Daedalus

<p style=”text-align: center;”>THE LIBRARIAN</p>
“Come here.”

Mayrie tensed at the grave, inscrutable timbre of his voice. Some would call it a salt-of-the-earth voice but she was under no illusion about the nature of the man seated before her. The slight narrowing of her eyes all but said, if it’s just the same to you Guv, I think I’d rather…[Read more]

Hmm, essay alert — me pontificating. I think Modernists such as James Joyce and Virginia Woolf had an excellent  grasp on the categories of psychic distance, although they probably didn’t call it that, going instead for stream of consciousness, free indirect style and omniscience. They announced themselves to be influenced by cinema and used it…[Read more]

I discussed that last point with the person who recommended the series to me, and we agreed that that’s actually one of its strengths. In real-life situations of war, revolution, unrest etc good people are just as likely, or even more likely, to get killed as bad people. The atrocities that occur at regular intervals are paralleled in real life…[Read more]

Thank you for this Richard, on the strength of which I’ve just recommended it to my daughter.

I’m not sure that I’d call The Ten Thousand Doors urban fantasy, exactly, as I understand it (yes, I did go and look it up). it has some of the tropes, like fantastical elements intruding into our world, but the setting is neither urban nor contemporary.

I take your point about some modern fantasy being more original (I’ve sampled George R R…[Read more]

There’s something awe-inspiring about coming into contact with truly large insects and similar bugs, and your blog reminded me of an incident on holiday in Spain, years ago. We’d rented a cottage and on the last day we were cleaning up and I’d put a bin-bag by the door. I reached down to retrieve what looked like a piece of vegetation poking out…[Read more]

I find it interesting how different people absorb PD in different ways.

I feel two aspects, at least, were being discussed on the Self-Edit course.

The actual physical distance of the description, which would correlate more to the wide or medium or close shot, seemed to be part of it. It certainly turned up in examples. It did not, however, seem…[Read more]

I feel hypocritical even writing a response, because I have drifted off so much and for so long, and managed to fail to submit an entry for three years of the challenge, but I would also be sad to see the Den go.

For me, it’s partly habit. If I don’t have a reason to log on, it is all too easy to just…stop doing it. And once a tab is shut, my…[Read more]

It only occurred to me after posting to do a bit of investigating, and it turns out this must have been a female golden-ringed dragonfly, which is the longest British dragonfly and is often found quite some way from water.

Dragonflies are increasing Dragonfly species are colonising the UK ‘at a greater rate than ever before’ | Natural History Museum (nhm.ac.uk)

I can’t remember if it was last summer or 2020 that we had dragonflies in the garden even though there are no ponds nearby.

The Big Butterfly Count starts today if you’re interested — and can cope with the heat!

‘…Every book back I read seemed to involve a magic sword or a ring and sorting the good from the bad became impossible…’ Yes, Kate, that was exactly my experience.

By contrast, to take a selection of the Ballantine books I read in my youth, The Well at the World’s End (William Morris), The Worm Ouroboros (E R Edison), The Night Land (William…[Read more]

Well, you’ve convinced me. I may have to add  have added the book to my ever-growing kindle list. Another great blog by the way.

“A bit harsh maybe” you say, of Ursula K. Le Guin’s remarks. My feelings about this are mixed. I can see her point, but I am not convinced. I would have thought that the way we approach the old stories is what matters.…[Read more]

I think our reading tastes have developed in a similar way, Richard. I read fantasy as a teen (though never a LOTR fan) but as I got older and every book back I read seemed to involve a magic sword or a ring and sorting the good from the bad became impossible, I moved away from the genre.

I do enjoy (and often write) our reality with a…[Read more]

Do write another blog, Richard!

Yes, the Cloud had the benefit of the Writers’ Workshop behind it. Not only did people find it from WW Courses, but from other services. I found the Cloud when I bought an editorial review. Then, it had things like the ‘Getting Published’ day in London and the ‘Festival of Writing’ in York.

Goes some way to…[Read more]

I’m in the same position as I was in last year: the Den is normally the only place I interact with anybody on-line, so I would be very sad to see it go. I’m a bit more up-beat about it, though, because since the ‘members’ side-bar on the home page has been changed from ‘most recent’ to ‘most active’ (good idea) it shows that quite a few people do…[Read more]