The Hole in the Zero

      “We aren’t going to get through,” said Kraag.
      “No,” said Paradine, rising to his feet.
      Merganser began to laugh uncontrollably. "You— Boss Kraag— Miss Helena—Warden— me— did we know— what we were looking for? Perhaps it's here— in the nothing."
      "Look," said Helena, "oh what does it mean?" She pointed to the monitor screens where the patterns had now frozen, but flickered slowly on and off.
      "Stasis," "said Paradine, "dimensional inversion, total instability."

The Centauri Device

Well, there's always a plus side. I'm in hospital again, and a bit stuck for reading. But among the books in Richard's Room, the little family/chillout room next to the Yeo Ward in Exeter's RD&E - amid Cookson, Cussler, King, Cornell, Helen Fielding ... aaargh! ... I did find just one good book, one I haven't read for around 35 years, M. John Harrison's classic SF novel The Centauri Device.

Apart from that, how did you enjoy the visit?

Sorry, but I keep finding Blackgang Chine out-takes. This one's from The Quiver and a serialised inspirational novel Borne Back, by Emma E Hornibrook, another late-Victorian writer with more credits than you'd think (cue bibliography).

When London meets Japan

The author Douglas Sladen - writer of the May 1895 Windsor Magazine piece "Odd Scenes in Japanese Streets" - rang bells, though I've never written about him on JSBlog. It eventually dawned on me that I'd mentioned him in A Wren-like Note as a neighbour of Maxwell Gray after she moved to Richmond.

The Amè-ya

Further to Blossoms from a Japanese Garden (5 June 2015), I just had to check the context on this one. What exactly was an Amè-ya, the vendor celebrated in the first poem in Mary Fenollosa's 1913 illustrated collection of poems for children, Blossoms from a Japanese garden: A Book of Child-Verses? I'll quote first.

Blossoms from a Japanese Garden

Blossoms from a Japanese Garden by Mary Fenollosa: cover image found during a quick camera purge.

The Reades' ministry: Blackgang and Punrooty

Another Blackgang, Isle of Wight, story: "Mr. Charles Reid, at Blackgang, in the Isle of Wight, is indefatigable in calling the sinner to sobriety.” notes the author of Drink: the Vice and the Disease, in the October 1875 London Quarterly Review. This one-liner spins off into an unusual saga of 19th century missionary activity by unlikely people in unlikely places.

At a Month's End: part 3

Continuing with part 3 of At a Month's End: leaves from the diary of a man of the time, told in three parts in London Society magazine in 1887: one of the less findable Bertha Thomas stories I decided to rescue from archive limbo, in part for its Devon interest.

An Episode at Blackgang Chine

A purge of 'out-takes' from a recent post series - see Blackgang Chine, March 2015 - finds this rather static romance story in an 1878 Tinsleys' Magazine, and a slight bibliographic puzzle relating to the authorship of two obscure 1870s novels.

At a Month's End: part 2

Continuing with part 2 of At a Month's End: leaves from the diary of a man of the time, told in three parts in London Society magazine in 1887: one of the less findable Bertha Thomas stories I decided to rescue from archive limbo, in part for its Devon interest.