Blogs

We Need to Talk About Cosby, BBC 2, BBC iPlayer, Writer and Director W Kamau Bell.

Posted by celticman on Mon, 06 Mar 2023

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001jw7l/we-need-to-talk-about-cosby-series-1-episode-1 https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p0f50h4m/we-need-to-talk-about-cosby-series-1-episode-2 https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p0f50jqx/we-need-to-talk-about-cosby-series-1-episode-3 https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p0f50n4g/we-need-to-talk-about-cosby-series-1-episode-4 We Need to Talk About Cosby is a play on the title of Lionel Shriver’s...

Story and Poem of the Month

Posted by Insertponceyfrenchnamehere on Sun, 05 Mar 2023

Our Story and Poem of the Month for February have very kindly been chosen by marandina: Spring is in the air, winter now behind us after a tricky few months for many, what with the cost of living crisis, the ongoing war in Ukraine and other issues at home and abroad. A bright ball of sun in a blue sky remains the writing oasis at ABCTales.com. It was lovely to be asked back to choose the monthly picks for February. It meant I could masquerade as...

Another Brilliant ABCTales Virtual Reading Event, Saturday April 1st!

Posted by Insertponceyfrenchnamehere on Fri, 03 Mar 2023

I am delighted to announce the following: On Saturday 1st of April we will be having an April Fool’s Day online reading event from 7pm - 9pm hosted by the wonderful Mark Burrow. Please email rachel@abctales.com . Let her know if you would like to read or be in the audience, also your username as well as your real name. Do get in touch quickly if you want to read as the list always fills up quickly. A zoom link will be sent to you before the...

The Mormons are Coming, BBC 2, and BBC iPlayer, Peggy Pictures, Executive Producers Danni Davis, Ida Ven Bruusgaard, Richard Macer and Belinda Cherrington.

Posted by celticman on Wed, 01 Mar 2023

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001jnfb/the-mormons-are-coming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormons Yesterday, I said to Sean, Robin’s dad, I couldn’t get swimming because there were two ducks in the swimming pool. ‘Really!’ he replied. ‘No,’ spluttered five-year-old Robin and Tilly at the same time. Shaking their heads and running away with that bemused expression that means that means they know what they’re about. ‘He’s a liar,’ said...

Charlie and the Edit Factory

Posted by marandina on Sun, 26 Feb 2023

When the story first broke about the changes to Roald Dahl’s books for children, I was as outraged as everyone else. So Augustus Gloop in “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” was no longer to be “enormously fat” but simply “enormous”. Mrs Twit in “The Twits” was changed from being “ugly and beastly” to just “beastly”. Lots of people have weighed in on the debate including Salman Rushdie, Brian Cox, Ricky Jervais and even Rishi Sunak has expressed...

Ronan Farrow (2019) Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators.

Posted by celticman on Sat, 25 Feb 2023

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MeToo_movement I know a girl, a little girl, I think of her in that way because of her size. She’s tiny. She got raped. I know the rapist too. I also know his mum. She contacted me and asked me to stop calling him a rapist. ‘It was just one of those things,’ she said. ‘She panicked.’ The irony here is her daughter must have panicked too. Because she’d gone to the police alleging an acquaintance had raped her a few...

Story and Poem of the Week and Inspiration Point

Posted by Insertponceyfrenchnamehere on Fri, 24 Feb 2023

Happy Friday! Poem of the Week is Yutka’s beautiful and moving, Different to caged birds. https://www.abctales.com/story/yutka/different-caged-birds There is, as always, an abundance of brilliant poetry on the site to choose from. Do read Mark Burrow’s ‘night of the armed siege' https://www.abctales.com/story/mark-burrow/night-armed-siege and Ewan’s 'Don’t Ask' too. https://www.abctales.com/story/ewan/dont-ask Story of the Week is Phil Whiteland...

The Great Stink, Channel 5, My 5, narrator Dr Xand Van Tulleken, director Janet Simpson.

Posted by celticman on Wed, 22 Feb 2023

https://www.channel5.com/show/the-great-stink-of-1858/#main-content https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Stink John Major: “Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less.” We all know where deregulation and a lack of cooperation take us. It allows us to put carbon into the air and gives our planet multiple sclerosis. That’s a deadly miasma which will be terminal for most of us. Coming to you soon. Britain 1858 is the...

Beastie and other stories.

Posted by celticman on Tue, 21 Feb 2023

Nobody tells you how much you’ll come to hate your book. Fight or flight. You freeze. You’re being held down and forced to read it again. Try a different font. Try reading it aloud. Give it time to settle. While I was waiting, I wrote a rough draft of the follow-up novel, Angel . Try primal screaming. It doesn’t work but it does annoy the neighbours. At least they know how you feel. The problem isn’t someone else’s. While you’re lining sentences...

Bonnie Garmus (2022) Lessons in Chemistry.

Posted by celticman on Sun, 19 Feb 2023

Bonnie Garmus, Lessons in Chemistry , has as its protagonist Elizabeth Zott, who shoots from the hip, and never fails to tell the reader why. The past is never past and all that. And in physics, as in life, nothing is ever lost. But Elizabeth Zott is a chemist. A first-class chemist. Physics may have created the atomic and hydrogen bombs. But it was chemistry and chemists that created our modern world. Elizabeth Zott is a genius, in the same way...

Pages