Paul McAuley

flicker with mottled feathers and slight red to head.

a young flicker, just contemplating the world from a picnic bench on the oregon coast. no cares in the world.

Rocks! On Maaaaaaaaaars!

Here are some rocks on Mars, photographed Sunday.

I do love a ghost gable like this found near Ancoats in Manchester - but it's rarer still to find the intangible signs of the puff of smoke from the chimney...

Beautiful

Image of Picocon 43 schedule: 9:30 Arrival 10:00 Guest speaker: Drew Wagar 11:00 Guest speaker: Paul McAuley 12:00 Lunch and Baguette Bash 13:00 Destruction of Dodgy Merchandise 14:00 Author Q&A panel 15:00 Trivia and Your Wildest Takes 16:30 Goodbyes

I'm one of the guests at Picocon, a one-day event Saturday March 7th at the Imperial College's Royal School of Mines, Prince Consort Street, London.

Close-up of a hawthorn flower and unfolding leaves.

Hampstead Heath, 08:01

The Twin Peaks title generator saying "ONE DAY THE SDANESS WILL END"

Part of me wants both Iceland & Norway to join the European Union simply because:

-It would hopefully give Putin a massive fatal stroke
-A map of the EU showing the UK sitting as Billy no mates on its own surrounded entirely by EU member states would illustrate perfectly Brexit's backward stupidity

Obscure YT of the day: Everyone's favorite actor Warren Oates stars in 1972's neo-noir CHANDLER as a private eye! Leslie Caron & Scatman Crothers costar.

youtu.be/iojYYuPTsK8?...

Signed copies of Paul McAuley’s novel Loss Protocol

Signed some copies of Loss Protocol in Forbidden Planet’s London megastore. Currently £4 off list price.

My photo shows the front of a warm-yellow coloured Minoan clay flask, hand painted in black with a frontally depicted octopus. The flask measures 27 cm (about 10.5 inches) in height. It has a short spout at the top with a small loop handle at either side. The octopus is swimming diagonally with its eight writhing, sucker-lined arms covering the whole surface of the flask. It stares out at the viewer with wide, almost cartoon-like eyes. Additional motifs include sea urchins, tritons, small rocks and seaweed. Minoan decoration depicting sea motifs is known by scholars as the ‘Marine Style’. The flask was excavated in 1903 at a Bronze Age settlement site at Palaikastro. The Palaikastro excavations, carried out between 1902 and 1906, were run by R. Bosanquet and R.M. Dawkins from the British School of Athens. The flask is part of the collections at Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Heraklion, Crete.

Marvellous 3,500 year-old Minoan clay flask decorated with a wide-eyed octopus 🐙❤️

Excavated in 1903 from a Bronze Age settlement site at Palaikastro, Crete.

Heraklion Archaeological Museum 📷 by me

#Archaeology

A very dangerous world, in which the FIFA Peace Prize no longer carries the weight of integrity it once did.

A very special treat on Saturday's Weird West Adams walk is the incredible Elmer McCurdy Museum, a celebration of the mummified old west outlaw who spent more time on display than he did breathing air--some of that time in the West Adams district! esotouric.com/event/weird-...

YouTube video by DRAGUNOFF Heebie Jeebies-Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five

cut in Chicago 100 years ago on this date: a wonderful, joyous, swinging record. Armstrong was far from being the first to scat, but he did it masterfully here. Nothing would be the same afterward for Armstrong, for jazz, for US pop music: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksmG...

Bug beats: Caterpillars use complex rhythms to communicate with ants Research from the University of Warwick has revealed that butterfly caterpillars use sophisticated rhythmic signals to communicate with ants, helping them gain protection, foo...

Caterpillars subvert ant music.

The spring 2026 issue of Tank magazine includes "The Walden Dead", a long, reflective essay by me about reading Henry David Thoreau while playing the zombie apocalypse sim "Project Zomboid": www.tank.tv/magazine/iss...

A yew tree on a steep slope of winter grass, silhouetted against a blue sky.

Finally stopped raining in Rain Island, so I went for a walk.

Thanks. East London is preferred usage. But yes, Anglican should be Anglian. Slipped past me, editor, copy editor & proofreader— but not you! Will pass on to publisher.

Currently reading @hutchinsondave.bsky.social’s slyly weird and most excellent The Essence.

Signed copies of Paul McAuley’s novel Loss Protocol

Signed some copies of Loss Protocol in Forbidden Planet’s London megastore. Currently £4 off list price.

Pleased to hear that you’re enjoying it. If you let me know what those typos are they can be corrected for the paperback.

Thousands of short story recs here at @jonathangibbs.bsky.social brilliant Personal Anthology project. Weekly update in which a writer chooses 12 fave shorts and discusses. Loads of links to read some of these too. Goldmine, been going for years 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

apersonalanthology.com

this is an absolutely astonishing feat of independent journalism, top to bottom, and proves that the only way to truly fight billionaires is not being funded by them. just…read the whole thing.

All serious historical novels are works of speculative fiction, even ones set in the ‘60s and ‘70s. These three are absolutely brilliant.

Skull season And some book news (No. 191)

Winter's end in the weird woods aided by a canine homunculus, urban heron rookeries behind the old warehouses, dystopian auspices in the airport flyover, and news about a new book, in this week's Field Notes: fieldnotes.christopherbrown.com/p/skull-season

The writer's bookshelf: Howard Mittelmark Eight questions about writers, books, and reading…

New on the Writer's Bookshelf this morning: eight questions about writers, books, and reading with the wonderful @howardm.bsky.social.

Rising atmospheric CO2 reduces nitrogen availability in boreal forests - Nature Nitrogen isotope tree-ring chronologies show that rising atmospheric CO2 has reduced nitrogen availability in boreal forests in Sweden, suggesting that elevated atmospheric CO2 is causing oligotrophic...

Boreal forests are significant carbon sinks. Reductions in soil nitrogen availability driven by rising CO2 levels may reduced their effectiveness.

A mossy stump with a few dead leaves on it and a twig and a Beech mast at the front. Above and behind the Beech mast is a tiny Snow Flea sitting facing right on the pale green moss.

Close-up of the Snow Flea facing right on pale green moss. This one is a male with its short modified wings curving up and backwards. Its body is shiny dark brown with pale yellowish legs. The head has a pair of large eyes and a beak-like extension pointing downwards. The antennae are quite long and thread-like.

A male Snow Flea on a twig facing left, just disappearing into a sprig of green moss.

A female Snow Flea sitting upright on pale green moss. Her back is dark shiny brown while the underside of her abdomen is pale yellow. The end of her abdomen is extended into a pointed ovipositor. The long legs are pale yellowy. Her head has a beak-like extension pointing downwards.

Snow Fleas (Boreus hyemalis) active in the sunshine at Felbrigg yesterday. Great to share these lovely little insects with members of Norfolk Fungus Study Group on their foray.

Loss Protocol ebook by Paul McAuley - Rakuten Kobo Read "Loss Protocol" by Paul McAuley available from Rakuten Kobo. Eight years after the catastrophic downfall of the cult his sister Izzy had joined, Marc Winters has at last found a ref...

Ebook of Loss Protocol currently at £12.99 on Kobo (and Kindle, if that's yr jam)... #JustSaying