The latest issue of the Edinburgh-based literary and culture magazine One is now out. Excellent interview by Andrew J. Wilson with Iain M. Banks. And SF author (and one time Computer Shopper columnist and Linux guru) Charles Stross has a good piece on his recent trip to Japan:

“They’ve got our future, damn it! It’s not the shiny future of jet packs and food pills—oh no, that’s not what Japan is about—nevertheless, they’ve got it and they’re living in it.”

(Charles’ latest novel, Halting State, is now out – and seems to be generating some good reviews).

And before I forget, there are a couple articles by me in there too: Orwell’s Sound Of Silence and Orwell and the Scots. As ever, writing these features maintains my enduring respect for professional journalists who have to do this kind of thing day in, day out.

My very old chum (best man) Mr A.J Wilson is down in London for a few days. Good to see him again – and find out how recent fatherhood is treating him.

He is deep in the throes of anthology editing and gearing up for WorldCon in Glasgow.

For those interested, more info below.

http://www.writers-bloc.org.uk/comrades/ajw/

Andrew J. Wilson was born in Aberdeen in 1963. After studying English Literature and Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh, he went into publishing, and currently works as a freelance editor and writer. He is the science fiction, fantasy and horror reviewer for The Scotsman.

Andrew has published short stories in magazines and anthologies in Britain and the United States, including DAW Books Years Best Horror Stories, Markings, Fear and Scottish Book Collector, and he has also read his work on BBC Radio Scotland. His plays The Terminal Zone and The Black Ambulance Gang have both been performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the latter on a moving bus several years before Speed was shown in the cinemas!

He has also published journalism and criticism in a number of markets, including Scotland on Sunday, Dreamwatch, Caledonia and Metro. He has also appeared on television and radio as a commentator, and regularly chairs events at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.

Recent stories have appeared in Gathering the Bones, an international anthology published by Harper Collins in Australia and Tor in the USA, and The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric and Discredited Diseases. Forthcoming work will appear in H. P. Lovecraft’s Magazine of Horror and Sailing on Strange Seas, a tribute anthology to William Hope Hodgson.