Christopher Fowler's Blog, page 436

Grand Living

Astonishing gothic St Pancras Grand Hotel – known by some as the Harry Potter hotel – reopened with a massive party last night under the auspices of Marriot, whose presence was only detectable from those hideous gold baggage trolleys they always have and the anodyne tinkling of Jamie Cullum performing at his piano.

This was [...]

Read Of The Week

'The Devil And Sherlock Holmes' by David Grann is a collection of unusual true stories rather like the kind of good magazine articles you used to get in the Sunday Times (and still get in some US magazines). They're by a New Yorker staff writer, which explains the origin of these pieces. They've been lumped [...]

The Spam Mountain

New attacks by moronic spammers mean that occasionally genuine comments from my intelligent, lovely readers don't get posted on this site. I personally have to check all untrapped spams (currently running at several thousand a day) and it's driving me crazy.

Here's what you can do. Spammers can't make their comments specific so they tend to [...]

The End Of Aural History

Claude Stanley Choules, the last known combat veteran of the first world war, died on Thursday at a nursing home in Perth, Western Australia. He was 110. Choules was born on 3 March, 1901, in Pershore, Worcestershire, one of seven children.

This is the closing chapter on the aural history of World War One. From now [...]

Where Ideas Come From

Whizzing round the web I bumped into a celebration of New York's defunct Spy magazine somewhere. It was virtually the only funny thing to happen in the eighties. I'd forgotten the mag had invented this, among many other fine and silly achievements. The idea was quickly co-opted by just about every other magazine and periodical [...]

Where Terrorists Go

To Hell, apparently, according to a US poll that has found most citizens believe Osama bin Laden is burning in lakes of fire.

Halfway Through A Good Book

Slow Reader

I've always had a slight problem with reading – I read the books I enjoy most very slowly. This becomes tricky when I'm reviewing novels or judging books for awards. And there are some writers – I won't mention names – who write as if their words were housebricks, and I keep stubbing my [...]

Weird Belated Easter Story Of The Week

Papers are reporting that the body of a man with his hands and feet nailed to a wooden cross and a crown of thorns on his head has been found in an abandoned South Korean stone quarry.

The body had a wound to the side of the torso and nylon strings tied around the neck, arms [...]

'The Soho Devil' Gets Ready For Flight

My first Bryant & May comic, 'The Casebook Of Bryant & May: The Soho Devil' is almost complete. Artist Keith Page has achieved the impossible, bringing my characters to life in a traditional watercolour style that's simply unique (this is a rough of one panel). Now we have to decide which publisher to go with.

Comics [...]

What's American Cuisine?

On my post about London's love of 'American Graffiti'-style bowling alleys I mentioned that there are no really American restaurants in London anymore. A reader has asked if there is such a thing as American cuisine, so come on Americans, defend your food!

I would mention my regional favourites; Louisiana gumbo, New England clam chowder, Maine [...]