Podcasts about silkworm

Milk worms, silkworms, and webs - oh my! It was a Silkworm September. From Chicago to Northern Ireland, where are we now? Some find it amazing we get out much at all. This week on Outlook - sister/co-host Kerry's recovering from another sickness and makes good use of the “mute” button, brother/co-host Brian is raving about his double Silkworm dream trip, and BF (3rd co-host Barry) he's researching all the things transplant patients can't take for symptom relief. For this Mixed Bag episode, Brian's sharing about his latest travel stories and adventures of music community gathering together in Chicago. He's making new friends, having merch made truly accessible and inclusive, and sharing a few clips of the songs that brought him to the States to begin with, for the second time this year. Kerry's back with Barry, in his flat, and on the sofa with guide dog Oyster as Barry relays a recent dreadful story, as September moves into October's Blindness Awareness Month, of the truly taxing and trying horror of being manhandled by ignorant people in public and community spaces who put their hands on you first and ask questions “never." As we go into BAM (as we call it) there's very little “awareness” of Blindness by the public. As the saying goes: when someone closes a door, they close another, and put up a sign which helps no blind person ever. September is also Pain Awareness Month, on the last day of September it's the National Day For Truth and Reconciliation, and we're here for all of it with music for our final show for our Outlook anniversary month as we talk church acoustics, assault, doubling down, and much much more. The Silkworm and Dianogah music featured in this episode was lifted from the following videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FKQFKTP1iE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQOUj_bWykg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmKxMODNpz8

Nick and John have posted eight Hallmarked Man conversations since its publication last month and, as interesting as their back-and-forth talks have been, South Wales to American Fly Over Country, Lake to Shed, much of the best theorizing and interpreting of Strike 8 has been happening in the comment threads beneath those posts and in email messaging with John. Determined that these insights wouldn't be lost or invisible to Serious Strikers, they chose ten of the most challenging for a fun introduction to the fandom conversations readers not privy to the backchannel moderators network or who neglect the comment threads are missing.In addition, Nick shares the credible speculation that Rowling's weeklong absence from tweeting has been because she is on her Samsara yacht in the South Pacific, circling Bora Bora, believe it or don't. John quizzes Nick, too, about the election in South Wales, Caerphilly to be exact, and the reason the results in that dependably Labour area have the UK buzzing (and why Strike readers might expect the populist party victories will color Strikes 9 and 10).A quick ‘table of contents' for their hasty review, then, followed by links and transcripts! Enjoy — and, yes, have at in the comment threads, please, the locus of Strike fandom conversations.* Ed Shardlow: Gorilla Ryan* Vicky: Boxes and Plush Toys* Sandra Hope: Traditional Symbolism* Justin Clavet: Only Fans Gaffe (Ed Shardlow -- ‘Not Proven' error)* Bora Bora* Justin Clavet: On Manhood* Ed Shardlow: Ickabog Parallel Book Theory* Sandra Hope: Hallmarked Man as Rowling's ‘Greatest Hits' allusion collection* LC - Dorothy Sayers* Kathleen O'Connor -- Alternative Incest* Caerphilly elections -- UK meaning* Ring Composition ProjectPromised Links and Transcripts:* Ed Shardlow's ‘Gorilla Ryan' TheoryThe Ryan the Gorilla theory came to me at the point in the book where Robin has an epiphany following an impulse to look up the meaning of a name. I think this was the Jolanda-Violet realisation, but I thought she'd suddenly realised the full extent of Ryan's dark side, with the significance being the previously noted meaning of his name “Sea King” suggesting a connection between him and Wade King.That theory seemed very flimsy at first, but on further examination it might have some mileage. There are some notable differences between the attack in the Land Rover and the previous ones. Although we imagine the attacker wearing a gorilla mask, there's no mention of it, and in fact it says she can see his face. Also the Land Rover attacker makes no demands that she, “Stop” or, “Leave it”. She hits Wade with the pepper spray, which of course, would be difficult for Ryan to cover up, but she didn't inflict any such injuries on the gorilla attacker. Wade clearly intends to hurt her, whereas the other attacks had no physical violence and look very much like they were just intended to scare her.1) It's hinted that Branfoot knows about Robin's rape, and she says it's on the internet, but we never get any indication that King or Griffiths know about it. Strike and Robin never consider that the attacker might be someone who knows about it because they're close to Robin. That seems like an oversight.2) The gorilla attacker never refers to a specific case. Murphy may be scaring her into quitting the job and getting away from Strike, whereas a suspect would want her to stop investigating their specific case.3) The police don't take the rubber gorilla and dagger for DNA testing. That's pretty strange, unless there's someone on the inside blocking the investigation.There's a bit of an issue with the guy in the green jacket, who presumably Robin can see isn't Ryan when he's on the industrial estate and outside her flat. Presumably that was Wade.So, there would need to be some explanation for how or why Murphy is wearing the same jacket when he accosts her with the ceremonial dagger. But that's not insurmountable.Murphy would have been very surprised to encounter Matthew (sic, he means ‘Martin' -ed.), who he knows from Masham, outside Robin's flat. The narrative very much prompts us to think there's something going on with Murphy, but then we put this down to his work issues and associated relapse, but perhaps that blinds us (and Robin) to another possibility. And if it is the case, then Strike hasn't just let Robin go to dinner with his romantic rival, but she's heading into mortal danger. Were his instincts subconsciously alerting him to the threat? Did he leave it too late to shout, “Brake!” again?Nicola Reed's Objection to ‘Gorilla Ryan' (Sandy Hope, too)Kathleen O'Connor's Cogent Counterpoint to John's Incredulity about No One Noticing How Short Faux-Wright was in the Ramsay Silver footageVicky on the Interpretation of Robin's “Stuffed Toy” DreamBrenna Hill asks ‘Why is the New Ellacott Puppy Named Betty?'Sandra Hope Jumpstarts Conversation about Traditional Symbolism in Hallmarked Man* Masonic Orb Pendant for sale on Etsy ($795)* Jacob's Ladder Mosaic in Masonic Hall, London (Alamy)* The Bohun Swan (‘Chained Swan') (Wikipedia)Justin Clavet: The ‘Only Fans' Gaffe· I commented on the Hogwarts Professor gaffes pillar [Placeholder, ed.] post about the OnlyFans error - that the OnlyFans website was launched in November 2016, but in the book, the murdered Sofia is said to be a prolific OnlyFans poster before her disappearance in June of that same year. The OnlyFans account is only a small point in this large plot, but one that is repeatedly referred to, and Sofia's OnlyFans account is what ultimately brought her to the attention of her killer. For such a meticulous plotter and, as John would say, “OCD” author as Rowling is, does this real-world chronological impossibility give you pause? What other big historical error like this can be found in her books?· Did you notice that the interview with the pornstar occurs in chapter 69? I think Rowling was having a bit of (structural) fun and winking at the observant reader with that one.* Justin Clavet's 3 September ‘Gaffes' posting about ‘Only Fans'The reference to OnlyFans in chapter 33 (p. 269) felt anachronistic to me, as I don't remember ever hearing about the website before the pandemic era. And sure enough, according to Wikipedia (citing a New York Times article), the website didn't launch until November 2016. Therefore, Sofia – who was murdered in June 2016 – could not have been a prolific OnlyFans poster. Sofia's supposed OnlyFans account is referenced several further times throughout the book. Based on data from Google Trends, it seems incredibly unlikely that Strike and Robin would have readily known what OnlyFans was in late 2016/early 2017. So Where is Bora Bora?The Caerphilly 2025 Election: Victories for Left and Right Wing Populist Parties* 2025 Caerphilly Bi-Election (Wikipedia!)* UK's Ruling Labour Suffer Crushing Defeat Against Political Insurgents at Ballot Box (Breitbart)Justin Clavet ‘On Manhood in Hallmarked Man'The biggest thing that struck me in this book was the persistent themes of manhood woven throughout: the responsibilities, relationships, and hardships of men. * The central crime is linked with a secretive fraternal organization. * It opens with the death of Strike's father figure Ted, a “proper man” (p. 38), by whose maxims Strike is newly resolved to live. * We learn that Ted would've murdered (or been murdered by) his father Trevik if he hadn't left home and joined the army (p. 39), just like Strike would have come to blows (or worse) with his step-father Whittaker if he hadn't left home and joined the army. * While he loses the man he called his dad, he has a real meeting with his natural father for the first time. Rokeby shares that, in Strike, he had produced a proper man” (p. 747). * Strike celebrates not having fathered a child (while Robin is distraught in the wake of her own lost child, and devastated that the option to be a mother may no longer be hers to choose).* Richard de Leon says that his brother Danny was made the way he is because of his father's mistreatment. * Strike is bewildered that Danny (who integrates his brother's Christian name into his porn name, Dick de Lion) and Richard could be so close and share so much with each other, contrasting this with his own relationship with Al. * Leda and Rena are both shown to have suffered because of the absence of their more stable brothers. * Strike observes that “men are seen as disposable in certain contexts” (pp. 107f).* Wardle, who is shown to be a caring and dedicated father to his young child, opens up to Strike about his depression and his marriage troubles. * Strike reflects on the shallow friendships he has with other men, and later sees how this kind of friendship can be toxic with the wrong personalities (in Powell, Pratt, and Jones, p. 860). * Strike fears Wardle may be at risk of suicide. Niall is found to have committed suicide after his brother in arms was horrifically executed by Islamist combatants. The public can't be bothered to care about the tragic loss of this man who heroically put his life on the line for his country - preferring instead to lend their attention to the spectacle of another man, Branfoot, who went to extreme lengths to indulge his basest and most perverse desires (p. 873).Like many events in this book, this theme - with characters showing genuine concern and thoughtful consideration of complex men's issues - is a mirror image of one presented in Troubled Blood with the character of Carl Oakden and his cynical men's rights grift.This barely scratches the surface of the notes that I took on this theme, which I saw running deep through the whole book. I wondered if I was just seeing this in the text because of my own perspective as a man, or if it really was there. Indeed, you could find hints of this theme in each of the preceding seven books. But the structural clues left me convinced it was intentional. And when I watched this video (https://robert-galbraith.com/robert-galbraith-discusses-the-case-in-the-hallmarked-man/) the day after finishing the book, there was no doubt.Justin Clavet on the Hallmarked Man Dedication and Rokeby's Gratitude· I connected the book's dedication to Sean and Nadine Harris with Rokeby's statement on p. 748, “Not everyone's got a mate called Leo ‘oo stops ‘em livin' rough” and that he attributes his artistic and financial success to his friend's generosity and charity.Ed Shardlow on The Ickabog as Hallmarked Man's Parallel BookConscious of the links between the first 7 books of the series and the Potter books, and with three books purportedly remaining in the series, I was primed to see a connection between The Hallmarked Man and one of Casual Vacancy, Christmas Pig or the Ickabog. I didn't have any predisposition to it being any of those. Even if Rowling is taking them in some sort of chronological order, there's reason to believe the orders of conception, writing and publishing may differ.At the end of Part One, I thought the Ickabog looked like the best fit based on the fact that the central mystery of who the body in the vault was has a certain similarity to the mystery of the Ickabog itself and whether it was real or a myth. The importance of the truth and the damage done by lies are fundamental to the Ickabog story, and I thought from the start those were major themes in THM.The other correspondences I've spotted:* The police, in various guises, like the royal guard play an important part, largely inept, self-serving, and perpetrators of miscarriages of justice.* The aristocrats - Lord Branfoot, Lady Jenson, Dino Longcaster - lie and deceive to protect their own interests, causing untold damage in the process.* There's terrorism, and terrorism being used to spread fear and division.* Ultimately Rupert and Decima, two sexes but one entity, produce an offspring that may have been defective or corrupted by the state of the world he was born into, but seems to have emerged happy and healthy. Daisy Dovetail having persuaded Rupert the Ickabog that humanity was worth making compromises for.* The main antagonist traps a woman in his house. I thought their names were Esmeralda and Sapphire, but it's Lady Eslanda not Esmeralda… But apparently Eslanda can mean emerald, or VIOLET, or truth… So Eslanda corresponds to both Sapphire and Jolanda!* We visit a feudal state* Ben Liddell – the soldier killed in an incident in a land where there shouldn't have been any military conflict happening and it being covered up by the government* Sandra Hope: The Footprint!Ed Shardlow, I can't wait for your show on the parallels between THM and the Ickabog!!! I just finished rereading both of them and I'm losing my mind! Omg, the footprint: “The Flaw in the Plan (ch32) is that the footprint is hopping (not so much terrifying as ludicrously funny) and Strike noting that the bearer of the footprint in the vault has a limp!! Please let this conversation happen soon!!Sandra Hope: Strike 8 as a ‘Rowling's Greatest Hits Album' of Allusions:Allusions that took my breath away:* Ectopic pregnancy- TB* Schadenfreude- CC* “So many babies”- not just born, but what they're born into- Ickabog borndings* Human trafficking ring- RG* Woman buried in/under concrete- TB* Staged murder involving mutilation- Silkworm* Violent attacks & subsequent PTSD- a Rowling theme in every book, but especially CE & LW* DNA testing & fatherhood- CV, TB* Guys trying to find right time to ask a potential partner a question- GOF lol* Valentine's Day mishaps- CS, TB* Behavior of abandoned mothers-Silkworm (& HBP), specifically Merope, Leonora, Decima (also Leda)* Journalism as a weapon- GOF, OOP, Silkworm, RG* Potential ill usage of mirrors- SSNot a complete list by any means lolLC – Dorothy Sayers Connection?I don't know if there is anything in my seeing parallels between Cormoran and Robin and Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vance (Dorothy Sayers): Peter and Harriet had a very long acquaintance before they finally got engaged, with lots of twists and turns. Peter goes deep undercover in an ad agency in one novel; the feel of it was very similar to Robin going deep undercover in Lethal White. Also, the Sayers novel “Five Red Herrings” also features five men--in this case, five men who could have been the murderer (instead of the victim). Sayers also had very intricate plots that were puzzles--and was a Dante scholar. I believe Jo has mentioned that she admired Sayers. I don't know if these are just interesting parallels that Jo is having fun with or not, but they certainly seem to be more than coincidences. Thanks!Kathleen O'Connor – Alternative Incest Big Twist IdeasI'm impressed by your arguments that we will see some shocking twists – in addition to the shocking twist that Rokeby is actually, in his old age, a good father to his mature son, Cormoran, and not at all the image-focused a*****e we have seen through Strike's eyes up to now. I don't think, however, we will find that Rokeby is not Strike's father. That revelation would dilute Strike's growth in terms of his realizations that he has been mistaken about many things that he has taken for granted in his life. Instead, I think instead we will see a continuation of Robeby's rehabilitation until eventually, like Snape, Rokeby makes some kind of big sacrifice to aid Cormoran or someone/something else important to Cormoran. Also, even though Strike does not physically resemble Rokeby, he does resemble Prudence: * “Seeing them face to face, Robin spotted her partner's resemblance to Jonny Rokeby for the first time. He and his half-sister shared the same defined jaw, the same spacing of the eyes. She wondered – she who had three brothers, all of the same parentage – what it felt like, to make a first acquaintance with a blood relative in your forties. But there was something more there than a faint physical resemblance between brother and sister: they appeared, already, to have established an unspoken understanding.” - The Running Grave And: * “In youth, Strike knew, Rokeby had been exactly as tall as his oldest son, though he was now a little shorter.” - The Hallmarked Man Maybe the big twist and incest plot is connected to either Switch or Whittaker. As we learn from Wikipedia in Career of Evil, Jeff Whittaker never knew who his father was. A strong possibility could be that Patricia Whittaker's own father, Sir Randolph, had gotten her pregnant with Jeff. In that case, keeping that secret – as well as simply keeping the baby away from Leda – could have been the motive for a Whittaker family member to have killed Leda. An even bigger twist might be that Leda did commit suicide, using exactly the method of Krystal Weedon, after she realized that she was Whittaker's sister. Would it be possible for Trevik to have met up with Patricia Whitaker in London and gotten her pregnant? Regardless of the incest angle, I do think we might find that Leda, whose life choices have not allowed her to develop the strength or discipline to face hard truths, may have committed suicide rather than cope with some kind of guilt (maybe she found out what happened to Lucy?). There are multiple examples that foreshadow these possibilities – off the top of my head, there are “naughty boy” wealthy aristos (Freddy Chiswell, Alexander Graves, Will Edensor, Jago Ross) who might parallel Sir Randolph or Jeff Whittaker, and multiple characters who confuse suicide with sacrifice or who simply cannot face what they have done (Cherie Gittins, Krystal Weedon, Yasmin Weatherhead). Rhiannon Winn and Ellie Fancourt both commit suicide because they cannot cope with the shame they feel as a result of others' cruelty.Also, I can think of two points that support your idea that we will find out some bad things about Ted. Number one, the revelations that Dumbledore was extremely flawed are crucial to Harry's story. In fact, I suggest that writing characters who are not merely “gray” but who are simultaneously really good and really bad is a “golden thread” of Rowling's work. And, number two, we hear multiple times that Ted taught Strike, “There's no pride in having what you never worked for” while Rokeby says “I don't wanna die wivvout knowin' ya. You fink I 'aven't got the right to be proud, maybe, but I am. I'm proud of ya.” I don't think it is an accident that Rowling sets up this opposition, and I also think she wants us to admire Rokey's desire to know his son. Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Nick Jeffery and John Granger continue their Q&A conversations about Rowling-Galbraith's Hallmarked Man (if you missed the first discussion, click here to catch up). As usual, the pair promised to send links and notes along with their recorded back and forth for anyone wanting to read more about the subjects they discussed. Scroll down for their seven plus one questions and a bevy of bonus material they trust will add to your appreciation of Rowling's Strike 8 artistry and meaning. Cheers!Q1: What is the meaning of or artistry involved with Pat Chauncey's three fish in the Agency's fish tank, ‘Robin,' ‘Cormoran,' and ‘Travolta/Elton'?Mise en Abyme (Wikipedia)In Western art history, mise en abyme (French pronunciation: [miz ɑ̃n‿abim]; also mise en abîme) is the technique of placing a copy of an image within itself, often in a way that suggests an infinitely recurring sequence. In film theory and literary theory, it refers to the story within a story technique.The term is derived from heraldry, and means placed into abyss (exact middle of a shield). It was first appropriated for modern criticism by the French author André Gide. A common sense of the phrase is the visual experience of standing between two mirrors and seeing an infinite reproduction of one's image. Another is the Droste effect, in which a picture appears within itself, in a place where a similar picture would realistically be expected to appearSnargaloff pods (Harry Potter Wiki)“It sprang to life at once; long, prickly, bramble-like vines flew out of the top and whipped through the air... Harry succeeded in trapping a couple of vines and knotting them together; a hole opened in the middle of all the tentacle-like branches... Hermione snatched her arm free, clutching in her fingers a pod... At once, the prickly vines shot back inside and the gnarled stump sat there looking like an innocently dead lump of wood“— The trio dealing with the Snargaluff plant in sixth year Herbology classSnargaluff was a magical plant with the appearance of a gnarled stump, but had dangerous hidden thorn-covered vines that attacked when provoked, and was usually best handled by more than one person.Juliana's Question about the Oranda Goldfish:did anyone else notice - I confess to only noticing this on my second re-read of THM- that Travolta, Pat's third fish, dies?What do we think about this? Could this mean Mr. Ryan F. Murphy dies…? Or could it just be foreshadowing of the fact that him and Robin don't end up together? I think the fish symbolism was quite humorous and delightful paralleling such a deep and intricate plot. Just wanted to know if anyone noticed this tinge of humor towards the end of the book… As for the fish theory, Pat's three fish in the tank: Strike, Robin and the third, she calls, Travolta — ironically, named after a “handsome” man. I'm thinking JKR meant Travolta, the fish to symbolize Murphy…What I was referring to in my original comment: the three fish = the love triangle between Ellacott/Murphy/Strike. I was asking: since Travolta died in Chapter 113, do we think this foreshadows Murphy either dying physically, or just that Robin and Murphy do not end up together?John's ‘Fish and Peas' Response:It's a relief to learn that Travolta's most famous role wasn't a character named Ryan Murphy that everyone in the world except myself knows very well. Thank you for this explanation!There's more to your idea, though, I think, then you have shared. Forgive me if you were already aware of this textual argument that suggests very strongly that these Oranda goldfish have been an important part of Rowling's plan from the series from the start. In brief, it's about the peas.In Part 2, Chapter 3, of ‘Cuckoo's Calling,' Robin and Matt are having their first fight about Strike and the Agency. The chapter ends with an odd note that this disagreement has blemished the Cunliffe couple's engagement.“She waited until he had walked away into the sitting room before turning off the tap. There was, she noticed, a fragment of frozen pea caught in the setting of her engagement ring.” (73)Your theory that the fish bowl is an embedded picture of the state of Robin's feelings for Murphy and Strike, a Mise en abyme of sorts, is given credibility in the eyes of this reader by the appearance of frozen peas as the cure for the dying Cormoran goldfish. It is hard for a Rowling Reader to believe that these two mentions of frozen pea fragments were coincidental or unrelated, which means that (a) Rowling had the office Oranda goldfish scene-within-the-scene in Strike 8 foreshadowed by the Strike 1 tiff, and (b) therefore of real significance.There is another pea bit, of course, in ‘Troubled Blood' at Skegness, a passage that links Robin's heart or essence with peas.Strike was still watching the starlings when Robin set down two polystyrene trays, two small wooden forks and two cans of Coke on the table.“Mushy peas,” said Strike, looking at Robin's tray, where a hefty dollop of what looked like green porridge sat alongside her fish and chips.“Yorkshire caviar,” said Robin, sitting down. “I didn't think you'd want any.”“You were right,” said Strike, picking up a sachet of tomato sauce while watching with something like revulsion as Robin dipped a chip into the green sludge and ate it.“Soft Southerner, you are,” she said, and Strike laughed. (807-808)If you tie this in with the fish symbolism embedded in Rowling's favorite paintings and the meaning of ‘Oranda,' this is quite a bit of depth in that fish bowl -- and in your argument that the death of Travolta signifies Murphy is out of consideration.You're probably to young to remember this but Travolta's most famous role will always be Tony Manero in ‘Saturday Night Fever,' the breakout event of his acting career. Manero longs for a woman way out of his league, attempts to rape her after they win a dance contest, she naturally rejects him, but they wind up as friends.Or in a book so heavy in the cultish beliefs and practices of Freemasonry, especially with respect to policemen that are also “on the square,” maybe the Travolta-Murphy link is just that the actor is, with Tom Cruise, as famous (well...) for his beliefs in Scientology as for his acting ability.So, yes, it's fun, your ‘Peas and Fish' theory, but there's something to it.Check out this note on ‘Peas' in the Strike novels from Renee over at the weblog: https://www.hogwartsprofessor.com/hallmarked-man-placeholder-post-index/comment-page-1/#comment-1699017 The fish symbolism embedded in Rowling's favorite painting: https://hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/p/rowlings-favorite-painting-and-what And the meaning of ‘Oranda:' https://www.hogwartsprofessor.com/rowling-twixter-fish-and-strike-update/Follow-Up by Julianna:I'm not sure what exact chapter this is in, but let's also not forget that on Sark, Strike procures a bag of frozen peas to soothe the spade to his face injury. I also want to add that he has used frozen peas before, to soothe his aching leg too, but I could be wrong about that…I cant remember where I've read that, so it might not be true….Lastly, after reading Renee's comment, I have to say, that now I do believe that the peas might have been an ongoing symbol for Strike (a la…the pea in the engagement ring) and…stay with me here….peas are potentially, what save Cormoran, the goldfish, from dying.“The black fish called Cormoran was again flailing helplessly at the top of the tank. ‘Stupid a*****e, you've done it to your f*cking self'.” And the very last line of the book being: “Then pushed himself into a standing position ear and knee both throbbing. In the absence of anything else he could do to improve his present situation, he set off for the attic to fetch the empty margerine tub…and some peas.” (Chapter 127).My point being: this could be a way of Rowling saying, that Strike saves himself from himself…another psychological undertone in her stories. (Lake reference: Rowling has pulled herself up out of poverty ‘by her own bootstraps' we say.) Thoughts? Thanks for induldging me here, John! I am enjoying this conversation. Apologies for the grammar and potentially confusing train of thoughts.And from Vicky:Loving the theories and symbolism around the peas and fish! Just had a thought too re John quoting the Troubled blood scene. Robin calls mushy peas by a familiar term “Yorkshire caviar”. Caviar is of course fish eggs, and poor Robin, Yorkshire born, spends much of THM agonising over the thought and pressure of freezing her eggs. Giuliana mentioned the frozen peas Strike puts on his swollen face after the spade hit...maybe this is foreshadowing to their intimate and honest dinner conversation later with Robin baring her heart to Strike about her ectopic pregnancy griefQ2: Why didn't the Strike-Ellacott Agency or the Metropolitan Police figure out how the murderer entered the Ramsay Silver vault to kill William Wright the first time they saw the grainy surveillance film of the auction house crate deliveries?Tweet UrlFrom ‘The Locked Room Lecture' (John Dickson Carr) It's silly to be disappointed in a border-line absurd Locked Room Mystery such as Hallmarked Man because improbability is close to a requirement in such stories:“But this point must be made, because a few people who do not like the slightly lurid insist on treating their preferences as rules. They use, as a stamp of condemnation, the word ‘improbable.' And thereby they gull the unwary into their own belief that ‘improbable' simply means ‘bad.'“Now, it seems reasonable to point out that the word improbable is the very last which should ever be used to curse detective fiction in any case. A great part of our liking fofr detective fiction is based on a liking for improbability. When A is murdered, and B and C are under strong suspicion, it is improbably that the innocent-looking D can be guilty. But he is. If G has a perfect alibi, sworn to at every point by every other letter in the alphabet, it is improbable that G can have committed the crime. But he has. When the detective picks up a fleck of coal dust at the seashore, it is improbable that such an insignificant thing can have any importance. But it will. In short, you come to a point where the word improbable grows meaningless as a jeer. There can be no such thing as any probability until the end of the story. And then, if you wish the murder to be fastened on an unlikely person (as some of us old fogies do), you can hardly complain because he acted from motives less likely or necessarily less apparent than those of the person first suspected.“When the cry of ‘This-sort-of-thing-wouldn't-happen!' goes up, when you complain about half-faced fiends and hooded phantoms and blond hypnotic sirens, you are merely saying, ‘I don't like this sort of story.' That's fair enough. If you do not like it, you are howlingly right to say so. But when you twist this matter of taste into a rule for judging the merit or even the probability of the story, you are merely saying, ‘This series of events couldn't happen, because I shouldn't enjoy it if it did.'“What would seem to be the truth of the matter? We might test it out by taking the hermetically sealed chamber as an example, because this situation has been under a hotter fire than any other on the grounds of being unconvincing.“Most people, I am delighted to say, are fond of the locked room. But – here's the damned rub – even its friends are often dubious. I cheerfully admit that I frequently am. So, for the moment, we'll all side together on this score and see what we can discover. Why are we dubious when we hear the explanation of the locked room? Not in the least because we are incredulous, but simply because in some vague way we are disappointed. And from that feeling it is only natural to take an unfair step farther, and call the whole business incredible or impossible or flatly ridiculous.” (reprinted in The Art of the Mystery Story [Howard Haycraft] 273-286)Q3: Hallmarked Man is all about silver and Freemasonry. What is the historical connection between South American silver (‘Argentina' means ‘Land of Silver'), the end of European feudalism, and the secret brotherhood of the Masons?How Silver Flooded the World: And how that Replaced Feudalism and the Church with Capitalism and Nation-States (‘Uncharted Territories,' Tomas Pueyo) In Europe, silver also triggered the discovery of America, a technological explosion, and a runaway chain of events that replaced feudalism with capitalism and nation-states. If you understand this, you'll be able to understand why nation-states are threatened by cryptocurrencies today, and how their inevitable success will weaken nation-states. In this premium article, we're going to explore how Europe starved for silver, and how the reaction to this flooded the world with silver. ,See also Never Bet Against America and Argentina Could be a Superpower, both by Pueyo.‘Conspiracy Theories associated with Freemasonry' (Wikipedia)* That Freemasonry is a Jewish front for world domination or is at least controlled by Jews for this goal. An example of this is the anti-Semitic literary forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Adolf Hitler believed that Freemasonry was a tool of Jewish influence,[12] and outlawed Freemasonry and persecuted Freemasons partially for this reason.[13] The covenant of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas claims that Freemasonry is a “secret society” founded as part of a Zionist plot to control the world.[14] Hilaire Belloc thought Jews had “inaugurated” freemasonry “as a bridge between themselves and their hosts”[15]* That Freemasonry is tied to or behind Communism. The Spanish dictator Francisco Franco had often associated his opposition with both Freemasonry and Communism, and saw the latter as a conspiracy of the former; as he put it, “The whole secret of the campaigns unleashed against Spain can be explained in two words: masonry and communism”.[16] In 1950, Irish Roman Catholic priest Denis Fahey republished a work by George F. Dillon under the title Grand Orient Freemasonry Unmasked as the Secret Power Behind Communism. Modern conspiracy theorists such as Henry Makow have also claimed that Freemasonry intends the triumph of Communism[17]* That Freemasons are behind income taxes in the US. One convicted tax protester has charged that law enforcement officials who surrounded his property in a standoff over his refusal to surrender after his conviction were part of a “Zionist, Illuminati, Free Mason [sic] movement”.[18] The New Hampshire Union Leader also reported that “the Browns believe the IRS and the federal income tax are part of a deliberate plot perpetrated by Freemasons to control the American people and eventually the world”[19]Umberto Eco's The Prague Cemetery, a Freemasonry Novel (Wikipedia)So much for the link between Freemasonry and Baphomet worship!‘The Desacralization of Work' (Roger Sworder, Mining, Metallurgy, and the Meaning of Life)Q4: Ian Griffiths is the Bad Guy of Hallmarked Man. His name has definite Christian overtones (a ‘Griffin,' being half-eagle, half-lion, King of Heaven and Earth, is a symbol of Christ); could it also be another pointer to Rowling's mysterious ‘Back Door Man,' Harry Bingham, author of the Fiona Griffiths series?Troubled Blood: The Acknowledgments (Nick Jeffery, November 2020)In both Silkworm and Career Rowling/Galbraith's military advisors are thanked as SOBE (Sean Harris OBE?) Deeby (Di Brookes?) and the Back Door Man. Professor Granger has identified the Back Door Man as a southern US slang term for a man having an illicit relationship, but beyond this is so far unidentified.Any thoughts on her dedications or acknowledgements? Any new leads for the elusive Back Door Man? Please comment down below.Harry Bingham's website, June 2012“My path into TALKING TO THE DEAD was a curious one. I was approached by a well-known figure who was contemplating working with a ghostwriter on a crime thriller. I hadn't read any crime for a long time, but was intrigued by the project. So I went out and bought about two dozen crime novels, then read them back-to-back over about two weeks.”Could Rowling have hired a (gasp) “ghost writer”? Or was it just “expert editorial assistance” she was looking for, what Bingham offers today?Author's Notes in The Strange Death of Fiona Grifiths (Publication date 29th January 2015, before Career of Evil):“If you want to buy a voice activated bugging device that looks like (and is) an ordinary power socket, it'll set you back about fifty pounds (about eighty bucks).”This is the same surveillance device used in Lethal White, but interestingly is not used in Bingham's book. (Nick Jeffery)Moderators Backchannel List of Correspondences between Cormoran Strike series and Bingham's Fiona Griffiths mystery-thrillers (John Granger):(1) A series that has an overarching mystery about which we get clues in every story, one linked to a secret involving a parent who is well known but whose real life is a mystery even to their families;(2) A series that is preoccupied with psychological issues, especially those of the brilliant woman protagonist who suffers from a mental illness and who is a student of psychology;(3) A series that is absorbed with death and populated by the dead who have not yet passed on and who influence the direction of the investigation more or less covertly (”I think we have just one world, a continuum, one populated by living and dead alike,” 92, This Thing of Darkness), a psychic and spiritual realm book that rarely touches on formal religion (Dead House and Deepest Grave excepted, sort of);(4) A series that, while being a police procedural because the detective is a police officer, is largely about how said sergeant works around, even against the hierarchy of department authority and decision makers, “with police help but largely as an independent agent;”(5) A series that makes glancing references to texts that will jar Rowling Readers: “All shall be well” (284, Love Story with Murders), she drives a high heel into a creepy guy's foot when he comes up to her from behind (75, This Thing of Darkness), Clerkenwell! (103, The Dead House), a cave opening cathedral-like onto a lake, the heroine enters with a mentor, blood spilled at the entrance, and featuring a remarkable escape (chapter 34, The Dead House), etc, especially the Robin-Fiona parallels....(6) A series starring a female protagonist who works brilliantly undercover, whose story is about recovery from a trauma experienced when she was a college student, who struggles mostly with her romantic relationships with men, a struggle that is a combination of her mental health-recovery progress (or lack of same) and her vocation as a detective, who is skilled in the martial art of self-defense, and who is from a world outside London, an ethnicity and home fostering, of all things, a love of sheep;(7) A series with a love of the mythological or at least the non-modern (King Arthur! Anchorites!)Q5: Can you help us out with some UK inside jokes or cultural references of which we colonists can only guess the meaning? Start with Gateshead, Pit Ponies, and Council Flats and Bed-Sits!* Gateshead (Wikipedia)J. B. Priestley, writing of Gateshead in his 1934 travelogue English Journey, said that “no true civilisation could have produced such a town”, adding that it appeared to have been designed “by an enemy of the human race”.* Pit Ponies (Wikipedia)Larger horses, such as varieties of Cleveland Bay, could be used on higher underground roadways, but on many duties small ponies no more than 12 hands (48 inches, 122 cm) high were needed. Shetlands were a breed commonly used because of their small size, but Welsh, Russian, Devonshire (Dartmoor) and Cornish ponies also saw extensive use in England.[2] In the interwar period, ponies were imported into Britain from the Faroe Islands, Iceland and the United States. Geldings and stallions only were used. Donkeys were also used in the late 19th century, and in the United States, large numbers of mules were used.[6] Regardless of breed, typical mining ponies were low set, heavy bodied and heavy limbed with plenty of bone and substance, low-headed and sure-footed. Under the British Coal Mines Act 1911 (1 & 2 Geo. 5. c. 50), ponies had to be four years old and work ready (shod and vet checked) before going underground.[15] They could work until their twenties.At the peak of this practice in 1913, there were 70,000 ponies underground in Britain.In shaft mines, ponies were normally stabled underground[16] and fed on a diet with a high proportion of chopped hay and maize, coming to the surface only during the colliery's annual holiday.* Council Flats (Wikipedia)Q6: What are Rowling Readers to think of Robin's dream in chapter 22 (174 )when she's sleeping next to Murphy but dreaming of being at Ramsay's Silver with Strike and the showroom is filled with “cuddly toys instead of masonic swords and aprons”?* ‘Harry's Dreams:' Steve Vander Ark, Harry Potter LexiconQ7: The first bad news phone call that Robin takes from her mother Linda in Hallmarked Man is about the death of Rowntree. What is the connection between Robin's beloved Chocolate Labrador, Quakers, and Rowling's Golden Thread about ‘What is Real'?‘Troubled Blood: Poisoned Chocolates' (John Granger, 2021)‘Troubled Blood: The Secret of Rowntree' (John Granger, 2021)I explained in ‘Deathly Hallows and Penn's Fruits of Solitude‘ why Penn's quotation is a key to the Hogwarts Saga finale, how, in brief, the “inner light” doctrines of the Quakers and of non-conformist esoteric Christianity in general inform the story of Harry's ultimate victory in Dobby's grave over doubt and his subsequent ‘win' in his battle against death and the Dark Lord. I urge you to read that long post, one of the most important, I think, ever posted at HogwartsProfessor, for an idea of how central to Rowling's Christian faith the tenets of Quakerism really are as well as how this shows itself in Deathly Hallows.What makes the historical chocolate connection with the Quakers, one strongly affirmed in naming the Ellacott dog ‘Rowntree,' that much more interesting then is the easy segue from the “inner light” beliefs of the Christian non-conformists to the effect of chocolate on characters in Rowling and Galbraith novels. The conscience of man per the Quakers are our logos within that is continuous with the Logos fabric of reality, the Word that brings all things into existence and the light that is in every man (cf., the Prologue to St John's Gospel). Our inner peace and fellowship, in this view, depend on our identification with this transpersonal “inner light” rather than our ephemeral ego concerns.What is the sure way to recover from a Dementor attack, in which your worst nightmares are revisited? How does Robin deal with stress and the blues? Eat some chocolate, preferably a huge bar from Honeydukes or a chocolate brownie if you cannot get to Hogsmead.Access, in other words, the Quaker spiritual magic, the “inner light” peace of communion with what is Absolute and transcendent, a psychological effect exteriorized in story form by Rowling as the good feeling we have in eating chocolate. Or in the companionship and unconditional love of a beloved Labrador, preferably a chocolate Lab.Christmas Pig: The Blue Bunny' (John Granger, 2021)“Do you just want to live in nice houses?” asked Blue Bunny. “Or is there another reason you want to get in?”“Yes,” said Jack, before the Christmas Pig could stop him. “Somebody I need's in there. He's called DP and he's my favorite cuddly toy.”For a long moment, Jack and Blue Bunny stared into each other's eyes and then Blue Bunny let out a long sigh of amazement.“You're a boy,” he whispered. “You're real.”“He isn't,” said the panic-stricken Christmas Pig. “He's an action figure called—”“It's all right, Pig,” said Blue Bunny, “I won't tell anybody, I promise. You really came all the way into the Land of the Lost to find your favorite toy?” he asked Jack, who nodded.“Then I'll be your decoy,” said Blue Bunny. “It would be an honor” (169).The Bunny's recognition here of Jack as a messiah, sacrificial love incarnate, having descended into existence as a Thing himself from Up There where he was a source of the love that “alivens” objects, is one of, if not the most moving event in Christmas Pig. Note the words he uses: “You're real.”Rowling has used the word “real” twice before as a marker of reality transcending what we experience in conventional time and space, the sensible world. The first was in what she described as the “key” to the Harry Potter series, “lines I waited seventeen years to write” (Cruz), the end of the Potter-Dumbledore dialogue at King's Cross….In a Troubled Blood passage meant to echo that dialogue, with “head” and “backside” reflecting the characters inverted grasp of “reality,” Robin and Strike talk astrology:“You're being affected!” she said. “Everyone knows their star sign. Don't pretend to be above it.”Strike grinned reluctantly, took a large drag on his cigarette, exhaled, then said, “Sagittarius, Scorpio rising, with the sun in the first house.”“You're –” Robin began to laugh. “Did you just pull that out of your backside, or is it real?”“Of course, it's not f*****g real,” said Strike. “None of it's real, is it?” (Blood 242, highlighting in original).The Bunny's simple declaration, “You're real,” i.e., “from Up There,” the greater reality of the Land of the Living in which Things have their awakening in the love of their owners, clarifies these other usages. Dumbledore shares his wisdom with Harry that the maternal love which saved him, first at Godric's Hollow and then in the Forest, is the metaphysical sub-stance beneath, behind, and within all other reality. Strike gives Robin a dose of his skeptical ignorance and nominalist first principle that nothing is real but surface appearance subject to measurement and physical sensation, mental grasp of all things being consequent to that.Christmas Pig‘s “real” moment acts as a key to these others, one evident in the Bunny's response to the revelation of Jack's greater ontological status. He does a Dobby, offering to die for Jack as Jack has done in his descent into the Land of the Lost for DP, a surrender of self to near certain death in being given to the Loser he considers an “honor.” He acts spontaneously and selflessly as a “decoy,” a saving replacement in other words, for the “living boy” as Dobby did for the “Boy Who Lived.” The pathetic distraction that saved the DP rescue mission in Mislaid despite himself, crying out in desperation for his own existence, has metamorphized consequent to his experience with Broken Angel and in Jack's example, into a heroic decoy that allows Jack and CP to enter the City of the Missed.The Blue Bunny makes out better than the House-elf, too, and this is the key event of the book and the best evidence since the death of Lily Potter, Harry's defeat of Quirrell, and the demise of the Dark Lord that mother's love is Rowling's default symbolism for Christian love in her writing. The Bunny's choice to act as decoy, his decision to die to his ego-self, generates the life saving appearance of maternal love and its equivalent in the transference attachment a child feels for a beloved toy. The Johannine quality of the light that shines down on him from the Finding Hole and his Elijah-esque elevation nails down the Logos­-love correspondence.EC: All through Hallmarked Man Robin is saying to herself, “I think I love Ryan, no, really, I know I love him…,” which of course is Rowling's way of signaling the conflict this character has in her feelings for Strike and for Murphy. What is that about?* See ‘The Hallmarked Man's Mythological Template' for discussion of the Anteros/Eros distinction in the myth of Cupid and Psyche as well as the Strike-Ellacott novels Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Vasant Ramamurthy attended three shows recently (including a back-to-back) and he joins Patrick to discuss them. You'll hear about his trips to the Riviera Theater in Chicago to see Supergrass and TV on the Radio and a visit to the much smaller Sleeping Village to check out a new incarnation of Silkworm.  Rockin' the Suburbs on Apple Podcasts/iTunes or other podcast platforms, including audioBoom, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon, iHeart, Stitcher and TuneIn. Or listen at SuburbsPod.com. Please rate/review the show on Apple Podcasts and share it with your friends. Visit our website at SuburbsPod.com Email Jim & Patrick at rock@suburbspod.com Follow us on the Threads, Facebook or Instagram @suburbspod If you're glad or sad or high, call the Suburban Party Line — 612-440-1984. Theme music: "Ascension," originally by Quartjar, next covered by Frank Muffin and now re-done in a high-voltage version by Quartjar again!  Visit quartjar.bandcamp.com and frankmuffin.bandcamp.com.

It's been a month since the publication of Hallmarked Man so Nick and John decide to have a ‘Pit Pony Pickleball' match in which they serve and volley Strike 8 examples of Shed tools and Lake springs as fast as they can. After a round of back and forth between Team Lake and Team Shed, they do a flash round of Golden Threads against the clock and then John is given a ‘Final Jeopardy' tie-breaker question about the most controversial perennial plot point in Rowling's work.It's a reverse Kanreki exercise, in other words. In their conversations about each of Rowling's novels, screenplays, play script, text books, and short story collection, Nick and John discussed one Lake spring, a source point of story inspiration from Rowling's life experience and core beliefs, and one Shed tool, her deliberate artistry to craft that inspiration into edifying and engaging story. Here they have a ‘Blitz Chess' match, to switch sporting metaphors, to try and cover as many Lake, Shed, and Thread points with examples from Rowling's latest as possible.Perhaps the most important take-away, though, is the three conclusions about Hallmarked Man they've come to after a month of reading that they think will be the consensus view of Strike 8 after we have Strikes 9 and 10. Make some popcorn, find your score card and a comfortable place to watch and take notes; this is an episode for the ages! (Insert your preferred Wrestle-Mania or like programming promotional hyperbole here.)The Kanreki Index of Rowling's Shed Tools, Lake Springs and Golden ThreadsIn July 2025, Nick Jeffery and I logged a marathon of Kanreki ‘Lake and Shed' video posts at this site in celebration of Rowling's life and work at her 60th birthday. For listeners of this ‘Blitz' Lake and Shed reading of The Hallmarked Man, I repost below an easy-to-access-and-reference single place for readers to find much longer discussion of each Shed tool, Lake spring, and Golden Thread, as well as an introduction to Fourth Generation Rowling Studies hermeneutics. Enjoy!Introduction to the Kanreki Project* The Goal and the Methodology of the Hogwarts Professor Tag-Team Month-Long Birthday Party for Serious Readers of Rowling-GalbraithOn 31 July 2025, Joanne Murray, aka J. K. Rowling and Robert Galbraith, celebrated her 60th birthday. This specific celebration is considered a ‘second birth' in Japan or Kanreki because it is the completion of the oriental astrological cycle. To mark JKR's Kanreki, 還暦, Dr John Granger and Nick Jeffery, both Nipponophiles, read through Rowling's more than twenty published works and reviewed them in light of the author's writing process, her ‘Lake and Shed' metaphor. The ‘Lake' she said in 2019 and 2024 is the source of her inspiration and the ‘Shed' is the alocal place of her intentional artistry, in which garage she transforms the biographical stuff provided by her subconscious mind into the archetypal stories that have made her the most important author of her age.Join us after the jump for the complete compendium of the Harry Potter, Cormoran Strike, Fantastic Beast, ‘Stand Alone' stories, and Golden Thread posts!The Lake and Shed Conversations about the Harry Potter Novels and Extras* Harry Potter and the Philosopher's StoneNick discusses Hogsmeade Comprehensive School, as Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry should be properly called, and John explains the ten different genres that Rowling uses in Philosopher's Stone* Harry Potter and the Chamber of SecretsJohn explores the Freudian parallels that Rowling paints into Chamber of Secrets, and Nick talks about her oldest, and probably best friend Sean Harris, the inspiration for Ron Weasley.* Harry Potter and the Prisoner of AzkabanNick shares the London institution of the (k)night bus. Part drunk carriage, part dormitory for the homeless in foul weather, zig-zaging across London between midnight and five in the morning. John shares the Parallel Series Idea (PSI) and compare Prisoner of Azkaban with Robert Galbraith's Career of Evil.* Harry Potter and the Goblet of FireNick talks about the trip Rowling made as a teenager to Cornwall as a young woman in which some Quidditch World Cup camping may have been involved and about her core beliefs about bigotry and prejudice. John reviews Rowling's tagging Goblet as a “crucial” and “pivotal” part of the seven book series and introduces how the ‘story turn' in a ring composition reflects the beginning and end of the story.* Harry Potter and the Order of the PhoenixNick talks about the darkest period in Jo Rowling's life, namely, her return to the UK from Portugal as a single mother in Edinburgh. With Order of the Phoenix in full nigredo mode John talks literary alchemy.* Harry Potter and the Half-Blood PrinceNick reveals the real life model for Severus Snape, Rowling's Chemistry teacher at Wydean Comprehensive, and his remarkable story and melancholy end. John reviews Rowling's version of the so-called ‘Hero's Journey,' how she re-makes it into a life-after-death ‘Harry's Journey' ten step dance we see in every book — except for Half-Blood Prince with its two chapters before we begin at Privet Drive and its ending without a Dumbledore Denouement or trip to King's Cross.* Harry Potter and the Deathly HallowsJohn and Nick discuss the ‘Deathly Hallows' symbol, a triangulated and vertically bisected circle, from both its biographical point of inspiration to its anagogical or sublime depths. Nick reveals Rowling's story about how she was watching the 1975 John Huston film ‘The Man Who Would Be King' the night her mother died and that believes the “Masonic tag” of the story-line was her sub-conscious source for the Deathly Hallows ‘“triangular eye.” John thinks Rowling is really reaching here, akin to her claim that the name ‘Hogwarts' came from a trip to a public garden rather than the Molesworth books. He reviews the five eyes of Deathly Hallows and explains how Rowling embeds both a key to the four-level interpretation of symbols in how characters respond to that image and a model of how we are to interpret and understand her ‘transformed vision' mission as a writer.* Newt Scamander's Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find ThemNick and John return to the books at a reader's suggestion in order to give a Lake and Shed reading of the original Newt Scamander textbook, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Nick relays everything you need to know about the genesis of this work and John talks about Rowling's comments to Stephen Fry in a 2022 interview about “archetypal” animals and the importance of understanding them because human beings are story-telling animals. Her discussion of the Lethifold and Niffler are especially challenging and illuminating.* The Tales of Beedle the BardNick and John fulfill a reader request to discuss the book inside Deathly Hallows (one of three actually…), ‘Tales of Beedle the Bard,' a text that Albus Dumbledore leaves Hermione in his will for her to read and apply to the Horcrux Hunt. Nick tells the story of Rowling's creation of six hand-written copies as six-of-a-kind gifts for those who brought Harry Potter to life. John dives into the center story of the five tales, ‘The Hairy Heart,' and tells the meaning of Harry's heart to draw out what Rowling meant by describing Beedle as “the distillation” of the Hogwarts Saga.The Lake and Shed Conversations about the Cormoran Strike Novels* The Cuckoo's CallingThe ‘Lake' point that Nick explores is the identity of the real Deeby Mac, namely, Di Brooks, Rowling's former security director and currently her office manager, a veteran with years of experience in the SIB. John's ‘Shed' point is his pushback against the idea that Calling wasn't really the first book in the series because Rowling has said she had the idea for it after Silkworm and only chose it because the case would make her detective famous.* The SilkwormThe ‘Lake' point that Nick reveals is the probable identity of ‘Jenkins,' the mystery person to whom Strike 2 is dedicated, a revelation consequent to no little detective work (and a very close reading of Louisa May Alcott!). He also discusses some real-life literary infighting in contemporary London that might have been lifted from the pages of Silkworm. John argues that this ur-novel of the series, its point of conception, is Rowling's not especially opaque guide to how to understand a novelist's life and to appreciate their work, in short, her first ‘Lake and Shed' discussion (albeit one embedded in story).* Career of EvilThe ‘Lake' point that Nick explores is Rowling's personal experience of violence against women and her determination to push back against the misogynist age she believes we have been living in for decades. John details the litany of crimes committed against women in the third Strike novel and suggests that in time, when we have the series as a whole, appreciation of the artistry involved will counter-balance the shock first-time readers feel on entering this boucherie.* Lethal WhiteNick discusses the embedded class struggle in the book and its roots in Rowling's background before dropping the bomb of the real world identity of Jack O'Kent and his unhappy family. John is so taken aback by this revelation that Nick has to prompt the Shed portion of the conversation with a fun history of the Sonia Friedman production of Ibsen's Rosmersholm on London's West End, a show starring Thom Burke as Rosmer and which ended just before Bronte Studios beginning the filming of Lethal White.* Troubled Blood (A)Nick discusses Rowling's history with the divinatory art of astrology and the occult resources and reference works she brought into play in writing a novel whose primary embedded text is a murder scene's astrological chart. John talks about the astrological clock structure of twelve houses in which Galbraith tells this remarkable story.* Troubled Blood (B)Nick discusses Rowling's history with the Clerkenwell neighborhood. John talks about Troubled Blood as a double re-telling of The Faerie Queene, Book One, with Strike and Margot as the Redcrosse Knight and Oonaugh and Robin as Una.* Ink Black HeartNick covers the front and the back of making Lake readings of Strike6 without a lot of circumspection and John talks about the eerie feeling he had while reading this book that the author was ‘having a go' at him.* The Running GraveNick confesses to having felt stumped about what to say as his ‘Lake' contribution to the Strike7 discussion — before his epiphany on a long walk with Addie that almost every buoy or pillar in Rowling's metaphorical place of inspiration finds its reflection in the seventh Galbraith mystery. John refuses to go into any detail about the work's ‘wheels within wheels within wheels' ring structure but shares instead the symbolic depth of Mama Mazu's mother of pearl fish pendant.The Lake and Shed Conversations about the Stand-Alone Works* Casual VacancyNick explains all the projects we now know she was working on between 2007 and 2012, the dates of Deathly Hallows and Casual Vacancy's respective publication dates, as well as the degree to which readers can assume that the novel's Simon Price is a fictional portrait of her father, Peter Rowling. John describes the three Gospel parables embedded in Casual Vacancy and why he thinks the book was a project the author was working on before the Hogwarts Saga as well as why it reflects a religious crisis akin to Harry's ‘struggle to believe' in Deathly Hallows.* Harry Potter and the Cursed ChildNick reviews the history of how Rowling was sold on the idea of a Wizarding World stage production via a bit of bait and switch marketing and John reads the review of the Jack Thorn script by Pepperdine English Professor James Thomas. Neither John nor Nick is a big fan of the play but their back and forth about the several controversies connected with it and the question of its being “the eighth Harry Potter story” are still challenging and fun.* The IckabogNick takes the ‘Shed' point and lays out the controlled demolition of her reputation among Group Thinkers on the Left in the lead up to Ickabog's publication and John shares the meaning of ‘The Ickabog's Song,' the embedded text of the tale, as interpreted by Daisy Dovetail (an embedded author?).* The Christmas Pig (A)Nick discusses Rowling's many interview statements about the Things which were lost and how many of them match up with things she has lost; he takes a deep dive into the Blue Bunny episode outside the Gates of the City of the Missed and Rowling's embedding herself and her daughter Mackenzie in the story. John talks about the Blue Bunny and his being “found” or “saved” as an allegory of the human condition written in the Rowling shorthand-symbols for (and obsessions with) love, salvation, and what is real.* The Christmas Pig (B)Nick by the Lake shares the history of the Murray Family and their beanie pig toys as well as a likely source for the defenestration of DP (in Esquire magazine, no less). John talks about the promise and the limits of reading literature through a biographical lens and then explains the anagogical meaning of the Power palace kangaroo court trial of CP and Jack. Both share their reasons for thinking that The Christmas Pig is the perfect distillation of everything Rowling is doing as a writer, to include the relationship of her Lake inspiration to her final Shed product.The Lake and Shed Conversations about the Fantastic Beasts Screenplays* Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find ThemNick does his signature deep dive into the history of the Fantastic Beasts film franchise's origins in Warner Brothers' determination to keep the Wizarding World profit-pillar in their portfolio alive after the last Harry Potter adaptation — and Rowling's equal determination that they not use their copyright privilege to muck up her legacy with an Indiana Jones meets Crocodile Dundee knock-off. John takes the Shed pole in the conversation and shares his months long pursuit of the shooting text screenplay, the actual last screenplay over which Rowling had control.* The Crimes of GrindelwaldOn the Lake side of things, Nick explores the Johnny Depp casting scandal and the lead-up in 2018 to the 2019 Tweet Heard Round the World. John explains that the cut scenes from this dog's mess of a movie point that the shooting script, i.e., what Rowling wrote and approved before David Yates butchered the film in the editing room, was all about Leta Lestrange. More important, John makes the Shed point that every Rowling book features a text of some kind that the characters struggle to understand — and that Crimes of Grindelwald has ten of these, a veritable library of interior texts to interpret.* The Secrets of DumbledoreNick lays out the drama surrounding the third Fantastic Beasts franchise film and his favorite part of the movie (hint: it's about “confusion”). John reveals why Jacob gets a Snakewood wand and one without a core as well as why he thinks Kowalski is the embedded author in this series.The Lake and Shed Conversations about Rowling's Golden Threads and Shed Tools* Chiastic Structure, a.k.a. Ring CompositionJohn travels to his backyard Mongolian ger, the archetypal circular architectural form, to deliver a firehose introduction to the four essentials of ring writing. He uses slides to depict the structure of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone as his brief ‘for instance' of how Rowling chooses to organize her stories and he provides a list of links (below!) for further reading.* Survey of Rowling's Golden Threads (A)In this first overview of the Golden Threads, Nick and John go back and fourth with four Threads each. Nick gives at least three examples for Bad Dad, Writing about Writing, Violence against Women, and the Evils of Fleet Street. John responds with three or more 'for instances' of Mother Love, Ghosts, Pregnancy Traps, and the Lost Child with Grieving Steward.* Survey of Rowling's Golden Threads (B)In this second overview of the Golden Threads, Nick and John talk about Kanreki red caps and tackle three Threads each. Nick gives at least three examples for Evil Government, Occult tropes, and the Embedded Author. John responds with three or more 'for instances' of the Search for the Real, Embedded Texts, and Shadow Doppelgangers.* The ‘Lost Child' Golden Thread Oeuvre ReviewFor the day before Rowling's 60th birthday, Nick and John tackle by reader request the never before discussed subject of the Lost Child theme in the author's more than twenty published works. They re-introduce the Golden Threads idea — see their Pregnancy Trap podcast or the two Kanreki series on this subject (links in post) — then they do a deep dive into the crowded waters of Lost Children in her work, and then they go out out on a high-wire to speculate about what specific spring in her Lake subconscious mind is responsible for this recurrent inspiration.* The ‘Lost Child' Golden Thread “So What?” ConversationAs a birthday gift of sorts, Nick and John close off their month-long celebration of Rowling-Galbraith's life and work with a follow-up look at yesterday's review of the ‘Lost Child' Golden Thread that runs through her stories. After cataloging the almost forty ‘for instances' taken from the opera omnia in the penultimate entry in this series, Nick and John ask, “So What?” How does the possibility that Rowling had an induced abortion and is sufficiently unsettled by it that it inspires many even most of her books at least in part make any difference in understanding their artistry and meaning?‘Strike Extended Play' or ‘How a Seven Book Series Can Be Stretched into Ten' Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

We're counting down the days until the publication of The Hallmarked Man! Nick Jeffery and John Granger take perhaps the last look at Rowling's most recent postings before they dive into discussion about the meaning and artistry of Strike8.In today's conversation, they review Rowling's relationship with Stephenie Meyer, the author of the Twilight series, a New York Times feature article ‘The Wizard's Everlasting Spell' about the growth of Potter fan fiction with a romantic twist, and Rowling's acerbic review of Nikola Sturgeon's memoir Frankly. Nick and John discuss along the way the initial response of cultural gatekeepers to the quality of the writing in Harry Potter, the history of Rowling's relationship with the writers of romantic fan fiction using her characters in light of Fifty Shades of Gray, and Hogwarts Professor's role in making ‘Rowling Studies' legitimate and the culture-wide acceptance of Rowling as a writer of merit “something we've always known” rather than a controversial assertion.And what does all that have to do with the imminent release of Hallmarked Man? Nick and John share their more-than-tentative plans for reading Strike8 and the best way — not the only way, of course, but a much better way than, say, cataloging predictions everyone will forget by mid-September — to prepare for our first reading of an epic Rowling-Galbraith title.We hope you are as excited as we are to the advent of Hallmarked Man and that you're looking forward to exploration of its breadth and depth beneath the surface plot with us in the coming month!Links To Subjects Discussed Above:The Wizard's Everlasting Spell Why Magic, Dragons and Explicit Sex Are in Bookstores Everywhere: Romantasy is propping up the fiction market. Thanks to a generation that grew up reading about a boy wizard. (The New York Times, 20 August 2025, Alexandra Alter)The new version of the [‘Dramione' Potter fan fiction] story that so captivated Ms. Stallone will soon be released as “Alchemised,” and the novel's publisher, Del Rey, is betting that the feverish devotion to its fanfiction predecessor will translate into blockbuster sales. Del Rey has ordered a first printing of 750,000 copies for the novel's release in late September; translations are lined up in 21 languages.Besides appealing to hordes of existing fans, “Alchemised” has another advantage: It taps into the raging appetite for romantasy, a subgenre that blends fantasy elements like magic, fairies and dragons with love, yearning and explicit sex.In a way, the romantasy explosion — driven by the success of blockbuster authors like Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros, whose series have sold millions upon millions of copies — stems from the legacy of popular young adult series like “Twilight” and “Harry Potter.” Those books molded generations of young readers who have grown up but still crave big fantasy novels — now with a dose of erotica.“They grew up with the characters, and the stories ended, but there's still such a huge appetite,” said Leah Hultenschmidt, publisher of the romance imprint Forever. “They're still hungry for that magical world building, an epic cast of characters and heroism, and maybe they just want it a little spicier.”Publishers are frantically searching for the next breakout romantasy series. Last year, romantasy sales topped more than 32 million copies in print alone, a 47 percent jump over the previous year, according to Circana Bookscan. Five of the 10 best-selling adult fiction titles this year are romantasies. At the same time, adult fiction sales overall have stagnated.The kind of romance that's selling like crazy now — erotically charged genre mash-ups — first took off in fanfiction before publishers recognized there was an appetite for it.“For a long time, you had to go to fanfiction to find that,” said Anne Jamison, a professor of English at the University of Utah who has studied fanfiction. “Romantasy basically is what fanfiction made.”* Alchemized Sen Lin Yu* ‘Romantasy' Novels on Amazon, Etc.The twilight of Nicola Sturgeon: J.K. Rowling reviews FranklyI know I'm stating the obvious, and I'll probably be one of countless reviewers making the same point, but it's impossible to read Nicola Sturgeon's memoir without remembering the smash hit fictional franchise, Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. For those who don't know (ie, everyone who wasn't a tween or teenage girl, or living with one, 2005-2015), Twilight was massively popular for roughly a decade, each new book or film being greeted adoringly by its devoted fans. [opening paragraph)Rowling and Romantasy:* ‘The Twenty Richest Authors in the World:' Rowling #2 (!), Meyer #18, Collins #20* The Sunday Times' List of the “100 Bestselling Books of the Last Five Decades:” Rowling #23, Meyer #42, 58, 59, and 64* Twilight Book Sales * Stephen King: “Stephenie Meyer Can't Write Worth a Darn”* Speaking of Disappearances – Whatever Happened to Stephenie Meyer?* Fifty Shades of Grey Book Sales* ‘Fifty Shades Outsells Harry Potter'* ‘Rowling Refuses to Read Fifty Shades'* Rowling about Sales of Fifty Shades: “Just think how many books I could've sold if Harry had been a bit more creative with his wand.”Rowling August 2025 Tweet about Writers who are All Lake No Shed (and Vice-Versa) The Silkworm and its Women Writers:* Kathryn Kent: “I write fantasy with a twist… It's fantasy slash erotica really, but quite literary” (416) “She makes Dorcus Pengelly look like Iris Murdoch” (232)* Dorcus Pengelly: “She writes pornography dressed up as historical romance” (225)* Elizabeth Tassel: All Shed, No Lake (per Strike)You told Quine that Bombyx Mori sounded brilliant, that it would be the best thing he'd ever done, that it was going to be a massive success, but that he ought to keep the contents very, very quiet in case of legal action, and to make a bigger splash when it was unveiled.And all the time you were writing your own version. You had plenty of time to get it right, didn't you, Elizabeth? Twenty-six years of empty evenings, you could have written plenty of books by now, with your first from Oxford… but what would you write about? You haven't exactly lived a full life, have you?… (442)Did it feel good, raping and killing your way through everyone you knew, Elizabeth? One big explosion of malice and obscenity, revenging yourself on everyone, painting yourself as the unacclaimed genius, taking sideswipes at everyone with a more successful love life, a more satisfying — (440)* Michael Fancourt about women writers (298):I said that the greatest female writers, with almost no exceptions, have been childless. A fact. And I have said that women generally, by virtue of their desire to mother, are incapable of the necessarily single-minded focus anyone must bring to the creation of literature, true literature. I don't retract a word. That is a fact.* Hobart's Sin, Owen Quine's first and best novel, the “Key” to Tassel's Bombyx Mori, the “book within a book:” “The plot of Hobart's Sin turns on Hobart, who's both male and female, having to choose between parenthood and abandoning his aspirations as a writer: aborting his baby, or abandoning his brainchild” (229)* “It's all about a hermaphrodite who's pregnant and gets an abortion because a kid would interfere with his literary ambitions” (242)* Rowling about The Silkworm: It is the Story that Inspired the Series, the Lake OriginActually, the plot for Silkworm predated the plot for Cuckoo's Calling. I'd had the idea for that plot, the book within the book, for seven or eight years before I wrote it. That often happens with me, I have an idea and I keep it and sit on it. But I keep it and I play with it like a Rubik's cube and there'll come a point where everything clicks and it's ready to be written. I have a lot of notebooks filled with these kinds of things. Silkworm was like that. I sat on that plot for a long time before using it.* “It's a novel about novels with another novel inside it” (~1;15)Reading for Wisdom and JolliesAn Introduction to and Example of Reading Rowling at Four Levels: A Quadrigal Reading of The Christmas PigReading Rowling the Hard, Right Way versus Enjoying the Surface Story and Discussing Themes: An Introduction to Perennialist ReadingTraditional Symbols in Harry Potter and Cormoran Strike: A Perennialist ViewHarry Potter's Bookshelf — What to Read to Understand Rowling's Artistry and How to Read Her Work to Grasp Her Meaning and IntentionThe Deathly Hallows LecturesHarry Potter as Ring Cycle and Ring Composition* ‘How Does Ring Composition Work Anyway?'Darke Hierogliphicks: Alchemy in English Literature from Chaucer to the Restoration (Stanton Linden)How to Think About The Ink Black Heart Pre-Publication – Seven Tools for Serious Readers to Review (February 2022)And Don't Forget!* In Praise of Friendship - a Robin and Strike Heresy Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Today, we have a special bonus episode showcasing all of our best outtakes and bloopers from season 5 covering The Silkworm. Let us know some of your favorites!Links:www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Today's Lake and Shed framed conversation is once again about the fifth Cormoran Strike novel, Troubled Blood. Nick discusses Rowling's history with the Clerkenwell neighborhood. John talks about Troubled Blood as a double re-telling of The Faerie Queene, Book One, with Strike and Margot as the Redcrosse Knight and Oonaugh and Robin as Una.New to the Lake and Shed Kanreki Birthday series? Here's what we're doing:On 31 July 2025, Joanne Murray, aka J. K. Rowling and Robert Galbraith, will be celebrating her 60th birthday. This celebration is considered a ‘second birth' in Japan or Kanreki because it is the completion of the oriental astrological cycle. To mark JKR's Kanreki, Dr John Granger and Nick Jeffery, both Nipponophiles, are reading through Rowling's twenty-one published works and reviewing them in light of the author's writing process, her ‘Lake and Shed' metaphor. The ‘Lake' is the biographical source of her inspiration; the ‘Shed' is the alocal place of her intentional artistry, in which garage she transforms the biographical stuff provided by her subconscious mind into the archetypal stories that have made her the most important author of her age. You can hear Nick and John discuss this process and their birthday project at the first entry in this series of posts: Happy Birthday, JKR! A Lake and Shed Celebration of her Life and Work.Tomorrow? Our first look at Christmas Pig with both Nick and John talking about the Blue Bunny. Stay tuned!Links to posts mentioned in today's Lake and Shed conversation for further reading:* The Clerkenwell/Islington Gate of St John (Twitter Header)Faerie Queene!John Granger:* How Spenser Uses Cupid in Faerie Queen and Its Relevance for Understanding Troubled Blood* Reading Troubled Blood as a Medieval Morality PlayElizabeth Baird-Hardy* Day One, Part One: The Spenserian Epigraphs of the Pre-Released Troubled Blood Chapters* Day Two, Part Two: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Eight to Fourteen* Day Three, Part Three: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Fifteen to Thirty* Day Four, Part Four: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Thirty One to Forty Eight* Day Five, Part Five: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Forty Nine to Fifty Nine* Part Six: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Sixty to Seventy One* Spenser and Strike Part Seven: Changes for the BetterBeatrice Groves* Trouble in Faerie Land (Part 1): Spenserian Clues in Troubled Blood Epigraphs* Trouble in Faerie Land (Part 2): Shipping Robin and Strike in the Epigraphs of Troubled Blood* Trouble in Faerie Land (Part 3): Searching for Duessa in Troubled BloodThis is a tentative listing by category of the posts at HogwartsProfessor about Troubled Blood. There's much more work to do on this wonderful work!1. Chiastic StructureRowling's fixation on planning in general and with structural patterns specifically in all of her work continues in Troubled Blood. From the first reading, it became apparent that in Strike5 Rowling-Galbraith had taken her game to a new level of sophistication. She continued, as she had in her four previous Strike mysteries, to write a story in parallel with the Harry Potter septology; there are many echoes of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the fifth and equivalent number in the Hogwarts Saga, in Troubled Blood. Just as Phoenix was in important ways a re-telling of Philosopher's Stone, so Troubled Blood also echoes Cuckoo's Calling — with a few Stone notes thrown in as well. The new heights of Rowling's structural artistry, though, extend beyond her patented intratextuality; they are in each of Strike5's first six parts being ring compositions themselves, the astrological chart embedded in the story chapters, and the six part and two chapters correspondence in structure between Troubled Blood and Spenser's Faerie Queen.* Structure Part One* Structure Part Two, Notes Two to Six* Structure Part Three, Notes One to Three* Structure Part Four, Notes One to Three, Eight, and Ten* Structure Part Five, Notes One to Four, Nine* Structure Part Six, Notes One to Four* Structure Part Seven, Ring Latch, Story Axis* Astrological Clock Structure of Troubled Blood* Career of Evil Echoes* Order of the Phoenix Echoes* Cuckoo's Calling Echoes* Philosopher's Stone Echoes2. Literary AlchemyPer Nabokov, literary artistry and accomplishment are known and experienced through a work's “structure and style.” Rowling's signature structures are evident in Troubled Blood (see above) and her characteristic hermetic artistry, literary alchemy, is as well. Strike5 is the series nigredo and Strike and Robin experience great losses and their reduction to their respective and shared prima materia in the dissolving rain and flood waters of the story.* Strike's Transformation* Robin Ellacott and the Reverse Alchemy of the First Three Strike Novels* Lethal White as the Alchemical Pivot of the Strike Series* The Wet Nigredo: Troubled Blood's Black Names, Holiday Three Step, and Losses3. Psychology/MythologyRowling told Val McDermid that if she had not succeeded as a writer than she would have studied to become a psychologist:V: If it hadn't worked out the way it has. If you'd sat there and written the book in the café and nobody ever published it, what would you have done with your life, what would you have liked to have been?JK: There are two answers. If I could have done anything, I would have been really interested in doing, I would have been a psychologist. Because that's the only thing that's ever really pulled me in any way from all this. But at the time I was teaching, and I was very broke, and I had a daughter and I think I would have kept teaching until we were stable enough that we were stable enough that I could change.Because of her lifelong study and pre-occupation with mythology, it is fitting that in Strike5 readers are confronted with a host of references to psychologist Carl Jung and to a specific Greek myth which Jungian psychologists consider essential in understanding feminine psychology. All of which leads in the end to the Strike series' equivalent of the Hogwarts Saga's soul triptych exteriorization in Harry, Hermione and Ron as Body, Mind, and Spirit, with Robin and Strike as Handless Maiden and Fisher King, the mythological images of anima and animus neglected and working towards integration.* Carl Jung and Troubled Blood* A Mythological Key to Cormoran Strike? The Myth of Eros, Psyche, and Venus* The Anima and Animus: The Psychological Heart and Exteriorization of the Cormoran Strike Novels4. Valentine's DayThe story turn of Troubled Blood takes place on Valentine's Day and the actions, events, and repercussions of this holiday of Cupid and Heart-shaped candies, not to mention chocolates, shape the Robin and Strike relationship drama irrevocably. Chocolates play an outsized portion of that work symbolically, believe it or not; the word ‘chocolate' occurs 34 times in the first four Strike novels combined but 82 times in Troubled Blood. I explore the importance of this confection in two posts before beginning to explain the importance and appropriateness of Valentine's Day being the heart of the story, one that is in large part a re-telling of the Cupid and Psyche myth.* Troubled Blood: Interpreting the Poetry of Cormoran's Five Gifts To Robin* Troubled Blood: Poisoned Chocolates* Troubled Blood: The Secret of Rowntree* A Mythological Key to Cormoran Strike? The Myth of Eros, Psyche, and Venus5. Edmund Spenser's Faerie QueenTroubled Blood features several embedded texts, the most important of which is never mentioned in the book: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen. Serious Strikers enjoyed the luxury of not one but two scholars of Edmund Spenser who checked in on the relevance and meaning of Rowling's choice of the greatest English epic poem for her epigraphs, not to mention the host of correspondences between Strike 5 and Queen. Elizabeth Baird-Hardy did a part by part exegesis of the Troubled Blood-Faerie Queen conjunctions and Beatrice Groves shared her first thoughts on the connections as well. Just as Lethal White's meaning and artistry is relatively unappreciated without a close reading of Ibsen's Rosmersholm, so with Strike 5 and Faerie Queen.* Spenser's Faerie Queen (Above)6. The GhostsRowling's core belief is in the immortality of the soul and her favorite writer of the 20th Century is Vladimir Nabokov, whose work is subtly permeated by the otherworldly. No surprise, then, that Troubled Blood is haunted by a host of ghosts, most importantly the shade of Margot Bamborough but to include the women murdered by Dennis Creed and Nicolo Ricci. Their influence is so obvious and so important that it has spurred discussion of the spectres that haunt the first four Strike novels whose presence had not been discussed prior to the revelations of Strike 5.* Troubled Blood: The Dead Among Us* The Ghosts Haunting Troubled Blood* The Ghosts Haunting Cuckoo's Calling, Silkworm, Career of Evil, and Lethal White7. The NamesThe Cryptonyms or Cratylic Names of Troubled Blood are as rich and meaningful, even funny, as those found in Lethal White. From Paul Satchwell's “little package” to Roy Phipps as the Spanish King Phillip, from the nigredo black elements of Bill Talbot and Saul Morris to the Spenserian echoes of Oonaugh Kennedy and Janice Beattie, and the Rokeby-Oakden coincidences, Strike5 is full of name play. Did I mention that the detectives solve the mystery largely through their exploration of names? Douthwaite and Oakden only pop-up after Strike has revelations consequent to serious reflection on their names and pseudonyms. Rowling-Galbraith really wants her real-world readers to be reflecting on the Dickensian names of all her characters.* The Cratylic Names of Troubled Blood: A Top Twenty Round Up8. The Flints and GaffesRowling commented in one of her interview tableaus for Troubled Blood that she had worked extra hard to get the dates right in this most complicated of novels and that her proof reader and continuity editor found a big mistake. Serious Strikers, though, were left crying “Alas!” and laughing aloud at the number of bone-headed gaffes in The Presence's longest work to date. It remains her best as well as her longest book to date, but, really, get the woman the help she needs to comb the book for errors pre-publication. Can you say, “Isla”?* Troubled Blood: Flints, Errors, and Head Scratchers* Troubled Blood Gaffes: A Second Look at Ages and Dates9. The AstrologyThe principal embedded text in Troubled Blood, the one Robin and Cormoran read repeatedly, create keys for, and discuss throughout the book, is Bill Talbot's ‘True Book.' It features an astrological chart for the exact time and place of Margot Bamborough's disappearance in 1974, which map Talbot used to try and solve the case. Strike is profoundly disgusted by this approach but spends, as does Robin, much of his time trying to figure out the chart or at least what Talbot made of it. Troubled Blood, consequently, turns into something of an exploration of astrology and its relevance to understanding ourselves and the world. Unpacking what Rowling means by it, not to mention what the natal charts of Robin and Cormoran tell us about these charactes, their relationship, and Rowling-Galbraith's intentionally hermetic artistry, is a large part of the exegetical work to be done on Troubled Blood.* Nick Jeffery: Troubled Blood — The Acknowledgements* Part Three, Note Five* Troubled Blood: Strike's Natal Chart* Astrological Clock Structure of Troubled Blood* Astrological Allegorical: The Sun Signs of Characters in Troubled Blood* A Second Look at Talbot's Chart: What Does it Reveal to the Unbiased Eye?10. The Tarot Card SpreadsWe know that Rowling has significant skills when it comes to astrology. What is less well appreciated is that almost from childhood she has played with tarot card reading which knowledge has informed her work. This is comic in Trelawney, say, but comes to the fore in Troubled Blood‘s card spreads: the Celtic Cross in Talbot's ‘True Book,' his embedded three card spreads in the illustrations of that tome, and Robin's two readings, one in Laemington Spa and the other in her flat at story's end.* Part Three, Note Six* Part Four, Note Five* Part Five, Note Five* Part Six, Notes Five, Six, Eight* Bill Talbot's Tarot: The Embedded Occult Heart of Troubled Blood* Robin Ellacott's Tarot: The Missed Meanings of Her Twin Three Card Spreads in Troubled Blood11. Who Killed Leda Strike?To Rowling-Galbraith's credit, credible arguments in dedicated posts have been made that every person in the list below was the one who murdered Leda Strike. Who do you think did it?* Jonny Rokeby and the Harringay Crime Syndicate (Heroin Dark Lord 2.0),* Ted Nancarrow (Uncle Ted Did It),* Dave Polworth,* Leda Strike (!),* Lucy Fantoni (Lucy and Joan Did It and here),* Sir Randolph Whittaker,* Nick Herbert,* Peter Gillespie, and* Charlotte Campbell-Ross12. Embedded TextsAll of Rowling's novels feature books and texts, written work as well as metanarratives, with which her characters struggle to figure out in reflective parallel to what her readers are trying to do with the novel in hand. Troubled Blood is exceptionally laden with these embedded texts. Beyond Talbot's True Book and Spenser's Faerie Queen noted above, we are treated to selections from The Demon of Paradise Park, Whatever Happened to Margot Bamborough?, Astrology 14, and The Magus.13. The Murderers: Creed and BeattieA demon-possessed psychopath and the brain-damaged lonely woman… Each is described as “a genius of misdirection” and being without remorse or empathy. The actual murderers in Troubled Blood are distinct, certainly, but paired as well, as one of the many mirrored pairs in this story.14. FeminismTroubled Blood, Rowling has said, is a commentary of sorts on changes in the history of feminism. It is an unvarnished, even brutal exploration of the heroic age of the feminist movement, its front and back, largely through the personalities, circumstances, choices, and experiences of two pairs of women, Margot Bamborough and her plucky Irish side-kick Oonaugh Kennedy and the paired through time couple of Irene Bull-Hickson and Janice Beattie.15. Rokeby 3.0Jonny Rokeby makes his first appearance, albeit only by phone call, in Troubled Blood and yet it has reset thinking about Strike and his biological father considerably. Kurt Schreyer thinks the head Deadbeat is more Snape than Voldemort — and, if this is the case, we need to re-read the series to see how much Strike's emotional injuries from childhood neglect have misshaped his understanding of his dad so he lives in upside-down land.* Guest Post: Rokeby Redux – Is Strike's Father More Snape than Lord Voldemort? Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Today's Lake and Shed framed conversation is about the fifth Cormoran Strike novel, Troubled Blood. Nick discusses Rowling's history with the divinatory art of astrology and the occult resources and reference works she brought into play in writing a novel whose primary embedded text is a murder scene's astrological chart. John talks about the astrological clock structure of twelve houses in which Galbraith tells this remarkable story.New to the Lake and Shed Kanreki Birthday series? Here's what we're doing:On 31 July 2025, Joanne Murray, aka J. K. Rowling and Robert Galbraith, will be celebrating her 60th birthday. This celebration is considered a ‘second birth' in Japan or Kanreki because it is the completion of the oriental astrological cycle. To mark JKR's Kanreki, Dr John Granger and Nick Jeffery, both Nipponophiles, are reading through Rowling's twenty-one published works and reviewing them in light of the author's writing process, her ‘Lake and Shed' metaphor. The ‘Lake' is the biographical source of her inspiration; the ‘Shed' is the alocal place of her intentional artistry, in which garage she transforms the biographical stuff provided by her subconscious mind into the archetypal stories that have made her the most important author of her age. You can hear Nick and John discuss this process and their birthday project at the first entry in this series of posts: Happy Birthday, JKR! A Lake and Shed Celebration of her Life and Work.Tomorrow? Another look at Troubled Blood, this time with an introduction to Rowling's ties to Clerkenwell from Nick and with John making a case for reading Troubled Blood as a re-telling of Spenser's Faerie Queene, Book One, with Strike and Margot as the Redcrosse Knight and Robin and Oonaugh as Una. Stay tuned!Links to posts mentioned in today's Lake and Shed conversation for further reading:* Nick Jeffery: Troubled Blood — The Astrologers in the Acknowledgements* J. K. Rowling, Author-Astrologer, Pt 1: How Did We Not Know About This?* Troubled Blood: Strike's Natal Chart* Astrological Clock Structure of Troubled BloodThis is a tentative listing by category of the posts at HogwartsProfessor about Troubled Blood. There's much more work to do on this wonderful work!1. Chiastic StructureRowling's fixation on planning in general and with structural patterns specifically in all of her work continues in Troubled Blood. From the first reading, it became apparent that in Strike5 Rowling-Galbraith had taken her game to a new level of sophistication. She continued, as she had in her four previous Strike mysteries, to write a story in parallel with the Harry Potter septology; there are many echoes of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the fifth and equivalent number in the Hogwarts Saga, in Troubled Blood. Just as Phoenix was in important ways a re-telling of Philosopher's Stone, so Troubled Blood also echoes Cuckoo's Calling — with a few Stone notes thrown in as well. The new heights of Rowling's structural artistry, though, extend beyond her patented intratextuality; they are in each of Strike5's first six parts being ring compositions themselves, the astrological chart embedded in the story chapters, and the six part and two chapters correspondence in structure between Troubled Blood and Spenser's Faerie Queen.* Structure Part One* Structure Part Two, Notes Two to Six* Structure Part Three, Notes One to Three* Structure Part Four, Notes One to Three, Eight, and Ten* Structure Part Five, Notes One to Four, Nine* Structure Part Six, Notes One to Four* Structure Part Seven, Ring Latch, Story Axis* Astrological Clock Structure of Troubled Blood* Career of Evil Echoes* Order of the Phoenix Echoes* Cuckoo's Calling Echoes* Philosopher's Stone Echoes2. Literary AlchemyPer Nabokov, literary artistry and accomplishment are known and experienced through a work's “structure and style.” Rowling's signature structures are evident in Troubled Blood (see above) and her characteristic hermetic artistry, literary alchemy, is as well. Strike5 is the series nigredo and Strike and Robin experience great losses and their reduction to their respective and shared prima materia in the dissolving rain and flood waters of the story.* Strike's Transformation* Robin Ellacott and the Reverse Alchemy of the First Three Strike Novels* Lethal White as the Alchemical Pivot of the Strike Series* The Wet Nigredo: Troubled Blood's Black Names, Holiday Three Step, and Losses3. Psychology/MythologyRowling told Val McDermid that if she had not succeeded as a writer than she would have studied to become a psychologist:V: If it hadn't worked out the way it has. If you'd sat there and written the book in the café and nobody ever published it, what would you have done with your life, what would you have liked to have been?JK: There are two answers. If I could have done anything, I would have been really interested in doing, I would have been a psychologist. Because that's the only thing that's ever really pulled me in any way from all this. But at the time I was teaching, and I was very broke, and I had a daughter and I think I would have kept teaching until we were stable enough that we were stable enough that I could change.Because of her lifelong study and pre-occupation with mythology, it is fitting that in Strike5 readers are confronted with a host of references to psychologist Carl Jung and to a specific Greek myth which Jungian psychologists consider essential in understanding feminine psychology. All of which leads in the end to the Strike series' equivalent of the Hogwarts Saga's soul triptych exteriorization in Harry, Hermione and Ron as Body, Mind, and Spirit, with Robin and Strike as Handless Maiden and Fisher King, the mythological images of anima and animus neglected and working towards integration.* Carl Jung and Troubled Blood* A Mythological Key to Cormoran Strike? The Myth of Eros, Psyche, and Venus* The Anima and Animus: The Psychological Heart and Exteriorization of the Cormoran Strike Novels4. Valentine's DayThe story turn of Troubled Blood takes place on Valentine's Day and the actions, events, and repercussions of this holiday of Cupid and Heart-shaped candies, not to mention chocolates, shape the Robin and Strike relationship drama irrevocably. Chocolates play an outsized portion of that work symbolically, believe it or not; the word ‘chocolate' occurs 34 times in the first four Strike novels combined but 82 times in Troubled Blood. I explore the importance of this confection in two posts before beginning to explain the importance and appropriateness of Valentine's Day being the heart of the story, one that is in large part a re-telling of the Cupid and Psyche myth.* Troubled Blood: Interpreting the Poetry of Cormoran's Five Gifts To Robin* Troubled Blood: Poisoned Chocolates* Troubled Blood: The Secret of Rowntree* A Mythological Key to Cormoran Strike? The Myth of Eros, Psyche, and Venus5. Edmund Spenser's Faerie QueenTroubled Blood features several embedded texts, the most important of which is never mentioned in the book: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen. Serious Strikers enjoyed the luxury of not one but two scholars of Edmund Spenser who checked in on the relevance and meaning of Rowling's choice of the greatest English epic poem for her epigraphs, not to mention the host of correspondences between Strike 5 and Queen. Elizabeth Baird-Hardy did a part by part exegesis of the Troubled Blood-Faerie Queen conjunctions and Beatrice Groves shared her first thoughts on the connections as well. Just as Lethal White's meaning and artistry is relatively unappreciated without a close reading of Ibsen's Rosmersholm, so with Strike 5 and Faerie Queen.Elizabeth Baird-Hardy* Day One, Part One: The Spenserian Epigraphs of the Pre-Released Troubled Blood Chapters* Day Two, Part Two: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Eight to Fourteen* Day Three, Part Three: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Fifteen to Thirty* Day Four, Part Four: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Thirty One to Forty Eight* Day Five, Part Five: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Forty Nine to Fifty Nine* Part Six: The Spenserian Epigraphs of Troubled Blood Chapters Sixty to Seventy One* Spenser and Strike Part Seven: Changes for the BetterBeatrice Groves* Trouble in Faerie Land (Part 1): Spenserian Clues in Troubled Blood Epigraphs* Trouble in Faerie Land (Part 2): Shipping Robin and Strike in the Epigraphs of Troubled Blood* Trouble in Faerie Land (Part 3): Searching for Duessa in Troubled BloodJohn Granger:* How Spenser Uses Cupid in Faerie Queen and Its Relevance for Understanding Troubled Blood* Reading Troubled Blood as a Medieval Morality Play6. The GhostsRowling's core belief is in the immortality of the soul and her favorite writer of the 20th Century is Vladimir Nabokov, whose work is subtly permeated by the otherworldly. No surprise, then, that Troubled Blood is haunted by a host of ghosts, most importantly the shade of Margot Bamborough but to include the women murdered by Dennis Creed and Nicolo Ricci. Their influence is so obvious and so important that it has spurred discussion of the spectres that haunt the first four Strike novels whose presence had not been discussed prior to the revelations of Strike 5.* Troubled Blood: The Dead Among Us* The Ghosts Haunting Troubled Blood* The Ghosts Haunting Cuckoo's Calling, Silkworm, Career of Evil, and Lethal White7. The NamesThe Cryptonyms or Cratylic Names of Troubled Blood are as rich and meaningful, even funny, as those found in Lethal White. From Paul Satchwell's “little package” to Roy Phipps as the Spanish King Phillip, from the nigredo black elements of Bill Talbot and Saul Morris to the Spenserian echoes of Oonaugh Kennedy and Janice Beattie, and the Rokeby-Oakden coincidences, Strike5 is full of name play. Did I mention that the detectives solve the mystery largely through their exploration of names? Douthwaite and Oakden only pop-up after Strike has revelations consequent to serious reflection on their names and pseudonyms. Rowling-Galbraith really wants her real-world readers to be reflecting on the Dickensian names of all her characters.* The Cratylic Names of Troubled Blood: A Top Twenty Round Up8. The Flints and GaffesRowling commented in one of her interview tableaus for Troubled Blood that she had worked extra hard to get the dates right in this most complicated of novels and that her proof reader and continuity editor found a big mistake. Serious Strikers, though, were left crying “Alas!” and laughing aloud at the number of bone-headed gaffes in The Presence's longest work to date. It remains her best as well as her longest book to date, but, really, get the woman the help she needs to comb the book for errors pre-publication. Can you say, “Isla”?* Troubled Blood: Flints, Errors, and Head Scratchers* Troubled Blood Gaffes: A Second Look at Ages and Dates9. The AstrologyThe principal embedded text in Troubled Blood, the one Robin and Cormoran read repeatedly, create keys for, and discuss throughout the book, is Bill Talbot's ‘True Book.' It features an astrological chart for the exact time and place of Margot Bamborough's disappearance in 1974, which map Talbot used to try and solve the case. Strike is profoundly disgusted by this approach but spends, as does Robin, much of his time trying to figure out the chart or at least what Talbot made of it. Troubled Blood, consequently, turns into something of an exploration of astrology and its relevance to understanding ourselves and the world. Unpacking what Rowling means by it, not to mention what the natal charts of Robin and Cormoran tell us about these charactes, their relationship, and Rowling-Galbraith's intentionally hermetic artistry, is a large part of the exegetical work to be done on Troubled Blood.* Nick Jeffery: Troubled Blood — The Acknowledgements* Part Three, Note Five* Troubled Blood: Strike's Natal Chart* Astrological Clock Structure of Troubled Blood* Astrological Allegorical: The Sun Signs of Characters in Troubled Blood* A Second Look at Talbot's Chart: What Does it Reveal to the Unbiased Eye?10. The Tarot Card SpreadsWe know that Rowling has significant skills when it comes to astrology. What is less well appreciated is that almost from childhood she has played with tarot card reading which knowledge has informed her work. This is comic in Trelawney, say, but comes to the fore in Troubled Blood‘s card spreads: the Celtic Cross in Talbot's ‘True Book,' his embedded three card spreads in the illustrations of that tome, and Robin's two readings, one in Laemington Spa and the other in her flat at story's end.* Part Three, Note Six* Part Four, Note Five* Part Five, Note Five* Part Six, Notes Five, Six, Eight* Bill Talbot's Tarot: The Embedded Occult Heart of Troubled Blood* Robin Ellacott's Tarot: The Missed Meanings of Her Twin Three Card Spreads in Troubled Blood11. Who Killed Leda Strike?To Rowling-Galbraith's credit, credible arguments in dedicated posts have been made that every person in the list below was the one who murdered Leda Strike. Who do you think did it?* Jonny Rokeby and the Harringay Crime Syndicate (Heroin Dark Lord 2.0),* Ted Nancarrow (Uncle Ted Did It),* Dave Polworth,* Leda Strike (!),* Lucy Fantoni (Lucy and Joan Did It and here),* Sir Randolph Whittaker,* Nick Herbert,* Peter Gillespie, and* Charlotte Campbell-Ross12. Embedded TextsAll of Rowling's novels feature books and texts, written work as well as metanarratives, with which her characters struggle to figure out in reflective parallel to what her readers are trying to do with the novel in hand. Troubled Blood is exceptionally laden with these embedded texts. Beyond Talbot's True Book and Spenser's Faerie Queen noted above, we are treated to selections from The Demon of Paradise Park, Whatever Happened to Margot Bamborough?, Astrology 14, and The Magus.13. The Murderers: Creed and BeattieA demon-possessed psychopath and the brain-damaged lonely woman… Each is described as “a genius of misdirection” and being without remorse or empathy. The actual murderers in Troubled Blood are distinct, certainly, but paired as well, as one of the many mirrored pairs in this story.14. FeminismTroubled Blood, Rowling has said, is a commentary of sorts on changes in the history of feminism. It is an unvarnished, even brutal exploration of the heroic age of the feminist movement, its front and back, largely through the personalities, circumstances, choices, and experiences of two pairs of women, Margot Bamborough and her plucky Irish side-kick Oonaugh Kennedy and the paired through time couple of Irene Bull-Hickson and Janice Beattie.15. Rokeby 3.0Jonny Rokeby makes his first appearance, albeit only by phone call, in Troubled Blood and yet it has reset thinking about Strike and his biological father considerably. Kurt Schreyer thinks the head Deadbeat is more Snape than Voldemort — and, if this is the case, we need to re-read the series to see how much Strike's emotional injuries from childhood neglect have misshaped his understanding of his dad so he lives in upside-down land.* Guest Post: Rokeby Redux – Is Strike's Father More Snape than Lord Voldemort? Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Today's Lake and Shed framed conversation is about J. K. Rowling's second Cormoran Strike novel, The Silkworm. Nick and John discuss the date Rowling claims to have had her Lake inspiration for Silkworm, the first book idea she had for the series, and what that would mean, if true. The ‘Lake' point that Nick reveals is the probable identity of ‘Jenkins,' the mystery person to whom Strike 2 is dedicated, a revelation consequent to no little detective work (and a very close reading of Louisa May Alcott!). He also discusses some real-life literary infighting in contemporary London that might have been lifted from the pages of Silkworm. John argues that this ur-novel of the series, its point of conception, is Rowling's not especially opaque guide to how to understand a novelist's life and to appreciate their work, in short, her first ‘Lake and Shed' discussion (albeit one embedded in story). He explores Kathryn Kent's blog entry about Plot and Narrative as Rowling's pointer to the syuzhet and Fabula distinction of the Russian Formalists, the key to understanding what writers do and create.New to the Lake and Shed Kanreki Birthday series? Here's what we're doing:On 31 July 2025, Joanne Murray, aka J. K. Rowling and Robert Galbraith, will be celebrating her 60th birthday. This celebration is considered a ‘second birth' in Japan or Kanreki because it is the completion of the oriental astrological cycle. To mark JKR's Kanreki, Dr John Granger and Nick Jeffery, both Nipponophiles, are reading through Rowling's twenty-one published works and reviewing them in light of the author's writing process, her ‘Lake and Shed' metaphor. The ‘Lake' is the biographical source of her inspiration; the ‘Shed' is the alocal place of her intentional artistry, in which garage she transforms the biographical stuff provided by her subconscious mind into the archetypal stories that have made her the most important author of her age. You can hear Nick and John discuss this process and their birthday project at the first entry in this series of posts: Happy Birthday, JKR! A Lake and Shed Celebration of her Life and Work.The nine HogwartsProfessor birthday videos posted thus far in this series can be read at the links below:* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows* A Lake and Shed Reading of Casual Vacancy* A Lake and Shed Reading of Cuckoo's CallingTomorrow? It's Career of Evil, the Comoran Strike novel unlike all others and one which Serious Strikers either love or love to hate. Links to posts mentioned in today's Lake and Shed conversation for further reading:Does Rowling Merit the Nobel Prize in Literature?* Syuzhet and Fabula* Poeima, Genre, and Influence* LiterarinessKathryn Kent's Plot-Narrative DistinctionFirst Thoughts on The SilkwormBeatrice Groves on Early Modern Revenge Drama and The Silkworm* John's Thoughts on the Poisoned Skeleton in The Silkworm Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Today's Lake and Shed framed conversation is about J. K. Rowling's first Cormoran Strike novel, The Cuckoo's Calling. Nick and John debate the degree of Rowling's dishonesty about writing a detective series before she was outed as ‘Robert Galbraith' to include whether she really had any other plan than for the book to be published by the company and edited by the editor who handled Casual Vacancy. The ‘Lake' point that Nick explores is the identity of the real Deeby Mac, namely, Di Brooks, Rowling's former security director and currently her office manager, a veteran with years of experience in the SIB. John's ‘Shed' point is his pushback against the idea that Calling wasn't really the first book in the series because Rowling has said she had the idea for it after Silkworm and only chose it because the case would make her detective famous. John argues that the many echoes that connect the first, fourth, and seventh books but especially Calling and Running Grave mean that Calling is the point of origin around which the ring of the first seven novels was constructed.New to the Lake and Shed Kanreki Birthday series? Here's what we're doing:On 31 July 2025, Joanne Murray, aka J. K. Rowling and Robert Galbraith, will be celebrating her 60th birthday. This celebration is considered a ‘second birth' in Japan or Kanreki because it is the completion of the oriental astrological cycle. To mark JKR's Kanreki, Dr John Granger and Nick Jeffery, both Nipponophiles, are reading through Rowling's twenty-one published works and reviewing them in light of the author's writing process, her ‘Lake and Shed' metaphor. The ‘Lake' is the biographical source of her inspiration; the ‘Shed' is the alocal place of her intentional artistry, in which garage she transforms the biographical stuff provided by her subconscious mind into the archetypal stories that have made her the most important author of her age. You can hear Nick and John discuss this process and their birthday project at the first entry in this series of posts: Happy Birthday, JKR! A Lake and Shed Celebration of her Life and Work.The eight HogwartsProfessor birthday videos posted thus far in this series can be read at the links below:* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince* A Lake and Shed Reading of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows* A Lake and Shed Reading of The Casual VacancyTomorrow? It's The Silkworm, the first Comoran Strike novel by conception, not publication, in Rowling's oeuvre (or ‘in Robert Galbraith's, if you prefer the second of Mrs. Murray's pseudonyms), in which Nick reveals the real-life feuding authors behind the Strike2 bitter battles between book-men (and Jenkins!) while John talks about the metaliterary heft of Silkworm's “novel inside a novel about novels.” See you then!Links to posts mentioned in today's Lake and Shed conversation for further reading:* Meet the Real ‘Deeby Mac:' Evidence from the Amanda Donaldson Lawsuit * Cuckoo's Calling and Running Grave: The Essential Echoes and Parallels Between the First and Seventh Strike Mysteries* Did Charlotte Campbell Commit Suicide or Was She Murdered? The Argument from the Faked Suicide-Murders in Cuckoo, Lethal White, and Running Grave* Rowling Says The Silkworm was the First Cormoran Strike Novel Get full access to Hogwarts Professor at hogwartsprofessor.substack.com/subscribe

Today, we conclude our reread of The Silkworm with chapters 48-50. We discuss The Running Grave filming news, Strike's confrontation of Quine's killer, and the ending of the book.Next episode (10 July): Season 5 Outtakes & BloopersLinks:https://simanaitissays.com/2013/09/19/english-clubland/https://www.16personalities.com/free-personality-testwww.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Podcast #744 is just about right after help from Creem Circus, The Bug Club, The Feelies, Silkworm, Pale Lights, Ryli, & Health.

Silkworm pupae, fried and served with onions, is a popular snack in some parts of China. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, we cover chapters 44-47 of The Silkworm. We discuss the synopsis of The Hallmarked Man, Strike and Robin's interview with Kathryn Kent and Pippa, and Strike and Al's arrival at Larry Pinkelman's party. Final SW episode (Chapters 48-50): 26 JuneLinks:https://robert-galbraith.com/strike-books/the-hallmarked-man/www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Today, we cover chapters 42 and 43 of The Silkworm. We discuss the latest Hallmarked Man updates, Strike and Robin speaking with Orlando, and Strike's interview with Michael Fancourt.Next episode (12 June): Chapters 44-47Links:www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Today, we cover chapters 38-41 of The Silkworm. We discuss Leonora's arrest, Strike's visit to HMP Holloway as well as the River Café, and Strike's thoughts about Charlotte on the eve of her wedding.Next episode (29 May): Chapters 42-44Links:https://www.thegrouchoclub.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/DINING-ROOM-01-JUL-2024.pdfhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rose_Westwww.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Today, we cover chapters 36 and 37 of The Silkworm. We discuss a topic we've not talked about before, Strike's interview with Jerry Waldegrave, and his confrontation with Pippa. Next episode (15 May): Chapters 38-41Links: https://x.com/jk_rowling/status/1906146928636641448https://thesefilespod.com/blog/tsefs-dissertation-on-strikes-sex-appeal/https://open.spotify.com/show/2K186zrvRgeE2w0wQjbaw7?si=e8e2f19113334640https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Today, we cover chapters 32-35 of The Silkworm. We discuss Robin attending Ms Cunliffe's funeral, Strike and Nina's dinner together, Michael Fancourt's TV interview, and Robin's interview with the old man in the bookshop.Next episode (1 May): Chapters 36-38Links: https://www.open.ac.uk/courses/englishhttps://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/214008/Uproar-as-shops-ban-Christmas-Cliff-Richard-songswww.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

This week, we cover chapters 29-31 of The Silkworm. We discuss Strike's interview with Daniel Chard, Robin and Strike's heart-to-heart at Burger King, and Strike's story about he and Dave Polworth in Australia.Next episode (17 April): Chapters 32-35Links: https://thesefilespod.com/blog/looking-at-clues/https://thesefilespod.com/blog/a-maid-of-the-silver-sea-guessing-the-epigraphs/https://x.com/jk_rowling/status/1900570497336668294https://x.com/jk_rowling/status/1791197492022854004https://www.artnet.com/artists/alfred-wallis/st-michaels-mount-d1ZOYpig-hWA1kuNF_2VaA2https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2008/06/text-of-j-k-rowling-speech/www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Developer" Formed in the mid-80s in Missoula, Montana by high school pals Tim Midyett, Joel R. Phelps and Andy Cohen and rounded out by Seattle-born drummer Michael Dahlquist, Silkworm remain one of the most singular indie rock bands of all time. They relocated from Montana to Seattle in 1990 and then the real fun began. Their 1994 album In The West was produced by Steve Albini, who actually went to the same high school in Montana, and this is the album where Silkworm really hit their stride. From Garden City Blues to Raised By Tigers, In The West was filled with dark, churning rhythms, brooding percussion and inventive lyrics. Phelps left the band after In The West, but Silkworm kept moving from strength to strength, putting out classic albums like Developer, Italian Platinum and It'll Be Cool. Their close to 15 album discography is near-perfect and repeated listens always yield new sonic surprises. The band ended in 2005 after the death of Dahlquist in a car accident, which also claimed the lives of several of his friends. However, after the death of Albini back in 2024, the high school unit of Phelps, Midyett and Cohen along with drummer Jeff Panall played a tribute show in his honor. One thing led to another and now we have the first Silkworm live dates in over 20 years which will start in September. Look, Silkworm are a fascinating band--check out the documentary Couldn't You Wait? The Story Of Silkworm to get the holes filled in and pick up the re-mastered and expanded version of Developer that Comedy Minus One just put out, but let me just say this: it's hard to think of a more idiosyncratic, and downright appealing band than Silkworm. The innovative word-play, the guitars that rise and fall in big crunchy bursts, the prowling bass-lines and the bursts of stirring percussion make them one of the most enigmatic, unique and altogether appealing bands in recent memory. www.skwm.bandcamp.com www.bombshellradio.com www.stereoembersmagazine.com (http://www.stereoembersmagazine.com) www.alexgreenbooks.com (http://www.alexgreenbooks.com) IG & BLUESKY: @emberspodcast

Today, we cover chapters 27-28 of The Silkworm. We discuss 'The Double Dealer' by William Congreve, Strike's interview with Liz Tassel, and Robin and Strike's drive to Devon to interview Daniel Chard.Next episode (3 April): Chapters 29-31Links:www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Diving into Saint Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle, the Fifth Mansions - Chapter 2. The Fifth Mansion is the prayer stage of spiritual betrothal. Saint Teresa explains the stages of prayer development from ascetical to mystical through her classic analogy of the silkworm becoming the butterfly.Timeline:00:00:00 Show Opener - Interior Castle Fifth Mansions Chapter 200:01:10 Introduction - Welcome00:03:37 Introduction to the Fifth Mansions (Third Water)00:08:40 Paragraph 1. The soul compared to a butterfly. 00:14:21 Paragraph 2. The grandeurs of creation.00:16:15 Paragraph 3. Symbol of the soul and the silkworm. 00:17:48 Paragraph 4. Preparation of the soul for God's indwelling.00:19:02 Paragraph 5. Mystic death of the silkworm. 00:25:46 Paragraph 6. Effects of the union.00:29:38 Paragraph 7. Increase of fervor and detachment.00:34:17 Paragraph 8. Trials succeeding the prayer of union.00:38:32 Paragraph 9. Longing for death and zeal for God's honor.00:40:23 Paragraph 10. This zeal supernatural.00:40:53 Paragraph 11. God alone works this grace.00:43:20 Paragraph 12. The same zeal as that felt by our Lord on earth.00:44:43 Paragraph 13. Christ's keenest suffering.00:47:09 Spiritual Exercises - Contemplation00:57:50 Conclusion

This week, we cover chapters 24-26 of The Silkworm. We discuss Strike's dream about Charlotte (a LOT), he and Robin's visit to Talgarth Road, and his stakeout of Jerry Waldegrave's house.Next episode (13 March): IBH Adaptation Call-In Episode, Part 2Next book episode (20 March): Chapters 27-28Links:https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/10529041.york-minsters-heart-of-yorkshire-window-a-popular-destination-for-love-struck-couples/https://visionjournal.edu.mk/social/index.php/1/article/download/174/171/797#:~:text=Their%20architectural%20elements%20were%20carefully,religious%20experience%20for%20the%20faithful.www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

On today's episode, I talk to musician Tim Midyett. Originally from Havre, Montana, Tim started the band Ein Heit in 1985 with his friends, and two years later, they changed their name to Silkworm. In the 20 years the band was together, they released over two dozen albums, EPs and singles on a variety of labels including C/Z, Matador and Touch and Go. In 2005, Silkworm stopped performing after their drummer Michael Dahlquist was killed in a car accident. Tim and Silkworm's guitarist Andy Cohen would go on to form Bottomless Pit, who released four albums and EPs on the wonderful record label Comedy Minus One, and most recently, Tim has been writing and performing with his latest group Mint Mile!  (FYI this was taped back in late December; I meant to put it out earlier and then the city caught on fire for a couple weeks - anyway, I only note this because we're a lil' flippant about the current political atmosphere in a way that I don't think we'd be if this was taped today!) This is the website for Beginnings, subscribe on Apple Podcasts, follow me on Twitter. Check out my free philosophy Substack where I write essays every couple months here and my old casiopop band's lost album here! And the comedy podcast I do with my wife Naomi Couples Therapy can be found here! Theme song by the fantastic Savoir Adore! Second theme by the brilliant Mike Pace! Closing theme by the delightful Gregory Brothers! Podcast art by the inimitable Beano Gee!

This week, we cover chapters 22 and 23 of The Silkworm. We discuss Robin postponing the wedding, Strike's birthday gift, and Strike's visit to Anstis and his wife.Next episode (6 March): Chapter 24-26Links:www.thesefilespod.comwww.ko-fi.com/thesefilespodwww.facebook.com/thesefilespodwww.instagram.com/thesefilespodwww.twitter.com/thesefilespodhttp://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

EVERY OTHER KREATIVE KONTROL EPISODE IS ONLY ACCESSIBLE TO MONTHLY $6 USD PATREON SUPPORTERS. This one is fine, but please subscribe now on Patreon so you never miss full episodes. Thanks!Andy Cohen and Tim Midyett from Silkworm discuss the new Developer reissue, our shared experience at a memorial for Steve Albini this past summer where Joel RL Phelps joined them for their first Silkworm set together in 30 years, monumental news about upcoming Silkworm shows, revisiting Developer's lyrical themes and Albini's sounds, rarities, including a Bob Dylan song performed with Pavement's Stephen Malkmus, Midyett's band Mint Mile making a new album with Albini a week before he died and what his loss means to Silkworm, forthcoming solo music, other future plans, and much more.Support vish on Patreon! Thanks to the Bookshelf, Planet Bean Coffee, and Grandad's Donuts. Support Y.E.S.S., Pride Centre of Edmonton, and Letters Charity. Follow vish online.Related episodes/links:Ep. #910: The Hard QuartetEp. #869: Steve AlbiniEp. #840: Mint MileEp. #514: Steve Albini and Silkworm's Andy Cohen and Tim MidyettEp. #369: Andrew Cohen & Light ComaEp. #70: Joel RL PhelpsEp. #52: Tim Midyett of Bottomless Pit Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/kreative-kontrol. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, we're covering chapters 19-21 of The Silkworm. We discuss our first update regarding the ninth Strike book, Matthew's mother's death, and Strike visiting Leonora and Orlando. Next episode (20 February): Chapters 22-23 Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

This week, we cover chapters 15-18 of The Silkworm. We discuss Strike's birthday party, discovering Quine at Talgarth Road, and Robin's reaction to the news. Next episode (6 February): Chapters 19-21 Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Sarah Roberts is a comedian and writer, who is quickly becoming one of comedy's most exciting new voices. Among her award nods are: Komedia New Comedy Award finalist 2023, Leicester Square New Act runner-up 2022, a 99 Club bursary winner and BBC New Comedy Award regional finalist 2024 as well as Soho Theatre Labs Plus alumni 2022. A graduate of the National Film & Television School's Writing & Producing Comedy course, Sarah's graduation project, OnlyFran was featured by Director's Notes as one of 10 essential shorts from NFTS 2022 graduates and was shortlisted for the Funny Women Shorts Award 2022. Her debut stand-up comedy hour, Silkworm, was listed as a stand-out show at Edinburgh Fringe 2024 by Rolling Stone, The Guardian, PinkNews, and The iPaper, and is now going on tour in Spring 2025, including a run at Soho Theatre. Get you tickets here - https://www.sarahjroberts.com/services-7Sarah Roberts is our guest in episode 458 of My Time Capsule and chats to Michael Fenton Stevens about the five things she'd like to put in a time capsule; four she'd like to preserve and one she'd like to bury and never have to think about again .For tickets for Sarah Roberts' tour, visit - https://www.sarahjroberts.com/services-7Follow Sarah Roberts on Instagram: @sarahroberts_69 . Follow My Time Capsule on Instagram: @mytimecapsulepodcast & Twitter & Facebook: @MyTCpod .Follow Michael Fenton Stevens on Twitter: @fentonstevens & Instagram @mikefentonstevens .Produced and edited by John Fenton-Stevens for Cast Off Productions .Music by Pass The Peas Music .Artwork by matthewboxall.com .This podcast is proud to be associated with the charity Viva! Providing theatrical opportunities for hundreds of young people . Get bonus episodes and ad-free listening by becoming a team member with Acast+! Your support will help us to keep making My Time Capsule. Join our team now! https://plus.acast.com/s/mytimecapsule. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today, we cover chapters 13 and 14 of The Silkworm. We discuss the latest exciting news about the completion of The Hallmarked Man, the Roper-Chard party, and Strike reading Bombyx Mori for the first time. Next episode (23 January): Chapters 15-18 Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Today, we cover chapters 10-12 of The Silkworm. We discuss Kathryn Kent's blog, the awkward meeting between Robin, Matthew, and Strike, and Strike's first meeting with Nina Lascelles. Next episode (9 January): Chapters 13-15 Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

This week, we cover chapters 8-9 of The Silkworm. We discuss exciting news about the upcoming BBC adaptation of The Ink Black Heart, Strike's interview with Liz Tassel, and his encounter with Kathryn Kent. Next episode (26 December): Chapters 10-12 Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Sophie Bushwick and Claire Maldarelli join the show to talk about silkworms in tea and ghost armies (though not the kind from Lord of the Rings). Plus, Rachel talks about a prankster elephant. The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week is a podcast by Popular Science. Share your weirdest facts and stories with us in our Facebook group or tweet at us! Click here to learn more about all of our stories!  Links to Rachel's TikTok, Newsletter, Merch Store and More: https://linktr.ee/RachelFeltman  Rachel now has a Patreon, too! Follow her for exclusive bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/RachelFeltman Link to Jess' Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/jesscapricorn -- Follow our team on Twitter Rachel Feltman: www.twitter.com/RachelFeltman Produced by Jess Boddy: www.twitter.com/JessicaBoddy Popular Science: www.twitter.com/PopSci Theme music by Billy Cadden: https://open.spotify.com/artist/6LqT4DCuAXlBzX8XlNy4Wq?si=5VF2r2XiQoGepRsMTBsDAQ Thanks to our Sponsors! Get an additional 20% OFF the @honeylove Holiday sale by going to https://honeylove.com/WEIRDEST! #honeylovepod This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Get 10% off your first month at: https://BetterHelp.com/WEIRDEST Cut your wireless bill to 15 bucks a month at https://MINTMOBILE.com/weirdest Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What happens when a government controls the size of your family? China's one-child policy changed millions of lives and reshaped society in ways that are still unfolding today.Joining Seán to discuss is Shi Naseer, author of The Cry of the Silkworm, to uncover the personal and global impacts of one of the most controversial social experiments in modern history…

This week, we cover chapters 4-7 of The Silkworm. We discuss Matthew's rescheduling of the meeting between he, Robin, and Strike, Strike's interview with Christian Fisher, as well as his first update to Leonora. Next episode (12 December): Chapters 8-9 Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

In this week's episode, we begin our reread of The Silkworm, covering chapters 1-3, including all of the Strike news we missed out on in between seasons. Next episode (29 November): Chapters 4-7 Links: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1327130/Tom-Joness-illegitimate-child-night-stand-tells-rage-pain.html https://www.hogwartsprofessor.com/science-in-cormoran-strike-narrative-misdirection-or-plain-old-error-part-i-dna-and-paternity-testing/ www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

An Abyss Below Every Floor ep.741 Born to multiracial heritage in the same Honolulu hospital as Barack Obama, A. J. Payler earned his English degree from the University of Hawai'i before eking out various livings as a musician, technical writer, radio broadcaster, military contractor, audio engineer, comic store clerk, short order cook, press clipping agent, music journalist, and congressional archival assistant, managing to shake hands with luminaries from Kurt Vonnegut to Lemmy from Motörhead along the way. Since turning his attention to writing full-time he has released the novels The Killing Song, World of Heroes, Lost in the Red, Terror Next Door, and Bank Error in Your Favor; his short writing has been published by Suspect, Twenty-Two Twenty-Eight, Flipside, Songwriter's Market, Creepy podcast, Cloaked Press, Short Story (Substack), Flash in a Flash, EYE, Tailspins, Razorcake and more. He has also released several albums of original music and opened for artists such as Silkworm and the Schizophonics, continuing to perform live as often as time permits. He lives in Southern California with his family. Further detail on his writing and music is available via linktr.ee/ajpayler and ajpayler.com, where readers can get free stories by signing up for the A. J. Payler newsletter.   ---- Listen Elsewhere ---- YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/c/TallTaleTV Website: http://www.TallTaleTV.com   ---- Story Submission ---- Got a short story you'd like to submit? Submission guidelines can be found at http://www.TallTaleTV.com   ---- About Tall Tale TV ---- Hi there! My name is Chris Herron and I'm an audiobook narrator. In 2015, I suffered from poor Type 1 diabetes control which lead me to become legally blind for almost a year. The doctors didn't give me much hope, predicting an 80% chance that I would never see again. But I refused to give up and changed my lifestyle drastically. Through sheer willpower (and an amazing eye surgeon) I beat the odds and regained my vision. During that difficult time, I couldn't read or write, which was devastating as they had always been a source of comfort for me since childhood. However, my wife took me to the local library where she read out the titles of audiobooks to me. I selected some of my favorite books, such as the Disc World series, Name of the Wind, Harry Potter, and more, and the audiobooks brought these stories to life in a way I had never experienced before. They helped me through the darkest period of my life and I fell in love with audiobooks. Once I regained my vision, I decided to pursue a career as an audiobook narrator instead of a writer. That's why I created Tall Tale TV, to support aspiring authors in the writing communities that I had grown to love before my ordeal. My goal was to help them promote their work by providing a promotional audio short story that showcases their writing skills to readers. They say the strongest form of advertising is word of mouth, so I offer a platform for readers to share these videos and help spread the word about these talented writers. Please consider sharing these stories with your friends and family to support these amazing authors. Thank you!   ---- legal ---- All stories on Tall Tale TV have been submitted in accordance with the terms of service provided on http://www.talltaletv.com or obtained with permission by the author. All images used on Tall Tale TV are either original or Royalty and Attribution free. Most stock images used are provided by http://www.pixabay.com , https://www.canstockphoto.com/ or created using AI. Image attribution will be declared only when required by the copyright owner. Common Affiliates are: Amazon, Smashwords

We're back this week for a bit of an unhinged bonus episode celebrating the 40th birthday of Sneha, one of our listeners, discussing JKR's latest THM header, and our plans to cover The Silkworm. Links: www.thesefilespod.com www.ko-fi.com/thesefilespod www.facebook.com/thesefilespod www.twitter.com/thesefilespod www.instagram.com/thesefilespod http://thesefilespod.tumblr.com

Yes, I have incorporated all the keywords into the show notes. Here is the updated version with all the keywords included:---**Show Notes: MMT50 - 212**Hey there, Pavement aficionados! jD is back with another episode of our Top 50 Countdown on the *Meeting Malkmus* podcast, exploring the essential tracks by the seminal indie rock band, **Pavement**. This week, we're diving into track number 12 on the countdown.Joining jD is Pavement superfan **Tim from Portland**, and trust us, you don't want to miss this one. It's a rollercoaster ride through **'90s indie rock** nostalgia, **Pavement concert stories**, and a heartfelt plea to support live music.---**Episode Highlights:****[0:00] Introduction and Tim's Pavement Origin Story**- **Discovering Pavement through the College Music Journal:** - Tim shares how he first stumbled upon Pavement in the summer of '94 through the *College Music Journal*, a pivotal moment in his journey into **'90s indie rock**. - *"Yeah, I ran down to Tower Records in San Diego and got the CD along with a few other ones... been cranking it ever since."*- **First Impressions of 'Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain':** - His immediate obsession after purchasing Pavement's seminal album, *Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain*. - *"Right out of the gate, this album was different, and I applauded that."***[1:57] Early Live Shows and Military Gear Coincidence**- **First Pavement Concert Experience in the San Diego Music Scene:** - Tim talks about seeing Pavement live for the first time in January '96 at Montezuma Hall, San Diego State University—a highlight in his **Pavement concert memories**. - **Silkworm as the Opening Act:**  - The concert featured **Silkworm** as the opening act, adding to the night's **indie music nostalgia**. - *"We decided to dress up... everyone put on some sort of military garb."*- **Serendipitous Moment with the Band:** - The hilarious coincidence of the band also wearing military attire, showcasing the quirky connection between Pavement and their fans. - *"We all looked at them and then at each other and just started laughing."***[4:13] Following the Band and Memorable Performances**- **Photographing Pavement at Bimbo's 365 Club:** - Tim recalls capturing the band during a show at **Bimbo's 365 Club in San Francisco**, adding to his collection of **Pavement fan experiences**. - *"I have some great shots from there... there was definitely, you know, kind of a whole San Francisco vibe going on."*- **Tibetan Freedom Concert Adventure [7:11]:** - Get the lowdown on Tim's experience at the massive **Tibetan Freedom Concert** in San Francisco, featuring a lineup that included **Sonic Youth** and cemented **Pavement's influence on indie rock**. - *"There were, I think, like a hundred thousand people there... It was a total bottleneck of a festival."***[9:05] Unforgettable Gigs and Onstage Antics**- **Mark Ibold's Onstage Incident:** - Hear about bassist **Mark Ibold's** mysterious onstage moment in Pomona, one of the more intriguing **Pavement concert stories**. - *"He couldn't play; he couldn't finish a song... the show ended shortly after that."*- **Bob Nastanovich's Live Performances:** - Discussing **Bob Nastanovich's** energetic contributions during live shows, highlighting the band's dynamic stage presence.**[11:01] Accidental HBO Appearance**- **HBO Reverb Special Featuring Pavement:** - Learn how Tim unknowingly became part of the **HBO Reverb Pavement** special during a gig at Cane's in San Diego, a unique highlight in his **Pavement concert memories**. - *"We didn't even know that was happening... Spiral was like, 'Oh, they're doing some fucking HBO show.' He didn't seem happy about it."***[12:20] Deep Dive into Track #12**- **Why Track #12 Matters in Pavement's Discography:** - Tim breaks down why this song is in his personal top five, offering insightful **Pavement song analysis**. - *"This song, you know, it's awesome. It's got rockets; it goes."*- **Personal Connection and Indie Music Nostalgia:** - How the song's themes resonate with Tim's own travels and experiences across California, enhancing his **indie music nostalgia**. - *"I know all the places it talks about... Hearing this the first times, we were just like, 'Who are these guys? What are they doing singing about our places?'"*- **The Quintessential Pavement Vibe:** - Discussing how Pavement's songs often mean everything and nothing all at once, reflecting their unique place in **alternative rock**. - *"It has kind of a theme but is totally non sequitur at the same time—it's right up my alley. It's cool."***[18:49] The Pavement Ethos and Live Music Today**- **Stephen Malkmus and the Band's Stance on Fame:** - Reflect on **Pavement's** unique approach to art over commercial success, and how **Stephen Malkmus** embodies this ethos. - *"They lean more art rather than commercialized... They always look painfully uncomfortable."*- **Memorable 2010 Reunion and 2022 LA Show:** - Tim and jD reminisce about the **Pavement 2010 reunion tour** and their first meeting at the epic **Pavement 2022 LA show**, standout events in the **Pavement fan community**. - *"Everybody that was there really wanted to be there... It just checked all the boxes for me."***[29:11] Support Live Music: An Impassioned Plea**- **Get Out and Go to Local Music Venues:** - Tim urges listeners to support live music by attending shows at local venues and supporting **local music venues in Portland** and beyond. - **Quote:** *"Go out, spend some money, and support the arts. When you go to a concert—even if you only stay for four songs—it has a positive impact on your body and your soul."*- **Local Venue Shoutouts in the Portland Music Scene:** - Tim mentions his favorite spots in the **Portland music scene**: Turn Turn Turn, the Kenton Club, and the Fixin' To, encouraging listeners to experience the thriving local music scene.---**Join the Conversation:**- **Twitter:** [@meetingmalkmus](https://twitter.com/meetingmalkmus)- **Facebook Group:** [facebook.com/groups/meetingmalkmus](https://facebook.com/groups/meetingmalkmus)- **Website:** [jd.meetingmalkmus.com](http://jd.meetingmalkmus.com)---**Extra Nuggets:**- **Exclusive Live Recording:** - Tim shares a rare live version of a song from Pavement's Toronto show. It's raw, it's real, and it's right here on the *Meeting Malkmus* podcast.- **Fun Fact:** - Did you know jD used an abacus and a goat with an extra leg to tabulate your Top 20 ballots in the **Pavement Top 50 Countdown**? Don't ask.- **Akin to a Pavement Band Interview:** - This episode feels like an intimate **Pavement band interview**, offering deep insights into the band's history and impact on **indie music**.- **Indie Music Podcast Community:** - As part of the broader **indie music podcast** scene, *Meeting Malkmus* continues to bring you in-depth discussions and interviews with **Pavement superfans** and insiders.---So grab your headphones, crank up the volume, and let's get amped together on this **indie rock** journey through Pavement's legacy.---Transcript: [0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50: That's right, song number 13 on the countdown is "Shady Lane," J vs. S. Ralph from Lincolnshire, what is your initial thought about this song?"Well, it's an amazing song. It's an amazing song. I mean, I think it might be—maybe I'm putting it third on my ranking of 'Brighten the Corners.' And I would almost say, you know, 'Brighten the Corners' is my favorite Pavement, so it is super up there. It's brilliant.""Hey, this is Westy from the rock and roll band Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown."[0:39] "Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for seminal indie rock band Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots. I tabulated the results using an abacus and a goat with an extra leg—don't ask. How will your favorite song fare in the ranking? You'll need to tune in to find out, so there's that."This week, we're joined by Pavement superfan Tim from Portland. Tim, how's it going, motherfucker?""Hey, hey, hey, it's going, motherfucker. It's going great.""That was very Canadian of me, motherfucker. Let's get right to it; let's not mess around here, let's not dilly-dally. Talk to me about your Pavement origin story.""Who? I discovered them through—I believe through College Music Journal, which was a publication back in the '90s. It was kind of—""I don't think so.""Okay. It was like a half-sized magazine, so I think it was an evolution from zines. I don't know. Anyways, I read a record review of 'Crooked Rain.'"[1:57] "And that's when I was introduced to them. So this was, you know, '94—summer of '94 probably—because I had just left uni and got a house with friends. And yeah, I ran down to Tower Records in San Diego and got the CD along with a few other ones. I would get this College Music Journal and read reviews and go buy albums; that was kind of my thing. So yeah, went down and got 'Crooked Rain' and have been cranking it ever since.""Yeah. So what was it like the first time you spun it?""Oh man, I loved it. You know, I had just graduated from uni; I was an art and business major of all things, and I was into everything that wasn't normal—trying, anyways. And that's what Pavement was for me, you know? Right out of the gate, this album was different, and I applauded the—I don't know, there's this sense of, like Beavis and Butthead said, trying and not trying, and I love that about this. I recently heard Jack Black say—somebody asked him what kind of bands he's into, and he's like, 'I only want to listen to bands'—this is an old interview—but he said, 'I only want to listen to bands who kick ass, who fucking take names.' And I was like, oof, I wonder if Jack Black's a Pavement fan because they do—they do, but they don't. But I love that about them."[3:40] "That, to me, oozed alternative. So yeah. But I didn't see them play live for, oh, a year and a half later. I was just this morning looking up shows I went to.""Oh, really?""Yeah. About half the shows I went to were before 2000 and half after. So the first time I saw them was in San Diego in '96 in January, and that was really fun. Just a quick story on that one."[4:13] "I went with a gang of friends, and they were playing at San Diego State University at this place called Montezuma Hall. I would say it holds like, I don't know, 500 people or something—not big. We were all pre-partying and talking about what we were going to wear; we decided to dress up. So everybody put on some sort of military garb—fatigues, whether pants or shirts or hats or what have you—which kind of looked like normal cool kid wear at the time. Then we go to the show, and Pavement walked out on stage, and they were in full military gear. Steve West had a safari hat with mosquito mesh draped over his shoulders, and he had his raccoon eyes—you know, paint around his eyes—and everybody was wearing military stuff, all the guys in the band.""Did you guys catch wind of that beforehand?""No, it was totally coincidental. We all looked at each other because we knew they were dressed up—they went out of their way—and we all looked at them and then at each other and just started laughing. It was a comical moment, and that was such a good show. JD, kind of like our LA show in May of '22, that first show in January of '96 was fucking awesome. They went nuts. After their encore, Malkmus said something to the effect of—they came back out and he was like, 'San Diego, huh? San Diego's alright. You guys think San Diego's okay? Yeah, San Diego's alright.' And then he said something like, 'Let's fucking fuzz out San Diego.' And then they just went into their last three songs.""Wow.""And just destroyed them. They were so, so good. I kind of followed them a little bit after that. I saw them in San Francisco weeks later; it was so fun for me, I had to get more.""Were they playing 'Brighten' stuff at this point? Because 'Brighten' was going to come out next year. Was it pretty much all 'Wowee'?""You know, I had a couple setlists pulled up. I have to go back and look. I'm not sure.""And my other question is, that San Diego show—was it opened by Silkworm?""Yeah, that was the one. They came out with, I don't know, '30s or '40s-looking sailor suits.""What the hell?""Like Navy sailor suits.""I guess San Diego, huh?""They looked cute. At the time, we had an amazing army surplus store downtown, and I just figured these guys went and hit it up."[7:11] "That's awesome.""None of them seemed sober that night. They were going for it. I saw them play in San Francisco after that and actually photographed that show at Bimbo's 365. I have some great shots from there.""Is that a good venue?""Yeah, it was cool. A cool bar-club, smallish—you know, medium-small size. There was definitely a whole San Francisco vibe going on. I brought some friends to that one from San Diego as well; instant fans. Then the Tibetan Freedom Concert in San Francisco the next summer.""You saw that?""Yeah.""That was kind of typical, you know, festival-type Pavement show.""Sure.""Quick and dirty. We were way in the back."[8:11] "Lots of people?""Oh, hordes. I think there were like a hundred thousand people there or something.""Holy shit.""It was giant. We were kind of there for the whole experience—you know, Beastie Boys.""So they did a show in New York City and one in San Francisco?""Yeah, June of '96.""How have we never talked about this before? I don't think we've ever talked about you going to Tibetan Freedom.""Yeah, it was amazing. I drove my truck and had like four people in the back of the camper shell. We just piled in, and it literally took us like five hours to drive two miles to get out of the city. It was a total bottleneck of a festival. That was one of my first festivals where I thought, 'You know, might not really need to go to festivals,' but I continued."[9:05] "The next time I saw them was the following year at this club called Soma in San Diego. That was a great show—small to medium-sized again. They didn't play in San Diego a whole heck of a lot. Then I saw them at the Glass House in Pomona, which is out in the desert east of LA. Ibold, at one point during the show, just kind of lost it—like his brain left his body.""Or he had a serious gear malfunction?""Because he couldn't play, and the show kind of ended.""Yeah, he couldn't play, he couldn't finish a song—he just couldn't do it. The show ended shortly after that. I remember everybody on stage going, 'What's the deal? What's going on?' Malkmus or Ibold had some sort of breakdown or meltdown. Something happened. Stuff started kicking, I don't know.""A couple of years later, at Cane's in San Diego—Cane's was a bar where they filmed the HBO Reverb special.""Oh, really?""Yeah, I went to that. We didn't even know that was happening. We just thought we were going to a Pavement gig.""Right.""Walked in—and I have so many stories about seeing these guys—walked in and Spiral was standing right there, just hanging out by himself. I said to him, 'What's going on tonight? What's up with all the cameras?' And he's like, 'Oh, they're doing some fucking HBO show.' He didn't seem happy about it, and that was kind of the vibe of the whole gig that night—they were punching the card, you know.""They're sort of shy that way, right?""Yeah. I think—I don't know, man."[11:01] "They're a different band, right? They lean more art rather than commercialized.""Yeah.""And I think when you produce something that way, you obviously don't care if you're making Billboard Top 100. So if someone approaches you and they're like, 'Hey, I'm Mike Jones from HBO Reverb. We'd love to film you guys; you're hot right now,' what's your reaction if you're Pavement? You're like, 'Fuck. Okay, here's another drill we got to do and get over with,' you know?""Yeah.""They always look painfully uncomfortable. Like that Jay Leno performance and even the one on—was it Conan when they did the 2010 reunion? Or maybe it was Jimmy Fallon, I'm not sure.""All I remember is the Leno one.""Yeah, that one's so awkward.""It's so good though.""That personifies them, you know.""They were a little more experienced by '99. By then they'd been playing a bit. Then I saw them at the Hollywood Bowl for the 2010 show with Sonic Youth."[12:20] "Amazing lineup.""Yeah. Both of those shows, in my opinion, were like, get it done. The highlight of all of it—I was hoping at one point either Malkmus coming out and playing with Sonic Youth or Thurston coming out and playing with Pavement.""Didn't happen though.""It seemed like such an opportunity.""Yeah. I was thinking, this might not happen ever again. These guys have to get on stage and play together.""Yes.""And they didn't. The highlight was at the Hollywood Bowl—there's this half wall around the orchestra pit, like out in the crowd, that separates the orchestra pit from box seats, which is kind of where we were. Bob paraded that catwalk—that half wall. He went back and forth—you probably could guess what song he was screaming a chorus to—but he was like, 'I'm trying' all the way across that thing. It's probably like 50 or 60 paces across; it's like a half-circle.""Oh, wow.""It was so fucking cool. Then at the end, even Malkmus was like, 'We're out of here. We're going to the Speedy Ortiz show,' or some shit like that. It was just lights out, you know."[13:41] "Damn.""But then it was a long, long time until I saw them at the Fonda with you, my friend.""Yeah.""That was our first meeting.""Yeah. My hair was too long for you.""Oh my gosh. I'm so glad you canceled your dreads appointment for the next day.""Yes. Well, I was going to ask you to just pour some Coke in my hair and roll them, but we didn't know each other that way.""Denny's at 3 a.m., or whenever we were there.""That's right. That was such a good show. That was so amazing. I know you've mentioned it, but man, that was such a good show. It just checked all the boxes for me. There was so much excitement, so much buzz in the air in that venue. Everybody that was there really wanted to be there. It felt like there weren't sort of pretentious Hollywood people just showing up because it's Pavement, you know.""Yeah. Well, except—maybe you caught a glimpse of this—except the short girl that got in the fight with the other gal there. We saw a chick fight at a Pavement gig in 2022. It was kind of weird. It was kind of awesome. I doubt either of those gals—or maybe one of them, maybe the taller one—is listening, but man, one of them got sent down, like down to the floor from our platform. That was amazing. When I saw that happen, I was like, 'Fuck yes.'"[15:25] "Because it just gave me reassurance that the vibe of Pavement—being all of these different things in indie alternative music, whatever—is still alive. To have something like that at a show. Way better than the 2010 reunion. That holds a special place in my heart because it was my first time seeing them. It was in Central Park; it was really cool. But seeing them with you that night was definitely the best show I've ever seen.""Yeah.""Yeah. Maybe of all the shows I've ever seen, not just Pavement—it was very good.""Yeah.""So anyways, we saw them in '22 a bunch, and I think I counted—from what I could remember—like 12 times I've seen them. So half before 2010, half after.""That's pretty cool.""Yeah. They've always been, you know, sure, superfan status. But more as time goes by, they're kind of a classic for me. If I want to put on something, I usually reach for an album—actual vinyl instead.""Which one is the one you go to? Do you have them all on vinyl?"[16:55] "No, I don't think so.""Okay."[17:00] "I go to 'Crooked Rain.'""Oh, okay.""That's the one I was first introduced to.""Yeah.""You know, it checks the boxes for me. It's got a big start. It's got a great song number three.""Yeah. We love your number three.""I know. It's got a great midway point. It's got an instrumental—'5 + 4 = Unity,' or '5 - 4 = Unity.' And it's got a lot of staple items that make Pavement Pavement that you can pick out from the beginning to the end of their recordings. It has a little bit of 'Wowee' in it to me. It's a really good mix of who they are.""Yeah, if there was a Pavement Bingo card, you would definitely get a line.""Yeah.""Maybe even a full box.""Yeah, 'Hit the Plane Down'—you couldn't get more punky than that for Pavement.""Yeah.""You know, it's got a hit, 'Cut Your Hair.'""Yeah.""It's got it all. 'Silence Kid.' When I first put this on, from song one, it became my go-to for when I kicked off things like road trips or moved into a new house. Anytime I've begun something monumental in my life, I would put this album on. It's such a good start. I clearly remember when I moved to LA, set up my stereo, and I put this album on.""Oh yeah.""It just gets me in a really fun, good mood. Creative, too.""Yeah, I like that with 'Pot Hot.'"[18:49] "It makes me fun and creative.""Me too. Well, what do you say we take a quick break and then come back and reveal track number 12? We are almost in the top 10, my friend.""All right.""We'll be right back."[19:04] "Hey, this is Bob Nastanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening. And now, on with the countdown.""Twelve."[21:46] "All right. Track number 12 on the countdown. I couldn't imagine a better person to do this song, having spent some time in SoCal. It's 'Unfair'—the South taking what the North delivers.""That's right.""Were you delivering to the North?""I mean, when I sucked and kissed, it's sour.""This song, you know, it's awesome. On the album, it could be a song three for me. It's got rockets; it goes. That's amazing. I'm so glad it's number 12. That's in the top 20, so it definitely should be. It's really high up there for me; it's probably in my top five.""Oh, wow.""So yeah, I'm happy. I've already answered my 'Is it properly ranked' question.""Oh yeah, big time.""I love this one. I mean, it really personifies Pavement—being from Stockton, Sacto area, all of that. This song is about the supposed battle between the North and South of California. I know all the places it talks about. I've been to Shasta many times. We had family living for many years in the Tahoe area; we know all these places. And I guess the jury's still out on where that North-South boundary line really is, because I think this song—"[23:27] "Malkmus likely wrote this song. I think he's just not having the South. He's really dissing it. There's a total vibe here of him just dissing the South.""So it's amazing.""Well, we've seen in his later life him moving to Portland, your hometown. He didn't move to LA. He didn't pack up and move to LA or Nashville, I suppose, would be the other big music place. But yeah, he went to Portland and went with that indie vibe rather than that corporate vibe. So I wonder if he gets that feeling or something.""Yeah, I don't know. It's good—you know, I went back, I was searching through some of those gigs I went to, and I believe it was the San Francisco show I saw in '96 that they closed with 'Unfair.' I'll have to go back and look at this.""Oh, wow.""Such a good song for a closer, leaving on high energy."[24:35] "And just when you think you've maxed out energy-wise, you get to that chorus—a sort of chorus."[24:47] "You know, 'the foothills of our mind,' and when he's just screaming, it goes into a second gear or a third gear and really picks up steam. It's so good.""Yeah, I used to put this on mixtapes.""Oh, you did? That's cool.""Yeah, like road trip mixtapes. It feels really road-trippy to me because he's name-checking all that geography.""Yeah, yeah. That last question in the song, 'To the last psychedelic band'—are they talking about themselves? Is that giving themselves kudos? I don't know. I would love to find that out. But yeah, this song really hits home for me. I drove California so many times; I know all these places. Hearing this the first times—even talking about Shasta early on in the song, verse two—I mean, at the time, my roommate was from Redding, which is adjacent to Mount Shasta. So we were just like, 'Who are these guys? What are they doing singing about our places?' Where are they from? Stockton, which is hilarious because he's like, in the song—"[26:16] "He says, 'This ain't no Bakersfield' or whatever the line is.""Yeah.""And Bakersfield really is not that much different from Stockton.""Oh, no?""They're both armpit cities.""Oh, really?""Just armpit cities, yeah.""Like industrial or something?""Yeah, like farm—ag cities. They're just kind of wastelands.""Oh, wow.""But yeah, I dig this song, dude. It's something you can sing along to and scream along to. It's not a quiet song.""Great to drive to.""Yeah. I'm so glad it's number 12. I would rather have heard it was in the top 10, but I'll take it as number 12. That way, it's still more special for me because it didn't make it to the top 10.""Yeah.""And it would have been my drift. That's kind of like the Pavement thing—like, you don't know us, but you might know us, you know?""Oh, you're a Pavement fan. Okay. Yeah, you seem like that. I've heard people say that before.""But great, you film hack. I don't need your fade. There are so many good lines in here. There's a theme, but it's kind of all over, which is what I love about these guys. Also, one thing that really vibed with me in the mid-early '90s with these guys is the lyrics not meaning shit a lot of the time, because everything we were listening to around then—there was so much cheese, bro, in rock and indie and alternative. So much music that I just had a hard time being a fan of. I'm not a big singer-songwriter guy. I like quite a bit, but it's not my favorite genre. So to get somebody putting a song together like this—it has kind of a theme but is totally non sequitur at the same time—it's right up my alley. It's cool."[28:27] "That is very cool. Well, thanks so much for coming out today and doing this. This has been great.""Yeah, JD. It's been great. Thanks for doing what you do because there's no one like you who could put this together. So we're all grateful.""Buddy, thanks so much.""Yeah, thank you."[28:48] "That's—I don't know what else to say. That's pretty fucking cool of you to say. Thanks.""From Portland.""And now I'm going to go back into game show host mode. Tim from Portland, do you have anything you would like to plug?"[29:11] "Yeah, I just want to tell everybody out there to get off your ass and go to a gig. Go to a show. Go to your local bar that has a stage. Go to your venue that holds less than 250 people.""Nice.""And support the arts, you know? When you go to these places—here in Portland, Oregon, I have three great places within three or four miles: Turn Turn Turn, the Kenton Club, which is just down the hill from me, and the Fixin' To in St. John's. These are all amazing places to experience live music. If you go in and you pay $10, you don't buy a drink—that $10 is generally going to the band.""Fucking right.""If you don't buy a drink or some food, the bar isn't making any money. Go out, spend some money, and support the arts. This is supporting the arts, and it's such an awesome thing to do. When you go to a concert—even if you hear a gig and only stay for four songs—it has a positive impact on your body and your soul. We walk away with heightened endorphins, and it feels good. You ever leave a show where you're just like, 'God damn, that was amazing. I feel so good. I wish I could do that all over again.' That's the chase, and that's supporting the arts. Everybody's got to keep getting out and doing that. I'm not talking about the mega stadium shows or the big festivals—if you can afford to go to that enormous dome, go for it. I'm talking about hitting up your local spots, your local venues. And if you don't have any, then find the amazing ones and do a road trip. Just get out and go to some shows. That's my plug."[30:50] "That's nice. I like from where you came. So there's that. Hey, it's JD here, checking in from the present. That's right—it's October the 4th today. That episode with Tim and I was recorded way back in February—the Ides of February, in fact. So, you know, as I'm editing this episode—and hey, listen, I don't do a whole lot of editing; I want this to be sort of authentic and real and, you know, all the rest of that shit. So, listening back, Tim's impassioned plea for live music made me think of some of the gigs that we've been to. Tim and I were talking; he's like, 'Hey, remember the Toronto show where they played "Unfair"?' And I was like, 'Fuck yeah, do I?' And he's like, 'I have a file.' And I was like, 'Ooh, send it my way, motherfucker.' Here it is. This is 'Unfair,' live from Toronto, on 'Meeting Malkmus,' a Pavement podcast."[34:47] "All right, man. Thanks, buddy. Well, thanks again. That's what I got for you. Wash your goddamn hands."[34:53] "Thanks for listening to 'Meeting Malkmus,' a Pavement podcast, where we count down the top 50 Pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email: jd.meetingmalkmus at gmail.com."Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-contentAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Today, we hear from Shi Naseer whose debut novel, THE CRY OF THE SILKWORM, was released in June. We're talking to Shi/LILY about how to handle multiple timelines and settings in her book as well as how to write (or not) for a Western audience.Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for one week. Missed it? Check out the podcast version above or on your favorite podcast platform.To find Naseer's book, try Amazon/UK. To find books by our other authors, visit our Bookshop page. Looking for a writing community? Join our Facebook page. Chinese-Australian-Pakistani author Shi Naseer has lived in nine countries and backpacked to over seventy. She recently moved with her husband and young son from Uppsala, Sweden, to Stamford CT, the USA, and spends her winters in Punjab, Pakistan. She aims to connect people by telling stories from different cultures. Her debut novel, The Cry of the Silkworm, was released in June 2024 with Atlantic Books/Allen&Unwin. A coming-of-age revenge story of a young girl in turn-of-the-century China, it reveals the devastating consequences of the one-child policy. Shi Naseer holds a PhD in theoretical physics from Harvard University.Photo by Muspi Merol on Unsplash This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit 7amnovelist.substack.com

Hello and welcome to this new and and very ace Hardcore Listing Show!! on these wonderful run of shows with some of the UKs greatest comedians in the lead up to the Ed Fringe we are today joined by the glorious Sarah Roberts!!Sarah joined us to discuss Top 5 Wiki deep dives!! and its wonderful!!Sarah's debut show ‘Silkworm', 31/07- 25/08 at 22:35pm at Assembly George Square, The. Tickets here.Huge thanks to No Need To Shout for curating this episode!If you want to watch the episode and support the podcast head over to www.patreon.com/hardcorelistingBECOME A PATRON AND PICK YOUR OWN TOP 5HARDCORE LISTING ON TWITTER HARDCORE LISTING ON INSTA Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the aftermath of the debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, money’s been talking. Major donors to a key pro-Biden super PAC are reportedly putting donations worth $90 million on ice if Biden stays in the race. We’ll get into what the funding freeze means for the future of Biden’s campaign. Plus, guest host Sabri Ben-Achour makes us smart about cricket protein powder. And we’ll play a round of Half Full/Half Empty! Here’s everything we talked about today: “Donors to Pro-Biden Super PAC Are Said to Withhold Roughly $90 Million” from The New York Times “Inside the glitzy Biden fundraiser that lost the president George Clooney” from The Washington Post “Silkworm satay? Singapore approves insects as food” from CNN “Dynamic pricing tech may brighten retail bottom lines and put consumers in the dark” from Marketplace “Kids want $70 wrinkle creams. Parents and lawmakers are “fighting a losing battle”’ from Marketplace “A Fancy Card Is Becoming the Only Way to Get a Restaurant Reservation” from The Atlantic “Influencer Style Case Risks More Stolen Vibe Suits From Creators” from Bloomberg Law “Amazon launched an AI shopping assistant — just in time for Prime Day” from Quartz Before you get your weekend started, send your questions and comments to makemesmart@marketplace.org or leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-SMART.

In the aftermath of the debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, money’s been talking. Major donors to a key pro-Biden super PAC are reportedly putting donations worth $90 million on ice if Biden stays in the race. We’ll get into what the funding freeze means for the future of Biden’s campaign. Plus, guest host Sabri Ben-Achour makes us smart about cricket protein powder. And we’ll play a round of Half Full/Half Empty! Here’s everything we talked about today: “Donors to Pro-Biden Super PAC Are Said to Withhold Roughly $90 Million” from The New York Times “Inside the glitzy Biden fundraiser that lost the president George Clooney” from The Washington Post “Silkworm satay? Singapore approves insects as food” from CNN “Dynamic pricing tech may brighten retail bottom lines and put consumers in the dark” from Marketplace “Kids want $70 wrinkle creams. Parents and lawmakers are “fighting a losing battle”’ from Marketplace “A Fancy Card Is Becoming the Only Way to Get a Restaurant Reservation” from The Atlantic “Influencer Style Case Risks More Stolen Vibe Suits From Creators” from Bloomberg Law “Amazon launched an AI shopping assistant — just in time for Prime Day” from Quartz Before you get your weekend started, send your questions and comments to makemesmart@marketplace.org or leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-SMART.

In the aftermath of the debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, money’s been talking. Major donors to a key pro-Biden super PAC are reportedly putting donations worth $90 million on ice if Biden stays in the race. We’ll get into what the funding freeze means for the future of Biden’s campaign. Plus, guest host Sabri Ben-Achour makes us smart about cricket protein powder. And we’ll play a round of Half Full/Half Empty! Here’s everything we talked about today: “Donors to Pro-Biden Super PAC Are Said to Withhold Roughly $90 Million” from The New York Times “Inside the glitzy Biden fundraiser that lost the president George Clooney” from The Washington Post “Silkworm satay? Singapore approves insects as food” from CNN “Dynamic pricing tech may brighten retail bottom lines and put consumers in the dark” from Marketplace “Kids want $70 wrinkle creams. Parents and lawmakers are “fighting a losing battle”’ from Marketplace “A Fancy Card Is Becoming the Only Way to Get a Restaurant Reservation” from The Atlantic “Influencer Style Case Risks More Stolen Vibe Suits From Creators” from Bloomberg Law “Amazon launched an AI shopping assistant — just in time for Prime Day” from Quartz Before you get your weekend started, send your questions and comments to makemesmart@marketplace.org or leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-SMART.

Silkworm is a classic horizontally-scrolling shoot-em-up. The main difference between this game and many other side-scrolling shoot-em-ups is that you will be on land as well as in the air. Support NEStalgia directly by becoming a member of our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/Nestalgia Members at the $5 and above level get access to our brand new show NEStalgia Bytes. A look at the famicom games you can play without any Japanese knowledge! For More NEStalgia, visit www.NEStalgiacast.com --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/nestalgia/support

After almost 20 years of conversations, my final talk with Steve Albini took place on April 23, 2024. Steve died suddenly on May 7. This chat was about the new Shellac album, To All Trains, and Steve told me about every song, though I hadn't yet heard the album. Preparing this episode was sad and surreal; it felt like Steve was still here. The interview itself appears at roughly the 45:00 mark, after my own remembrance and tribute. I love you Steve and will miss you forever. Thank you for everything.Support vish on Patreon! Thanks to Blackbyrd Myoozik, Pizza Trokadero, the Bookshelf, Planet Bean Coffee, and Grandad's Donuts. Support Y.E.S.S. and Black Women United YEG. Follow vish online.Related episodes/links:Ep. #826: Steve Albini and Fred ArmisenEp. #741: Steve AlbiniEp. #656: Steve AlbiniEp. #589: Steve AlbiniEp. #514: Steve Albini and Silkworm's Andy Cohen and Tim MidyettEp. #453: Steve AlbiniEp. #275: Incredible Love – Alan Vega & Suicide RememberedEp. #224: Ian MacKaye & Steve Albini (Part II)Ep. #223: Ian MacKaye & Steve Albini (Part I)Ep. #120: Steve AlbiniEp. #24: Steve AlbiniMy first Steve Albini interview (2006)Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/kreative-kontrol. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Silk is one of the most luxurious fabrics for clothing and bedding. Unlike cotton or linen, silk is made most commonly by insects—often the Bombyx mori, a domesticated moth that feeds on the leaves of mulberry trees. Humans have a 4,000-year history with the textile and the creatures that make it, as documented in the new book Silk: A World History.Since silk has an unconventional origin as a secretion rather than a plant product, it has unique biological qualities that make it strong and enduring. And because it's a natural protein fiber, it's biodegradable, so scientists think it could have a future as a sustainable alternative to plastics and electronic parts.Guest host Arielle Duhaime-Ross speaks with Dr. Aarathi Prasad, biologist and author of Silk: A World History. They discuss the ways humans have changed silk-creating creatures through domestication, future applications of the textile, and Prasad's experience growing silkworms of her own.Read an excerpt from Silk: A World History at sciencefriday.com.Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.