. If you came to the country illegally, you are ineligible for asylum in the UK. This strips the Home Office, the immigration tribunals and the higher courts of jurisdiction to even consider claims. A claim that cannot be considered cannot suspend removal and therefore, cannot delay a flight. Re-entering after deportation and destroying ID becomes a serious criminal offence Re-entry after deportation will be…
The Operational Plan We will create an enforcement unit called UK Deportation Command, including an Illegal Migrant Identification Centre - harnessing cutting edge data fusion A Reform government will create a cutting edge enforcement data centre to relentlessly identify and detain all illegal migrants in the UK. Using powers granted by the new legislation, it will automatically share data between the Home Office, NHS, HMRC, DVLA, banks and the police. It will power bulk warrants, including mandatory biometric capture during any police encounter. Each power addresses a failure mode observed over the past decade - for example, banks and GP surgeries unaware of a customer's status, or overstayers slipping through because a warrant covered only a single property. Secure Immigration Removal Centres (SIRC) will be built rapidly to detain up to 24,000 Detention capacity for up to 24,000 will be created within 18 months. The Home Office will build Secure Immigration Removal Centres. This will be modular accommodation built in remote parts of the country. Conditions are basic but not punitive: prefabricated two-person rooms, canteen catering, on-site medical suites. Robust perimeters and internal movement controls prevent escapes. This enables detention-on-arrest: no more bail. This capacity would allow for up to 24,000 illegal migrants to be deported per month. Initial Voluntary Return Window A six-month Assisted Voluntary Return window precedes large-scale raids. Illegal migrants will be offered a financial incentive to self-deport. An app will be launched to facilitate this. The Deportation Flights The Home Office will scale up charters to 5 flights per day. To guard against last-minute aircraft unserviceability, the RAF will keep one Voyager aircraft on six-hour 'hot-spare' readiness. If a commercial charter breaks down, detainees can still be flown out that night, preserving operational integrity. The legal reset will mean activist lawyers will no longer be able preven…
The UK version of “Project 2025” by the Reform party includes a British ICE, a concentration camp for 24,000 people, mass surveillance and withdrawing from refugee, anti-torture and anti-trafficking conventions.
It’s on their website. That’s how comfortable fascists are in the UK today.
Desperately need to talk to Ed about slates - not the ornamental kind, the kind that are letting in water! 💦
27.01.2026 09:28 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Photo of a man navigating a gondoler on to a pontoon on the grand canal Venice. The sun is shining and there are historic buildings in the background. Photo taken from the restaurant of the Hotel Monaco and Grand Canal. There are tables and chairs in the foreground on the pontoon
Good morning from Venice!
It looks exactly like all the photos and paintings you've ever seen. I'm not sure why I'm surprised.
One of the reasons why Elon Musk and other folks on the right want to shut down Wikipedia (or "compete" with it). It's a good platform for regular folks to accumulate data, even keep track of all of this administration's atrocities in real time. Great work
25.01.2026 03:20 — 👍 2074 🔁 695 💬 16 📌 8This 👇👇👇
25.01.2026 12:40 — 👍 6 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
A DM on insta from a reader, sent Monday at 23.18 : Hi Sam, I just finished your book Your Every Move. Wow I was hooked from the start. The suspense was brilliantly done and kept me guessing right to the end. I couldn't out it down! Huge congratulations on such a fantastic book.
How fab is this? Sent on Monday night 11.20pm, I hope it didn't keep u up too far past yr bedtime!
Messages & reviews from readers are just so lovely ❤️
YOUR EVERY MOVE is a stalker thriller set in London & Cornwall, in the world of prime property, it's 99p on Kindle & was an instant No 1 😘
You really need @daveruddenwrites.bsky.social, such a brilliant guest, entertaining and so so brilliant (proper genius, understands writing and the genre like nobody else I know!)
25.01.2026 12:33 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Thanks so much for having me on Sean!
Was worried about your time so didn't get into the issue about Irish libraries not paying PLR on audio and ebooks, that's a whole segment of its own - you'll be hearing more about it soon I hope.
Huge congratulations to @samblakebooks.bsky.social
👏👏
Vanessa Fox O’Loughlin, also known under the pen name Sam Blake, has been re-elected for a second term as chair of @societyofauthors.bsky.social
Read:
www.thebookseller.com/news/vanessa...
via @thebookseller.com
News! Tis me with my other hat. Delighted to have the support of the board to continue for the next two years. Lots to do.
21.01.2026 04:34 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0@julietemckenna.bsky.social one for ypu/your community
21.01.2026 04:17 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0Thank you!!
20.01.2026 12:42 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Thank you!! ❤️
📚💙
Table set with a silver teapot, milk jug and a cylindrical China cup with grey and white vertical stripes on a matching saucer . There's a piece of shortbread on the saucer and a silver strainer over the cup. In the foreground is the bound draft of Sam Blake's 2027 book and in the background you can see the terracotta walls of The Coral Room at the Bloomsbury Hotel.
Brunch y/day in The Bloomsbury Hotel, one of my fav places, with Dr Mary Black, one of my fav people, such a powerhouse of experience & good sense & who has an INCREDIBLE memoir coming nxt yr!
Check out Splav: Adventures with my family on the River Sava preorder @kennysbookshop.bsky.social
A photo of Sam Blake's red samsonite cabin case in the airport with a cup of coffee on the top and a tube of Clarins beside it. The coffee cup has a 'signed by the author' sticker on it. Sam's luggage tag is the cover of her book Keep Your Eyes on Me in the hope that she doesn't lose the suitcase.
Image of Aer Lingus departure board for the 8.45 Heathrow flight, a pic of Westminster and two red buses behind the flight info - I love how they use a picture of the destination on their flight info boards!
The fab Mairéad Hearne looked at me aghast when I said I didn't know abt the transformative effects of Clarins Beaute Éclair - so what was the first thing I grabbed in the airport? BEFORE THE COFFEE!!
All copies Your Every Move now signed in Term 1 WHSmith 😊✈️
2nd week at No 1 - THANK YOU 🎉🥂🙏❤️
Your Every Move came out on 1st Jan and was an instant Irish Times No 1 bestseller! Here's a roundup of the coverage, reviews and fabulous windows...
12.01.2026 14:39 — 👍 4 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Irish Times bestseller list showing Sam Blake's Your Every Move at No 1 above Dan Brown, Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Reese Witherspoon & Harlan Coben, John Banville, John Grisham and David Baldacci, woo hoo!!
Sam Blake with her hands in the air as she describes something exciting at the launch of Your Every Move. She's wearing a black dress and heavy gold necklace and has red shoulder length slightly curly hair & glasses. She's standing behind a brown wooden podium speaking into a microphone.
Thrilled that Your Every Move is an instant No 1 bestseller, & what a week!! A stalker thriller set in the world of luxury property, it has something for everyone!
And it's still 99p/ €1.14 on Kindle/ Thriller of the Month at Apple Books so you don't even have to leave the house to grab a copy! 📚💙
Fantastic launch for Your Every Move in Dun Laoghaire this evening, thank you so much to everyone who came! This is shortly after Edel Coffey realised we used her quote for the cover 🤣❤️🥂
09.01.2026 00:34 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Congratulation @samblakebooks.bsky.social 👏
The twisty, gripping #YourEveryMove is now a No. 1 Bestseller and it can be yours for ONLY 99p so don't miss out (& of course tell your friends!!)
Pick up a copy today:
amzn.eu/d/0sx4phP
Inspired by:
www.writing.ie/interviews/c...
Mairéad Hearne in a grey jumper beside Sam Blake who is wearing glasses and a black top
A stage with a 5 person panel sitting on armchairs Kate Ryan Julia Skinner Sam Blake Nadine Campbell Hughes Stephen Ryan
Network Cork's first event of 2026 kicked off last night with a focus on Getting Published.
A really insightful evening with plenty of wit, warmth, and sincerity in abundance.
@networkirelandcork.bsky.social
It was such a pleasure to attend with @samblakebooks.bsky.social (see alt for full panel)
I could pretend I avoid em dashes these days because I don't want to be mistaken for chat gpt but the truth is I just can't remember the keyboard shortcut.
07.01.2026 12:50 — 👍 33 🔁 2 💬 4 📌 1
I'm selling this work by the Northern School painter Reg Gardner. Dated 1974, his early impasto technique really gives the picture a rich form of texture. It measures 16 inches by 12 inches. £875. Please drop me a line if you're interested richard@richardmorris.org
07.01.2026 12:55 — 👍 49 🔁 9 💬 0 📌 0Thank you so much!!! Do hope you enjoy it!
07.01.2026 12:59 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0