Author: Alexis Kennedy

25th June 2021
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The Confusion of Tongues

Linguistics quiz! Everyone loves a linguistics quiz.

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3rd June 2021
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‘Against Worldbuilding, And Other Provocations’: Bonus Material

Matt teaches Classics at St John’s, Oxford, where I’m delighted to say that he specialises in the study of ancient literary parody.

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21st April 2021
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“Hee-hee-hee-hee, wipeout!”

Work has been getting on top of me over the last six months. Then I had a passle of family miseries and an unrelated health scare.

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2nd April 2021
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Gravity

16.01.16 The ‘unusual uncle’ I mention below was David Insall, a fascinating man who at different times had been a sheep farmer, an environmentalist, and a contract officer in Oman. My mother assures me he once brought a wolf pup to her dinner party.

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31st March 2021
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/kəˈbal/, Part 3: The Society of Simon

The following is an extract from an article Alexis wrote decades ago, in 1996, for British roleplaying magazine Valkyrie. It’s juvenilia, and some bits make him wince – but it’s an insight into his early style and fiction which later became Fallen London, Sunless Sea and Cultist Simulator. [ Part 1, Part 2 ]

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19th March 2021
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Three Reviews of Games from the Year 2035

‘Press X to Cure Cancer’ was a much more topical gag in 2015, though not really a very good one even then. I probably shouldn’t try to be down with the kids.

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5th March 2021
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Three Reviews of Unreviewable Games

I borrowed the idea for this from Stanisław Lem, who wrote every entertaining and faultlessly straight-faced critical essays about nonexistent books he’d invented. Ramon Llull was real, though I’ve never been sure how to pronounce him.

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19th February 2021
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Building the Frontier

I didn’t talk about my own time in LambdaMoo, because that wasn’t really the point, but since you ask, I built a house in a very large mostly-dead dragon.  

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5th February 2021
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The Labyrinth

What’s the difference between a labyrinth and a maze? The original, primal Labyrinth – the first in human history – the one from which all others derive – is of course Jim Henson’s 1986 David Bowie vehicle.

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22nd January 2021
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How It Happened To Happen

Jack Cohen is a reproductive biologist who gives talks on speculative xenobiology. I once heard him explain how we had happened to evolve from a species of fish that kept its reproductive organs next to the pipes it used to eliminate waste from its body.

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27th November 2020
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/kəˈbal/, Part 2: The Denied

The Denied are a small cult – perhaps two hundred in all, including children – most of whom live in a sizeable but remote village in Kurdistan.

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18th September 2020
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September #1: IS THIS THING ON?

MAYBE A PUBLIC ALPHA OF BOOK OF HOURS?! Also, our August newsletter goes out.

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28th August 2020
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/kəˈbal/, Part 1: The Caldecotts

The following is an extract from an article Alexis wrote decades ago, in 1996, for British roleplaying magazine Valkyrie. It’s juvenilia, and some bits make him wince – but it’s an insight into his early style and fiction which later became Fallen London, Sunless Sea and Cultist Simulator. [ Part 2, Part 3 ]

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7th August 2020
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DAYBREAK IN THE INVISIBLE SERAPEUM

This is the season of the Forge of Days – the hottest August day in the UK for the last decade – so here’s something apposite for you.

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24th April 2020
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How I Got Into Games, Part 1: Echo Bazaar

I get asked a lot how I got into games. I always feel unhelpful when I tell my story, because it’s such an unconventional and such an unrecommendable one.

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10th April 2020
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Wherever You Go

Below is the current list of places featured in EXILE (excluding the Priory of Captains, the Pentapolis and the other final destinations).

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18th February 2020
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“What are your influences?”

This is probably the question I’ve been asked most over the years, and every time as soon as I answer it I think of someone

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10th February 2020
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State of the Factory: Year 2

Thanks for reading to the end! I hope it’s been useful. And if you’ve stayed with us through the rough times, we really appreciate it, both of us. A heartfelt thank you. It’s probably meant more this year than any time before or since.

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