Hello there, {$name|default:'reader'}. I hope you're having a great week.

Thanks to those of you who sent me feedback on my thoughts about New Year Resolutions in the last newsletter. The replies were mostly confirming that no, resolutions like that don't work - with one exception. One reader resolved never to make another resolution, and so far has not broken that one!

I also appreciated the advice on touch-typing. Despite the fact my brain tends to be the bottleneck in the actual writing process, there are plenty of other tasks that would benefit from improved typing speed. Most importantly, though, is accuracy. While autocorrect and spelling checkers have come a long way, I still don't entirely trust them - and finding a bizarre correction or a homonym in a finished work is always annoying. The fewer mistakes I make at the start of the process, the better the end result will (hopefully) be.

There's some fascinating space news in this issue for you, and have you ever wondered who might respond to nightmarish creatures from the great void with a heartfelt 'oh, bother'?

Space News

Challenging Cosmological Ideas

One of the fundamental beliefs about the universe is that, on the largest scales, it's basically all the same. Sure, there are galaxies, stars, planets, huge things that exist in one place and not another, but to a cosmologist they're just little lumps of matter, evenly spread about the void.

Except... researchers at the University of Central Lancashire have found more evidence that this long-held belief might not be right.

A giant ring of galaxies and galactic clusters 1.5 billion light-years across is too regular to fit into existing models of the universe. Add to that an arc more than double the length 'nearby', and those models begin to look somewhat dubious.

Now consider these are the latest in a long string of 'inexplicable' structures, and the belief that we need a new understanding of how the universe came into being only grows. The leading theory is that these are frozen relics of the very early universe, when tiny variations in density were 'baked in' to the structure, and have grown along with the cosmos.

Whatever is causing these mega-structures (and no, it's not aliens), there's still a lot to discover out there!

An artist's impression highlighting the positions of the Big Ring (in blue) and Giant Arc (shown in red) in the sky.

Source: BBC News

Other Books To Check Out

I've gathered a few great books from independent authors like me, I hope you'll check them out.

And let me know if you have any books to recommend! I'm particularly interested in indie authors, but anything you've read and loved would be awesome.

Free!

A Madam, a Tinker, and a Resurrected Cat

Cover of 'The Obstructed Engine'

storyoriginapp.com

This prequel short story to "The Adventures of Bodacious Creed" reveals how Anna Lynn Boyd, young brothel madam and secret inventor, resurrected her pet cat, met her partner Jonny, and how Jonny became mute. There's science, adventure, heartbreak, and love in this tale that won an honourable mention in the Writers of the Future Contest.

Buy Now!

storyoriginapp.com

Cover of 'The Guardian of the Palace'

Everyone knows magic isn't real.

Alien invaders? Ha!

But something destroyed an entire skyscraper in a never-before-seen implosion. Can one skeptical security guard stand between monsters and magic that threaten the world?

Disillusioned with her military career, Red Hernandez crawled back to civilian life as a second tier security lead for an engineering marvel meant to cram more people into the tiny island of Manhattan. She expected her biggest struggles to be integrating back into a society where social media and closet space reigned supreme. But when mysterious forces destroy a building similar to the one she's chartered to protect, in an implosive blast never before seen, all notions of a cushy retirement job go up in smoke.

With lives on the line, but big money pushing to continue construction, Red finds the steely determination that she'd lost in the desert of her past. Monsters lurk in the shadows, forcing her to re-evaluate everything she believed to be true... and all that she imagined.

Can one woman save the world, or will disbelief be her undoing?

Strange News

Who is the Cerne Abbas Giant?

The Cerne Abbas Giant, carved into a chalky hillside in Dorset

For a long time, the Cerne Abbas Giant was shrouded in mystery (his only cover, since he's a stark naked figure). He was believed to either be a stone-age creation, or a more modern piece of work until as recently as 2021. That's when scientists examined the materials in the carving and decided he was a 10th Century creation, dating him to the Saxon period.

The new theory is that he was carved as a morale-boosting image of Hercules, prominent on the hillside where troops would have mustered before riding out to battle the Viking invaders. I had always remembered that the Vikings held sway in the North of England, not the south, but this article helpfully points out that:

the first recorded encounter between an Anglo-Saxon and a Viking raiding party was at Portland, just 16 miles south.

Hercules was at that time held as a model of masculinity and a warrior, so the choice of him as an idol would make sense. And given that armies tend to have a lot of time on their hands while readying for battle, it's not impossible that idle soldiers might have been pressed into service to carve him for the first time.

Source: The Guardian

Other Books To Check Out

storyoriginapp.com

Woo-niverse GIVEAWAYS to Keep You Warm & Cozy: Fantasy, Paranormal, Supernatural, Magical Realism, and Sci-Fi

Take your pick from a vast collection of completely free books running the spectrum from epic fantasy, science fiction, cosy tales and even horror. Perfect to while away the chilly January nights.

Get these books before the giveaway ends on February 13th!

Miscellany

A cryptogram hidden inside a silk dress reveals... the weather in 1888?

Source: noaa.gov

The Kingdom of Books in Hay-on-Wye. Features castles and cannons!

Source: Atlas Obscura

Winnie the Pooh and H.P. Lovecraft's works are all in the public domain now. So a crossover was inevitable...

Source: threadreaderapp.com

And Finally

My writing hasn't been all that productive lately.

My flash fiction project, 'An A to Z of British Myths' has fallen behind, so I'll be resurrecting that very soon. I am very much enjoying it, but real-life events got in the way for a while. Nothing to worry about, all is well, but as I heard someone say recently:

I try to take life one day at a time, but lately several days have ambushed me all at once.

And I'm still struggling with the edits on the next 'Fairies' book, so I've decided to set it aside again while I let my unconscious mind have a crack at it. Something isn't right with it, and I can't seem to figure it out. It'll come to me, sooner or later.

While these have been stewing away, I've not been idle! I've noodled on a few other ideas (sometimes working on a project that's in a different phase of development can unlock the motivation) and been doing some long-overdue admin. The Martian series is being advertised more widely now, and to my immense gratitude people are picking it up and enjoying it!

Which is why I'm going to focus on book three in the series! This will bring the story of the second Martian invasion to a close, and I have some very interesting ideas for how to do that... My poor characters, though, might well resent the things I'm going to put them through.

I've also been reading more, making time to do that rather than mindlessly scrolling YouTube or Netflix looking for something to watch. I have an embarrassingly large 'To Be Read' pile, so it feels great to get back to slowly demolishing it.

What do you do, when things grind to a halt? I find changing things up, working on something new, or even just a change of scenery can work wonders. Going for a walk has helped me out of a 'block' more than once...