Meta tags:

Headings (most frequently used words):

2025, 2024, tuesday, the, in, december, dabbler, saturday, wednesday, friday, of, drabbles, september, july, review, monday, 13, 2026, 04, 14, 30, sunday, thursday, march, january, that, my, trumpet, tangents, and, end, 2023, february, 31, october, 08, august, 01, june, 07, 24, may, spoons, are, ears, mission, creep, press, unfair, dinkum, strudel, mineshafts, trojan, donkey, chapbooks, paperback, ebook, plays, performed, volcano, theatre, trivialities, face, other, egypt, robots, love, signs, times, podcast, extracts, interview, eleventh, commandment, flapping, doodles, romantic, onion, antics, devil, halo, omnibus, second, hand, hands, growl, at, moon, triple, obscura, this, poem, around, world, eighty, ways, sunset, suite, rabbit, shadow, german, about, me, april, 28, 17, 26, november, 09, 12, 03, 06, 10, 29, 19, 02, links, archives,

Text of the page (most frequently used words):
the (596), and (286), that (137), for (101), but (96), this (90), book (87), was (82), have (82), will (74), published (66), one (64), are (57), year (52), with (51), from (45), first (44), writing (42), has (42), books (40), hughes (38), them (38), been (38), rhys (37), all (35), stories (34), comments (34), posted (34), drabbles (34), novel (34), work (32), also (32), story (31), plays (31), 2025 (30), wrote (30), out (29), december (28), press (28), more (28), they (28), collection (28), volume (28), other (27), very (27), fiction (26), not (26), poetry (26), ebook (25), july (24), 2024 (24), into (24), there (24), march (23), three (23), each (23), poems (23), february (22), june (22), last (22), when (22), two (22), had (22), which (22), best (22), september (21), january (21), may (21), some (21), many (21), new (21), about (20), short (20), would (20), were (20), written (20), most (20), only (20), write (20), his (20), just (20), now (20), april (19), november (19), october (19), august (19), read (19), time (19), next (19), words (19), project (19), long (19), amazon (19), too (18), four (18), fictions (18), here (18), available (18), paperback (18), years (18), can (17), flash (17), way (17), second (17), think (17), 2023 (16), good (16), those (16), tales (16), then (16), another (16), total (15), edition (15), after (15), publishing (14), weird (14), days (14), you (14), dabbler (14), set (14), well (13), ever (13), exactly (13), who (13), free (13), any (13), like (13), novella (13), linked (13), than (13), these (13), 2021 (12), 2014 (12), 2013 (12), 2012 (12), 2011 (12), 2010 (12), 2009 (12), 2008 (12), 2007 (12), 2006 (12), writers (12), reading (12), called (12), few (12), tangents (12), 2022 (11), 2005 (11), five (11), because (11), chapbooks (11), anthology (11), moon (11), far (11), even (11), what (11), 2019 (10), 2015 (10), much (10), back (10), began (10), publisher (10), finished (10), turned (10), hundred (10), every (10), omnibus (10), almost (10), love (10), never (10), writer (9), volumes (9), contain (9), fact (9), part (9), always (9), issued (9), series (9), works (9), growl (9), full (9), 100 (9), own (9), link (9), might (9), tuesday (9), soon (9), editions (9), don (9), day (9), really (9), fantasy (9), their (9), egypt (9), performed (9), 2018 (8), 2016 (8), self (8), going (8), life (8), big (8), yet (8), comedy (8), third (8), final (8), features (8), him (8), reason (8), ago (8), others (8), rather (8), 000 (8), obscura (8), how (8), absurdist (8), together (8), made (8), 2017 (7), complete (7), india (7), novels (7), before (7), end (7), length (7), western (7), happen (7), thousand (7), featuring (7), robots (7), different (7), fourth (7), ideas (7), cover (7), done (7), lot (7), chiron (7), often (7), world (7), delighted (7), already (7), strange (7), trumpet (7), experiment (7), 2020 (6), eibonvale (6), blog (6), michael (6), moorcock (6), finally (6), people (6), know (6), among (6), devil (6), halo (6), make (6), sure (6), did (6), saturday (6), check (6), hand (6), anyway (6), actually (6), still (6), act (6), until (6), didn (6), better (6), sense (6), idea (6), both (6), hope (6), feel (6), real (6), took (6), thanks (6), light (6), cycle (6), pandora (6), bluff (6), trilogy (6), introduction (6), theatre (6), unfair (6), dinkum (6), 2026 (5), thinking (5), paul (5), brian (5), list (5), swansea (5), though (5), whether (5), must (5), prepared (5), follows (5), little (5), chapbook (5), mention (5), telos (5), raphus (5), pieces (5), currently (5), being (5), adventure (5), publication (5), enough (5), therefore (5), telling (5), comedies (5), your (5), means (5), contains (5), form (5), need (5), believe (5), past (5), delight (5), regard (5), wednesday (5), without (5), polyphemus (5), gibbon (5), mine (5), non (5), author (5), issue (5), contributing (5), triple (5), question (5), happy (5), hands (5), our (5), men (5), characters (5), seem (5), hardback (5), over (5), sell (5), surprise (5), huge (5), science (5), place (5), several (5), friday (5), onion (5), title (5), sets (5), old (5), signs (5), completed (5), play (5), limited (5), copies (5), face (5), kharms (5), library (5), art (4), inspired (4), things (4), publishers (4), david (4), man (4), view (4), speculative (4), supposed (4), said (4), sri (4), nice (4), green (4), living (4), barthelme (4), impossible (4), fairy (4), regarded (4), off (4), look (4), anthologies (4), ghosts (4), haven (4), horror (4), maybe (4), put (4), review (4), such (4), take (4), decided (4), publish (4), ready (4), later (4), drabble (4), cyclops (4), centaur (4), isn (4), collections (4), released (4), won (4), while (4), come (4), myself (4), choose (4), german (4), based (4), hopefully (4), start (4), westerns (4), future (4), takes (4), 1000 (4), ebooks (4), ancient (4), kind (4), sequence (4), small (4), projects (4), pleased (4), around (4), terms (4), something (4), attanasio (4), runs (4), poem (4), knows (4), where (4), answer (4), came (4), month (4), easy (4), prose (4), found (4), john (4), wales (4), sold (4), wasn (4), anyone (4), effort (4), say (4), through (4), order (4), see (4), process (4), antics (4), eleventh (4), commandment (4), description (4), mood (4), podcast (4), thousandth (4), knick (4), knack (4), farce (4), stage (4), mission (4), creep (4), gray (3), adele (3), filippo (3), article (3), personal (3), longer (3), tend (3), public (3), lanka (3), get (3), guest (3), nabokov (3), henry (3), sixty (3), stuff (3), main (3), thing (3), coffee (3), mind (3), publications (3), tribute (3), produced (3), hardbacks (3), lengthy (3), garden (3), boris (3), accepted (3), plan (3), once (3), trojan (3), sunset (3), suite (3), again (3), wordage (3), blurb (3), space (3), 200 (3), probably (3), original (3), today (3), hard (3), thursday (3), hugely (3), certainly (3), philosophical (3), language (3), text (3), opinion (3), rabbit (3), shadow (3), sunday (3), turn (3), sort (3), anything (3), guess (3), seen (3), west (3), elsewhere (3), ways (3), seems (3), exposure (3), monday (3), unique (3), eighty (3), earlier (3), beginning (3), under (3), none (3), previously (3), word (3), kafka (3), samuel (3), delany (3), offbeat (3), along (3), six (3), chapter (3), extremely (3), following (3), masterpiece (3), reality (3), beast (3), everything (3), quickly (3), significant (3), mostly (3), covers (3), wanted (3), great (3), namely (3), frame (3), contained (3), listening (3), imagined (3), path (3), create (3), understand (3), despite (3), aberystwyth (3), trad (3), numbers (3), ten (3), including (3), energy (3), individual (3), right (3), includes (3), mean (3), waiting (3), room (3), production (3), dropped (3), recent (3), weeks (3), giving (3), romantic (3), doesn (3), themed (3), suggested (3), grouped (3), piece (3), audio (3), times (3), zelazny (3), inside (3), heads (3), style (3), brazil (3), prequel (3), lateral (3), himself (3), fictive (3), volcano (3), working (3), seeing (3), actors (3), learned (3), promo (3), find (3), promotion (3), fund (3), mike (2), battenbough (2), dog (2), dreams (2), dead (2), chris (2), harrendence (2), wilson (2), aldiss (2), photos (2), online (2), links (2), name (2), give (2), kept (2), spent (2), honour (2), literary (2), invited (2), got (2), playing (2), badminton (2), regularly (2), looking (2), alasdair (2), lives (2), vladimir (2), donald (2), reader (2), truly (2), outstanding (2), large (2), glib (2), flippant (2), wish (2), adventures (2), apart (2), vian (2), fall (2), include (2), novellas (2), considered (2), productive (2), single (2), average (2), genuinely (2), consist (2), remain (2), paradoxical (2), monsters (2), easily (2), country (2), across (2), feature (2), 300 (2), 400 (2), quite (2), precision (2), editing (2), eye (2), absolutely (2), download (2), platform (2), page (2), thirty (2), select (2), hoping (2), der (2), schatten (2), meines (2), hasen (2), sieht (2), aus (2), wie (2), eine (2), translated (2), peter (2), person (2), responsible (2), alchemy (2), indebted (2), task (2), difficult (2), concept (2), consists (2), mosaic (2), lyrical (2), witty (2), looks (2), happens (2), cups (2), cowboys (2), summer (2), fists (2), fleece (2), gorillas (2), requirement (2), keep (2), coming (2), late (2), continue (2), paperbacks (2), classical (2), myths (2), entirely (2), greek (2), should (2), line (2), want (2), sales (2), etc (2), stick (2), especially (2), high (2), spirits (2), twists (2), humour (2), call (2), windows (2), bears (2), objects (2), date (2), point (2), purchase (2), tim (2), newton (2), anderson (2), unlikely (2), example (2), planning (2), finish (2), readers (2), chance (2), boomerang (2), gang (2), delays (2), marvellous (2), inventive (2), turns (2), meaning (2), dangerous (2), stop (2), nothing (2), followed (2), entire (2), momentum (2), themselves (2), favourite (2), fifty (2), editor (2), between (2), absurdism (2), least (2), brief (2), sentient (2), odd (2), vast (2), pleasing (2), sensible (2), used (2), learn (2), live (2), sorts (2), told (2), viewpoint (2), imaginary (2), gets (2), number (2), favourites (2), sequel (2), parts (2), however (2), why (2), wouldn (2), lots (2), tremendous (2), material (2), lost (2), essential (2), incredible (2), encountered (2), somewhat (2), shame (2), returned (2), comes (2), happened (2), worth (2), hardly (2), rarely (2), motivation (2), rapidly (2), moving (2), phase (2), given (2), borderless (2), journal (2), various (2), cycles (2), result (2), reward (2), beastly (2), uncle (2), city (2), island (2), mini (2), remains (2), popular (2), suspect (2), curious (2), explorer (2), microfictions (2), foreword (2), elsewhen (2), experience (2), presence (2), hell (2), damned (2), million (2), months (2), onions (2), unpublished (2), print (2), rate (2), aren (2), intend (2), phantoms (2), accidents (2), course (2), either (2), having (2), richard (2), james (2), rix (2), domestic (2), flapping (2), doodles (2), genuine (2), pleasure (2), audiobook (2), exists (2), authors (2), wholly (2), fashion (2), influence (2), texts (2), speculations (2), theme (2), extracts (2), recital (2), sites (2), interview (2), unwieldy (2), sixteen (2), fifteen (2), excellent (2), mythology (2), early (2), certain (2), planned (2), commercial (2), retelling (2), daphnis (2), chloe (2), instead (2), action (2), intended (2), earliest (2), dates (2), egypts (2), exist (2), alternative (2), land (2), generations (2), devoted (2), post (2), oldest (2), 1989 (2), renowned (2), wordplay (2), association (2), effect (2), women (2), incanubula (2), influenced (2), ronald (2), firbank (2), nathanael (2), attempt (2), themes (2), trivialities (2), seemed (2), use (2), grand (2), feels (2), falling (2), random (2), copy (2), inevitable (2), weekend (2), event (2), director (2), firstly (2), scripts (2), prehistoric (2), alive (2), obliged (2), worked (2), generally (2), since (2), wondered (2), loop (2), eight (2), knew (2), fairly (2), titles (2), limit (2), imprint (2), donkey (2), partly (2), highlight (2), modesty (2), talented (2), evenson (2), https (2), www (2), com (2), celebrate (2), strudel (2), mineshafts (2), welcome (2), narrator (2), supporters (2), isbn (2), spoons (2), ears (2), 2004, archives, dados, rosa, huw, rees, charnel, doze, tiddu, natural, gardener, nature, gloomy, seahorse, friar, horn, screaming, atomic, fez, letter, livros, areia, occidente, tartarus, nicholas, roerich, helen, finney, amy, botello, martina, aydin, gonzalo, canedo, helena, eflerová, whittle, artists, harlan, bruce, holland, rogers, allyson, bird, quentin, crisp, theodora, goss, cisco, stepan, chapman, aliya, whiteley, safaa, dib, brendan, connell, jeff, vandermeer, soares, elise, blackwell, amin, maalouf, goodreads, toucan, wikipedia, postmodern, mariner, tellmenow, isitsöornot, rhysop, fables, website, profile, united, kingdom, location, subscribe, atom, 1000th, talk, enjoyed, visits, climbed, pada, mountain, climbing, goa, festival, relief, somewhere, speak, married, forward, patrick, white, voss, wodehouse, pigs, wings, somerset, maugham, narrow, corner, 1982, janine, eugene, ionesco, bald, soprano, walter, moers, 13½, captain, bluebear, despair, loving, party, caught, concluding, anthony, burgess, enderby, stanislaw, lem, cyberiad, omnibuses, wasted, waste, price, pay, listed, slim, sampler, bound, printer, broke, separately, starfish, mount, abraxas, stylish, graphologist, oddness, illustrated, dubisch, immortality, alien, buddha, rubaiyat, wistful, wanderings, perceval, pitthelm, bear, strict, magazines, briefly, ballard, players, titan, wizard, killers, nicely, fantastic, schools, staff, reports, deep, ranging, novelettes, proud, soul, road, dynamiting, honeybun, carpe, tedium, simian, flipflops, rip, van, winkle, juliet, escape, zine, nightmare, abbey, submit, panda, supernatural, shouldn, lucky, situation, likely, increased, document, wordcount, ahead, yearly, surprised, 344, 919, divide, quote, friend, miniature, tragedies, accounts, voyages, discoveries, ironic, compressed, digested, snack, furthermore, outlet, spread, 250, case, devised, scheme, extravaganza, subconscious, offers, hourly, tricky, adjusting, microfiction, requires, challenge, enjoy, grips, tomorrow, relevant, amazons, 1104, survive, unspecified, disaster, translations, mordio, arranging, christian, veit, eschenfelder, translator, although, compare, bellos, translating, georges, perec, amazed, agreed, tackle, complex, showcases, fulfilling, integrated, its, core, twist, ending, smaller, oulipo, suitably, framing, device, tall, camp, night, portmanteau, painting, shuld, conceived, middle, illustrations, yee, haw, weirdly, honeymoon, captains, stupendous, less, mia, wolff, crazy, embark, brain, prompting, hone, down, 600, proposed, mild, obsession, legends, stems, impressionable, age, allusion, analogue, involves, teller, witness, tetractys, decad, independent, typographical, layout, snappy, elastic, longitude, globe, move, fast, crepuscularks, phantomimes, worse, restricted, hibernating, memory, britain, tory, government, yes, wit, whimsy, relish, bittersweet, ian, watson, brighter, indubitable, modern, sentence, master, concerned, topics, mythical, beasts, gods, dilemmas, metaphysics, trousers, bridges, haircuts, paradoxes, journeys, brackets, pretzels, dinosaurs, thunder, duels, kangaroos, dozens, ordeals, entertaining, official, per, drifted, featured, kristine, ong, muslim, jayaprakash, satyamurthy, feasibly, successful, similar, lines, sextuple, quintuple, quadruple, recently, fascinated, depends, sells, bane, imagine, summary, entice, deft, tale, becomes, exploring, questioning, definitions, humanity, discovering, crossing, deserts, forests, american, continent, searches, kill, meets, magicians, avenger, jalamity, kane, seeking, rid, menace, artificial, wild, robotic, demonic, bill, bones, normal, human, studied, mojave, shaman, transformed, driven, keen, justice, hunt, villains, killed, boss, newspaperman, ridley, smart, feverishly, frenetic, pacing, powerful, flowed, happiest, candles, untitled, record, appear, aardvark, caesar, concise, maintain, difference, surrealism, concepts, content, tragedy, mystery, paradox, equal, unified, timeless, weirdness, imaginative, playful, werewolves, giants, pirates, mutants, witches, elephants, mirrors, parade, majority, geometric, garish, whacking, within, allows, behalf, complicated, pythagorean, stood, sam, knight, premonitions, bureau, barth, sheer, genius, immensely, clever, satisfying, unit, weaker, secret, funhouse, engage, malcolm, lowry, instant, fan, seek, carr, williams, ultimately, stoner, william, gass, dialogue, exchanges, milan, kundera, enthusiasm, waned, kennedy, toole, brilliant, creaky, editors, pushing, revisions, knowing, confederacy, dunces, omensetter, luck, augustus, season, sinji, ultramarine, fowles, passges, dragged, magus, undoubtedly, decades, astounding, getting, choice, pale, fire, bristol, birmingham, exeter, ystalyfera, pontrhyfendegaid, hiked, whole, gower, coast, hikes, mid, podgorica, fair, montenegro, profitable, 3340, ambition, achieved, inching, closer, figures, miniscule, compared, appearances, thirteen, castles, south, egaeus, flame, tree, standouts, medusa, infernal, mysteries, whatever, conclusion, leaner, excessive, interest, lacking, ditties, note, 2174, 161, younger, engaged, vowed, involved, special, treatment, masala, manage, substantial, safely, glad, curiously, sagas, relatively, meet, armed, jake, leo, walking, skeleton, travis, bertie, bunny, grunter, cranny, faddock, discourager, bookmarkus, aurelius, silverfake, painter, elbigelli, illegible, signature, charlotte, creeps, malta, fibba, flobba, jones, blob, spooky, frightful, boo, jenkins, truman, quixote, gothario, boast, gusters, jellyfish, morton, meta, inserts, 1008, epics, sequences, overlap, cast, populate, frequent, visitors, evolves, dusted, promotional, purposes, starting, variants, spain, subterranean, pilgrim, progress, eschatological, epic, paranormal, picaresque, cthonic, pirate, wyvern, hypnotic, horizon, mesmeric, continuing, proof, universe, exciting, creative, brightens, lightens, burdens, convinces, font, exuberant, inventiveness, souls, wait, circle, eternal, punishment, assigned, pass, monty, zubris, travel, enormous, reach, designated, seat, journey, miles, asked, confidence, ahoy, plenty, trite, ditty, considerably, roughly, spherical, she, marry, peach, leek, verses, flying, saucers, revenge, tribulations, trilobites, meteorites, ducks, else, breath, quirky, option, amorous, earn, money, focused, approach, prove, rewarding, invariably, anymore, away, creation, finance, creating, schema, matter, occasionally, chain, contributors, jim, matthews, mala, mukherjee, suess, evershed, rob, tannahill, marie, lecrivain, temple, jason, rolfe, andrew, mitali, chakravarty, banks, danijela, trajković, reba, das, patnaik, macek, iii, neil, sanzari, goddard, glikman, mwangi, macharia, rebecca, lowe, vicki, roman, godzich, try, bought, animal, vegetable, mineral, wuxing, droll, whim, needed, issues, humorous, solicited, selected, formatted, uploaded, photo, washing, hanging, image, facebook, someone, ought, surprising, usa, host, retailers, excited, announce, concentration, admire, equals, embodied, disinterested, possible, willing, declare, true, geniuses, pessoa, borges, influences, calvino, particularly, meditative, simply, technique, same, primarily, standalone, dream, narrated, tom, zodiacal, interviewed, gone, equipment, obsolete, sound, beaming, surface, venus, stopped, splurge, amount, expect, monster, equivalent, rush, storybook, extra, appendages, split, sections, positioned, throughout, appropriate, places, collected, wandering, photographed, wording, inspire, box, arrived, designer, fondly, recall, obscure, egyptian, everyone, keeps, agree, grounding, easier, connected, classic, lord, creatures, darkness, notion, rewriting, reworking, suppose, roger, follow, pattern, goes, tangent, halfway, originally, rare, moods, marketable, daftness, chlorine, outer, androids, goatherds, shepherds, asteroid, ibonvale, 1994, considerable, gap, piecemeal, strong, cohesion, excellently, designed, creations, beautifully, multiplicity, infinite, layering, secrets, parallel, sinister, mysterious, pyramids, inverted, object, mummified, transform, geometrical, travesties, realm, nostalgia, sandblown, cut, mightiest, rivers, enigmatic, swirling, dust, millennia, nights, thick, accumulated, echoes, countless, alluring, exotic, arcane, focus, desire, archaeologists, webpage, information, narratives, obsessions, perceptions, subversions, forefront, contribution, unconventional, perfect, square, format, pages, exclusive, painfully, handcrafted, japanese, binding, usual, scarce, plus, private, low, cost, consisting, existing, appears, framed, culmination, comedic, stranger, incidents, graced, ruled, flux, ordinary, cause, adapt, demands, logic, perish, blow, fanfares, secure, head, tries, crashed, balloon, accident, leads, becoming, household, introduced, members, tribe, suit, armour, levitating, skull, reflection, woman, state, quantum, superposition, fated, flann, brien, surreal, application, logics, express, reflect, modes, ironies, modest, offering, homage, manifestation, admiration, fantastical, tragicomedies, 1920s, 1930s, anticipate, postmodernist, fragmentation, simultaneously, tradition, russian, deeply, hybrid, recurring, achieve, awful, hilarious, resonance, progresses, bricks, pedestrians, disintegrating, discovered, grabbed, shelf, impulse, ultra, dramatic, shards, pure, mitigating, factors, fragments, possess, profundity, echo, amplify, sometimes, distort, undermine, somehow, perfectly, thus, logical, beyond, incidences, daniil, premiere, 11th, venue, performances, arts, deal, major, contemporary, meantime, tickets, details, stages, pre, existence, guessing

Text of the page (random words):
so includes extracts from the book narrated by tom newton posted by rhys hughes 11 00 am 0 comments friday june 13 2025 the eleventh commandment my new book has just been published and i am delighted with it my delight isn t surprising really as i tend to be delighted with most of my books this one was published in the usa and the publishers were a genuine pleasure to work with the book is a collection of very short fictions grouped into three sets all the stories in each set are linked by mood theme or technique and the three sets are linked to each other in the same way but each short piece is primarily a standalone i guess these stories can be called flash fictions but for some reason i don t particularly like that description the texts are paradoxical and meditative and i think of them simply as speculations the true geniuses of this kind of fiction in my view were kafka pessoa and borges other influences on this book include calvino and barthelme both are always an influence on me these are the authors i most admire do i regard myself as their equals certainly not but i do believe my new book contains ideas that are wholly original and embodied in pleasing prose in as disinterested a fashion as possible i am willing to declare that the eleventh commandment is worth reading but it s your time and concentration not mine my task is over the book exists the paperback and ebook editions are available from a host of online and real retailers i am excited to announce that there will be an audiobook edition soon my first audiobook posted by rhys hughes 3 40 pm 0 comments sunday march 09 2025 flapping doodles the third and final gibbon moon poetry anthology has just been published last august for no good reason i took a photo of my washing hanging on the line and also for no good reason posted the image on facebook someone suggested it ought to be the cover of an anthology the following day on a whim i turned it into the cover of an anthology then i needed to create the anthology first i decided that this anthology would contain poetry themed on domestic issues humorous poetry mostly then i solicited poems then i selected the best put them together formatted the book and uploaded it to amazon flapping doodles droll domestic poems every year i try to publish one poetry anthology the first one was wuxing lyrical in 2022 and then last year was animal vegetable mineral i wasn t sure what i would do for this year but now i know the book is here and available to be bought and read many thanks as always to the contributors namely jim matthews mala mukherjee suess adele evershed rob tannahill marie c lecrivain richard temple tim anderson jason e rolfe andrew james wilson mitali chakravarty peter banks danijela trajković reba das patnaik j c macek iii neil sanzari paul battenbough james goddard boris glikman david rix michael mwangi macharia rebecca lowe vicki day roman godzich i was thinking about creating another anthology next year and i even had a schema prepared for it and a title the chain but i now think it s unlikely ever to see the light of day the fact of the matter is that i seem to be giving up the act of writing poetry and also having anything at all to do with poetry apart from occasionally reading it so no more editing or publishing poetry books poetry doesn t really get read anymore another reason i am giving up writing poetry is that it takes time and energy away from the creation of my novels and short stories i have found writing poetry to be a lot of work for very little reward either in terms of exposure or finance of course one doesn t write poetry to earn money one doesn t even write poetry for it to be read by many people but i have to be a little more focused in my approach and put my energy into the projects that will prove most rewarding to me in every sense and those are invariably prose books posted by rhys hughes 11 22 am 0 comments friday march 07 2025 romantic onion antics four months ago i asked which is the better title for a collection of quirky poems 1 romantic onion antics 2 amorous onion antics i finally decided on the first option romantic onion antics poems on your breath is a collection of verses about onions and flying saucers phantoms and revenge accidents and monsters tribulations trilobites meteorites ducks and who knows what else here s the title poem of the book i am an onion you are a leek i love you a lot but i intend to marry a peach because she is roughly spherical like myself and you aren t just a trite little ditty probably the least significant of all the poems in the book i think i regard this as my best poetry collection so far but my poetry production rate has dropped considerably in recent weeks i seem to be in the process of giving up the writing of poetry however i have written so much of the stuff in the past five years that i have plenty of unpublished material that i still hope will see print this new book consists of the poems i have written in the past four months with nothing earlier than that and so i can say with some confidence onions ahoy posted by rhys hughes 2 59 pm 0 comments friday january 24 2025 the devil s halo my best fantasy novel in my view is a subterranean pilgrim s progress it s also an eschatological epic a paranormal picaresque and a cthonic comedy and it has been published today the devil s halo is set in the waiting room of hell where damned souls wait to have a circle of eternal punishment assigned to them they pass the time telling each other the stories of their strange lives monty zubris must travel the entire length of this enormous waiting room in order to reach his designated seat a journey of several million miles for many years i have regarded each new book from rhys hughes as continuing proof that the universe is a marvellous exciting and creative place his work brightens my days lightens my burdens and convinces me that i am in the presence of a font of exuberant inventiveness paul di filippo reading is a mesmeric experience and the devil s halo is one hypnotic horizon after another a a attanasio many thanks to elsewhen press for publishing the book as i have said already i think this is my best fantasy novel to date and by fantasy novel i mean a novel in which impossible things happen the devil s halo includes a foreword by a a attanasio who to my mind wrote the best fantasy pirate novel ever a masterpiece called wyvern posted by rhys hughes 1 26 pm 0 comments tuesday january 07 2025 dabbler omnibus i think i can safely say that after today i never need to think about drabbles again dabbler in drabbles is done and dusted the omnibus edition has just been published there are hardback paperback and ebook editions of this huge book for promotional purposes i have made the ebook free for the next three days starting right now here is the link for amazon us but check out your own amazon variants for example amazon uk or amazon spain etc there are 1000 drabbles here with the meta inserts 1008 in total and they are mostly self contained microfictions but there are mini epics here too cycles and sequences of tales that often overlap with each other a huge cast of characters populate these drabbles many of them frequent visitors to the text as it evolves through the individual stories be prepared to meet three armed jake leo the walking skeleton travis the stick man curious bertie bunny grunter cranny faddock the discourager bookmarkus aurelius silverfake the painter elbigelli with the illegible signature charlotte creeps malta witty fibba flobba explorer jones blob hope spooky frightful and boo editor jenkins truman quixote gothario the boast gusters jellyfish morton and many many more not to mention polyphemus the cyclops who is telling the tales and chiron the centaur who is listening to them this project took a lot of my time and energy and i am glad it s over at last curiously among all my books my collection of mini sagas stories exactly 50 words in length has done relatively well it remains to be seen whether this collection of drabbles will be as popular i suspect not but who knows for sure posted by rhys hughes 11 55 am 0 comments tuesday december 31 2024 end of 2024 review writing in 2024 i wrote 55 stories most were very short and can be found in my second hand hands collection but i did manage a few more substantial pieces the garden path a novella one of my personal favourites of everything i have written i hope to write a sequel next year and maybe even create a novel from the two parts masala island a science fiction novella that might turn out to be the first part of a novel not sure yet special treatment the first lengthy chapter of a new novel that will be a weird western called the boomerang gang i also wrote more pieces for various story cycles i am engaged on including city life which is almost finished and i began a new fantasy series set in wales called my beastly uncle i finished my huge 100 000 words dabbler in drabbles project in four volumes there will be an omnibus edition next year but i have vowed never to write another drabble this project took up too much of my time and the end result was too small a reward for the effort involved i wrote a lot of poems but i do feel i am rapidly moving out of the poetry phase i have been in for the past five years my poems are only absurdist ditties anyway if it wasn t for borderless journal regularly publishing them i might have given up already i note that i have written 2174 poems in total of which 161 were written when i was younger i think this is almost enough for anyone i wrote only one article and no plays at all for some reason i lost interest in writing non fiction i love writing plays but they are never produced and only rarely published so my motivation has been lacking somewhat conclusion a much leaner writing year than last year but that s hardly a surprise last year was excessive published books growl at the moon telos publishing was my only trad published book this year i am very happy with the way it has turned out all my other books were self published but one of them in this poem i think is my best poetry collection so far for whatever that is worth my novella my rabbit s shadow looks like a hand was translated into german and published as der schatten meines hasen sieht aus wie eine hand among anthology appearances i think that my thirteen castles south in infernal mysteries egaeus press and what actually happened in medusa flame tree publishing were the two standouts as for sales when it comes to my work trad published in anthologies i have no idea what the numbers are but when it comes to my self published books and ebooks this year was my most profitable so far i sold 3340 books my ambition is to sell ten of my books every day i haven t achieved that but am inching closer these figures are still miniscule when compared with big writers out there other stuff i began the year in india i returned to the uk and spent time in bristol birmingham exeter swansea ystalyfera aberystwyth and pontrhyfendegaid i hiked the whole of the gower coast and did other hikes in mid wales i was a guest of honour at the podgorica book fair in montenegro and i have been invited back for next year reading the best novel i read in 2024 was undoubtedly pale fire by vladimir nabokov i had been meaning to read it for decades astounding in every way getting back into nabokov last year is the best reading choice i have made for a long time the second best novel was the magus by john fowles which despite some passges that dragged turned out to be a masterpiece i was also happy to finally engage with malcolm lowry ultramarine made me an instant fan now i will seek out his other work a season in sinji by j l carr is the best novel by this writer that i have read so far augustus by john williams was good as are all four of his novels but ultimately stoner is the only essential one omensetter s luck by william h gass has some of the most incredible dialogue exchanges i have encountered in fiction not an easy read as a novel though life is elsewhere by milan kundera might be the best novel i have read by him my enthusiasm for him has somewhat waned over the years and i wish i had read this one before the others a confederacy of dunces by john kennedy toole brilliant but creaky in parts i can almost understand why his editors kept pushing for revisions but they should have published the novel anyway knowing that he would probably go on to write even better things and it s a shame he never got the chance to do so as for short story collections lost in the funhouse by john barth is sheer genius however i can understand why many people wouldn t like it the stories tend to be writing about writing but they are immensely clever the secret of this book by brian aldiss is a late collection but one of his best lots of the stories don t work well but those that do are tremendous and the volume is satisfying as a unit despite the weaker material as for non fiction only one book really stood out for me this year the premonitions bureau by sam knight a good reading year all in all posted by rhys hughes 11 58 am 0 comments thursday december 12 2024 dabbler in drabbles 4 i have finished writing the fourth volume of my dabbler in drabbles project together all four volumes contain exactly 1000 drabbles the first volume has one hundred of them the second volume two hundred the third volume three hundred and the fourth volume four hundred this is a pythagorean number sequence and rather nice i feel there is a frame of sorts but it is contained within the main text the cyclops polyphemus is telling the drabbles to the centaur chiron some of the drabbles are told from the viewpoint of chiron but it is only chiron s viewpoint as imagined by polyphemus and polyphemus knows this and allows his imaginary chiron to know it too which means that the real chiron also gets to know it because he is listening on our behalf but it gets a lot more complicated than that there will be a whacking great big omnibus edition next year hardback as well as paperback i began this project when i was in india just over a year ago a sensible person would have used those 100 000 words in a novel not me i m not very sensible but i did learn something from this project namely never to write another drabble as long as i live and i won t the covers are geometric and garish that s how i wanted them the cover of the omnibus will be much more pleasing to the eye so there you have it dabbler in drabbles is done posted by rhys hughes 8 49 pm 0 comments wednesday december 04 2024 second hand hands my new story collection features fifty stories the vast majority of which have never been published before 47 are new these are mostly brief tales strange offbeat imaginative inventive and playful fictions featuring ghosts werewolves giants pirates mutants spirits witches elephants sentient mirrors and a parade of other odd characters i delight in...