The girl at the heart of Christopher Edge’s novel is ahead of her age: clever enough, at nine years old, to understand astrophysics, quantum mechanics and nuclear fission. She’s about to embark on an Open University course and (perhaps) even build a smallish nuclear reactor in her parents’ garage. This alone would be the premise for an entertaining novel, but mere pages into The Infinite Lives of Maisie Day, its heroine faces a mystery that seems beyond even her. It’s the morning of her tenth birthday, but where’s her sister, her Mum and Dad? She goes to the front door and looks out. Where’s the street gone?

It appears the end of the universe has come, and Maisie’s going to face it alone.
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This article was first published in the Spring 2017 edition of the British Fantasy Society Journal. Learn more about the Society here.

In 2014’s Autumn edition of the British Fantasy Journal, I promised a Strange Gazetteer of the British Isles, a tour around the real places where unreal things have happened.
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“A man. A house from his dreams. His two cats. An attempt to get to grips with the Grey Fug that is depression.”

I’d like to introduce you to the world of Chris Browning. He’s the artist behind the Common Swings, a series of comics and odd publications including The Life Cycle of P.E. Teachers and A Journal of Very Rude Birds, and it really is a glorious, unique world of its own; in my opinion, the work of an irrepressibly creative, idiosyncratic genius.
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It’s ages since I had a nice sit down and a chat with someone on Pile of Leaves, so let’s correct that right away. Meet Dom Conlon: poet, storyteller, picture book author and space biscuit.

Dom, welcome to the walled garden of Pile of Leaves. Cup of tea? Biscuit?

Dom: Thanks Nick. Both would be lovely. Only, not fig biscuits or pink wafers. I revisited both of those as a test of my childhood memory and found both to be miserable experiences.

I thought I’d write a word or two about mess. There’s a lot of things that can get in a mess – detritus and and plans, politics and clothes. When books get in a mess it can sometimes be more distressing than the other kinds because we go to them for solace and order. I don’t dare illustrate this with a picture of our back room at the moment. For a year, the big bookcase in here has been threatening to fall apart and two weeks ago – blam – it happened. Right on my head, as it happens.
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Books are for life, not just for childhood.

Well, some books, anyway. I’m fairly sure the Beast Quest books have little to offer the fully-grown reader, any more than we need our dinner cut up for us. Not to condemn those books: learning to read is a revolution in the head, a new understanding of code, narrative, of degrees of reality and self.

Hello! Here’s a blog about why the blog is quiet and for how much longer, about what’s new with me, about a new story in the world, and some errata.

It’s officially and Meteorologically spring – don’t look at me that way, you can feel it too. There’s a little milk and sugar in the dark, bitter teapot of the soul. If you go to the park you might see crocuses or snowdrops or something, anyway, flower identification not being my strong point. You’ll see dogs, too.
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For my last blog of the year, I'm reviving a meme from yesteryear. Last week, Facebook, for all its faults, reminded me of a blog post from 2010 where I set myself the challenge of answering a meme using only the names of books I'd read that year. That was a particularly good year, and at first I thought I couldn't repeat it - especially as I've done so badly at keeping track of my reading this year.

This winter, I’ve been working in a bookshop for the first time in my life. I don’t want to talk directly about it, so let’s dive straight into the realms of fantasy and say it’s a venerable family business in the fishing town of Little Hastening-On-Sea, which I have unexpectedly discovered I am sole heir to (this even sounds like the sort of Disney family movie you’d get on Boxing Day when I was a kid).

It seems that nobody quite knows why we tell ghost stories at Christmas. There’s Charles Dickens’ massively influential tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, of course, and mentions in Washington Irving. There’s a tantalising opener to a spooky winter’s tale, never-quite-told in Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale, and hints elsewhere. Beyond that lies a deep mystery.
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I'm Nick Campbell, yes I am. Research student, writer of strange stories, blogger of umpteen years standing, and indefatigable reader.
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