Simon Guerrier

The cover for Uncanny Magazine Issue 69, "Kuolonuni" by Broci: A femme-looking figure with blue-green wavy hair and red eyes stands with one hand atop the other, open palmed up, a blue-pedaled flower with yellow stamens floats above centered to their chest. On their head is a pale blue snake with red eyes curled like a circlet. Their sleeves are pink, and their shoulders have wavy, yellow feathers or hair attached to a yellow and pink high collar. Behind them, green lily pads crowd each other out in a black background. The whole image has a hand-drawn look, with the colors textured like watercolors on paper. In white text is the "Uncanny" banner, "March/April 2026," Issue Sixty-Nine," and the artist, writer, essayist, poets, and Uncanny staff credits.

Uncanny Magazine Issue 69 Part 1 features all-new short fiction by Angela Liu, Anjali Sachdeva, and Stephen Graham Jones! buff.ly/VcNzPe8

I’ve just sat in the garden for my lunch break and finished reading a daft book

I will never not adore "and allies" in a fieldguide title. Don't mess with the grasshoppers or the earwigs and crickets and cockroaches will fuck you up

Promise I'll get some pink stuff before publication day.

I once sat next to him at a dinner at an academic conference, where he overheard that I was interested in sci-fi and asked, very gravely, whether I though Cold Lazarus was a bit Blake’s 7.

Very sad to hear from his wife that Kenith Trodd passed away on Sunday. A brilliant, fearless maker of tv and film, including a long and lively partnership with Dennis Potter. It was an honour to know him and interview him about his illustrious career. www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/14...

Interview: Mock elections for people with learning disabilities in Bexley With local elections imminent, there’s lots of talk about what councils can and should be doing to engage residents in the process — especially those residents who, for one reason or another, don’t us...

Thing from my day job: I spoke to the team at Bexley Council who have organised mock elections for adult with learning disabilities: socialcare.today/2026/02/26/i...

We’re not told specifically in the text of the book

amazing cover for a fascinating moment in time. the advent of containerisation famously ended the London Docklands as actual docks (because container ships are incredibly big and wouldn't be able to travel up the Thames)

The Widow of Bath, by Margot Bennett

Loved it, the last third particularly. In case of interest: 0tralala.blogspot.com/2024/12/the-...

“Bombastic side eye” says my resident expert (9), approvingly.

More of this, please and thank you

YouTube video by Play For Forever Play for Today - Love Letters on Blue Paper (1976) by Arnold Wesker & Waris Hussein FULL FILM

Richard Pasco, Elizabeth Spriggs and Patrick Troughton in Play for Today - Love Letters on Blue Paper by Arnold Wesker, directed by Waris Hussein (2nd March 1976)

youtu.be/_mfywL3znkY?...

Married Life for Mary. 1. The (normally) unseen work of housekeeping Mary Severn Newton had two jobs in her married life – artist and mistress of a household – and struggled to do both. She has my sympathy!

Mary Severn Newton had two jobs in her married life – artist and mistress of a household – and struggled to do both in the 1860s. She has my sympathy!

What she depicts so well is that struggle, often humorously, in her sketches. New blog: www.debbiechallis.com/post/married...

Thank you. I have a bunch of ‘em in transit to me atm.

Yeah, and assumption would have been that TV show would end up here at some point. But this and later books mean you could read up on eps months before seeing them.

All v helpful as I try and marry up some dates and possible influences.

Blish’s intro to Spock Must Die! is useful, confirming that the first Star Trek anthology was published in the UK in July 1969 to coincide with the first broadcast of eps (or republished, cos there’d been a 1967 edition) and suggesting success on UK TV might get cancelled show back in production.

Really interesting!

The first anthology was published 1967 (published in the UK on 21 April according to the Bookseller). He seems to have worked, at least in some cases, from draft scripts. So yes, I think he delivered MS and saw little of the editorial that followed. (Terrance claimed same of early Targets!)

Great, thank you! Really interesting. I can see similar stuff happening in early Doctor Who annuals and novelisations.

Ta!

That’s interesting. Do you happen to know where Blish said so? This all new territory to me!

US edition from 1970 (second pressing)

Artwork, showing a snake facing off against a rabbit, by Emma Howitt for the cover of science-fiction magazine Interzone issue 304 (March 2026)

The new issue of science-fiction magazine Interzone is out now and features my short story “NKATA”: interzone.press

Superted, Spottyman and Blotch walking on a pavement in Cardiff. There is a distinctive wall to the left with a turret motif and a road to the right.

Google Maps screenshot of Cardiff. The wall of Cardiff castle is on the left , then there is a road and the Angel Hotel on the right. It matches the previous image.

Superted, Spottyman and Blotch on a pavement, seen from the side. There is a wall with a stone animal in front of them and a castle behind them. Superted's rocket is parked in the castle grounds.

The same image taken from Google Maps in November 2022 but without the rocket.

Kicked off St David's Day watching Superted's 1980s road safety videos and matching them to their actual locations in Cardiff.

But yes, lack of paperwork suggests some informal conversation. And, as you say, early because he (apparently) didn’t pitch story-with-monsters as he surely would have after seeing Daleks

V good - Potter at the press launch particularly inspired. One thought: at BBC Programme Planning Committee on 21.11.62, Stuart Hood (C.P.Tel) asked if work could be found for Dennis Potter. Donald Wilson would have been in that meeting, so would have met / known Potter by press launch a year later?

Lurid orange cover for the paperback Star Trek novel Spock Must Die! by James Blish, with mirror image photo depicting two versions of Spock

Good morning Womble. I am reading the first original Star Trek novel (for adults), the engagingly nuts Spock Must Die! by James Blish.

When Dennis Potter wanted to write for Doctor Who “Blossomiest blossom”, says Jodie Whittaker’s thirteenth Doctor moments before she regenerates in The Power of the Doctor. This snatch of dialogue references a famous remark by Dennis Potter from his ...

New on my blog today, an article about the time Dennis Potter tried to get into writing for Doctor Who in the 1960s, what his story would have been about, and the other times he crossed paths with the series. Hopefully this will interest a few of you.
thehiddenplanet.substack.com/p/when-denni...