Today is an insanely busy day for us. Caroline is officiating at three services, at one of which, this evening’s Nine Lessons and Carols, by candlelight, I’ll be reading one of the passages while looking after Tom. Also, annual afternoon drinks with Caroline’s colleagues, then visiting other parishioners, including a colleague of mine who’s popped over to see family, then recording a very important SF Squeecast, and on the same day we’re also having curtains fitted. Because until now we’ve been hiding behind conveniently placed objects. (I do think the curtain fitter should arrive with a cry of ‘it’s curtains for you!’) Tom may have a nap at some point (he’s kind of given them up) but we probably won’t. I had to shave my beard before dawn, because I knew I wouldn’t get time later today. So I thought, as a nice, simple blog, I’d give you a quick tour of my office.
From the doorway, to the left of the photo, you can see John Picacio’s calendar, his cover for Fast Forward 2, an anthology that contained an early story of mine, Mike Collins’ original art for my Doctor Who story ‘The Hopes and Fears of All the Years’, which appeared in the Daily Telegraph. Below is my Doctor Who display case, which contains all the DVDs, and all the books about the series I own, with a Dalek on top that was a present from the production office.
These shelves contain all my own work, from ancient VHS cassettes of Casualty, to DVDs, CDs, books and comics. Also, my action figures, including my collection of Doctors. On the top shelf there are a few keepsakes: statuettes given to me for being a guest at two Convergences and an Eastercon; a statue of the Black Knight; figures of Lex Luthor, Etrigan and Wolverine; bottles of own label beer from Convergence, ‘Felsecar Mead’ from an old friend, with an owl on the label, and red wine with a London Falling label; a magic pony that sings.
Beside that is the bookcase that contains part of my SF collection, with the Marvel Essentials atop the whole case. Unseen below are shelves containing my Bernice Summerfield and Big Finish Doctor Who audios. The original art on the wall is by Trev Hairsine, from Wisdom, my first US comic series.
We pass a window and turn to find my desk…
The original art on the wall is by Ryan Kelly, from Saucer Country. I have a Fortean Times mouse mat. And thank goodness you can’t see what some of the thumbnail documents on the screen are. That mug has ‘top Dad’ written on it.
We pass another window, and get to the last corner, where we find…
The bookcase has my awards on top of it, a BSFA Award for Best Short Story, an Eagle for Best Newcomer, a Doctor Who Magazine Award for Best Writer and one of two Hugos won by The SF Squeecast. Below that are the Bernice books, then my Fortean library. On the wall is Neil Gaiman’s prose piece ‘The Day the Saucers Came’, signed by the man himself. Beside that is the signing plaque DC Comics made up for my Action Comics appearances. On the floor, waiting to be hung somewhere in the house is John Picacio’s illustration for my Wild Cards story ‘The Elephant in the Room’.
Finally, here we get back to the door…
On the left is a Laurie Pink ‘Paul and Mike’ cartoon, which just has one of them saying to the other ‘you smell of paint’, and is an original sent to me by the artist herself. Beside that is original art by Jimmy Broxton, from Knight and Squire, and on the back of the door is a screen print of the London Falling cover that Lee Harris had made for me. The shelves below contain my London and police reference library. Behind the big white doors are doubles of my own work, a pile of role-playing games, and a rail with my suits on it.
There we go, now you know exactly where I am as I type this. To demonstrate that what I thought might be happening downstairs the other night turned out to be true, here’s our front room. How Christmassy is that?
Tomorrow’s blog, if all goes as planned, should be something very special: twenty well-known writers sharing the worst moments of their careers, in the hope of making aspiring writers feel better about their own mishaps. Cheers.
Please Feel Free to Share:
