It’s February 2026. I’m a writer goddamit! I also dabble with publishing and film production.
I’m on a train as I write this note to you, blasting home to Glasgow. I’m having one of those “what I am doing with this gift that is life?” conversations with myself, so what better time to update the Now page?
Projects
Yesterday saw the first full, non-WIP screening of our documentary film. It went extremely well and you find me a little bit buzzy.
My second novel, Tether has gushed out. It is disgusting bliss. And is yellow. Get it, players!
I’ve written a few pieces for New Escapologist Issue 19 and commissioned others still. Issue 18 remains good and fresh though, so please pick up a copy online or at one of these excellent places.
I’m yet not sure what my next big project should be. I’m thinking of doing some New Escapologist collections of early issues. These should be better than “best ofs” and I see the archive editions of Worn journal as something to aspire to.
That said, I don’t want to spend a year managing the long tail of legacy projects. I’d like to crack on with the third novel. I also have an idea for a thing dependent on snagging interviews with two quite high-profile guys, so there are practical challenges there.
Other stuff too. As you can probably tell, I’m reconstituting.
Reading
I’ve been reading Autonauts of the Cosmoroute, by the mid-century Argentine novellist Julio Cortázar. Its a 1982 account of Cortázar and his wife Carol Dunlop travelling between Marseille and Paris (usually a journey of a couple of hours) in a VW van, stopping for the night at every other rest station over the course of a month. It’s absolutely brilliant and their experiment was done years before psychogeography or love of motorway modernism really existed.
I’m having fun trying to smash my wishlist. I want to read or acquire the whole lot of it this year. A nourishing time.
I also have an ongoing project to read all of Stephen King. Good clean fun.
Travel
We’re on a train as we speak. Pay attention. We just passed through Wigan North Western station.
Culture Gobbling
I lik this picture (from this Guardian item) of puppeteer Ted Milton playing with his son in 1971:
Scarred For Life is a great podcast with good guests. They each bring three “scars” from their childhoods, usually (but not always) from things glimpsed via popular culture. Yvette Fielding’s episode is a fascinating insight into the production of paranormal telly while Dom Joly’s recent one is a remarkable account of his travel writing career. Nick Helm’s “scar” of Freddy Kreuger popping up everywhere in 1980s London, especially on posters in the Tube, is very relatable to me: it sounds like we both had childhoods spent flinching at strange and inappropriately-placed horror film images.
I’m watching Starfleet Academy because curiosity got the best of me. I generally dislike NuTrek, so that this show is watchable is miraculous. Akiva Goldman, notably, was nowhere near the creative process.
I’m filling my Charlie Kaufman and Spike Jonze gaps. Here’s a rare and pleasant documentary about Maurice Sendak made by Jonze that I carelessly and probably illegally lobbed onto YouTube:
When I mentioned the Sendak film to friend Lando, he sent me this collection of interviews between Sendak and NPR’s Terry Gross. Tis moving.
Sometimes, stand-up comedy is important to me: positive, rugged, pure, independent, ideas-driven, a cleanse. Other times, I’m disgusted and bored by it. It makes me feel glad at the moment, though the mudslide of mediocre acts about to take over my favourite Glasgow music venue for the March comedy festival threatens to push my buttons. One of my first stand-up loves was Harry Hill’s Man Alive video, which was very much a sacred text. Harry is back now, on YouTube for free, with The Harry Hill Show. It’s absolutely adorable. I am instantly a fan of “Name the Seed,” and I love that it’s filmed at Battersea Arts Centre where I have many several happy memories, not least interviewing the Iceman for a day. Go away from the flats.
Physical Form
Here’s how I look now, shot on expired Polaroid film by the Iceman himself:
And a wider shot of what was actually going down:
Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive