"An algorithm’s watching me, I am not certain why, It sends advertisements for things I do not want to buy, It makes me feel uneasy, that upon me it has preyed, And if I could locate it, I would whack it with a spade." Pam Ayres MBE (Hat tip to Sally Frise who reposted it on X, formerly twitter, today.)

Allan Massie, the author, columnist and The Scotsman’s chief literary critic who wrote for the paper for 50 years, has died aged 87. Mr Massie had been suffering from cancer and passed away on Tuesday at the home of his daughter, Claudia, surrounded by his family. It is estimated Mr Massie reviewed some 3,500 books for The Scotsman since starting at the paper in 1975, and he also contributed to the sports pages, where his columns on rugby and cricket ran for over three decades. Mr Massie wrote more than 25 novels, starting with Change and Decay in All Around I See in 1978. The Last Peacock (1980) won a literary award and was followed by The Death of Men, a thriller based on the 1978 kidnapping and murder by terrorists of Italian statesman Aldo Moro. His mid-European trilogy of A Question of Loyalties (1989), The Sins of the Father (1991) and Shadows of Empire (1997), was considered by the author to be among his best work. Widely published in France as well as the UK, he was honoured wi...

" Beyond the Rift " which is the fourth and final part of the "Transdimensional Hunter" SF quartet by John Ringo and  Lydia Sherrer was published today. It's available for the Amazon kindle  here . This series of novels is what C.S. Lewis used to call a "Bildungsroman" (a coming of age story) in which the central character is a teenage gamer, playing a VR game about a supposed Transdimensional threat to humanity. Unknown at the start of the story to her, or most of the people playing the game, it is not actually a game at all - the threat is real and they are really defending the earth. Distinct shades of "Ender's Game" by Orson Scott Card (which is at one point referenced in this book). A review will be posted this week, as soon as we have finished reading the book.  (We intend to get reviews of new books up quickly when they come out, but not at the price of reviewing a book before we have finished reading it properly!)   

The third and final part of the Dark City Girls trilogy by Michael Dalton and Adam Lance was published today (29th January 2026) for the Amazon kindle ebook reader. Dark City Girls is a noir fantasy combat story blending romantic and magical elements and either directly includes the main characters from, or references, more than half-a dozen other series written by the authors in what they call the "Fateforged Universe." It is a "gamelit" story, e,g, it reads like a novelised version of a fantasy roleplay combat adventure game, complete with character sheets with ability lists and combat stats for the main characters and occasionally some of their antagonists. The central character "General Zane" had been a major leading a cavalry troop during and immediately after the American Civil War. In 1867 he and some of his men accidentally passed through a gap between worlds and found themselves in the "Fae Wilds" e.g. a place where dreams and creations ...