Breakfast in the Ruins
Friends old and new join me in Derry and Toms roof gardens to discuss the work and influence of prolific British fantasist Michael Moorcock, as well as other bits of 60s and 70s genre fiction that came to me via my Grandad in the 80s and informed my world view. Books, music, role-playing games, wrestling in Featherstone Library and many other digressions await.
Episodes
Thursday Jun 27, 2024
The Land That Time Forgot
Thursday Jun 27, 2024
Thursday Jun 27, 2024
Allister Thompson returns to Derry and Toms as we hurtle back to 1918 and brave the cold waters of the Atlantic to take a look at The Land That Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs, subject of Michael Moorcock's sole filmed movie script (along with James Cawthron of course).
Expect discussions about mysterious island tropes, personal propensities to cannibalism, dodgy theories of race and C Thomas Howell!
Allister's latest release (at time of posting this at least) is Apocalypse Man by Khan Tengri and it includes a nice Moorcockian track too.
Thursday Jun 06, 2024
(The Coming of) The Coming of the Terraphiles
Thursday Jun 06, 2024
Thursday Jun 06, 2024
FINALLY!
After all this dancing around the subject of Michael Moorcock writing for the iconic Doctor Who IP and talking Alien and Quatermass and Blake's 7, Miles joins me in the Cloister Room as we just about get to The Coming of the Terraphiles...
Just about...
But with our tendency to go off on tangents AND 61 years of Doctor Who to consider perhaps it was inevitable that this would be a multi-part deal. Anyway, join us as we talk about Timelords, edgy 90s Who novels, 12p swiss rolls and much more besides... even a bit of Moorcock here and there.
LISTEN TO THE CASUAL TREK PODCAST
Wednesday May 15, 2024
Blake's 7 by Trevor Hoyle
Wednesday May 15, 2024
Wednesday May 15, 2024
Join my co-conspirator John and me as we board the Civil Administration ship London where our brutally oppressive crew sets the speed to Time Distort 5 and makes for Cygnus Alpha where we will all suffer for our crimes!
En route, we'll have plenty of time (between beatings and summary executions) to discuss Trevor Hoyle's novelisation of the first four episodes of Terry Nation's Blake's 7 and the series itself. And some other stuff.
Sadly, we chose a book that features NO SERVALAN WHATSOEVER. But we still talk about her...
Tuesday Apr 30, 2024
The Blade in the Angel's Shadow w/ Andy Darby
Tuesday Apr 30, 2024
Tuesday Apr 30, 2024
Andy Darby is back in Derry and Toms to talk about his all-new novel, The Blade in the Angel's Shadow!
Enochian madness, brutal sieges, swordplay and the machinations of the Elizabethan court all combine to give our heroine a hard time, some gnarly powers and a profound ethical dilemma.
It's available from all good stockists now...
Tuesday Apr 16, 2024
QUATERMASS
Tuesday Apr 16, 2024
Tuesday Apr 16, 2024
Andrew Nette returns to Derry and Toms as we continue to muse over some formative telly, novelisations and other stuff but on this occasion to talk about Nigel Kneale's enduring and iconic character Professor Bernard Quatermass (and a load of other digressions, naturally, including brief musings on a favourite mercenary war flick). We roam around the original Hammer films, the impact of Quatermass on the zeitgeist and, most specifically, the 1979 serial and its novelisation by Nigel Kneale himself.
HUFFITY-PUFFITY PUFF!!!
Check out Quatermass III on Bandcamp
Tuesday Apr 02, 2024
ALIEN: When IPs collide (Colony Wars and Cold Forges)
Tuesday Apr 02, 2024
Tuesday Apr 02, 2024
In our continued deliberations about tackling Michael Moorcock's Doctor Who novel The Coming of the Terraphiles, several questions about the pitfalls of writing for established IPs have arisen, and a pressing one is:
What happens when Trumpton and British politics intrude upon the Alien universe?
We investigated so you don't have to, so join Miles Reid-Lobatto (writer and co-host of the Casual Trek Podcast) and SF Starship artist and designer Ian Stead AKA Biomassart as we look at what makes the Alien IP tick and how some recent books have tackled it. Mainly Alien: Colony War. But also Alien: The Cold Forge. Which we probably should have talked about more, because it's great.
You can read my 2012 feature on Alien 3 here (just don't start any more flame wars you Colonial Marines fans you).
Tuesday Mar 19, 2024
The Weird of the White Wolf
Tuesday Mar 19, 2024
Tuesday Mar 19, 2024
Loz returns to Derry & Toms to talk about the remaining tales we haven't covered that complete Michael Moorcock's The Weird of the White Wolf.
Elric tests some early chat-up lines in While the Gods Laugh, Moonglum finally shows up in The Singing Citadel and Loz bares all (though not his nipple) in a grievance-filled tirade against neopolitan ice cream.
JOIN US!
Tuesday Feb 27, 2024
New Edges For Old Heroes w/ Oliver Brackenbury
Tuesday Feb 27, 2024
Tuesday Feb 27, 2024
Oliver Brackenbury returns to Derry & Toms to talk about the next phase of his excellent mag New Edge Sword and Sorcery. Moorcock talk, uncovering and unleashing a golden age hero anew and copious amounts of caffeine and lemsip dominate.
JOIN US.
Be sure to check out the Backerkit link for New Edge Sword and Sorcery issues 3 and 4 and Oliver's podcast So I'm Writing a Novel...
The conversation about The Dreaming City and The Folk of the Forest is on Youtube
Also check out Dan Charnley's podcast, Dan Rambles and the Preston Speculative Fiction Group's interview with MM
Tuesday Feb 20, 2024
Options (Robert Sheckley)
Tuesday Feb 20, 2024
Tuesday Feb 20, 2024
Derek AKA Imrryr returns to Derry and Toms to talk about fellow New Yorker Robert Sheckley, the late master of SF satire and absurdist parables, and his rather unusual and wigged-out 1975 opus... Options.
Spoiler... it's out there... AND I LOVE IT!
All of the Imrryr catalogue is available via Bandcamp, including merch, and when I get the links for the upcoming physical releases I'll add them here.
Monday Jan 29, 2024
The Time of the Hawklords
Monday Jan 29, 2024
Monday Jan 29, 2024
So it turns out there's a 'Britain is Fucked' novel about Hawkwind tonning around in a van fighting ghosts and squares with guns that shoot their music AND that happens to feature Moorcock as a tertiary character with a saucy house computer.
WHO KNEW???
Well, some of you did obviously... but I didn't until my mate Yarks sent me a copy for my birthday a few years ago. It turns out that I was dimly aware of author Michael Butterworth at the time as I'd had some of his Space 1999 novelisations on my shelf for f'n years without realising that he was one of the dudes behind Savoy Books and appears to be a really cool cat.
So who better to drop by Derry and Toms to talk about it than Joe Banks, author of Hawkwind: Days of the Underground: Radical Escapism in the Age of Paranoia?
Nobody. Nobody better.
JOIN US!

Breakfast in the Ruins
It had been a few years since I tried anything new hobby-wise and particularly anything t’interweb related beyond twitter and generally using it for all of the general reasons we use it (gifs, cat pics, buying things I don’t need etc).
However in recent years, whilst doing lengthy commutes, I found that podcasts had moved on somewhat from the type I’d been exposed to previously, with less of the ‘yuck yuck’ interactions between podcast hosts that felt the need to be artificially heightened, and more of a naturalistic and joyous approach to a specific subject matter that drew me in to feel part of the conversation.
Combined with this new found interest I’ve been needing a hobby and outlet for my creative energies, such that they are.
A few years back, for similar reasons, I started a blog (mentallicohullic.com), where I was able to have a good rant, but also link to the online articles I’d written for thequietus.com. I didn’t really keep that up with any regularity though, so it fell by the wayside, although it is still live.
Anyway, it struck me a while later that a sudden upsurge in interest amongst my friends in fantasy fiction, and particularly Michael Moorcock, had generated a number of conversations that I really enjoyed participating in. We were also having particular discussions about how to best model Moorcock in a table top role playing game. One night I started typing up some thoughts regarding my approach to it and, reading it back, it was written in a conversational style and for a split second the idea of a podcast themed around Michael Moorcock’s books and other associated art seemed appealing. A few sherries later I’d ordered a USB audio hub and a condenser microphone and the next day recorded a five minute podcast introduction as a proof of concept. I shared it with some like-minded friends and, following feedback, decided to give it a whirl.
Michael Moorcock as a subject seemed the natural choice, for reasons that may become apparent during the introductory episode. As you'll see as the show progresses, there's a reason why I call it 'Moorcock flavoured'.