Kate Kelly's Blog, page 25

Ants in the Woods

We sat in silence among the trees, hoping to spot an elusive red squirrel. There were traces of their presence all around – fresh gnawed pine cones – but the squirrels were hiding from us. We did see a sika deer, a young stag who ventured close, rising up on his hind legs to browse the newly bursting spring foliage. And further on we found the wood ants. 
We came across a number of wood ants’ nests in the woods that day, but this one was particularly impressive.

The surface of t...

Invader!

Looks like my attempt to stop the badger coming into my garden and digging up my vegetable plot has failed!

I have the feeling that for every hole I block he’s just going to dig another one!

Any suggestions?

The Countdown Begins

There are only four months to go until Red Rock is published, and for now all is quiet. But I know it won’t stay that way.

There’s a lot of waiting in the writing business, stretches of time when nothing much happens. But when things do start happening it can all be a little crazy.

For the first few months of this year things were hectic. I signed my contact, I met my editor, I started work on my edits with a deadline to meet and I went up to London for my publisher’s launch party. It was all...

Rockfall at Durdle Door

There was a massive rockfall along the coastpath between Durdle Door and Lulworth Cove on Monday night. So yesterday I popped over to take a look and here are some pictures.  The rockfall as viewed from Durdle Door.
Close up so you can see where the footpath has disappeared. It's a good job this happened during the night - it's a popular tourist destination and the path is usually teeming!  And just to give you an idea of how unstable the cliffs can be around here - this used to be the...

Arachnid Massacre

We stumbled out of the woods and into this scene of carnage.  
They’re plants, stems bent and broken by winter snows and countless frosts, leaves dried and crumpled like old rags.

But for us they were so much more.

Here lie the remains of the arachnid hoard, cut down on the battlefield and left to bleach in the winter sun; legs broken at angles, brown bodies cold in their slaughter.

They lie just outside a rather fine gothic pile – and we decided they must have attacked in the dead of night,...

The Big Cat Mystery

Okay, so this is a picture of a very small cat, and that is because I have never been fortunate enough to spot one of the famous Dorset Big cats. But there are plenty of people who claim they have.

In fact there was a sighting only a couple of weeks ago where one was spotted in a field near Dorchester by a passing lorry driver.

Dorset is by no means the only place where big cats have been seen – we’ve all heard of the Best of Bodmin – and there have been sightings in many other places too.

Now i...

The Greenland Vikings

We think of Greenland as an inhospitable place – a land of ice and rock. The only inhabitants are the Inuit (their lifestyle finely tuned to their environment), men who plunder the land for valuable resources such as rare minerals, and explorers and scientists braving those icy wastes for the greater good.

But once there were settlements and farms. And these settlers were Vikings.

Greenland was discovered by Eric the Red back in the 10th century. He named the place Greenland to make it sound lu...

On Top of the World

This is an ancient landscape and if you look you will see the traces of past civilisations – from the tumuli that form grassy mounds along the skyline, to the roman roads that run straight and true and, often, are still used to day.   For a long time the flat topped hill you can see in the picture, Pilsdon Pen, was throught to be the highest point in Dorset. But a few years ago it was re-measured and its neighbour, Lewesdon hill, was found to be a couple of metres higher. It is from...

My Top Ten Martian Tales

Sticking with the Martian theme I thought I'd share my top ten Martian tales. So there they are - in reverse order:

(10) The Martian Way by Isaac Azimov  - No SF list would be complete without Azimov, so here he is.

(9) Voyage by Stephen Baxter - an excellent alternate history where mankind is already out exploring space.

(8) The Outward Urge by John Wyndham - Not a writer normally associated with hard SF but this is an exception to the rule.

(7) Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars by Kim Stanle...

The Real Mars Mission

 My novel, Red Rock, is set just after the return of the first manned mission to mars; a mission with a special connection for Danni, because her aunt was one of the astronauts.

Mankind may not yet have set foot on the red planet, but there have been regular missions to mars over the years.

It is a world full of surprises. The first images of ancient river channels sent back by Mariner 9 set the world ablaze, and since then the search for water and for evidence that there may once have bee...