This is my latest newsletter that just went out to subscribers on 24th March 2026.

Hello fiends.

How the fuck are ya? Things aren’t really getting any better, are they? I do my best to stay optimistic and positive, but these are trying times. Someone said recently that the human brain wasn’t designed to know what the worst people in the world are thinking every fifteen minutes, but the internet forces us to know it, and there’s truth in that. Just the same as there have always been horrible people and fucking idiots in the world, but they used to be separated by geography. The internet has allowed those pricks to find each other and get organised. Like all things, the internet has been a force for incredible good and also incredible bad.

I was commenting recently how the internet is the last democratised media we have left. Oligarchs are buying up literally every other form of media, unrestricted by monopoly, content or even truth-telling laws, and the internet is the last place we can converse and share ideas outside of billionaire psychopath influence. Of course, they’re trying to control that too, with algorithms and Elon turning Twitter into a cess pit of hate and everything else. And it’s no coincidence that the absolute slurry of AI polluting every inch of the digital sphere is working exactly as intended. You can’t trust anything any more, be it images, video, text – the erosion of trust has been insanely rapid and is almost complete. Some of are continually railing against the rot, but so many people are either lapping it up in a post-truth haze (“I don’t care if it’s AI, it’s cute!”) or they’re turning away from the internet completely. Which might seem like a smart move – which is, in fact, a smart move in many ways, especially for mental health – but it all plays into the hands of the oligarchs who want to control all messaging.

Sorry, didn’t mean to get all heavy on your collective arse. The point I was planning to make, and there is optimism here, is that we need to take back the democratised internet. Things like this newsletter, our own personal websites, online groups that aren’t polluted by an algorithmic feed of idiocy and hate. All of which is to say that I can’t tell you how grateful I am to have you good folks subscribed and interested in hearing from me. It’s nice to think you’re here because you want to be and I’m not yelling into an abyss. So much social media lately feels like that, and all too often the abyss yells back.

So, thank you for being here and let’s all do our best to maintain these genuine human connections in a sea of artificiality and bigoted rhetoric. Real people get hurt by online bigotry in genuine and long-lasting ways, but real people can also stand up for those copping the worst of it. It’s essential, in fact, that we do stand up for what’s good and right. We stand with the most marginalised because we’re all in this together and no one is expendable. No one is acceptable collateral damage.

Okay, let’s move on. Before anything else, I want to thank my pal, author and all around good egg, Damon Young (yes, he is an actual egg, which is weird because he looks like a person, but there you go) for correcting something I said last time. I was talking about how summer was finally striking here in Tassie and I said:

Hot and dry with that uniquely Tasmanian sun that’ll sear the skin off your bones if you stand in it too long. That’s more to do with the state of the ozone layer above than anything about Tassie in particular, but there it is.

Well, interestingly, Damon pointed me to this article: ​https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-15/tasmanian-heat-feels-hotter-than-on-mainland/10705112​ which explains that the ozone here is really not an issue and it’s more likely “the quality of Tasmania’s air, which means the sun’s rays don’t have to compete with pollutants”. Which is kinda awesome, really. The air here is amazing. But just like every cloud has a silver lining, so does every silver lining, by definition, have a cloud. Clean air = harsher sun. Eh, I’ll take it. Just have to remember to cover up and use sunscreen.

Thanks, Damon!

In other news, things are moving along with The Rise. It’s been really well-received so far, which is a huge relief. All the early reviews are overwhelmingly positive. Please do help me spread the word about these books – your influence as readers is huge and word of mouth is powerful magic.

Otherwise in my publishing life there’s not much going on right now. Loads of irons in lots of fires, of course, but none ripening yet (it takes an award-winning author to mix a metaphor that thoroughly). Of course, I’ll let you know any news as soon as I can. I do, however, have some news regarding public appearances. You heard it here first: in April and May I’ll be a guest at events in the Gold Coast, Melbourne and Hobart.

It’s an absolute thrill to be joining the awesome Supanova tour once again. I’ll be a guest at Supanova Gold Coast on April 11th and 12th, and then at Supanova Melbourne on April 18th and 19th. That’s my birthday weekend, so hopefully it’ll be extra special.

Then there’s an event much nearer home. I’ll have a table at the Tasmanian Indie Author Book Fair in Hobart on May 9th and 10th. Details of those events can all be found here:

Supanova Gold Coast, April 11th and 12th

​ https://www.supanova.com.au/events/gold-coast-2026/event-home/​

Supanova Melbourne, April 18th and 19th

​ https://www.supanova.com.au/events/melbourne-2026/event-home/​

Indie Author Book Fair, Hobart – May 9th and 10th

​ https://tassieindieauthorbookfair.com.au/​

I will also be heading to Sydney later in the year, but more on that nearer the time.

What I’ve Been Enjoying

I was a huge fan of the Preacher comics back in the day (by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon, with incredible painted covers by Glenn Fabry). I only discovered recently that they’ve made a TV show of it. So I’ve been bingeing that. I’m currently halfway through Season 2 and really enjoying it. It’s close to the comics in some ways and quite divergent in others, but it’s hugely entertaining viewing.

I also kept seeing ads for a new movie called Ready or Not 2. I hadn’t even heard of the first one, so I tracked it down and watched that and it was brilliant. Genuinely bonkers fun with some really good lore behind the mayhem. And Samara Weaving is fantastic – I plan to track down all her horror outings, she’s a scream queen/final girl of the highest order. I can’t wait for number 2 at the movies now.

When it comes to reading, I’ll give that egg, Damon Young, another shout out. He’s a fiction and non-fiction author, an actual philosopher, and his latest book is Immortal Gestures. We’re invited to join Young as he “sheds light on thirteen curious gestures. Drawing equally from classical poetry and science-fiction, heavy metal and ballet, Young illuminates our varied humanity from prehistory to today.” It’s a really good read, delivered with intelligence and wit. I enjoyed it.

I mentioned Dungeon Crawler Carl last time, and that series is just going ballistic at the moment. I’ve read the second one now as well and it’s also great.

I’m a huge fan Luke Arnold’s Fetch Philips books. You might know Luke better as Long John Silver in Black Sails or Michael Hutchence in INXS: Never Tear Us Apart, but he’s a bloody good author too and writes a series of fantasy noir novels not to be missed. The fourth is the latest and it’s called Whisper in the Wind, which I will be getting to soon, but I’ve just read the third in the series, One Foot in the Fade, and it’s excellent. These books really do get better with every volume.

Lastly, I got to read an advanced copy of Joanne Anderton’s new novella, due out at the end of April from Bad Hand Books. It’s called Pixerina: A Haunting, and it’s absolutely fucking fantastic I genuinely can’t recommend it highly enough. Go in without knowing too much and be transported.

Okay, that’s enough from me for this month. Big love to you all, and remember, there are more good people than bad, the bad people are just really loud. So we stand up to be heard at every opportunity. Keep in touch, keep reading the good stuff and spreading the word about it, and I’ll catch you next time.

Al

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