Tag: Edinburgh

See you at Cymera Festival in June with Charles Stross

I was very excited to be asked to attend Cymera this year, and over the moon when they asked me to chat with the legendary Charles Stross! The great thing about Cymera is if you can’t make it in person (it’s in Edinburgh!), then they also live stream the events. More details below, and you can grab your tickets here.

Eldritch Gods and Other Uninvited Guests with Mark Stay and Charles Stross

Saturday, June 1, 2024, 10:15 AM 11:15 AM

The Pleasance, 60 Pleasance, Edinburgh, EH8 9TJ

Running time: 55 minutes followed by a book signing

Venue: Upper Hall

Price: £11/£8 concession – In Person – or £5.50 Live Stream – (plus 50p booking fee)

This event takes place in person and is broadcast via live stream.

A recording of this event will be available to catch-up on our YouTube until Sunday 14th July 2024. Ticket holders and weekend pass owners will receive the catch-up link automatically after the festival. Please keep an eye on your SPAM.

Find out more about ACCESS to our events here, and for information about TICKETS, click here.

Son of a Beach

It’s been a fun week with a trip to the beach at Whitstable to interview Julie Wassmer. I had hoped to get some lovely audio atmosphere with waves lapping on shingle and gulls screeching overhead, but the tide was out so I had to settle for a gentle breeze buffeting the microphone. Fortunately, Julie is great fun to chat to and she told me all about working on EastEnders, bumping off the locals in her novels, and why all writers should live in fear of a cup of tea and bacon sandwich. Listen here.

I finished the John Yorke Story for Screenwriting course. 16 weeks of pretty intense work. Was it worth it? Check out my thinkings over here…

I also got to visit Hachette’s new warehouse in Didcot. While this may not sound like everyone’s idea of a fun day out, I did get to ride on one of their pickers, which went some 25 metres in the air and the queues were shorter than Disney…

Also, if anyone’s concerned that print books are on the decline, this vast palace of storage and hi-tech distribution should allay those fears. This place was built to pump books out into the world and they’ve left plenty of room for expansion.

IMG_3103

I finished a short story this week. It’s a prequel to The End of Magic in which we meet our antagonist. My agent Ed read it and enjoyed it, though he did have one note: “Maybe the humour could be a little less lavatorial…? But that’s probably my shit to deal with.”

I do seem to have a thing about bodily functions… What do you say? Should I take this crap?

Also, I’m going to be on the new Dominic King arts show on BBC Radio Kent next Tuesday 12th at around 8pm. He asked me to put together a montage of voices from the podcast, which I did, but I’ve also made a “Guess the voice” quiz, which you can play here…

Till next time!

Mark