Rian Hughes – författare

Science fiction paperbacks exploded over the 1940s and '50s literary landscape with the force of an alien gamma bomb. Titles such as Rodent Mutation, The Human Bat vs The Robot Gangster, Dawn of the Mutants and Mushroom Men from Mars appeared from fly-by-night publishers making the most of the end of post-war paper rationing. They were brash and seductive - for around a shilling the future was yours. The stories were often conceived around a pre-commissioned cover and a title suggested by the publisher, and the writers were paid by the word, and sometimes not paid at all. Titles were knocked out at a key-pounding pace, sometimes over a weekend, by authors now lost to literary history (plus a few professionals who could spot an opportunity) who were forced to write under pseudonyms like Ray Cosmic, Steve Future, Vector Magroon or Vargo Statten. Despite the tight deadlines and poor pay, the books' cover artists still managed to produce works of multi-hued, brain-bending brilliance, and collected here is an overview of their output during an unparalleled period of brash optimism and experimentation in publishing.

A cartoon pin-up book packed full of explosive charm plucked straight from the pages of Blighty magazine. During the era of classic cartoon pin-up art in Britain, no illustrator was as prolific and omnipresent as Scotsman Arthur Ferrier. With pen in hand, he could render the female form in a way that was at once funny, charming, and unbelievably sexy. As the cheesecake king of good girl art, his voluptuous, wasp-waisted, leggy women were a big hit with the troops during World War II, raising not only morale but a few eyebrows as well.

‘Utterly unique . . . A masterpiece’ The Daily Mail‘Stunning . . . Brilliantly original’ The GuardianLondon is built from concrete, steel and the creative urge. Old technology gives way to the new. Progress is inevitable – but is it more fragile than its inhabitants realize?A strange anomaly is uncovered in the new top-secret Crossrail extension being built under Buckingham Palace. It is an archaeological puzzle, one that may transform our understanding of history – and the origins of London itself.And if our modern world falls, we may have to turn to the technology of the past in order to save our future.

Starring a cast of cuties who are as captivating as they are mischievous, Cabaret Cuties delves into Ferrier's post-war pin-up illustrations. During the era of classic cartoon pin-up art in Britain, no illustrator was as prolific and omnipresent as Scotsman Arthur Ferrier. With pen in hand, he could render the female form in a way that was at once funny, charming, and unbelievably sexy. As the cheesecake king of good girl art, his voluptuous, wasp-waisted, leggy women were a big hit with audiences. Overflowing with pretty girls and one-liners plucked from the pages of Blighty magazine, this book honours the work of an often overlooked master of comic illustration.

Take a front-row seat for Showgirl Sirens as Ferrier's irresistible cartoon pin-ups command the spotlight. During the era of classic cartoon pin-up art in Britain, no illustrator was as prolific and omnipresent as Scotsman Arthur Ferrier. With pen in hand, he could render the female form in a way that was at once funny, charming, and unbelievably sexy. As the cheesecake king of good girl art, his voluptuous, wasp-waisted, leggy women were a big hit with audiences. Replete with gorgeous girls and witty one-liners whisked from the pages of Blighty magazine, this book celebrates the early work of an often overlooked master of comic illustration.

'Extraordinary stuff . . . There are ideas larger and more mind-bending, I think, than those I have come across in any other sci-fi novel.' - Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-timeAt Jodrell Bank a mysterious signal of extraterrestrial origin has been detected. Artificial intelligence expert Jack Fenwick thinks he can decode it. But when he and his associates at Hoxton tech startup Intelligencia find a way to step into the alien realm the signal encodes, they discover that it’s already occupied – by ghostly entities that may come from our own past.Have these ‘DMEn’ (Digital Memetic Entities) been created by persons unknown for just such an eventuality? Are they our first line of defence in a coming war, not for territory, but for our minds?XX presents a compelling vision of humanity’s unique place in the universe, and of what might happen in the wake of the biggest scientific discovery in human history.As compelling as it is visually striking, Rian Hughes’ first novel incorporates NASA transcripts, newspaper and magazine articles, fictitious Wikipedia pages, undeciphered alphabets, and ‘Ascension’, a forgotten novelette by 1960s counterculture guru Herschel Teague that mysteriously foreshadows events.Wrapping stories within stories, Rian Hughes’ XX unleashes the full narrative potential of graphic design. Drawing on Dada, punk and the modernist movements of the twentieth century, it asks us who we think we are – and where we may be headed next.The battle for your mind has already begun.