twinmaker

“The Last Christmas”

“The Last Christmas” 

Visual vandalisations by Heidi Berthiaume, thumbnail by Martin Livings. I have excellent friends. Once upon a time, people believed in a fat old man who flew around the world on Christmas Eve, delivering wonderful presents to all the good kids and lumps of coal to all the bad. That was before the Water Wars, when […]

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The Reading of Recommended Texts is Recommended (but not Compulsory)

The Reading of Recommended Texts is Recommended (but not Compulsory) 

I’m obsessed with d-mat. (Does it show?) As well as writing Twinmaker and all the related short stories and urban myths and stuff–having huge fun doing it too, let me tell you–I was working on a PhD examining the history of matter transmitters, with a view to making other people obsessed with them too. Or […]

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The “Half Monk and Half Delinquent” Francis Poulenc

The “Half Monk and Half Delinquent” Francis Poulenc 

Clair Hill, the main character of Twinmaker, loves music. I do too, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that she shares some of my tastes. One of my favourite composers is Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc, a member of the French group Les Six (not a band name, but it would be a good one, wouldn’t it?). He […]

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“Crystal Clear”

“Crystal Clear” 

Because even in the future, I’m sure some people will still fall for pseudoscientific guff like this . . . Have you heard the one about the “Telecleansing” guru who used d-mat to “cleanse” himself of cholesterol? He died, of course: our cells don’t work if you take all the cholesterol out. What about the […]

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