• Sun, 15:59: BSFA Short Fiction and Non-Fiction, 2018 https://t.co/baAR7tSfsD #275
• Sun, 20:48: RT @davidallengreen: This thread is a summary of why I think George R R Martin does the legal side of the Song of Ice and Fire so well. I…
• Sun, 22:38: RT @alexwilcock: Happy birthday, Terrance Dicks, who wrote the first #DoctorWho story I ever saw. Without whom… So I most especially love R…
• Mon, 10:45: RT @DPhinnemore: “We failed to recognise the absolute unassailability of the four freedoms… Our mutual recognition ask was seen to be che…

Rounding up my votes in the other two BSFA categories (see also Best Novel and Best Art Work).

Best Short Fiction

No less than seven shortlisted works this year, five of which I liked. (Though this means there must have been at least a three-way tie for fifth place, which indicates a rather low turnout at the second stage of nominating.)

7) The Land of Somewhere Safe, by Hal Duncan. Second paragraph of third chapter:

So presently then, she’s snug in nightie, dressing gown and slippers, peeping into the kitchen to find Peter scoffing down his third bowl of cullen skink, and a clean bowl waiting for herself, and Mrs Macleod with a ladle: In and sit ye down, Lass.

I didn't really understand what was going on here – the use of language looked clever but it was too much like hard work for me. You can get it here.

6) Exit Strategy, by Martha Wells. Second paragraph of third chapter:

I crossed one of the multi-level plazas, where humans and augmented humans were sitting singly and in groups at scattered tables and chairs, talking, viewing entertainment media on the displays, or working in their feeds. Surveillance was tight so I started one of the new codes I had written on the way here.

Lots of people love this series about an anthropomorphic robot that is programmed to kill. Personally, I hate stories about cute robots, even cute killer robots, and this didn't change my views. You can get it here.

5) Phosphorus, by Liz Williams. Second paragraph of third chapter:

I couldn’t tell whether Essegui was relieved or not to see the back of me: we’d always been quite fond of each other–at least, I’d thought so–but since recent events she’d taken to looking at me sidelong, as if trying to anticipate what I might do. Or what I might change into. It upset me to see the suspicion in her eyes, but it also made me angry. Did she think I might turn on her? But in the dark of the night, as I tossed and turned, the little sneaking thought would come: she might be right.

I liked all of the rest of the shortlisted stories. This was an intense tale of family secrets and ancient mysteries on Mars. Wasn't quite sure how the two narratives hung together, but I enjoyed the read. You can get it here.

4) "The Gift of Angels: an Introduction", by Nina Allan (Clarkesworld). Second paragraph of third section:

In the image he talked about, the woman’s mouth is partially obscured by her hair as it blows back across her face. In my father’s moment of epiphany, Mum’s head is thrown back as she laughs uproariously at a joke made by one of her companions. They are seated around a table outside a cafe on the rue Linné, in the 5th arrondissement. The sun glints off cutlery, coffee cups, the rims of glasses. My father is walking past them, away from the Jardin des Plantes and towards the metro. Hearing my mother’s laughter, he turns his head. He looks straight at her, gazing into her eyes as into a painting.

Gripping atmospheric story of family and romance set in Paris a few decades from now. Heavily rooted in two films which I haven't seen, which is on me rather than the author, but that meant I bounced off some of the cultural references, and also it seemed odd that in a story set decades ahead, culture seems to have stopped in the meantime. Generally good stuff though. You can read it here.

3) "The Purpose of the Dodo is to be Extinct", by Malcolm Devlin (Interzone #275). Second paragraph of third chapter:

(1.1) Articles fallen upon subject. (Definition: articles struck subject at force, directly OR indirectly causing physical trauma which led directly to death.)

A fun story of cross-time-stream problems, the guy who always dies at the same time whichever parallel universe he is in and the attempts to work out what is really going on. Comedic tone appealed to me as well. You can get the relevant issue of Interzone here.

2) "Kingfisher", by Marian Womack (Lost Objects). Second paragraph of third chapter:

My dreams were getting more elaborate each night: the less I wrote the more I dreamed, apparently. I got some more reclaimed paper and cut each sheet in four pieces. Then I used my yarn needle and some leftover yarn to tie it together. I put the little notebook on my bedside table with a pencil. The first night I had carefully prepared it all, sharpened the pencil, etc., nothing happened of course. But I left it there, just in case. Soon I started filling the notebook with ideas for short stories, impressions from my dreams, strange landscapes. If Jonas had read it he would have mocked me. But I knew somehow that I would understand the labyrinth of impressions when the time came to sit down and finally write.

A very different, grim story of a relationship breaking down in a near future world where we have had environmental catastrophe and yet middle-class struggle against harsh economic reality continues, as does the battle against patriarchy. Vividly realised and tautly told. You can get the full collection here.

1) Time Was, by Ian McDonald. Second paragraph of third chapter:

There were enough clues in the letter for me to place and roughly date it. The references to Osborne House and the Heliopolis Club immediately identified Cairo; Al Max and the Western Harbour landmarked Alexandria. The line about hearing the guns placed the time around either the first or second battle of El Alamein. The front was only eighty kilometers west of Alexandria—Montgomery’s line in the sand—and on a still night, across the waters of Mareotis, notorious for how they warped sounds and closed up spaces so that a distant conversation was as intimate as a whisper, it would be possible to hear the artillery. I can’t imagine any troops being rotated home in British Egypt’s darkest hour, so I inclined more towards the Second Battle of El Alamein in October. A place and a time. Five minutes online would give me the British order of battle in Egypt in 1942. I glanced again at the letter. I suppose His Majesty needs his photo-boy more than I do. Ben served in Intelligence. This would be fun. It was then that I realized I had dreamed through my stops, and I regained enough presence of mind to push onto the platform as the doors were closing.

Fantastic queer romance timeslip war story, tying in lots of lovely detail (both historical and narrative) and building to a conclusion that I didn't quite see coming. Gets my top vote. You can get it here.

Best Non-Fiction

I'm really hampered this year, in that three of the short-listed finalists are series of review columns in publications that I don't generally read. I may get around to reading enough of some of them to feel that I can form a judgement, but voting closes in less than six days from now so it may not happen…

The remaining two are both good solid pieces. I am putting Aliette de Bodard's essay, "On motherhood and erasure: people-shaped holes, hollow characters and the illusion of impossible adventures", second of the two – it's a critically important topic, but I think also it deserves a longer treatment than this, and also I think that 1600 words is in general too short for a BSFA-winning piece. You can (and should) read it here. It is too short to have chapters; the third paragraph (plus footnote) is:

To put it bluntly, mothers are just not there [1]. While pregnancy is either monstrous or sacred, either body horror or the delivery of the chosen child, motherhood is defined by its absence. We aren’t characters: we are people-shaped holes. We are empty spaces or hollowed-out characters, whose sole purpose–when the story bothers to give us one–is to erase ourselves for the sake of our children.
[1] Throughout this blog post, I’ll be making a deliberate gendered distinction, because the set of expectations is vastly different between cis mothers and fathers. People who don’t fall in either of these categories (trans, non-binary people, and other marginalised genders and sexes) are even more at risk of erasure, othering, demonization, etc.

So my top vote (as of now) goes to Publishing the Science Fiction Canon: The Case of Scientific Romance, by Adam Roberts, a short monograph that looks at the links between the development of the book market, mass literacy and sf as it was in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I learned a lot from it, not just about the history of the genre. The second paragraph of the third chapter is:

This latter fact [better public education] is the horizon within which all book production necessarily exists: books, after all, cannot be sold to an illiterate audience. The UK Parliament passed a number of Elementary Education Acts between 1870 and 1893, and these vastly increased levels of literacy amongst the general population. In 1840, less than two-thirds of grooms and less than half of brides in England and Wales could sign their own names at marriage; in 1900, 97 per cent of both groups could do so (fully functional literacy, sufficient for reading novels for pleasure, would have been lower in both cases of course, but these numbers give a sense of the magnitude of the social shift). Similar moves in France reduced the percentages of illiteracy from 53 per cent of men and 73 per cent of women in 1790 to 23 per cent of men and 33 per cent of women in 1876. By 1900, both numbers were in the low single figures (Woods, The Demography of Victorian England and WalesLire et écrire: l’alphabétisation des français de Calvin à Jules Ferry).

You can get it here. Thouigh as I said, I may bump in some of the reviews if I manage to look at them in the next few days.

• Sat, 12:56: RT @campbellclaret: Good to see Dulwich-educated City trader and friend of billionaire private jet lenders @Nigel_Farage teaming up with ne…
• Sat, 14:00: RT @bbcdoctorwho: Happy birthday to the wonderful Fifth Doctor, @PeterDavison5! #DoctorWho https://t.co/Psd5qR0EnQ
• Sat, 15:37: BSFA Award for Best Novel, 2018 https://t.co/UAYCSx8DD8
• Sat, 20:00: My week on Twitter : 59 Mentions, 32.7K Mention Reach, 262 Likes, 88 Retweets, 297K Retweet Reach. See yours with… https://t.co/tP3jNVaDbF
• Sat, 20:48: RT @Longshanks1307: So I just re-watched the classic Simpsons episode ‘Bart Gets An Elephant’. It is 25 years old, but a parable for our ti…
• Sun, 10:45: RT @ttomholIand: tessa thompson as pringles: a thread https://t.co/btlJ5PwbI2

• Fri, 12:56: The strange death of Tory economic thinking https://t.co/JuS1S9MpVO Fascinating point on the biggest problem with t… https://t.co/Mgx0cE0i1V
• Fri, 16:00: Of 32 Speakers of the House of Commons since 1707, only two sat for Scottish seats (James Abercromby, Edinburgh, 18… https://t.co/QA4gomDeOg
• Fri, 16:05: RT @matociquala: How Game of Thrones ends: https://t.co/Iadt1RUztu
• Fri, 17:11: How Rupert Murdoch’s Empire of Influence Remade the World https://t.co/n0FCwaDNkd The inside story.
• Fri, 18:53: Script Doctor: the Inside Story of Doctor Who 1986-1989, by Andrew Cartmel https://t.co/lJppsbJmSx
• Fri, 22:02: RT @stellacreasy: Tonight over 70 parliamentarians stand with victims of sexual violence, and are calling on both the Home Secretary and th…
• Sat, 04:08: RT @lowflyingrocks: 2019 GN, 10m-22m in diameter, just passed the Earth at 12km/s, missing by 662,000km. https://t.co/LCs3YNLho3
• Sat, 10:45: What Do You Do With Your Life After You’ve Already Been The World’s Youngest Dictator? https://t.co/uVyR0gdVjW Fasc… https://t.co/znmbggiJn6
• Sat, 11:14: RT @BrigidLaffan: My take on the Brexit saga this week-key message—-The UK is discovering it is a cold place outside the room via @IrishTim…

Second paragraph of third chapter:

The following Monday, I experienced for the first time in my life the physical shock of seeing my name in print. I was leafing through Doctor Who Magazine and suddenly found I was in it. It said something like, ‘Since the new script editor, Andrew Cartmel, has just arrived, it seems likely that it was the producer who commissioned Pip and Jane Baker.’ Very astute. I was glad that people could work out for themselves that I was not responsible for Time and the Rani.

Another of the many books brought out for the 50th anniversary a few years back, which I am slowly working through. (Can’t find the Douglas Camfield one, annoyingly.)

I found this a really refreshing book. It’s fascinating to read it in contrast with Matthew Waterhouse’s account of the early days of the John Nathan-Turner era, and indeed Richard Marson’s account of JNT’s career and life. Like Matthew Waterhouse, Cartmel was already a fan before being recruited as the script editor for the last three years of Old Who, coinciding with Sylvester McCoy’s time as the Doctor. But he was a bit older, he wasn’t as invested in it, and although this was his first job in television, he already had had a bit of a career and also had a very clear idea of what he wanted to do with Who.

Most of the Who first-person books I have read situate the writer’s experience on the programme in the context of a longer (and often happier) career; this one is unusual in that we get little insight into Cartmel’s life before 1986 or after 1989. But it pays off in terms of interesting detail. One person who looms very large in Cartmel’s narrative who I don’t think I had even heard of before is Kate Easteal, the production secretary, who was clearly crucial to keeping the show together and is almost unmentioned in other writing.

Cartmel gets very much into the weeds of the production of each of the twelve stories produced on his watch, including some interesting gossip on the personal frictions (not least in his own love life), but more particularly on the challenges posed by an unsympathetic BBC hierarchy and a political situation where Cartmel was doing his best to displace various established writers and other stakeholders. Each story is taken as a narrative unit, which means that the book ends up being not completely sequential, as in real life the production of various stories often overlapped. But the payoff is that we follow each story from start to finish, and basically we fans are more interested in how The Happiness Patrol came to be than in knowing exactly what was in the production office in-tray in July 1988.

(Speaking of which, it was a bit poignant to hear of the death of Graeme Curry, writer of The Happiness Patrol, a couple of weeks after I had finished reading this – as I mentioned, I am way behind in bookblogging. He was only 54.)

Anyway, I enjoyed this more than I expected, and learned more than I expected as well, so we can score that as a win. You can get it here.

• Thu, 12:06: RT @davidallengreen: @aklagareSE Long-term followers will remember I covered the case at length in c. 2011-12. https://t.co/UDm4pMxjYq an…
• Thu, 12:56: RT @MrAComerford: – Misgenders – Deadnames – Calls trans surgery “mutilation” – Says trans people should learn to accept their bodies – Cal…
• Thu, 13:08: Geopolitics: Sweden vs the UK https://t.co/DDguRMkARz What I wrote about Julian Assange in 2012.
• Thu, 13:37: Bulgarian news piece about lobbying in the EU. I make an appearance from roughly 2:27 to 3:40. https://t.co/CW9mBHMlN2
• Thu, 14:10: Omar al-Bashir: Sudan military has ousted ruler after protests https://t.co/BoGLLlfc8F Couldn’t happen to a nicer c… https://t.co/P350LGxG50
• Thu, 16:05: RT @JamesKanag: Dire Tory performance with young voters is I think driven by 8 factors. 1) % of electorate which is BME 2) Expansion of Hig…
• Thu, 17:53: RT @lowflyingrocks: 2019 GV5, 4m-8m in diameter, just passed the Earth at 4km/s, missing by 653,000km. https://t.co/Jk3TikKfWL
• Thu, 18:05: Utterly fascinating. https://t.co/aWATEOpsv7
• Thu, 18:48: Expo 58, by Jonathan Coe https://t.co/0VEVLhZ1mR
• Thu, 20:48: Beyond the Throne https://t.co/x7VQb7KgnW Northern Ireland stories from Game of Thrones

• Fri, 07:53: I’ll be on @BBCgmu Good Morning Ulster in about 10 mins (just after 7 am UK time). https://t.co/GNjr3CmZVB
• Fri, 09:32: 4657 9443 6378 https://t.co/KFUako1d4w
• Fri, 10:45: RT @IrelandEmbGB: Ambassador @AdrianGONeill’s letter to @spectator @FraserNelson in response to Robert Hardman’s piece about #Ireland and t…

Second paragraph of third chapter:

Things had progressed pretty smoothly since the weekend. Over last night's dinner, he had finally told Sylvia about the Brussels assignment. She had been shocked, at first: the thought of coming with him did not seem to cross her mind (nor did he suggest it), and the prospect of being left alone for six months certainly alarmed her. But Thomas's reassurances were convincing: there would be letters, there would be telephone calls, there would be weekends when he flew home to see her. And the more he told her about the fair itself, the more she came to see that this was an opportunity he could not afford to turn down. 'So, really,' she had said – at last beginning to see the thing clearly, as pudding was dished up and she poured condensed milk over her slender portion of apple pie – 'it's a great honour that Mr Cooke has singled you out in this way. He didn't ask any of the others. And you'll be rubbing shoulders with people from all sorts of places: Belgians, French – even Americans…' And Thomas had realized, when she said this, that from one point of view Sylvia was actually willing him to go, already: that in her eyes, painful though the separation would be for both of them, he would grow in stature from this experience. No longer a mere government pen-pusher, he would become, for six short months, something much more interesting, and indeed glamorous: a player (however small) on the international stage. The idea appealed to her – even titillated her. And perhaps it was this knowledge, more than anything else, that lightened his step that Tuesday afternoon, and added a few imaginary inches to his height as he strode across the footbridge towards Birdcage Walk. He felt a sudden, unexpected kinship with London's seagulls as they swooped low over the water beneath him, revelling in the freedom of flight.

I'm always on the lookout for books about Belgium, and this revolves around the great Expo 58, which put postwar Belgium firmly on the map and whose legacy remains in the north of the city. Thomas Foley is a mid-ranking mild-mannered civil servant who gets sent to Brussels to oversee part of the British cultural contribution, the Britannia pub in the UK pavilion. He gets involved in some not terribly believable spying scrapes, and in an entirely believable romantic intrigue (the two are of course linked). The distance across the channel was much greater in those days before cheap phone calls, let alone emails or the Channel Tunnel, and there's some very effective writing about the difficulties of communciation. There's also a very lovely passage where Foley finds the site of his Belgian mother's home near Leuven, before the first world war. And there is a nice coda set in 2009, wrapping up the various plot strands, more or less. Not great literature, but entertaining in a quiet way. You can get it here.

This was my top unread book acquired in 2014. Next on that pile is 1913: The World before the Great War, by my former colleague Charles Emmerson.

• Wed, 12:56: RT @DrJaninaRamirez: I just heard a relationship die in Oxford. Boy and girl walking together towards the Eagle and Child. Him: ‘So you’ve…
• Wed, 14:58: Another classic shot of my bald patch. https://t.co/D7fg3wRj09
• Wed, 15:54: My first ride with #Lime. Still getting the hang of it. Use referral code RXFU4AL to sign up and receive one free u… https://t.co/9GCdAU8MqT
• Wed, 16:05: The emerging Boeing 737 Max scandal, explained https://t.co/5aCZDCTZ0d Horrifying.
• Wed, 16:14: @Tom_DeWaal’s book launch, at @Carnegie_Europe with @valasekt. (@ Carnegie Europe in Brussels)… https://t.co/QBANMGShfc
• Wed, 16:15: RT @nwbrux: @Tom_DeWaal’s book launch, at @Carnegie_Europe with @valasekt. (@ Carnegie Europe in Brussels) https://t.co/qTlrAGu94A https://…
• Wed, 16:49: RT @herszenhorn: Arriving at #EUCO summit having again failed to clinch #Brexit deal in London among her own party, PM @theresa_may focuses…
• Wed, 17:08: RT @brexitcountdow1: Brexit is 55 hours away. #brexit
• Wed, 17:11: RT @GameOfThrones: Not today. @Maisie_Williams remembers her first day on set. #GameofThrones https://t.co/HFQgctlkcl
• Wed, 18:15: Secret Histories, ed. Mark Clapham https://t.co/E0pSfbA7Vn

• Wed, 18:22: RT @Moedas: Fiction often inspires science, and black holes have long fuelled our dreams and curiosity. Today, thanks to the contribution o…
• Wed, 18:49: RT @JussiPositively: A year ago I predicted a strong chance of #Brexit collapsing due to the impossibility of getting a good deal for UK, i…
• Wed, 20:48: RT @JacqConMusic: Little know fact: The idea of the white cowboy originated in the cinematic days of John Wayne and was maintained because…
• Wed, 21:18: Thread. https://t.co/FkUsAp3Mdw
• Wed, 22:28: RT @BarristerSecret: He’s now literally trying to pick a fight with an automated account. https://t.co/9rmInBLtgo
• Wed, 22:31: Fair, for once. https://t.co/69wA8THJ26
• Thu, 03:59: RT @LeoVaradkar: And we’re done. (1) Flextension to Oct 31st (2) We’ll take stock of situation at our regular summit in June (3) UK to take…
• Thu, 10:02: RT @ElectionMapsUK: Fear not election enthusiasts – we’re having European Parliament elections! (Extension till 31st October, with review…
• Thu, 10:45: This is rather moving. https://t.co/50My2kTfGO
• Thu, 11:44: Julian Assange arrested at Ecuadorian embassy https://t.co/B6q17MUtsa

Second paragraph of third story ("A Gallery of Pigeons", by Jim Smith [James Cooray Smith]):

These events occurred during the period covered by the very earliest pages of the first volume of my memoirs of the Great War. I had been inadvertently swept up in the joyous crowd that celebrated outside Buckingham Palace on that, in my mind even then, dreadful day in August when His Majesty’s Government declared war on Germany and her allies. I would never have joined that throng by choice but I was busily making a home visit to an elderly patient in Victoria and foolishly attempted to make my journey home on foot via The Mall and Trafalgar Square. I did not know then, indeed I could not have known then, how different and how, in so many different senses, catastrophic that war would be, but I mourned its opening none the less. As someone who had seen war firsthand, and who has known many others who have seen it likewise, I could never celebrate the opening of a conflict, no matter how just its cause may seem. So it was that the excitement of the crowd, mostly young and mostly from the lower orders, shocked me greatly.

Hugo nominations behind me for this year, it’s back to bookblogging, and I have quite a backlog to clear, even without counting the Hugo finalists that I will have to leave until after Worldcon.

This is a collection of nine Bernice Summerfield stories, with a linking narrative by Mark Clapham which rather loosely connects them. It’s a while since I read it now, so just to flag up the two stories that stood out for me one way or the other. “The Illuminated Man” by Mark Michalowski takes Benny’s son Peter into a dangerous environment – captive of a freak show, where he has to unravel a mystery for himself. It showed an underplayed character in a new light. On the other hand, Eddie Robson’s “The Firing Squad”, which is linked to this and the Sherlock Holmes pastiche “A Game of Pigeons” by an insufficiently explained plot device, has Peter’s father Adrian in a rather ridiculous odyssey across wartime France, walking from one nick-of-time adventure to another. Nothing else that stands out now that I try and write about it a couple of months later. You can get it here.

Next in this sequence: Present Danger, ed. Eddie Robson.

• Tue, 12:56: RT @hugorifkind: Proper flash of age yesterday, getting a polio booster and remarking to the vv smart 20 something nurse that when I was a…
• Tue, 16:05: RT @emilylooked: friendly reminder that the “transgender debate” is verified, peer-reviewed science endorsed by the worlds leading health o…
• Tue, 17:11: Does Political Violence Work? https://t.co/wzxQbcfSPM “You’re more likely in America to be killed through auto-erot… https://t.co/synbnjnGU7
• Tue, 17:27: RT @APHClarkson: By 2016 so much UK analysis was so obsessed with supposed EU weakness and incoherence that you ended up with a state elite…
• Tue, 18:37: RT @AFP: #BREAKING Cross-party Brexit talks delayed until after EU summit https://t.co/EFQAb7XoS4
• Tue, 18:41: RT @adamfleming: EU27 ambassadors will tonight discuss a draft document setting out a #Brexit extension lasting “only as long as necessary…
• Tue, 19:08: Tuesday reading https://t.co/0G7Rgs0rlx
• Tue, 19:09: RT @eucopresident: There are times when you need to give time time. My letter to EU leaders ahead of tomorrow’s #EUCO: https://t.co/bAsz4Qx…
• Tue, 20:46: If I had to bet, I would bet that 30 June will not be the end. I would bet that we see an extension that goes on fo… https://t.co/roDVSFnxBx
• Tue, 20:48: The democratic swindle of the Spitzenkandidat https://t.co/c9jxl0sevQ I agree with @FrDe2059 – it was a bad idea in… https://t.co/n0HXhPtxEC

• Wed, 07:33: RT @zoyashef: For those who were wondering, here’s the #EP2019 #EUelections2019 emoji
• Wed, 09:06: RT @seanearley: This is the funniest thing I’ve seen on social media this week (via @darraghdoyle) https://t.co/3aJw8hawar
• Wed, 09:38: RT @JamesCrisp6: Two things about tonight’s #EUCO summit in Brussels… 1. Macron will NOT veto extension. 2. Britain is not deciding wh…
• Wed, 10:45: RT @jonlis1: What could go wrong? https://t.co/govX4QcN0l
• Wed, 11:28: RT @ThisDayIrish: This day 21 years ago – 10 April 1998 – the Good Friday Agreement was signed by the British and Irish governments. Descr…

Current
A Little Life, by Hanya Yanagihara
Daniel Deronda, by George Eliot

Last books finished
Before Mars, by Emma Newman
Combat Magicks, by Steve Cole
Time Was, by Ian McDonald
Publishing and the Science Fiction Canon: The Case of Scientific Romance, by Adam Roberts
The Land of Somewhere Safe, by Hal Duncan
Embers of War, by Gareth Powell

Next books
Troll Bridge, by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
The Botany of Desire, by Michael Pollan

• Mon, 12:39: APCO Worldwide is looking for a great Project Consultant at our office in Brussels – suitable for candidates with 1… https://t.co/PJErPZDojt
• Mon, 12:56: RT @alanferrier: This gentleman is Professor Daniel Muijs, Deputy Director of Ofsted – the UK Government Office for Standards in Education,…
• Mon, 15:49: RT @pmdfoster: @bopanc The fact May is travelling not sitting in Westminster talking to Corbyn seems to indicate that there is little prosp…
• Mon, 16:05: RT @dakami: Well, shit. https://t.co/c0g1gycolV
• Mon, 16:28: RT @UKPoliticalNews: Today is Theresa May’s 1000th day as Prime Minister.
• Mon, 17:11: Polish general who fought with Washington may have been a woman https://t.co/JkxbS2DiVy Misleading headline. Pulask… https://t.co/vLcwHkKspV
• Mon, 17:47: RT @NaomiKritzer: @nwbrux I am really frustrated by this spin. He may have been intersex. He seems to have considered himself male througho…
• Mon, 18:05: RT @chrisgreybrexit: This is obviously a restatement of a long-held position, but it’s an important one because many Brexiters continue – p…
• Mon, 18:41: RT @wallaceme: BREAKING: The Conservative Party has opened applications to stand in the European elections 2019. Email to candidates begins…
• Mon, 18:56: Hugo finalists – Goodreads/LibraryThing statistics https://t.co/ffmEkHaP7f

• Mon, 20:33: Go Time Ladies! #OnlyConnect
• Mon, 20:38: RT @faisalislam: NEW: the official Order that means it is now the law that the European Parliamentary elections take place on the 23rd May…
• Mon, 20:48: Change the narrative: how a Swiss group is beating rightwing populists https://t.co/Hyv5w2cRWz Fascinating.
• Mon, 21:01: RT @Aiannucci: I rather admire the way the EU is defending Ireland’s interests. They really do look after their member states. We should jo…
• Tue, 08:58: Nice to see some actual *ministerial* pushback on JRM. https://t.co/mKQgPOFr1z
• Tue, 09:09: RT @davidallengreen: This week is, or should be, a humiliation for the Brexit-supporting politicians and pundits who got us into this predi…
• Tue, 10:45: Another Leaver repents. https://t.co/M3nBgXK8B8

Once again I'm running the statistical ruler over the finalists for the Hugos – this year, more than ever. This has not often been a useful guide to which books will win; however I think it does show the extent to which they ave penetrated popular consciousness, at least to within an order of magnitude.

In each case, the books are ranked by the geometrical average of their number of owners on both Goodreads and LibraryThing. To start off with, the 2019 finalists for Best Novel:

All six finalists for 2019 Best Novella were published as stand-alone volumes, so we can do the same for them:

The finalists for Best Related Work include an online archive project and a series of Youtube videos, so I can't make a comparison there. That brings us to 2019 Best Graphic Story:

A special 2019 Hugo category, Best Art Book, has the largest variation in orders of magnitude:

The Lodestar Award for Best YA Book will be awarded under that name for the first time this year:

And finally, the 1944 finalists for Best Novel:

• Sun, 12:56: A Mysterious Infection, Spanning the Globe in a Climate of Secrecy https://t.co/O0oy3AFQ8d Candida auris, the fungus that will not die.
• Sun, 14:48: Jim Marshall: Sarajevo then and now https://t.co/sTpPQKMyXt Photographs from 1996 and 2019.
• Sun, 16:02: RT @jhcoakley: @LLocock I fear this shows the system working exactly as its originators intended.
• Sun, 16:03: The system is working exactly as it’s originators intended. https://t.co/TcFRSmRgvn
• Sun, 16:05: Agreed – a completely bizarre kerfuffle. https://t.co/nbR0C95zh1
• Sun, 18:27: Brussels of the Bront�s https://t.co/xP3HNB5srr
• Sun, 19:01: I did not know your mother well, but I liked her a lot. https://t.co/Jw7Gn01A93
• Sun, 20:48: RT @CatHallam1: Today, I simply wanted to renew my passport online. After numerous attempts and changing my clothes several times, this exa…
• Sun, 22:24: RT @MrBeamJockey: This commemorative plaque comes with its own recommended-reading list. #CharlotteBrontë #AlwaysReadThePlaque https://t.c…
• Sun, 23:03: RT @jasonomahony: It’s funny. The same thing Brexiteers want off the front of their passports is the thing they complain has boosted Irelan…

• Mon, 07:30: RT @davidallengreen: Good morning. Another Monday. Another week where the UK is set to leave EU without a deal on the Friday by automatic…
• Mon, 08:17: Latest from @JonWorth. I think 8% way too low for No Deal. https://t.co/RaR5udrKAJ
• Mon, 10:45: I was a strong Brexiteer. Now we must swallow our pride and think again https://t.co/Tn4XS9EPFI Very strong from… https://t.co/FETwhV4xbx
• Mon, 11:41: RT @APCOBXLInsider: #ALDE and En Marche #LREM. European liberals can revolutionise EU politics after the #EP2019, but face a number of chal…

I’ve been a member of the Brussels Brontë Group mailing list for many years, but until today had never been to any of their events. However, with the rest of the family away this weekend, rather than be at home alone I made a rare Sunday morning visit to the capital, where Jones Hayden was leading a two-hour guided tour of the sites most associated with Charlotte and Emily Brontë’s 1842 teaching experience at the Pensionnat Héger, and Charlotte’s return the following year.

Charlotte fell in love with the headmaster, Constantin Héger, who did not return her feelings; she mined this experience directly for Villette and also for her first and least well-known novel, The Professor. As a result she had a rather ambivalent attitude to Belgium and the Belgians, summed up perhaps best in the voice of William Crimsworth, the narrator of The Professor, who sighs:

Belgium! name unromantic and unpoetic, yet name that whenever uttered has in my ear a sound, in my heart an echo, such as no other assemblage of syllables, however sweet or classic, can produce. Belgium! I repeat the word, now as I sit alone near midnight.

I had already read a book or two on the subject, and I know the rather small patch of the city that is relevant fairly well – these days, I often start or end my commute with the walk between my office and the Central Station, and that inevitably takes me to Rue Baron Horta and past the plaque on the Bozar building.

But I discovered lots of new little things, like the unofficial plaque hidden in the truncated stump of Rue Terarken around the corner:

And I had never been inside the Chapelle Royale, a Protestant church since Napoleonic times, where the Brontë sisters would have worshipped. It’s an amazing little haven of mixed Geneva / C of E sensibility.

It was a good warm day for a walk. I got a lovely vista over the Mont des Arts to the lower city; the buildings on the Rue de la Madeleine, immediately to the right of the equestrian statue and the tower of the city hall, are probably a rare case of a streetfront that has not changed much since the Brontë sisters knew it.

Helen MacEwan, the founder and leader of the Brussels Brontë Group, stood at the top of the steps that lead down from the statue of General Belliard to Rue Baron Horta, which was built on the site of the Pensionnat Heger after it was demolished, and read out Charlotte Brontë’s words reporting from the same spot almost 180 years ago in The Professor:

I saw what a fine street was the Rue Royale, and, walking leisurely along its broad pavement, I continued to survey its stately hotels, till the palisades, the gates, and trees of the park appearing in sight, offered to my eye a new attraction. I remember, before entering the park, I stood awhile to contemplate the statue of General Belliard, and then I advanced to the top of the great staircase just beyond, and I looked down into a narrow back street, which I afterwards learnt was called the Rue d’Isabelle. I well recollect that my eye rested on the green door of a rather large house opposite, where, on a brass plate, was inscribed, “Pensionnat de Demoiselles.”

Most of the Rue d’Isabelle was demolished in 1909, but you can walk on the upper part of it in the vaults of the Coudenberg Museum.

Because most of the buildings have been destroyed and all the placenames changed, there are fewer opportunities to quote from Villette, but here is Jones Hayden at the bandstand in the Park, locally referred to as the Kiosk, declaiming from one of the few drug-fuelled passages in the works of the Brontë sisters:

The song, the sweet music, rose afar, but rushing swiftly on fast-strengthening pinions—there swept through these shades so full a storm of harmonies that, had no tree been near against which to lean, I think I must have dropped. Voices were there, it seemed to me, unnumbered; instruments varied and countless—bugle, horn, and trumpet I knew. The effect was as a sea breaking into song with all its waves.

The swaying tide swept this way, and then it fell back, and I followed its retreat. It led me towards a Byzantine building—a sort of kiosk near the park's centre. Round about stood crowded thousands, gathered to a grand concert in the open air. What I had heard was, I think, a wild Jäger chorus; the night, the space, the scene, and my own mood, had but enhanced the sounds and their impression.

A Jäger chorus did perform at the Kiosk in the Parc de Bruxelles on 15 August 1843, though presumably not all of the audience were quite as high on laudanum as Charlotte Brontë's narrator Lucy Snowe. By the time she wrote Villette, Charlotte would of course have become all too familiar with the effects of mind-altering narcotics from her own family experience.

There were 22 participants in our group, 19 women and 3 men (and one of the other two men had never read a word by any of the Brontës; he had come to hang out with his girlfriend who is more of a fan).

I was pretty proud of myself for struggling into Brussels from darkest Flanders on a Sunday morning; my bubble was burst by meeting two women from Austria who had come specially to Belgium for the walk after reading about it in their local newspaper, and then even more so by meeting another participant from California who had planned her entire trip to Europe around it. It rather put into context my own pathetic indecision about whether I could get up early enough.

I would recommend Brontë fans in Belgium or elsewhere to follow suit. The patch of Brussels concerned is really tiny – five minutes' jog gets you from the Kiosk to the Protestant Church or vice versa – but there is plenty to look at and think about. The walks happen every year in April and October, and are usually flagged up well in advance. And there is plenty to read about the Brontës’ time in Brussels to get you in the mood. It’s also a salutary reminder of the historic strong ties between Belgium and the UK, which the last three years of tin-eared British diplomacy have eroded so badly.

• Sat, 12:56: RT @gowri_chandra: an older lady asked what I do and I said journalist and she gave me a fist bump and said WE HAVE TO BRING TRUMP DOWN and…
• Sat, 13:15: ‘It is a religion’: how the world went mad for Moomins https://t.co/enM9TtE4WX
• Sat, 13:34: Behind the scenes at the 2019/1944 Hugo announcement video https://t.co/MTMXRhOHYh
• Sat, 14:48: RT @MykeCole: Absolutely brutal re-enactment of Demetrius Poliorcetes’ siege of Rhodes in 304 BC. The reenactors clearly illustrate that de…
• Sat, 17:20: RT @LisaMMcGee: Okay for those asking the Donna Traynor footage in Derry Girls isn’t archive, we shot it, the woman just hasn’t aged in 25…
• Sat, 18:39: Please do. https://t.co/aPGRDWc6qN
• Sat, 19:41: RT @robminchin: Politico have made a tool to see how many British Members of Parliament follow a Twitter account. Interesting that top Brit…
• Sat, 20:01: My week on Twitter : 40 Mentions, 492 Mention Reach, 202 Likes, 80 Retweets, 180K Retweet Reach. See yours with… https://t.co/PUzHaCWu8S
• Sun, 07:49: RT @pmdfoster: The final, inevitable knot in which @theresa_may has tied herself. Good tour of #Brexit talks here by @ShippersUnbound @ca…
• Sun, 10:45: RT @SJAMcBride: Something doesn’t add up in Theresa May’s sudden over-the-top concern for how Northern Ireland is governed. After two years…

• Sun, 10:56: RT @chrishanretty: I wonder how things are going in the parallel universe where David Cameron committed the UK to EFTA membership at the be…
• Sun, 11:24: Belgium! name unromantic and unpoetic, yet name that whenever uttered has in my ear a sound, in my heart an echo, s… https://t.co/BacGrCOTAZ
• Sun, 11:30: RT @greensideknits: @nwbrux Thought of you while reading this yesterday (from Edward Pickering’s “The Ronde”)… a book otherwise very keen…
• Sun, 11:44: RT @Feorag: @nwbrux Careful now! That could start a war.

Two years ago today, I posted about how the video announcing the 2017 Hugo final ballot was made on a rainy Saturday in Helsinki.

Two years on, to the day, this is the story of the 2019 Hugo and 1944 Retro Hugo video, similarly shot in Dublin. If you haven't seen it yet, here it is:

It's longer than the Helsinki video because we had more categories – 31 rather than 18, with the new Lodestar Award, a special category for Best Art Book, and 11 Retros. The concept is generally the same, but we made a number of technical innovations which I'm noting here for the curious:

Filming was done on two iPhones simultaneously, one for videography with a directional mike, fastened to a hand-held frame frame, the other with a clip-on mike attached to the speaker for sound only.

James Shields did almost all of the filming (I myself filmed both him and Catherine Sharp), and Fionna O'Sullivan did the lion's share of management of the process, so they are rightfully credited as co-directors. I decided the sequence of announcements (mixing 1944 Retros in with 2019 Hugos) and chose my own category (squarely in the middle), but James and Fionna selected the rest of the announcers (with some input from me and the Chair) and mapped out a very cunning plan for filming, essentially in two-hour-long chunks clustered around particular areas (Trinity College, Merrion Square, Dublin Castle, etc).

We were able to film across several days. The first few clips were filmed on the evening of Thursday 28 March, and a few more on the evening of Friday 29th; on Saturday 30 it was all-day, from 9 am to 6pm (and we kept precisely to the timetable, finishing in Dundrum which is convenient for my mother's house, where I was staying); and on Sunday we went to Howth to film Jim Fitzpatrick and then back into the city centre to do a retake of an earlier clip, where we had, erm, originally omitted one of the finalists from the script…

Editing was done entirely by Mark Slater. Each day's clips were uploaded to a shared Dropbox folder that evening, and Mark then worked on them ceaselessly from England. On reflection, it would have been much nicer for Mark if we had scheduled the release date for later in the week; there were only 46 hours between the last clip being filmed on Sunday and the launch of the video on Tuesday, and that's really not very long at all for a project of this length and complexity.

Unlike Helsinki we didn't include background music. The sound environment was tricky enough, and of course we didn't have a clear idea at the outset of how long the video would be.

I missed the Thursday evening filming as I was still travelling to Dublin. But I did watch the start of one of the Thursday evening clips when I woke briefly in the middle of the night. To my horror, the announcer said "nominees" instead of "finalists" (the latter is very much our preferred style). I went back to sleep, and had a nightmare that everyone had said "nominees" and we would have to reshoot the entire thing, and for some reason this meant me flying to South Africa through a solar eclipse while my luggage had been stolen in Belfast. (Dreams are weird.) When I woke up, I watched the clip in full and noted to my relef that the announcer in question had actually caught the mistake and said "finalists" in subsequent takes…

…except that Mark then advised that the take with "nominees" was the only good one, because of too much background noise in the other takes…

…so he successfully managed to paste the audio of the announcer saying "finalists" over the word "nominees" – if you listen very carefully you can hear the cut marks and note that the speaker's lips are not saying "finalists", but I don't think you would spot it if you weren't looking for it. (Go on – see if you can work out which clip I'm referring to!) Otherwise we would have had to re-shoot with a different announcer as the original person had meanwhile gone out of town for the weekend.

Mark Slater adds:

More obvious than the ‘nominees’ slip, was the announcement for 1944 Fan Writer. Another outdoor location with sound issues where the far and away best take unfortunately included the announcer say ‘Bob’ Wilson Tucker instead of Wilson ‘Bob’ Tucker, and then pulling a face at the end when she realised.

But it *was* the best take – so I changed the order or words and snipped out the funny face (she wouldn’t have thanked me for leaving it in). The loss of lip sync and the edit is far from seamless, but as no-one has mentioned it I assume I mostly got away with it.

I must say having re-watched it even after knowing about this heroic bit of editing, I can’t see it! So well done Mark.

I think a video like this works well if you have a historic city with dozens of potential filming venues, as is the case for both Helsinki and Dublin. I don't think it works in every case, and I encourage future Worldcons to think outside the box. I'd hate for a nifty city video to become part of fannish expectations every year, particularly considering the vast amount of volunteer work it requires. But I was very satisfied with the result, and am hugely grateful to James, Fionna and Mark for making it happen, to the dozens of announcers and other volunteers who participated, and to the promotions and web team for making the launch seamless.

And finally a group of us gathered in the Gibson Hotel to watch the video go live on Tuesday, as the social media team tweeted out the finalists. (Picture taken by Vince Docherty at the scene.) I got home quite late that evening, and am now having a quiet weekend to recover…

• Fri, 12:56: My Quest to Understand What Caused My Children’s Birth Defects https://t.co/pWqnBPIpZb Horrifying.
• Fri, 13:35: RT @deckie: @RonanMcCrea The European Parliament Elections (Amendment) Act 2019 specifically states how the final elected MEPs in the two c…
• Fri, 15:38: RT @damonwake: @dannyctkemp @laurnorman “…yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes it’s a member state competency Yes.”
• Fri, 16:05: RT @TomMcTague: An example of the diplomacy and PR Ireland has straightforwardly excelled at over the past three years. In contrast, Northe…
• Fri, 17:11: What the College-Admissions Scandal Reveals https://t.co/StRyTGG09Z Or, as the original title puts it, “They Had It Coming”.
• Fri, 18:20: RT @damonwake: This is both startling and wholly unsurprising. https://t.co/MTeeKADCni
• Fri, 18:58: RT @davidallengreen: A week today the UK leaves the EU by automatic operation of law, without a deal, unless something exceptional happens.…
• Fri, 20:23: So, would the UK be forced to join an EU army if it remained in the EU? Or was the UK in fact able to obstruct it a… https://t.co/GmxTuJTIE7
• Fri, 20:48: RT @GilesTerera: @Lin_Manuel in Houses of Parliament today I suddenly feel a hand on my shoulder, I freeze, turn round. A super serious loo…
• Sat, 06:32: RT @lowflyingrocks: 2019 GU1, 9m-20m in diameter, just passed the Earth at 17km/s, missing by 629,000km. https://t.co/33VikhDWBf

• Sat, 10:45: RT @JRowanBXL: At our meeting of the EU Employment Committee this morning, an official from Norway showed this slide about their Brexit pre…
• Sat, 11:10: RT @TheAndyMaturin: With all of this recent talk of having to participate in European Parliamentary elections; I’d just like to register th…

• Thu, 12:56: RT @EmporersNewC: Hello Mr Morgan, I’ve just seen this tweet. I don’t know if you were out of the country at the time, but let me respect…
• Thu, 15:51: RT @almostadiary: @jonworth interesting article, remembering what you mentioned last August about @theresa_may actually caring about NI/the…
• Thu, 16:05: China’s Influence Digs Deep Into Europe’s Political Landscape – Bloomberg https://t.co/FFoGNLS2wa …but it’s not a… https://t.co/mNt1uq2eJu
• Thu, 17:40: RT @davidallengreen: If you can take warmth from the below, then do so. Please. But the cold fact remains that unless something exceptiona…
• Thu, 19:12: No. https://t.co/Q2JY9cr11n
• Thu, 19:51: RT @GuardianHeather: NEW – hearing meeting of cabinet ministers in Downing St has broken up; and a letter is now being drafted to Labour, s…
• Thu, 21:20: Der Journalist Klaus Mehnert gibt in seinen „Erinnerungen“ ein Gespräch wieder, das typisch ist für Konrad Adenauer… https://t.co/2c4lvVpohx
• Fri, 09:09: How many MPs follow your Twitter account? https://t.co/v1rWwjiNZp Took a bit of cutting and pasting, but here’s m… https://t.co/xsP416Pz8n
• Fri, 10:15: RT @Brexit: Read Theresa May’s letter to EU Council President Donald Tusk, seeking to delay Brexit to June 30 https://t.co/DNExNJmDNT https…
• Fri, 10:28: I am switching back to optimism that No Deal can be avoided. Looks like TMay agrees that European elections must be… https://t.co/gHEjZ2XOoT

• Fri, 10:41: You say the sweetest things. https://t.co/EsgboFJIT7
• Fri, 10:45: RT @EoinKeane101: When I’m asked for the Brexit update at work: https://t.co/cbL6SsLU4E
• Fri, 10:59: I’m just generally friendly. https://t.co/a8ItnmxxlR

• Wed, 12:56: RT @ilgarmammadov: Today govt’s “one window” ASAN refused me a passprt & asked for a refernce from JusticeMinistry. TheMinstry will not iss…
• Wed, 16:05: The untruth about benefits DWP ministers keep repeating https://t.co/sCpDfaQX0Q
• Wed, 17:11: Awww. https://t.co/6R06En0uJW
• Wed, 18:32: RT @Peston: In some ways though this is the most symbolic vote of all so far – MPs not deciding on how not to decide on Brexit. 310 tie on…
• Wed, 18:48: RT @RobDotHutton: Today we have Cooper-Letwin. On Monday, We had indicative votes. And tomorrow morning, We shall have further cross-party…
• Wed, 18:48: RT @RobDotHutton: This is Malthouse A. And this Is the Brady Amendment, which secured a majority, Although it requires alternative arrange…
• Wed, 18:48: RT @RobDotHutton: This is no-deal, which was better than a bad deal But now might not be. And do not subvert The will of the people. They k…
• Wed, 18:48: RT @RobDotHutton: And this you can see is the People’s Vote. The purpose of this Is not to reverse the result. It is merely To check what e…
• Wed, 18:48: RT @RobDotHutton: They call it a final say: We knew what we voted for Even if we can’t agree: like Malthouse, And no-deal, and backstop, an…
• Wed, 18:48: RT @RobDotHutton: (Deep apologies to Henry Reed: https://t.co/J7fPiDUA4C)

• Thu, 08:53: RT @pmdfoster: This is #Brexit. This. All our woes and failures in one tweet https://t.co/Oa9K0225Yk
• Thu, 10:45: RT @carolune: Using poppadoms to determine the shape of the microwave’s standing wave #physics #inTheKitchen #science https://t.co/4RQzpj…

• Tue, 15:03: RT @Dublin2019: It’s time to announce the 2019/1944 @TheHugoAwards finalists. The video announcement can be found here https://t.co/ysM…
• Tue, 15:03: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for the 2019 Lodestar Award for Best Young Adult Book are: The Belles by @brownbookworm Children of Blood a…
• Tue, 15:03: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer are: Katherine Arden S.A. Chakraborty R.F. Kuang Jean…
• Tue, 15:03: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Art Book (1/2) are: The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition Daydreamer’s Jour…
• Tue, 15:03: RT @Dublin2019: 2019 Best Art Book (2/2): Spectrum 25: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – The Art…
• Tue, 15:04: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Fan Artist are: Sara Felix Grace P. Fong Meg Frank Ariela Housman Likhain (Mia Sereno) Spring…
• Tue, 15:05: RT @Dublin2019: For our first retro category, the finalists for 1944 Best Fan Writer are: Forrest J Ackerman Morojo (Myrtle Douglas) Jack…
• Tue, 15:06: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Fan Writer are: Foz Meadows James Davis Nicoll Charles Payseur Elsa Sjunneson-Henry Alasdair…
• Tue, 15:06: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Fancast Be The Serpent @serpentcast The Coode Street Podcast @CoodeStreet Fangirl Happy Hour @…
• Tue, 15:07: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for the 1944 Best Fanzine are: Fantasy News Futurian War Digest The Phantagraph Voice of the Imagi-Nation Y…

• Tue, 15:09: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Fanzine are: Galactic Journey Journey Planet Lady Business nerds of a feather, flock together…
• Tue, 15:09: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Semiprozine are: Beneath Ceaseless Skies Fireside Magazine FIYAH Magazine of Black Speculativ…
• Tue, 15:11: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Professional Artist are: Hannes Bok Margaret Brundage Virgil Finlay Antoine de Saint-Exupéry…
• Tue, 15:14: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Professional Editor, Short Form are: John W. Campbell Oscar J. Friend Mary Gnaedinger Dorothy…
• Tue, 15:15: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Professional Editor, Short Form are: Neil Clarke Gardner Dozois Lee Harris Julia Rios Lynne M…
• Tue, 15:16: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form are: The Ape Man Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman Der Fuehrer…
• Tue, 15:18: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: The Expanse: “”Abaddon’s Gate”” Doctor Who: “”Demons of t…
• Tue, 15:19: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form are: Batman Cabin in the Sky A Guy Named Joe Heaven Can Wait…
• Tue, 15:19: RT @dduane: It’s such a privilege and honor to be asked by @Dublin2019 to announce the nominees for one of the categories of the @HugoAward…
• Tue, 15:20: RT @kalanadi: This is an amazing list of new writers, I am so pleased! #HugoAwards https://t.co/vSFUneLnJu

• Tue, 15:20: RT @Books_Pieces: YAAAS, look at this best novel line up. Calculating Stars, Record of A Spaceborn Few, Revenant Gun, Space Opera, Spinnin…
• Tue, 15:20: RT @ClaireRousseau: Time to have #HugoAwards OPINIONS!!! https://t.co/o1G5O126bd
• Tue, 15:20: RT @joesherry: Holy shit! @ClowderofTwo Congrats on being a finalist for both Fan Writer and Fanzine!!!!! #HugoAwards
• Tue, 15:21: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form are: Annihilation Avengers: Infinity War Black Panther A Qu…
• Tue, 15:21: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Graphic Story: Buck Rogers: Martians Invade Jupiter Flash Gordon: Fiery Desert of Mongo Garth…
• Tue, 15:22: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Graphic Story are: Abbott Black Panther: Long Live the King Monstress, Volume 3: Haven On a S…
• Tue, 15:23: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Related Work (1/2): Archive of Our Own Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. H…
• Tue, 15:25: RT @Dublin2019: 2019 Best Related Work (2/2): An Informal History of the Hugos: A Personal Look Back at the Hugo Awards 1953-2000 https://…
• Tue, 15:25: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Series: The Centenal Cycle, by @m_older The Laundry Files, by @cstross Machineries of Empire,…
• Tue, 15:26: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Short Story (1/2): “Death Sentence” by Isaac Asimov “Doorway into Time” by C.L. Moore “Exile…

• Tue, 15:26: RT @Dublin2019: 1944 Best Short Story (2/2): “King of the Gray Spaces” (“R is for Rocket”) by Ray Bradbury “Q.U.R.” by H.H. Holmes “Yours…
• Tue, 15:27: RT @Dublin2019: Finalists for 2019 Best Short Story (1/2): “The Court Magician” by Sarah Pinsker “The Rose MacGregor Drinking and Admirati…
• Tue, 15:27: RT @Dublin2019: 2019 Best Short Story (2/2): “STET” by Sarah Gailey “The Tale of the Three Beautiful Raptor Sisters, and the Prince Who Wa…
• Tue, 15:27: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Novelette (1/2): “Citadel of Lost Ships”, by Leigh Brackett “The Halfling”, by Leigh Brackett…
• Tue, 15:28: RT @Dublin2019: 1944 Best Novelette (2/2): “The Proud Robot”, by Lewis Padgett “Symbiotica”, by Eric Frank Russell “Thieves’ House”, by F…
• Tue, 15:30: RT @Dublin2019: 2019 Best Novelette (2/2): The Only Harmless Great Thing, by Brooke Bolander “The Thing About Ghost Stories”, by Naomi…
• Tue, 15:30: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Novella (1/2): “Attitude”, by Hal Clement “Clash by Night”, by Lawrence O’Donnell “The Drea…
• Tue, 15:30: RT @Dublin2019: 1944 Best Novella (2/2): The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry The Magic Bed-Knob; or, How to Become a Witch in…
• Tue, 15:31: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Novella (1/2): Artificial Condition by @marthawells1 Beneath the Sugar Sky by @seananmcguire…
• Tue, 15:32: RT @Dublin2019: @marthawells1 @seananmcguire @Nnedi 2019 Best Novella (2/2): The Black God’s Drums by @pdjeliclark Gods, Monsters, and the…

• Tue, 15:32: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 1944 Best Novel (1/2): Conjure Wife, by Fritz Leiber, Jr. Earth’s Last Citadel, by C.L. Moore and Henr…
• Tue, 15:32: RT @Dublin2019: 1944 Best Novel (2/2): Das Glasperlenspiel [The Glass Bead Game], by Hermann Hesse Perelandra, by C.S. Lewis The Weapon M…
• Tue, 15:33: RT @Dublin2019: The finalists for 2019 Best Novel: The Calculating Stars by @MaryRobinette Record of a Spaceborn Few by Becky Chambers Rev…
• Tue, 16:07: RT @Dublin2019: Congratulations to the finalists for the 2019/1944 @TheHugoAwards Thank you to the volunteers who helped put this togethe…
• Tue, 16:22: RT @LordGrimdark: I have once again been disgracefully overlooked by the Hugo Awards. Some may say that my failure to publish anything with…
• Tue, 16:53: RT @Stone_SkyNews: Letter confirming that the UK is preparing for the prospect of taking part in the European Elections – a prerequisite of…
• Tue, 17:00: RT @HugoAwardFan: Dublin 2019 Announces Hugo and Retro Hugo Finalists @TheHugoAwards @Dublin2019 #worldcon https://t.co/ABX6OOYHR9
• Tue, 17:03: RT @davidallengreen: The UK is now in the worst possible Brexit predicament Only a momentous act of political will can avert a no-deal exi…
• Tue, 17:11: RT @alexstubb: For those wanting to follow the Finnish Presidency in the second half of 2019, please follow @EU2019FI. Oh why was there no…
• Tue, 17:38: RT @StefaanDeRynck: We can rework Political Declaration @MichelBarnier said @epc_eu But if Withdrawal Agreement is not approved, only 2 opt…

• Tue, 19:29: Sorry to miss you! https://t.co/oIleYEckol
• Tue, 20:10: RT @lowflyingrocks: 2019 FT2, 14m-32m in diameter, just passed the Earth at 27km/s, missing by 903,000km. https://t.co/vKDSmuhcht
• Tue, 22:43: Message of the day from a friend on Facebook: “Hi Nicholas, just FYI I’ve deleted that post you commented on becaus… https://t.co/Q0NT3q7kdG
• Tue, 23:30: RT @Stone_SkyNews: Sources in EU institutions v clear tonight that Brexit extension to May 22 (which was first offered at the last EU summi…
• Wed, 09:15: RT @FinancialTimes: ‘The UK’s current predicament on Brexit is now the most serious it has been since the 2016 referendum. It is as if a mi…
• Wed, 10:45: RT @cmpriest: Romeo + Juliet, 1996. At an um…let’s say pivotal scene, the woman behind us leaned over to her buddy and whispered real lou…
• Wed, 10:45: Secretary of State for Wales resigns. (I confess I had not heard of him.) https://t.co/hi5l4SZ0Ea
• Wed, 11:19: Apparently a junior minister rather than Secretary of State. A case of a person I had not heard of, resigning from… https://t.co/Kt8LCuXKlk
• Wed, 11:21: Yep, lesson learned. https://t.co/6EI5kJ74Ql

• Mon, 12:50: RT @anandMenon1: So, back to Brexit. And, with apologies for the delay, I’d just like to share some highlights from the @UKandEU report we…
• Mon, 15:57: I agree with @DamonWake. https://t.co/BTyHNjwkgn
• Mon, 17:11: RT @davidallengreen: The legal choreography of the United Kingdom’s Article 50 extension – and a serious problem ahead By me, at @Preiskel…
• Mon, 17:11: RT @SebDance: I’ve been sent this list by 3 separate Facebook users. Each demanding I explain my “support” for it. It purports to be abou…
• Mon, 18:30: RT @Dublin2019: We’ve prepared the ballots and will announce the finalists for the 2019/1944 @TheHugoAwards live at 1400 Irish Time on 2 Ap…
• Mon, 19:30: RT @piris_jc: HoC: a customs union with the EU, a EEA “Norway” or a kind of EEA with or without a Customs Union, are NOT “alternatives” to…
• Mon, 20:01: RT @ALamassoure: Honored to say a few words to celebrate the 5th anniversary of the @Eurpeace. Congrats on the work carried out for peacebu…
• Mon, 20:48: Killer Rabbits in Medieval Manuscripts: Why So Many Drawings in the Margins Depict Bunnies Going Bad… https://t.co/4nbAz5JSGU
• Mon, 21:39: RT @davidallengreen: Remember pundits will soon say that the outcome of the indicative votes was inevitable, even though no pundit can curr…
• Mon, 23:08: MPs again fail to vote in favour of anything. https://t.co/XLBP12cZXT

• Mon, 23:11: RT @davidallengreen: The UK still has no clue about how to do Brexit. Three years since referendum. Two years Article 50 period. Three v…
• Mon, 23:51: RT @davidallengreen: Brace, brace. https://t.co/9rPIhOUy9r
• Mon, 23:54: RT @joncstone: One remarkable thing is how few Tories supported literally any options tonight: 15 for confirmatory referendum (253 agains…
• Tue, 00:07: RT @pmdfoster: Given the lack of basic understanding of what a no deal is, and the apparently infinite capacity of the Tory party to negoti…
• Tue, 00:27: RT @nick_gutteridge: EU diplomat on indicative votes: ‘We‘re slowly switching off. April 12 is looming large and that’s now our real focus.…
• Tue, 08:00: RT @BrigidLaffan: Tonight is the night that I have become convinced that U.K. will leave EU without a deal. I don’t see how it could be sto…
• Tue, 08:43: RT @johanbjerkem: .@MichelBarnier at @epc_eu: if the UK so wishes we are ready to change the PD. If the HoC doesn’t vote in favor of the de…
• Tue, 09:12: RT @damonwake: ‘Boost’. https://t.co/7qdZsEM0c1
• Tue, 09:50: RT @SimonFraser00: I dream of a day when we stop banging our heads against the brick wall of #Brexit & focus on real problems damaging our…
• Tue, 10:14: RT @davidallengreen: Would query if UK now has any reputation as a serious negotiating partner. And the damage this will have will last ye…

• Tue, 10:18: RT @davidallengreen: For political commentary, other accounts are available. I have no idea. But from a law and policy perspective, UK is…
• Tue, 10:22: RT @mattholehouse: Unimprovable. https://t.co/PN4Y8m5gR2
• Tue, 10:35: RT @Dublin2019: Today’s the day We’ve prepared the ballots and will announce the finalists for the 2019/1944 @TheHugoAwards live at 1400…
• Tue, 10:45: RT @monicabyrne13: Here’s what the Joe Biden thing reminds me of: My Dad was a college professor. As I was growing up, many of his friends…
• Tue, 10:45: RT @nick_gutteridge: Michel Barnier is speaking at @epc_eu this morning, just after MPs yet again failed to agree on a Brexit way forward.…
• Tue, 11:57: The old House of Lords chamber of the Irish Parliament is one of my favourite spaces in Dublin. Unfortunately not o… https://t.co/vY5wiTXvAT

• Sun, 13:20: RT @stonewalluk: Happy #TransDayOfVisibility! To all our trans friends and family: you are valuable, valid and important, whether you choos…
• Sun, 14:48: RT @dlsgibson: There aren’t “legitimate concerns” with immigration. There’s facts, immigration overwhelmingly a good thing, and opinions, t…
• Sun, 14:56: RT @alexwilcock: OTD 1980: #Blakes7 Terminal The final end (or is it…?) Tragic, fabulous and still deeply upsetting – the definitive ‘every…
• Sun, 15:11: RT @DmitryOpines: 1/ You’re going to hear wild and contradictory claims about Customs Unions. Two reasons: 1. The Brexit conversation has…
• Sun, 16:05: RT @Beakmoo: Morning! She shrieked into the void. https://t.co/1pzc8ofljp
• Sun, 16:55: Weird to think that if Veronica Guerin was still alive, she would be turning 60 this year. (@ Veronica Guerin Statu… https://t.co/a8OIdVS5w9
• Sun, 16:57: I’m borrowing these words directly from a friend: On #TransDayOfVisibility, a reminder that trans women are real wo… https://t.co/24tehONE9r
• Sun, 18:58: April books https://t.co/mJcJLHQNV2
• Sun, 20:38: RT @PropertySpot: Ivan Rogers: “You can start with tub-thumping stuff, and red lines, and be lionised by your party conference, and describ…
• Sun, 20:38: RT @PropertySpot: Ivan Rogers talking to Swiss colleague: – Do your politicians seriously not understand that in the world where you’ve ex…

• Sun, 20:38: RT @PropertySpot: Link to the full event here: https://t.co/T4xHktHWW8
• Mon, 10:21: You say that like it’s a bad thing!!!! https://t.co/eGFbQhPmOF
• Mon, 10:45: Very funny!!!! https://t.co/kj1bDgXSYN
• Mon, 10:45: We cannot go back to a hard Border any more than Berlin could return to the Wall https://t.co/CuJHXtVW7U via @IrishTimesWorld