Christopher Fowler's Blog, page 499

Why I Don't Get Invited To Festivals Much

See the people on the signing panel.
How happy they are that anyone turned up at all.
How pleased they are when someone purchases a paperback instead of spending all their time on their walky-phones and jabscreens.

From time to time, though, the lovely people at the British Fantasy Society are prepared to put up with me [...:]

The Rubbish I Plough Through So You Don't Have To

As a book reviewer who sits on film boards and attends a fair number of arts events, I get quite a lot of exposure to the arts. It leaves me deficient in all sorts of other ways. For example, I know very little about the World Cup and nothing at all about popular TV shows, [...:]

Loaf To Tell The Truth

This is a subject very close to writers' hearts, as most days we dine 'al desko'.

When is a bakery not a bakery? When it's little more than 'a tanning salon for baguettes', according to the Real Bread Campaign. Just how much bread is made elsewhere is revealed today in a ruling by the Advertising Standards [...:]

Roofworld Revisited

Reader Annie Fernie points out that our own Roofers (see 'Roofworld Comes True') do it better than the Moscow mob, and from the shots these lads have been taking from their vantage points, I think she's right. Follow her comment link for more astounding images and details of their vertiginous exploits on top of the [...:]

Blackpool Rocked

Long after Dennis Potter's 'The Singing Detective' and before 'Glee', another BBC TV drama, 'Blackpool', telling the story of thuggish casino owner David Morrissey's descent into moral hell, was made for UK television. Surfing about last night, I came across this clip which reminded me how it too used music of the period to tell [...:]

Roofworld Comes True

Way back in 1988 I wrote my first novel, Roofworld, about disaffected youths living in rooftop communities. It's taken 22 years, but it looks like that future has finally arrived. This is Dmitri Yermakov, 18. He's part of a youth subculture that has taken shape in Moscow. Its adherents are called Roofers, and they gain [...:]

Re:View – Watchmen Director's Cut

The Blu-Ray director's cut of Watchmen runs 3 hrs and 5 mins. I warn you, because you may be thinking twice about seeing it twice. I enjoyed the film at its opening (partly, I admit, because it was a red carpet premiere) but time reshapes our pleasures, and a new version seemed a good way [...:]

Dennis's Big Idea

See Dennis.

Dennis is a multi-millionaire.

Doesn't just looking at his perky pose make you feel tired and slightly depressed?

Dennis Crowley is the 33-year-old co-founder of Foursquare, the 'fastest growing location-based social network'. The service, which has attracted more than two million users and is valued at $95m after just 16 months, allows its users to share [...:]

Mixed Messages

Trust a trip to Spittalfields in London's East End to yield its usual crop of confusing street signs. Here are two (of six) painted into parking bays by artists, just to confuse motorists.

And Spittalfields is, of course, the anti-designer area, as evinced by this sign.

Fiction Goes Bizarre

It started with Pride & Prejudice & Zombies (the first book ever to contain its entire joke in the title alone), then Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. Extremism in writing isn't new – it's a sixties idea that JG Ballard was handling very well – but so-called Bizarro Fiction, which mixes extreme images with ideas, [...:]