Helen Lowe's Blog, page 198

My Year In Retrospect — On The Supernatural Underground Now!

My regular posting day for the Supernatural Underground is the 1st of every month, so for today’s post I’ve featured a few of my significant, writing-related moments from 2013.

To check them out, click on the following link:

A Year In Retrospect: A Few Significant Moments From 2013

Because of this, the “resolution” post will now feature tomorrow!

Happy New Year!

It is already January 1 here in New Zealand and I have managed to take down the old calendars and put up one new one: yahoo!

I know that the new year always finds us all in many different places, sometimes just geographically dispersed but often in disparate ‘spaces’ in terms of health, employment, and emotional and physical wellbeing.

But I hope, whatever ‘place’ or ‘space’ we may be in on this January 1, 2014, that the unfolding year will bring new adventures for those who seek them and saf...

New Year’s Eve: A Thought for The Cusp of the Year, Courtesy Of St Augustine

Last light of the sun, & of 2013...

New Year’s Eve is the time when we stand on the cusp of the old year and the new, when it is timely to look both back and forward. There may be more apposite quotes for such a time and activity, but I am hard pushed to think of them:

“Bad times, hard times, that is what people keep saying, but … We are the times; such as we are, such are the times.”

~ St Augustine, 354 – 430 AD

Certainly a thought to reflect on in terms of our own intentions for 2014.

Acknowledging Contributors: The One-Off Reviewers :)

Currently, I am acknowledging the contributors, some regular, some one-off contributors, who joined me “…on Anything, Really” this year—as a thank you for their time and energy to help make this blog an interesting place to visit.

So of course I have to mention those who undertake reviews for the blog — including this year’s “one-off” reviewers:

Karen McMillan:

Karen lives in New Zealand and is the author of both fiction and non-fiction. She has a Diploma in Professional Writing and an Advanced...

Acknowledging Contributors: Andrew Robins & SFF Reviews

Currently, I am acknowledging the contributors, some regular, some one-off contributors, who joined me “…on Anything, Really” this year—as a thank you for their time and energy to help make this blog an interesting place to visit.

So of course I have to mention those who undertake reviews for the blog, chiefly Andrew Robins who has contributed a number of reviews over the past two years.

You can find all reviews under the Category, “Book Reviews for …on Anything, Really” in the far right hand s...

Acknowledging Contributors: Marion Drolsbach & “To Hell & Back: Translating Dan Brown’s ‘Inferno.’”

Marion,'Inferno' translator & TV star!

Currently, I am acknowledging the contributors, some regular, some one-off contributors, who joined me “…on Anything, Really” this year.

I really appreciate the contribution of their time and energy to help making this blog — I hope! — a fun and interesting site to visit.

My second acknowledgment, for a two-part post I felt was something really special, is for translator Marion Drolsbach, who shared an insight into her experience of translating Dan Brown’s...

Acknowledging Contributors: Rebecca Fisher & ‘Big Worlds On Small Screens’

Rebecca Fisher

As I indicated yesterday, over the next few days I shall be acknowledging the contributors, some regular, some one-off contributors, who joined me “…on Anything, Really” this year.

I really appreciate the contribution of their time and energy to help making this blog — I hope! — a fun and interesting site to visit.

First up, I’d really like to put my hands together for Rebecca Fisher who has been bringing us ‘Big Worlds On Small Screens’, consistently, every second Wednesday witho...

Acknowledging Contributors

Bends in the river...

This is the time of year when I usually embark on my “Best Of…”/”Most Read” posts — & I will get to that very soon.

But first I would like to acknowledge my 2013 “…on Anything, Really” contributors, so that will happen over the next few days through to the New Year, with “Most Read” thereafter.

Meanwhile, keep enjoying those holidays, whether long or short.

Merry Christmas!

Joy, Joy; Happy, Happy—& Merry, too:
all the best wishes from me to you!

Tuesday Poem: Christmastide

Christmastide

Christmas—and we

like so many others

are washed north

on a tide of summer,

our route signposted

by pohutakawa,

all flowering late

against a mirage

of cabbage trees,

dusty in the heat

that shimmers

above melting tar—

the whole country baking

as the nation makes

its annual pilgrimage

of Christmas and New Year:

Good to see ya, we say,

or simply mate, pouring out

a cool one before we sit

down together, buoyant

with the sunshine

and the colour,

the high tide of summer.

© Helen Lowe

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To read the featured poem...