Old writer on the block

The writing diary of a well-mellowed science writer who cares about the public understanding of science and knows the ropes. This blog bounces between my curiosity, the daily realities of professional writing, the joy of pursuing nature, and my recycling of ideas that won't be in some book or other as far as I can see, but still needed sharing. I welcome comments and suggestions! Spam will be blocked and reported. For my books, see http://members.ozemail.com.au/~macinnis/writing/index.htm

Showing posts with label temporary obsessions. Show all posts

Wednesday, 18 February 2026

Diary of a project

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Or, I am going dotty. Some of my older friends know that I used to do stipple doodles. Some of my former colleagues know that I used to do...

Wednesday, 5 November 2025

You don’t have to be crazy to be a writer (It does help, though.)

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This is a resurrection of an article I wrote ten years back, because it says a few important things, and it had been locked away behind a pa...

Monday, 15 September 2025

Not to be mistaken for granite

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This is lifted from the book I am currently about to sign off on. I hope it will be published under the title What On Earth? * In 2017, I w...

Thursday, 23 January 2025

A fifth edition of The Big Book of Australian History

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A note to file in mid-2026: editing and formatting is done for the dead-tree version: a week should see the e-book version done. A short sam...

Australianisms

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Update April 2026 This book is now avaialble as an e-book, through this link . A short sampler of one of the works up in the air, right now....

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About Me

Peter Macinnis: Sydney, NSW, Australia; Peter Macinnis turned to writing after his promising career as a chiaroscuro player was tragically cut short by a caravaggio crash during the Trompe L'Oeil endurance race. He recently did remarkably well in the early rounds of the celebrity underwater cooking program, Moister Chef, but he was disqualified for using dried fruits and desiccated coconut. He has a pet leech named Gladys, which has lived in a container on his desk for the last six months, as part of another book, and he is an expert echidna handler and ant lion wrangler. He wrote both the score and the libretto for the acclaimed opera Manon Troppo.

Sorry, that’s not quite right. I write and sometimes broadcast about science, for young and old. I write mainly about science, environment, or social history for both adults and children, depending on how the fit takes me on a given morning. I usually have one book coming back after editing or in production, one being edited, one being written and one or more being actively researched.

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