Who the fuck blogs these days?  Certainly not me.  The last post I wrote – a magnificent review of Yoon Ha Lee’s Revenant Gun was published back in late July.

Still, I thought I’d give it another crack.  Essentially, I’ll be re-posting (to one extent or another) my garbled thoughts and reviews on Facebook.  So if you’re friends with me there you’re unlikely to see anything new here… unless you hate Facebook and would rather read a blog.  I’m sure I’ll keep things going for at least a month, maybe three.

Anyway, while I’m still motivated, (new year gloss and all that), this post from the brilliant Nina Allan sets a goal to read at least 19 books not published in 2019.

I’ve read a couple of books on her list (she’s going to love Martin John), and there’s a couple more that I’ve also been meaning to read for years.

Even before I started reviewing for Locus, my focus was always on reading new fiction. Part of this was FOMO, and part of this was keeping up to date with works from up and coming authors (which I suppose is also FOMO). Then there’s my recent tradition of reading award longlists. I’ve cut this back, but essentially the last third of the year is made up of reading the Man Booker, National Book Award and Goldsmiths Prize nominees.

The point is I need to make time for older stuff. Nina has chosen 19 pre-2019 books to read. I’m sure I can achieve a similar number. But to make it a tad more difficult it will need to be novels that were published before 2018.

Also, I have to finish journey through Iain M. Banks Culture novels.  And I had no idea there was a new book out from Will Wiles this year – Plume out in May.