August was split into three by two rewarding trips to Oxfordshire. I also wrote my first novelette this month, and the pilot episode I worked on last year is out! You can consume both for free through links found below!

Things I did

So, those two Oxfordshire trips were the main days of import this month. The first was staying at Magdalen College with my father and loyal reader of this letter, Nick! We only had two nights, but crammed a lot in.

Our usual first stop in Oxford, for the brilliance of their free exhibitions, is the Weston Library. The first was focussed on the Wonder of Birds, mainly inspired by a book by Jackie Morris and Robert Macfarlane. There were so many beautiful illustrations, interesting tidbits and poignant artefacts like a great auk egg and feathered costumes in the Codex Mendoza.

The second was focussed on pets, posing lots of questions and statistics, but the best bits were items like the original Roverandom typescript, some handwritten Pullman on daemons, and plenty of ancient depictions of animals from bronze statues and medieval mandrake-pullers to cats watching food cooked for Janus and an illuminated beastiary.

The Clarendon Building Muses are also being restored/remade, so I got to see some of them up close!

But you want to hear about staying within a college, right? We stayed in the new building, which meant a bt of exploring before finding our room up one staircase of many. But they were professors’ rooms, which meant I had a whole common room through my door before the bedroom! Our stay also included a full breakfast in the massive dining hall!

The highlight of that first evening was the eclipse! People were gathered on the lawn with a variety of viewing equipment and once the best of it was done we walked round the meadow in the quiet half-light.

The next day involved a lot of walking to places old and new, including Mansfield College with its chapel/dining hall containing all sorts of Nonconformist statues and stained glass, and great signs.

That evening and the next morning I enjoyed two more solo walks around the college grounds. There was something so special about being able to sit in those lovely surrounds, just watching the deer. I’d never seen so many fawns before. It took me a while to confirm the sound I kept hearing was indeed coming from their little mouths, a sort of goose-like bleating whenever they’d have to sprint to catch up with the rest of their family. It was also fascinating studying the behaviours of the herd at different times of day, like a shoal moving into shade or spreading out into different units.

This was all around Addison’s Walk, where I also discovered on the last morning, while watching a heron, C. S. Lewis’s poem by a gate, “What the Bird Said early in the Year”, which I’ve found in full on this interesting page. I also of course managed to visit the chapel without anyone else there! I’d forgotten how impressive the reredos and painted glass was!

The second Oxfordshire trip soon followed, for my volunteering at North Leigh Roman Villa. It was great to see all the new additions to site, from reconstruction paintings to all the new Roman-appropriate plants and skeps. I did the whole record-breaking shift, meeting some great visitors like one of the producers and locations directors(?) of the CGI film Dinosaur, and a Dutch teacher from the town on the edge of the Roman empire that I’d written about a few years ago now.

While up there, I also visited Stratford-upon-Avon for the first time in my memory. After reading Patrick Stewart’s autobiography, it was great to see all the RSC and related buildings!

I also went into the chancel of Holy Trinity Church. There were so many interesting details to study beyond the Shakespeare family graves, like the misericords.

And those medieval discoveries continued into the Guild Chapel, with this 1300s poem momento mori, the remnants of a big last judgement and more. The statues around the town, especially the Gower Memorial ones were pretty impressive too, so many quotes and characters floating around.

The Rollright Stones were next. A stone circle and series of other monuments still so set into their surroundings along the crest of the hill, with their views pretty much the same as the Neolithic. I’d seen a lot about the circle thanks to Cavan Scott and George Mann’s yearly pilgrimmage there. Discovering the variety of other features into Saxon times, and even the nuclear bunker entrance and modern day labyrinth in the woods.

A return to Oxford included St. Michael’s church, with its King George and the dragon statues, and whole history of the city wall gates which functioned as a prison and now a good viewpoint.

The William Morris windows in Harris Manchester’s chapel should be on everyone’s city visit list, I think. So dazzlingly designed, from the leafy patterns to the angels crowding into each window with successive orbs for the days of creation.

More colleges were ticked off the list as well. Wadham had lots of colourful glass too, one of the original Emperor heads from the Sheldonian’s perimeter, and a moving display of unissued diplomas to Ukranian students killed by Russia.

Keble College was a final stop on that day. It felt like the Palatine Hill again, the scale of the structures, also much like the V&A. The chapel there was like a Victorian Ravenna, with the original The Light of the World painting.

Minster Lovell was the final spot on the trip. After watching Time Team’s Digging for Disney, it was like my version of that, looking round the ruins of the manor and the decorated burial in the church. A highlight was the dozens of white doves living on site.

And yesterday for me was All Points East (APE) where I saw both half alive and twenty one pilots, was introduced to PVRIS and Ren, and just had a great day amongst thousands of likeminded fans.

Things I wrote

This newsletter…

Earlier this month I sent out a bonus email to you all about this year’s WIP Comics anthology, on the theme Dreams and Nightmares. If you donated, thank you so, so much.

Because we hit our goal! My first comic story in print is coming soon! And not only that, be we hit the stretch goal, so the book’s in hardcover! There’s not much more to say other than go and have a look at this preview of my collaboration with artist Asia Kazub on WIP’s instagram.

Another set of links for you to follow are this one, to GLUE the zine’s issue #3 team announcement, and this one, to their post about the theme of the issue, strings.

I’m so excited to be working with the team there again, alongside some familiar contributors and equally talented new ones.

I’m collaborating with one of those new contributors. The first part of that has been copying and pasting and taking notes in a four page essay of sorts, research for us to work from… but that’s all I’ll say.

I also rewrote an earlier poem and added a stanza with many images from my trip to Oxford or also gathrered semi-recently. I can’t wait for you to read that, and see how it might be presented. We’re really all working on something special in this issue.

I also penned a much more proper essay of sorts this month, not that either will really be seen by you readers…

The Other Side of London is a dark comedy drama pilot exploring the hidden reality of female homelessness in London, through friendship, survival, humour, vulnerability and the everyday experiences of women living on the streets.

Such an incredibly important story, told by incredibly talented people! Watch it now on YouTube and please share: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL4QgYKEujc

I was lucky enough to work as script supervisor/continuity on the project last August. Very rewarding to see it all come together, considering the changes we had to make on filming days. I shared my few bts photos on insta.

And the writer/producer/lead actor of the project, Marion, shared some candid insights into the making of the pilot on instagram too. You can read that here, and see some more bts shots of me at work!

Surprise! I wrote a novelette this month, to share at APE.

Here’s the link to read Bandito Camp.

It’s a story in five parts, based on everything twenty one pilots created for their fictional world of Trench, a saga told over five main albums, many music videos, countless online posts, and in person exhbitions. My interpretation centred around a character who organises the Banditos’ camp came to just over 16,000 words (which is why I didn’t fill your inbox with it!). Hope you enjoy the themes explored, even if you’re unfamiliar with the lore!

If you would like to see this story told in its basic beats (perhaps a good crash course before diving into the depths of my version), here’s the band’s playlist of most relevant music videos: Twenty One Pilots - The Story

2026 Projects Written

Comic: 1

Comic Outline: 1

Essays: 2

Novelette: 1

Pitch decks: 3

Poems: 7

Rewrites: 9

Short Films: 4

Short Stories: 7

Steam Page: 1

Things I gained

I am behind on my Star Wars comics reading I must admit. But I’m excited to see how both the Maul and Echoes of Empire series conclude or near a conclusion. I’m equally excited to read that Saw Gerrera one-shot. Saw is such an incredible character, with roots in The Clone Wars but has continued mainly thanks to Forest Whitaker’s portrayal in Rogue One - and then in many things after.

A big stack of books this month, gathered from such places as the National Trust book barn at Guildford’s Dapdune Wharf, various second hand shops on both Oxford trips, and from charities at home and in Stratford:

Top down, we have a classic if you like a would-be conqueror’s description for the information it provides on the people he’s trying to conquer. On the other side of non-fiction, inspired by Dan Smith’s songs about the writers as part of his album Ampersand, I’ve picked up The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson and Leonard Cohen’s Stranger Music. The Bauhaus book is also thanks to the various designs of the group that Tyler Joseph of twenty one pilots has been wearing on his lore-infused T-shirts.

On the fiction side, Nunslinger and Ascension were easy snags considering how much I love Stark Holborn’s factus Sequence and the fact that I was on a walk with Nicholas Binge at Worldcon 2024! I remember him announcing a film adaptation is in the works! I haven’t read any Ken Follet before, but knowing about his recent Stonehenge book, I thought his take on Anglo Saxon fiction would be inspiring!

Speaking of my writing, there’s some more books for research at the bottom of the pile, especially the upside down spine Perigord book with so many wonderful places I’ve visited including a map of the region I spent a good chunk of this May. At the very bottom are issued of the Tate magazine, containing articles/interviews about my two favourite exhbitions at the Modern site, the one featuring works of Hilma af Klint, and the other Anthony McCall’s Solid Light installation that wowed me two years ago.

Thank you so much for your continued support. And if you’re a new reader, I hope you’ll consider subscribing to hear about everything I’m doing, writing and gaining. Next month this newsletter will turn three! And I’ll turn twenty-four!