I’ve just been reading Readly. It’s £7.99 a month, allows me access to hundreds of magazines and I resisted it when I first heard of it, but when you think of the cost of magazines it isn’t that bad. I feel guilty every now and then when I have a months where I don’t use it much, but generally I get much more than I would if I was still buying paper magazines, with all their environmental costs.
The selection changes, so you can’t always get what you want. On the other hand you don’t find yourself paying £4 for a magazine that really only contains two articles you want, and finding that neither were as good as you hoped.
Last night I was able to read two writing magazines, bookmark and article in a collectors’ magazine, find some new information on Commander Frank Brock, the fireworks man, and read two good articles in the Times Literary Supplement, which enabled me to take my mind for a walk (as the advert for the TLS says, assuming I can be so crass as to call anything associated with the TLS an “advert”.
There’s a very good article on the meeting of Sassoon and Owen in Craiglockhart Hospital in 1918, though that’s a subject which has, to be honest, been done to death. There’s also an excellent book review by Rory Stewart. The book in question is a biography of Boris Johnson and Stewart’s review is a masterpiece. I don’t think he likes Boris. It was a sad day for British politics when Boris beat him to the leadership.
Which all goes to prove that it’s dangerous for me to have time on my hands.