I want my money back. Where's all the trains? T2 is a harder film than Trainspotting. It's violent, it's the violence Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie have done to themselves in the past 20 years. Still funny, still new in places but hard. All alive, life is their sentence. Not being fathers in any real sense of the word is their worst punishment for being clueless, stupid,and sometimes cruel and selfish for 20 years. 20 years of learning who...

Thank you to Catherine Poarch for her brief on Creation last month. Seeing as it's February I feel drawn towards expressing my die-hard romantic nature in lyrical form. Don't assume I'm after Valentine's Day couplets and a table at that rustic Italian on the High Street. There's nothing more cringeworthy than a bloke with a rose threaded between his teeth. I trust there won't be a love heart or a teddy bear or gasp: an unsigned card in sight. (...

This was a terrific game with Celtic players scoring all seven goals. Dedryck Boyata scoring a terrific headed own-goal for St Johnstone after Celtic had opened them up several times, with a goal from Liam Henderson in the first five minutes. This continues a recent trend in which Celitc’s so called fringe players come in and not only do they do a job, they frequently end up man on the match. Stuart Armstrong was first to pick up the baton and...

January's picks courtesy of blackjack-davey: Impressed by the unhallowed and witchy flavour of January’s poetry and prose, perhaps in part because I’ve been reading Shirley Jackson’s Dark Tales, this month it was clear which story had won. With the rise of the dictator and bad daddy figure in America, the feeling that the liberal enlightened perspective was actually the dream and we return to reality with a bump and deep tribal xenophobia,...

I was at a Requiem Mass for Rose Anne Winn today. It was great. I don’t mean the religious service. I can take them or leave them. Apart from funerals, usually it’s the latter. Auntie Rose was my godmother. The last remaining matriarch of the Connelly family, which included my mum Jean, and her sisters Auntie Phyllis and Auntie Cathy. Only Uncle Ben, in Canada, of the patriarchal line remains. Uncle Tom and Uncle Terry are dead. What I mean by...

Story of the Week goes to ajhoward for his ghostly prose 'curious-one-under' and Poem of the Week to lovewriting for her poem 'auchtertyre.' Big congratulations to both. Breathtaking landscapes and a sift through the soul makes a deeply restorative read: https://www.abctales.com/story/lovewriting/auchtertyre Richly compelling, this first installment of a ghost story switches us confidently between digital and urban setting to distort perceptions...

Tulip Siddiq is one of our best Labour MPs. She recently voted against Brexit, and always follows the wishes of her constituency. She has the hard job of filling Glenda Jackson's boots in Hampstead and Kilburn, England's most marginal constituency where she won her seat in Westminster by 44 votes. As well as being little and cute and very sharp witted and switched on, Tulip is from a family that has lived politics the hard way. Her grandfather...

Book links: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hollow-Point-wartime-adventures-Molenaar-ebook/... https://www.amazon.com/Hollow-Point-wartime-adventures-Molenaar-ebook/dp... HOLLOW POINT - Robert Craven I think some books are too long. That the writer's voice is somehow lost in the padding. I have just released HOLLOW POINT ; the fourth WW2 novel featuring my character, Eva. It is a short novel, just above the size of a novella, that has allowed me to...

Money is worthless. Join every mob at banks and shops, cash in. Arm yourself Bring the family home, with a chimney, you can cook by firelight. Bring the bike in from the garden shed. Plan your meals. Starve slowly. With much love You won’t hear from me again.

Big congratulations this week to Rosa Cruz for 'Forever-Home' and to blackjack-davey for 'Me and My Shadow' - our brilliant Story and Poem of the Week! https://www.abctales.com/story/rosa-cruz/forever-home https://www.abctales.com/story/blackjack-davey/me-and-my-shadow .. and here's this week's Inspiration Point (it's a great one): https://www.abctales.com/inspiration-point-ip