George Sandison's Blog, page 2

The cheese sandwich of despair

“A linguistic energy, trivial and tireless, will triumph over my very memory.”

– Roland Barthes

The Fyre documentary documents the catastrophic failure of a luxury festival on a tropical island, featuring core contemporary storytelling mechanics – a three-act journey, interesting characters, glamorous settings, heroes and villains, and more.

It’s a compelling testament to how easily led we are when we think collectively, and how individual wills are subsumed by Billy McFarland’s transparent...

News of Titanic proportions

They say good things come in threes*. They also say you can’t have too much of a good thing, and something about cakes and eating. This January I decided to see what happens when you take all these idioms, smash them together in a particle accelerator and paint the results in glitter.

A particularly shiny part of the results has just entered the visible spectrum in the form of an article in The Bookseller. I am delighted, and still somewhat shocked, to tell you I’m going to be the new Managin...

I just swore at all of FantasyCon in one go…

FantasyCon really is a wonderful thing. Not only did I see countless wonderful people, I got to read a new story in public, speak on two panels, stage a miraculous recovery from the fringes of hangover death, run a really busy book launch, break out of my AirBnB, catch up with rumours about myself and, rather improbably, win an award…

It’s entirely humbling to win the 2018 award for the Best Independent Publisher. I mean this humbling:

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That’s me trying not to burst into tears in the middle o...

The Island of Dreaming Beasts

Crowdfunding is a mad old thing, isn’t it? It’s a slippery, tricksy little git which has all the hallmarks of publishing’s trademark factor – alchemy. You can add all the same ingredients and get totally different results every time. If you’re really lucky you might even get some idea why.

However! There are two Kickstarters going on right now which have got it right, which I recommend you checking out. Bonanza days for fans of weird fiction.

This Dreaming Isle

After the success of 2084 last...

Nine Worlds 2018

That’s right, Nine Worlds time! This weekend the Novotel Hammersmith is home to the full-regalia geeky con. All the SFF content, Knightmare Live, lectures on why Bill & Ted 1 is the only film to get the philosphy of time travel right, and some top-drawer cosplay. They had a guy dressed as Londo Mollari* last year, FFS.

I’m going to be there all weekend, wearing a different hat every day. So if you’re at the con make sure to come and say hi!

The Only Way is Indie! I’m talking about indie publ...

Unsung at the British Fantasy Awards

This is what us in the trade call A Good Day. The shortlists for the British Fantasy Awards were announced yesterday and I’m somewhat staggered to report that Unsung has got three nominations this year.

As well as Malcolm Devlin’s ridiculously good collection, You Will Grow Into Them, there are nominations for 2084, the anthology of dystopian fiction inspired by Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four I edited, and Unsung Stories as the best indie press overall. If anyone asks, my official comment is:...

Reading for the Shadow Booth

I’ve had a good year for publications with a few things either out or placed, and one of those is my story ‘Keel’ in volume 2 of The Shadow Booth.

The Booth is a new journal of weird and horror fiction put out by the ever-industrious Dan Coxon and both volumes are full of some excellent writers, so are well worth checking out. We’re talking Mark Morris, Aliya Whiteley, Gary Budden, Kirsty Logan, Dan Carpenter, Johnny Mains, Dan Grace, Gareth E. Rees and more.

I’m reading at The event to celeb...

On Writing ‘Framing Ilva’ and The Lonely Crowd

The most excellent folk over at The Lonely Crowd were recently kind enough to publish a story of mine, in issue 8 of their journal.

‘Framing Ilva’ is a story about a refinery in the south of Italy which is famous, there at least, for the terrible effects it is having on the environment and the population. Having spent a fair amount of time in Puglia over recent years, it’s one of those names that’s always around, if rarely discussed. So I was delighted when John Lavin asked if I wanted to wri...

Black Friday and the flesh-eating elephant in the room

Sometimes you encounter unlikely bedfellows at exactly the right time. This happened to me with Yeon Yeon’s Train to Busan (2016), Wolfgang Streeck’s collected essays, How Will Capitalism End? (2017) and Black Friday. They sit together so well it’s frightening.

First, a quick precis of Streeck’s hypotheses: We’re screwed.

A slightly longer one is that capitalism is consuming itself at an ever increasing pace. We are fleeing a series of crises, from global inflation in the ’70s, to soaring pub...

The Strange Reformation of Josephus Miller

This post assumes you have seen up to series 2, episode 9: The Weeping Somnambulist of The Expanse.

The Expanse, it would seem, is a hit. Not having read James S. A. Corey’s books I realise there’s a huge fanbase out there, so that, combined with a few recommendations from friends – including one comparison to Babylon 5 – brought me in.

But something doesn’t quite sit right. It’s that comparison to Babylon 5. For all its faults – and as a dedicated fan, I am the first to say there are many… –...