Blog Archive: January 2026

Books What I Have Read
Whenever I am a bit BORED and start with the DOOMSCROLLING I often stop and think "Hang on, is this really what I want to be doing with my precious time on planet Earth?" and the answer usually comes back as "No, obviously, you'd much rather be reading a BOOK". This is not always an option but when it IS I have been making a concerted effort over the past year to do THAT instead, which has been frankly DELIGHTFUL and resulted in my reading SIXTY SEVEN books in total.

I know this because I have also kept a RECORD of what books I have read, when I finished them (or in some cases GAVE UP because I am a grown-up and am allowed to do that now) and what I THORT. This was done for two reasons: firstly because I like having LISTS of things that I've done as it gives me a super-charged thrill of achievement, and secondly because I sometimes FORGET what I've read and end up reading it again.

Of the 67 books listed 32 were GRAPHIC NOVELS, a term I used ADVISEDLY to mean comics in BOOK form rather than actual comics which should always be called COMICS. Lots of these were re-reads, sometimes for FUN and sometimes for SERIOUS ACADEMIC REASONS, which meant I got to enjoy some of my FAVES like "All Star Superman" and the Alan Moore/Alan Davis "Captain Britain" all over again. Of the new (or at least new to ME) stuff that I read I think my favourites were "The Filth" (which I gave up on after two issues when it first came out but turns out to be BRILLO), Ryan North's "Star Trek Lower Decks" collections, "Badtime Bedtime Stories" by Leo Baxendale (which is AMAZING), "The Power Fantasy", "Asterix in Lusitania" and "Giant" by Mollie Ray which I bought while at The Lakes and is beautifully done and suddenly VERY MOVING.

Of the text-only books 15 were NON-FICTION and were mostly, though not entirely, to do with COMICS or THE BEATLES, of which probably "Cartoons and Comic Strips" by Terry Bave was my favourite, not because it's especially well-written or informative (it basically says he liked comics and he and his wife Shiela got their ideas from Seeing Kids Doing Things when they went for a walk) but because he came across as LOVELY. Terry and Shiela Bave crop up a LOT in the podcast and now whenever they do I feel a glow of AFFECTION towards them. Other than that my non-fiction FAVES were "The Ark Before Noah" by Irving Finkel (which was, to my surprise, VERY funny), a lovely memoir about a BADGER called "Brocky" by Sylvia Shepherd, and "How To Be In A Pop Group" by Alan Jenkins what I have spoke of before and still HIGHLY recommend.

That leaves 20 FICTION books, including the full Arthur C Clarke Award Shortlist, which was HIGHLY enjoyable this year. Amazingly, one of the ones I liked the most actually WON this time too!

I also read TWO (2) SCIENCE FICTION TRILOGIES last year, which is not the sort of thing I would usually want to get involved with. The longest running, for me, was the SPACE trilogy by CS Lewis, which I read over the course of nine months with GAPS in between to recover. This starts off FAIRLY normal in the first book, where it's a bit like HG Wells or something and then gets progressively more DERANGED as ACTUAL SPACE ANGELS turn up and then MERLIN. It's all quite good fun - especially the end of the first book where the hero basically goes "PUB!" - but A Bit Much and VERY LONG. The other trilogy was "Shards of Earth" by Adrian Tchaikovsky whose books I like a LOT. This wasn't QUITE as much fun as the standalone books or the ones with SPIDERS and OCTOPUSES in them, but I read them all one after the other in the space of a couple of months so they must have been pretty good!

That leaves nine other books, my favourites of which were probably "My Cousin Rachel" by Daphne Du Maurier (EXCITING!), "Mill On The Floss" by George Eliot (a bit long but also DEAD GOOD), the first two "Fermi's Progress" books by Chris Farnell (dead good, dead FUNNY) and "The Bullet That Missed" by Richard Osman, which I read entirely out of order but which I also read in about two days as it was V FUNNY.

There were a few books along the way that I didn't finish, and quite a few that I wanted to finish a lot sooner than I did (AUTHORS! Write shorter books please!), but for the most part it was a GRATE year of READING which was a whole lot more enjoyable than spending the equivalent time looking at rubbish stuff on my phone and thinking "Is that real or AI?" BOOKS! They are ACE!

posted 8/1/2026 by MJ Hibbett
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Things To Come in 2026
As we settle ourselves gently into the still slightly too hot, and yet also not quite yet warmed up enough (METAPHORS) waters of 2026, I thought I'd have a quick think through some to the things that are hopefully on the way over the course of the next orbit around the sun. This is partly to get them out of my HEAD, but also to offer something for the me of the futuristic space year 2027 to look back upon and say "Wot was he on about?"

Obviously there will be more Data and Doctor Doom to come, not least because "Avengers: Doomsday" should FINALLY be out at the end of the year. Not only will there be more live shows (including a few as yet unannounced) but there should also be a PODCAST too. My plan is to do an AUGMENTED version of the live show, with more PRODUCED versions of the songs and indeed some EXTRA songs too, and release it as a short series so it's THERE for people who want to know more when DOOM enters the MCU. I've made a small start so far and it is sounding Quite Good!

Alongside that I'm also starting work on the NEXT big academic project, which is going to be called "Data and Judge Dredd". There's a LOT to be said about this and I'll save most of that for another time (READER'S VOICE: "PHEW!") but the general plan is to do the data gathering and analysis in the first half of this year then get it ready as a NON-ACADEMIC book which I'm hoping to SELF-PUBLISH - with another SHOW to go alongside it - in time for Dredd's anniversary in February 2027. Like I say, there's LOADS of THORTS about how this is going to work and why I'm doing it that way, but we'll save that for another time!

And then of course there's the ALBUM what I'm recording with Mr CJ Thorpe-Tracey. We're BOOKED into the studio next week to go and do some more tracks, and all being well we'll have at least one more similar session to get all the basic tracks done before we move into the exciting Putting Other Stuff On Top period, which is the BEST bit for all albums. If you've not heard it yet you can download a SNEAK PREVIEW of how it's probably going to sound via our version of Mull Of Kintyre which we recorded for the Joyzine Advent Calendar. I mean, obviously that's a song written by P McCartney and D Laine, rather than either of US, but it still sounds PRETTY GRATE! We'll also have some GIGS later in the year, at least one of which we may be able to announce fairly soon!

Finally, for this bit anyway, there's still a massive chunk of season three of The Funny Comics Fan Club still to come as well! John and I are currently just about two episodes ahead of ourselves, so I can confidently say there is some GOOD STUFF still to come as we work towards a GRAND FINALE around February time. The current thinking is that we'll stop the regular series with the end of this one, but there's still room in the future for some SPECIAL EDITIONS and, of course, changing our minds!

Those are the main THEMES for ROCK and ASSOCIATED ITEMS that I foresee over the course of 2026 but, as we know from our DELVINGS into HISTORY last year, there's always more ADVENTURES to come that you would never have thought about at the start of the year. Let's hope that they are a) KRAZY and also b) FUN!

posted 6/1/2026 by MJ Hibbett
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A Farewell To 2003
On New Year's Eve I posted the FINAL entry in my year long series of "Old Blogs", where I re-posted blogs from 22 years ago on The Socials and then added some commentary to explain what was going on. The idea of doing it was nicked from Mr Bob Fischer who did a wonderful year's worth of blogs a while ago revisiting his old school diaries, and as he packed that in after 12 months I thought it was only fair to complete the ripping off by ending mine at a similar point!

The original thought process behind it, apart from "This'll force me to actually POST something on an almost daily basis", was that I'd be able to shed light on some of the things that happened back then which I couldn't really talk about at the time. As it turns out, pretty much the opposite was the case, not least because back then I was A LOT more willing to say stuff on the blog that I definitely would not do now. These days I usually pause and THINK before slagging somebody off who could very easily GOOGLE themselves and see it, but back then I was not so considerate. I have been Quite Surprised at times to see my younger self being so indiscreet!

Another problem with the "shedding light" aspect was that I don't actually REMEMBER a huge pile of stuff that happened, so that when Younger Me dropped GNOMIC HINTS of things he was up to Modern Me usually had absolutely no idea what he was on about. The plus side to this, however, was that there were also many occassions when I was suddenly reminded of fun things that I hadn't thought about for over two decades!

The main lovely thing about it though was all the PALS who popped up along the way, the vast majority of whom (possibly ALL of whom actually) I am still in touch with, even if not quite so often in THE PUB with. I watched "It's A Wonderful Life Again" over Christmas, because of course I did, and one of the bits that really stuck out for me was at the very end where (SPOILERS) he gets a book from Clarence with the inscription "Remember, no man is a failure who has friends." There are certainly times when I inwardly BEMOAN my inexplicable failure to accrue fathomless RICHES through my ART, but when I get into one of them moods I am always reminded of the krazy adventures I've had and the krazy PEOPLE I've met along the way. That has very much been the case with the Old Blogs - there were certainly ADVENTURES in 2003, and there were definitely PALS too!

So thanks to all the pals who appeared in them, and thanks to all the pals who READ about them. If you wish to continue the journey into 2004 and beyond then all the old blogs are extremely available in the archives, but for my part I am hoping that 2026 is going to be a year when some NEW stuff happens. Tune in next time, or possibly in 2048, to find out what they might be!

posted 5/1/2026 by MJ Hibbett
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