Last night at 1:30am I woke up from a brief slumber to take part in the Fantasy Fiends podcast, with hosts Andy Peloquin and Stevie Collier. My first time to do something like this! It was a blast – I guess I never talk to other fantasy authors, so what a pleasure it was to dig in with them. We talked about: how our real-world adventures and travels (Japan, Canada, ruins) have inspired us in our character and world creation. our writing processes and productivity schedules (1 book ever 2 momnths for Stevie, 1 a month for Andy!). our various …
Great review of ‘Ruins of the Rising Sun’
Here’s a really great review of my new haikyo book, Ruins of the Rising Sun, on Seba Rashii culture zine. Thanks Seba Rashii! Quick quotes- “The stunning image of an abandoned, devoid-of-any-purpose roller coaster is a powerful metaphor for the clear ups and downs described along the way by the author. Any reader already acquainted with Japan will know it is place that doesn’t leave any impression other than the permanent on a person and the haikyo featured in this book are perhaps uniquely Japanese. With everything from abandoned theme parks to love hotels, soap lands and leftovers from the …
Axiom Interview
I recently did an interview with Axiom magazine about my haikyo photography and fiction writing. Axiom is a print and web magazine focused on Japanese entertainment, gaming, and culture, run by Adam Miller and Jimi Okelana. I chatted with Jimi for about 10 minutes- probably the first time I’ve done an interview over the phone. I’ve done interviews a couple of times before, but only by email. By phone is fun, though challenging to express what you want to say concisely without just going on and on. I think I did go on and on, but Jimi managed to pluck …
The Boltonian
About a year ago my old school in Bolton got in touch with me about writing something for the alumni school newsletter. I think they had seen the review of this site in the Guardian newspaper, and figured something on haikyo would be pretty interesting. I put something together along with a few photographs, fired it off along with my address for the chap to send a copy of the newsletter, but then unfortunately never heard back from him. I assumed he hadn’t run my piece, and forgot about it. A few days ago I was in touch with an …
Weekender Interview and Cover
A few months back Elisabeth Lambert of the Tokyo Weekender (one of several free English magazines available in Tokyo) got in touch with me about haikyo. She was doing research for an article, and we went back and forth with a few sets of interview questions. It’s always interesting for me to talk about haikyo, especially if the person ‘gets it’- compared to people who (and I understand this view too) think ‘why would you want to go to dirty old buildings full of trash’? The magazine came out this week, and it turns out the haikyo piece is the …
Kindred Spirit Interview- The Spirituality of Ruins
I’ve mentioned my sister Alice on this site before– when she got her book ‘The High-Heeled Guide to Enlightenment‘ published. She spent a year of her life experimenting with various forms of spirituality- going to shamans, doing sweat lodges, having reiki crystal therapy, being regressed through past lives, etc… It’s a fascinating read I’d recommend to anyone interested in that sort of thing. Typically I’m not, but I’ll admit some of it got me thinking. Anyway- since that book came out she’s been hard at work promoting the book and writing pieces for magazines based around the topics of the …
Diggnation!
The guys on diggnation from Revision 3 covered my asylum top 10 ghost town article on their most recent show. This is awesome. I don`t customarily watch the show- I`ve got Scott to thank for the notification- but am well aware of digg, and of the comings and goings of co-host Kevin Rose thanks to his appearances on This Week in Tech. It`s fantastic to have him reading and liking my article and photos- even if he does garble one sentence from the text. Thanks to the guys on diggnation for choosing this article to cover, and thanks to everyone …
The Guardian reviews this site
About an hour ago the Guardian newspaper put a review of this site online.