In his foreword for the Writers' and Artists' Yearbook 2006, Terry Pratchett offers a wonderful piece of writing advice. For those of you trying to get novels published, you can't go far wrong with this.

He suggests that you read the trade presses very carefully. As soon as you see that an editor has left a publishing house, you should send your manuscript to the publisher, addressed to the editor who has just left:

Say, in the tones of one engaged in a co-operative enterprise, something like this: "Dear X, I was very pleased to receive your encouraging letter indicating your interest in my book, and I have made all the changes you asked for...". Of course, they won't find the letter. Publishers can never find anything. But at least someone might panic enough to read the MS.

Terry Pratchett, Writers' and Artists' Handbook 2006

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Iain Rowan on a wonderful Victorian invention. Why don't we still have one of those?

Markos Moulitsas shows a nice sense of irony in compiling this list of quotes from Republicans about the attacks on Bosnia.

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We went out to dinner last night at our favourite Indian restaurant, Omar Khan's in Bradford. The food there is great, the prices are quite cheap and much to our pleasure, they evicted a group who were being too noisy and disturbing the other customers. Most restaurants don't seem bothered because they're getting money in, but OK's were. It's a really nice change to find a restaurant that cares about its atmosphere enough to lose money in the short term.

Omar Khan's has a website. Don't go to it. It's crashed my browswer once already.