Helen McCarthy

@glider

Glider in the night, dancer in the dark, lover of lost rivers and paths in the woods and libraries and half-open doors. Moonlights as a writer. Images/poems mine unless credited. AI must be consensual.

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Helen McCarthy@glider· 20d

Outside our hotel in Aberdeen, a row of granite warehouses that once served the port and could make fantastic homes for Scots( not fancy flats for offshore investors.) Can #AndyBurnham mobilise local authorities to bring such local assets back into the service of the community?

Helen McCarthy@glider· 21d

Take a trip down to The Vintage Market on Aberdeen's Market Street and get your retro groove on! Fab shop with lovely friendly staff.

Every corner packed with funky 40s-90s goodies

Stunning clothes and an Adam Ant annual!

Haori, possibly 70s/80s, in glorious condition with a groovy lining.

Helen McCarthy@glider· 21d

The residents of Dundee are peaceable, friendly and infeasibly cute.

Helen McCarthy@glider· 24d

If you see this, reskeet with a Sentai team that is not Power Rangers or Super Sentai.

Left to right, Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward, John, Gordon, Scott and Virgil Tracy, Aloysius 'Nosy' Parker, Brains, Alan Tracy - the International Rescue action team.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jul 11

#SomethingBeautiful - a glorious animal in its natural habitat. Increasingly rare because us.

Artistic photo of a lion, taken in low light emphasising tawny golden shades.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jul 9

The Winged Victory of Samothrace, seen first with my dad watching the Fred Astaire movie Funny Face when I was five, then again in Paris on a school visit aged 12. The only woman who could hold her own with Audrey Hepburn on a screen.

The Winged Victory at the Musée du Louvre, allowing Audrey Hepburn (right of image, red dress and smile like an exploding sun) her moment in the spotlight.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jul 8

Cast yourself as a villain

Cruella's trash dress from Disney's 'Cruella' assembles binbags and old newspaper articles into a ballgown with a 20 foot train. Worn by Emma Stone as Cruella, inspired bit of recycling.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jul 3

Fallowfield in Manchester does indeed have a remarkable museum, the Platt Hall Gallery of Costume, the wrold's first dedciated costume museum. It's set in an 18th century merchant's house with daffodil lawns, and I visited frequently in my student days. Visit platthall.org for info.

Platt Hall, Fallowfield, Manchester, the world's first museum of dress. Photo © platthall.org/about shows an elegant Georgian redbrick mansion with a pillared entrance porch over the front door, a three-storey main facade and two single-storey side wings. I don't know if these are original or were added later to meet the needs of changing times.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jul 3

Japanese artists had the same issues. How do you give your clients the exotic animal pictures they want if you've never seen said exotic animal, or maybe just glimpsed one? This woodcut around 1800 is just one example, though the elephant looks a lot feebler than that solid Beverley beast.

An unsigned Japanese woodblock print from c. 1800, possibly by Yoshiharu. It depicts an elephant in a rocky landscape, and given that the artist might never have seen an elephant it's a reasonable approximation despite the almost horse-like tail and the very floppy ears. The line work is lovely, contrasting the animal with the rocks - the living creature looks quite weak and feeble despite its size, drawn with lines almost as delicate as those of the waterfall at top right, while the rocks are solid, strong, with plants clinging to them, vibrant with life. (That's just my view, the elephant may have seen it differently. Maybe the artist just wanted to tell us he was absolutely starving and eyeing up those plants as lunch.) Image: edogallery.com

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jul 3

My beautiful city yesterday, snapped from the South Bank of the Thames as I raced across town between two terrific exhibitions. I absolutely love London in any weather, but on a day like this it's glorious to come from the noisy shadows of Borough Market to this world of sky and water.

2 July 2026, around 13:00. Looking downriver from the waterside just below Southwark Bridge, the massively gentrified Billingsgate Fish Market retains its iconic towers. I think that's the railway line from London Bridge station running through it below the new buildings. The river looks calm
in this shot but there was a fairly strong tide running, and the wind made pretty patterns in it. I wish I'd had time to take video.

2 July 2026, around 13:00. Looking upriver from the waterside just below Southwark Bridge, which you can see here with St. Paul's Cathedral rising majestically behind it. From this angle, for the moment at least, it still dominates the City skyline as Wren intended.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jun 13

My beloved 15-year-old persimmon Vans are finally wearing out. The soles are so thin I'm having Sam Vîmes moments everywhere I walk. This is their last summer, but I love them so much I've put padded insoles in to try and keep them going through September. #favourites #oldclothes

Helen McCarthy@glider· May 15

#TheMangaBible in stock at #TravellingMan on BBC Newcastle's Granger Street!

Helen McCarthy@glider· May 10

Happy memories: every Sunday afternoon in spring and summer, the seductive chimes of the ice cream van would sound, and us kids would look hopefully at our parents, relaxed after lunch and happy to hand over a tanner so we could race outside and join the queue.

A black and white photo showing a crowd of children aged between three and ten or eleven, waiting to be served at a Lyons Maid ice cream van parked on a narrow suburban street in the early 1960s. All but one of the boys wear shorts, shirts and jumpers. They all have short hair. The girls wear short dresses, one with a cardigan.Two have long hair and one appears to have short hair. I don't have a photographer's name or a date for this image.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Apr 28

When I see images like this one from Cockatoo-info.com, I don't just see the charm of an ungainly infant still growing into its body, but totally confident and curious; I think yeah, birds really are dinosaurs.

A cockatoo chick with feathers just beginning to emerge though its naked pink skin. It's sitting in the palm of a human hand and appears completely unafraid. The chick already has an intensely curious expression, and will grow into an intelligent and engaging creature. Photo: cockatoo-info.com

Helen McCarthy@glider· Apr 9

These heady spring days are the perfect time to look at Dante Gabriel Rossetti's The Blessed Damozel in the Lady Lever Art Gallery. It's the commissioned second version of the painting based on his poem - Rossetti was an early adopter of the media mix. www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/artifact/ble...

The second, smaller version of Dante Gabriel Rossetti's painting The Blessed Damozel, based on his own poem, shows a beautiful. voluptuous redhaired woman leaning on the parapet of Heaven, looking out wistfully, surrounded by angels. The frame is ornate and gilded with a carved classical pediment at the top and a smaller image showing her lover the world below Heaven in a separate frame at the bottom.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Feb 27

There is no situation, however hellish - or indeed paradisal - that is not enhanced by a bowl of hot, rich, luscious French onion soup topped with golden croutons and sensually melting, clinging cheese.

My birthday lunch began with this rich, golden, gorgeously cheesy bowlful of French onion soup. And it just kept getting better from there.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Feb 27

All I want for my birthday is for everyone who sees this to buy #TheMangaBible or borrow it from their local library. If you buy it from an indie bookstore or bookshop.org that's even better because it shares the love even further.

Cover images of The Manga Bible American, French and German editions and promo materials. The cover colour scheme is hot pink and black with bright yellow and white lettering. Cover art c Baron Yoshimoto, used with permission

Helen McCarthy@glider· Feb 13

My cold is now officially epic and Steve's is catching up. My nose and throat are disgustingly productive, the rest not so much. But this evening I'm recording a US podcast to promote #TheMangaBible so I'll try for Garbo rather than gargle. Tickets tinyurl.com/2u9pcjfr

Poster for thé live-streamed launch if The Manga Bible on 3 March in London and online, by Seed Talks. Tickets on Eventbrite https://tinyurl.com/2u9pcjfr

Helen McCarthy@glider· Feb 3

Please share the now complete link for tickets to my book launch and livestream on 3 March. I really appreciate your support, sorry to chop off a vital bit of the link! tinyurl.com/2u9pcjfr

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jan 20

In London on 3 March? Why not book a ticket for my book launch? Hear about how - and why - the book came into being, some of the stories it contains, be among the first to get a copy, and if you like I'll sign it! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-manga-...

Poster for the talk "The Manga Bible: History, Hearsay, Facts" gives details of the talk and displays six manga style images, all in black on a pale cream coloured background.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Jan 8

Thrilled to receive an advance copy of La Bibbia dei Manga - Gribaudo's Italian edition of The Manga Bible. Many thanks to translator Paolo Silvio Poli for making my work accessible in Italian. #TranslatorsRock

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 29

Triffic Steve Kyte cover for the UK paperback.

Steve Kyte art showing Tom Baker at lower left

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 22

Since it is now Christmastide, we broke out the Fortnum & Mason biscuits with our morning coffee today. We only have Toffolossus in the house at Christmas, because otherwise we'd be skint and the size of two substantial 1930s semi-detached suburban villas. Sin and depravity in biscuit form.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 22

#SomethingBeautiful snow edition: this programme is now off BBC iPlayer but you can revel in some of its stunning stills of wild things in the snow. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/a...

A portrait shot of the head and shoulders of an adult snow leopard in falling snow. The beautiful animal has a characteristic catlike face with shorter, blunt ears and pale green-golden eyes. its fur shades from white to soft beige with black markings.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 18

Not the most constructive way to approach who might win SPOTY, is it? The i Paper's very own front-page own goal nominates a man to "break female dominance" when women and girls have less opportunity and get paid less than men in every field of sport.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 11

Oh dear. Found by chance on Amazon: a dozen heavily illustrated books on very varied topics self-published by one guy in about a year. Sounds suspiciously like #AI - of course I could be wrong. Still, anyone who's published on yokai, horror, science of history for 8-12 year olds, check this out.

An advertisement for a new self-published book on Japanese monsters. heavily illustrated and rapidly produced.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 8

Our tribute to the ancient pagan gods is now lighting up our halls. Every dinosaur and robot and angel and animal, every bit of laser cut plastic carved wood and fragile blown glass bauble, holds a memory of people and places we love. Wishing you all a joyous Yuletide.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Dec 3

Still no justice. But if this photomontage of the unjustly killed, and the names and pictures of all 12 officers who leveraged the glacial Enquiry to retire before justice found them, went up outside both Anfield and Hillsborough, and stayed there, that would be something.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Nov 11

Somewhere people are arguing over whether you put the jam or the cream on the scone first; here it's a case of how highly spiced you want your scone and whether you prefer mango chutney or lime pickle.

Helen McCarthy@glider· Oct 26

I love that @irishali13.bsky.social reposted this glorious Chagall sketch. But with my costumer's hat on it takes me back to all the times designers would come into the workroom with one of these and expect us to make it into fully functioning dance costumes that wouldn't slip or reveal all onstage.