WARREN ELLIS LTD

1oct26

Published October 1, 2026 by Warren Ellis

Tennessee death row inmate Christa Pike has been taken to hospital after an attempt to execute her by two lethal injections failed, her lawyer says.

Her legal team filed an emergency motion to halt the convicted murderer’s execution as it was happening, saying: “Ms Pike has lost consciousness and still has a heartbeat and is audibly snoring.”

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cq8r6rjdvlx6o

They killed you twice and you’re snoring.

Yesterday was an utter failure. The deli was closed because I was given the wrong opening times on Monday. So I went to a pub that will go unnamed. And could not obtain a glass of wine because the fortysomething chimp behind the bar appeared to not know what wine was, showed me a bottle of vermouth and asked me if it was wine, looked at a cork in a bottle like it was insurmountable black magic, and then laughed and informed me he didn’t have “one of those things” to open the bottle with.

Get a hobby and let that guide your style choices. Fishing? Gardening? Skateboarding? All of these things have style codes and legacies that you can pull from and use to inform what you wear and how you wear it. Being online is not a hobby, so don’t want to dress like a guy who looks at posts a lot. |
Nick Catucci https://riffpost.substack.com/p/you-dont-want-to-dress-like-a-guy

It is now nearly 3pm, and I have spent the last three hours wandering around town, buying cheese and meat, drinking wine and coffee and chatting with people.

OPERATIONS: newsletter is already locked and in the scheduler.
STATUS:

READING: RED SHEET, James Ellroy (UK) (US+). I also read 50 pages of FLIGHT FROM TIME ONE

MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.

Tags: crime

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30sep26

Published September 30, 2026 by Warren Ellis

Big sky on Monday night.

I have fresh herbs, so I’m making herb salts this week. I also have a bulb of black garlic so I can knock up a jar of black garlic butter for herself.

Next up, making a jar of cold ginger tea. This is easy: take three or four inches of ginger, chop it up, juice a lemon, throw it all in a jug, pour a pint of boiling water over it, wait fifteen minutes, stir a couple of teaspoons of honey into it, strain, cool and jar.

Right. I’m off to buy cheese. Will do this properly tomorrow.

OPERATIONS: figured out a script step last night, so I’m working that through today while also figuring out the progression on another script, and thinking about how to extend the working days. Just loaded all of COLLIDE 01 into the newsletter for Sunday. Had a weird work-related half-revelation late last night, and am eyeing a couple of new notebooks (including the Roterfaden) hungrily.
STATUS: watching the weather radar so I can leave the house once the next band of rain passes. It is weirdly hot. 20C when I went to bed at midnight last night.
READING: RED SHEET, James Ellroy (UK) (US+). I also read 70 pages of FLIGHT FROM TIME ONE Monday night, and that book is so insane it may end up being a newsletter entry or several posts here.
LISTENING:

I’ve been low-online long enough that I have missed buying some CDs that I may have wanted, including a new Laura Cannell that went up for pre-order on the 24th and appears to have sold out instantly, which annoyed me.

DRINK: Birds and Bees summer ale, as it’s still warm here!

MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.

Tags: food

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28sep26

Published September 28, 2026 by Warren Ellis

First day of reset. Index cards, paper, pens.

Haunted Ambient Mix, which I need to remember I need to listen to at the end of the week!
Researchers trying to use AI to build an “Out-of-this-World-Model” that will allow AI equipped spacecraft to “‘dream’ dozens of potential futures and control the system outputs to “step” toward that dream future” of docking with low earth orbit space stations

The deli was randomly closed – fuck you, Dan – so I stopped in at the Pipe of Port for the first time since it reopened. It’s a basement bar/restaurant that’s been in Southend since God was a boy.

Fried cauliflower, hummous, vegetables, pomegranate and smoked salmon. Rain would approve of everything but the salmon.

OPERATIONS: I got two pages done and sent before I went out to lunch. I have some copying over from a notebook and some scripting to do, and I really need to reply to some emails…!
STATUS:

READING: RED SHEET, James Ellroy (UK) (US+).
LISTENING: right this second, HAPPINESS, Paavoharju + Joose Keskitalo. Making a conscious choice this week to listen primarily to CDs.
LAST WATCHED: Mock The Week, I think. I’m glad it’s back. Now I want some cable channel to bring Frankie Boyle’s New World Order back.

MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.

Tags: ai ambient podcast space

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27sep26

Published September 27, 2026 by Warren Ellis

Terrible day yesterday: ill and brain-fogged and too much to do. Missed the gig at the Jazz Centre I had tickets for. But I did make it to Konsztrukting Soundz in the evening.

I didn’t actually have high hopes for the night – free jazz and skronk saxophones are NOT my thing – but it was actually incredibly good. Drone saxophone! A trio of a guitarist doing Sunn O)))-ish doom drones, a saxophonist staying in the deep registers and an experimentalist drummer smashing his way around the edges – amazing. Site notes.

STATUS: starting today, a complete reset.
READING: RED SHEET, James Ellroy (UK) (US+). First Ellroy I’ve read since the incoherent BLOOD’S A ROVER and damn this is a return to form.
LISTENING: just about to go through the catalogue of The Owl Service, a band whose existence I only learned of last night.

MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.

Tags: events

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Published September 26, 2026 by Warren Ellis

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23sep26

Published September 23, 2026 by Warren Ellis

Running late today.

ACCESSIONS:

Apparently this thing is 1200 pages long.

THE ROUSE, China Mieville (UK) (US+)

I’ve seen reviews for DIGGER start to appear, and, as with MEGALOPOLIS, it makes me want to see it more. Which is not something I thought I’d ever say about a Tom Cruise film.

READING: finished TENTACLES LONGER THAN NIGHT, Eugene Thacker (UK) (US+). Wondering if it’s time to descend into some of the Very Long books I have in the pile.
LISTENING: Posterior Vitreous Detachment (Video Soundtracks Vol 1) by Seymour Glass

MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.

Tags: books library

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22sep26

Published September 22, 2026 by Warren Ellis

I imported a new supply of beard oil from my current favourite source, Fires Of Freyja in North Carolina USA. HEKS, I didn’t order – they threw it in for free! Such lovely people.

OPERATIONS: notebooks, all day. Development and script layouts.
STATUS: Eyestrain! Hence notebooks – I need a day of less screens.
READING: TENTACLES LONGER THAN NIGHT, Eugene Thacker (UK) (US+)

MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.

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21sep26

Published September 21, 2026 by Warren Ellis

Printing off development material to paste it into notebooks. This is a piece of COLLIDE, the comic with Jerome Eyquem that is being serialised in chunks on my newsletter. He’s working on part two right now, so I need to sit and think about part three.

Sunday’s newsletter: notes on the arrival of the Roterfaden notebook.

It’s a glorious day outside. I have to say, I love the Indian summers we get now. I mean, we’re all gonna die, but it’s pretty.

OPERATIONS: we do not do #1000mphclub any more, but it’s definitely going to be 100mphclub for a little while. Today is a bits and pieces day, including a quick partial update of warrenellis.com, which I haven’t amended in a few years.
STATUS: