Captain's Log: December 2025
The story so far, and what's next on the voyage.
What’s been happening in the last few months, plus an end-of-year bonus: Questions in a Bottle!
Welcome to this December edition of the Captain’s Log!
If you’ve recently come aboard, welcome! Most of the emails you get from me (usually a couple of times a month) will be original sci-fi, fantasy or other speculative fiction. But every so often (usually once a quarter, but I’ve belatedly realised that this time I haven’t sent one since July!) I send a housekeeping post like this one, to update readers on what’s been happening and what’s coming up next.
In case you missed it (1)
Since July, I’ve posted three short stories, all in different genres, and one three-part sci-fi mini-serial.
First, the short stories. For dystopian drama, check out Post Tenebras Lux:
For the second ever Peatpunk short story, here’s Seal Puke and Sea Anemones:
And for a historical speculative supernatural tale, An Account of a Great Healing in the Island of Brenday, in the Year of Our Lord 1659:
The sci-fi mini-serial To All Creation started as what I thought would be another short story, exploring the question of what might happen if a particular Biblical text was interpreted in a particular way. It developed into a slightly longer and I think more complex story, and I ended up reading more than I’d expected on spaceflight to the dwarf planet Ceres and drawing pictures of planetary orbits trying to work out the geometry of it. That probably doesn’t show very much in the story, but the research rabbit-holes that go into writing is one of the tremendously fun things about it! I also had fun with this because I could in imagination re-visit the city of Geneva, Switzerland, where I spent time as a postgraduate student. I can still smell the roasting chestnuts on cold winter days.
In case you missed it (2): fun things with other people
There were also a couple of opportunities to take part in experimental collaborative projects with other writers.
The first, back in August, was organised by the immensely talented writer, musician and artist Jon T. Weather Reports explored how we as humans react in the face of something vast and unknown. My contribution, Elaine, looks at foreignness and the question of where home is. (Regular readers should note that this piece is a little different from my usual style, and includes a limited amount of profanity).
The other collaboration was the Bruce project hosted by SUM FLUX, a bimonthly online zine. We were invited to write our own interpretation of a shared character, a middle-aged man from Ohio. Again, I tried a different style for this one, playing with the structure of the story and thinking about what it means to really know someone. Check out The Uncreation of Bruce below:
Questions in a Bottle
One of the wonderful writers I came across in the Weather Reports collaboration is Olivia McNeilis. A week or so ago, she posted her answers to a series of writing and book-related questions, and posed some questions of her own. She very kindly tagged me and invited me to answer them, and I thought that might make a fun end-of-year addition to this post, so here goes!
Did you always want to be a writer? What’s the first story you remember penning?
I always loved making up stories. In primary school, I didn’t just love writing stories in a jotter in class; I was the weird kid wandering the playground making up stories in my head instead of playing with the other children. I did play with the other kids some of the time, but a fair chunk of time I would be imagining something like what it would be like to be a really tiny person, like a Borrower, riding one of the many discarded crisp packets that littered the playground and soared high, high as the flat school roof, when the wind caught them (and this is a very windy place, so those Borrowers would have had some wild rides). But I don’t think writer occurred to me as a career choice. I did go through a phase of wanting to be an illustrator though.
The first story I distinctly remember writing was around Primary Seven (age 10-11), in school. It was a bit of a Lord of the Rings rip-off (the main character was called Frodo) and it involved some kind of magic marbles. It was illustrated, too. I could probably still find the jotter somewhere.
Do you know when something’s good when you finish it? Or do you need some space?
Often, there is a sense of rightness when I finish something and I reckon it’s good. Before getting to that point, there’ll be a nagging feeling that no, it’s not done yet, and I’ll keep working on it. But I don’t objectively know that it’s good. That needs a bit of space, and even then I find it hard to objectively evaluate my own work.
Where do you draw inspiration from?
The landscape and culture and history of my home islands in Scotland; the 10+ years I spent working in China; the interplay of languages and cultures; cool science; moral and ethical questions around science and technology (at the moment, AI crops up a bit); random ideas that come in the middle of the night; conversations with friends and family.
Do you enjoy editing your work?
Yes and no. Mostly no, but I do enjoy seeing the improvement in a piece of work after it’s been edited.
What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve heard?
Get an editor. I wish I could say I followed this advice, but I can’t afford to hire one at the moment! I do see this as an issue with a lot of self-published writing. I’ve read some really great novels, novellas and short story collections that have been self-published, but I think all of them would have benefited from more professional editing. I’m sure the same would be true of my writing, because we’re so often blind to our own flaws. I’ll still keep reading self-published fiction as well as traditionally published work, but maybe I’ll try to save enough to get an editor for my own work before trying to publish it properly.
What’s the best line you’ve written this year? What’s the best line you’ve read?
This is a tough one. Perhaps this long sentence from In Memoriam:
You’d think the consumption of all that energy, all those cells with their data-crammed nuclei, dying and undying, all those dripping lipids, those subcutaneous fats, oils sequestered in the sebaceous glands, marrow of bone and meat of muscle, that all of that released would burn with a soft blue flame like the gases rendered from those ancient animals crushed under rock and sea; like a lantern fuelled by the cetaceous sperm of Ahab’s revenge; like fruiting bodies of luminous fungi in undergrowth at night, hyphae hidden away but spores ready to burst into the world; like warm phosphorescence on some far shore; like the slops and scraps from a primary-coloured primetime nuclear power plant.
As for what I’ve read, there have been far too many brilliant lines. I’d probably choose something from Titus Groan or Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake, because the man was a genius with the English language, and his writing bubbles with the joy and wit of it, but I borrowed the book from the public library and don’t have it to hand now. Getting my own copy is on my wish list.
Do you have any work you believe in that has yet to be published? If so, what’s it about?
I have a couple of first- or second-draft novels sitting around that I’m desperate to edit and get into the world somehow. The one I’m most keen to get back to is kind of an alternative universe adventure with a Victorian vibe.
Do you have any writing goals for 2026?
Other than keeping up my regular short stories for subscribers, I’ll be working on a Gaelic novella for which I’ve received a commissioning grant. It’s a peatpunk mystery story — think Agatha Christie meets peat bogs in a post-climate-crisis future.
My other aim is to finish editing Destination Europa, which still needs a lot of work. It was a goal for 2025 that I didn’t quite make! Settling back into life in Scotland and starting two new jobs took up a lot of my time and energy. But I’m still working on it!
Thanks, Olivia for the tag! I’m going to throw these and a couple more questions out to anyone who’d like to respond:
What was a favourite book (old or new) that you read in 2025?
What is a book or story from your childhood that has influenced who you are today?
I’d love to hear your answers to any or all of these! Stick them in the comments if you’re on Substack, or reply in an email if you like!
Coming up next will be a festive short story, released later this month (possibly during the Christmas / New Year holiday period)!
With grateful thanks for joining me on the voyage, and with best wishes to you and your loved ones for a blessed and peaceful festive season,
Caitriana
Shout out to Peake! 🙌😂
I wish I could afford an editor too! No matter how many times I proofread, I can never catch everything myself, and then I start to second-guess really silly things and get myself in a muddle. Cognitive dysfunction really doesn't help these days either. I was really fortunate to have a friend, who does editing for non-fiction publications, edit my first three novels for free. Just his notes on the first book highlighted all these weird little habits and oddities I would never have noticed on my own. Once they'd been pointed out I could immediately identify and fix them for myself at the writing stage. Probably the most helpful thing anyone has ever done for me as a writer on the technical side of things.
Favourite book I've read this year was No Longer Human, by Osamu Dazai. It really got to me in a way I hadn't anticipated. Still can't shake the weight of it and don't think I will for a long time. Funny how a book, written in another age and another culture, by someone with a life so different from your own, can cut so close to the bone. I've asked for one of his other novels, The Setting Sun, for Christmas, so looking forward to reading that.
The childhood book is a tricky one, there are so many I could pick, but I think one that had a big influence was The Three Musketeers, which I read when I was about 9 or 10. It's the dynamic of the characters that really struck me... that mix of bravado, humour, admiration, rivalry, even tenderness, the 'all for one and one for all' code of friendship... it showed me, as a child, how nuanced and powerful (and fun!) platonic relationships can be.
Great captain's log! Looking forward to reading more of your fiction in 2026! 😊
Possibly not a popular opinion, but I'm always antipathetic when it comes to editors. Personally I don't need them because I know when something I've written is good, or if/when, and how this or that bit of it might need a little changing. It's partly because I have also done professional editing and proofreading, and I have a dissociative condition, so I can often read my own stuff as if it wasn't written by me. And, without being narcissistic, I do love reading my own stuff. Anything I write that is rubbish usually is obviously rubbish before I finish, so I simply don't finish. Perhaps that's a sort of pre-emptive editing, as it were.
This is notwithstanding other people's interpretations and subjective opinions of anything I write. Lots of people might not like this or that I write, or would have done it differently, but in those cases 'differently' isn't 'better'. I think a lot of professional editing is not only subjective, but perhaps also attempts to self-justify their invoice by being seen to chop and cut all over the place. Ultimately, they don't know you, can't get inside your head, and cannot be at one with whatever motivated you to write the story. A story always belongs to the individual writer, in the end. No one else can write it.
Best book I read this year is re-reading 1984 and seeing new stuff in it. Understanding it a lot more too.
Childhood book - Asimov's End of Eternity, which IMO is the best book he ever wrote and it still informs my genuine belief in the way the galaxy works even now (continuous intervention when necessary, that is, although not necessarily involving time travel). Can't remember how old I was at the time. 9 or 10 perhaps.