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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 19h

A lovely bonus to the #CreatorsEmergencySummit yesterday was walking from Tottenham Court Road through Bloomsbury on that clear, perfect autumn morning. I've walked all over London for almost sixty years and I never tire of it.

Bloomsbury Square Gardens - photo via Tripadvisor

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

I still love this place more than I can express, and working for the British Library when the Reading Room was still a reading room is one of the greatest privileges of my life.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

An absolutely lovely write up from Liberty, who was at my Seed Talks #StudioGhibli presentation on Monday evening. I'm thrilled at how this one resonates with people of all ages. I bring the same passion to any topic because much of it is already there in the audience - I tap into their energy.

A five star Trustpilot review of Helen McCarthy's Seed Talks presentation on The Art History of Studio Ghibli, posted by Liberty

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

On a train to Slough for a rare chance to support my beloved as he signs autographs, shows some artwork and hopefully sells a few prints. He is my wingman and I'm his, but he rarely steps into the spotlight, so this is a real treat for me. www.facebook.com/sloughcounci...

A poster for the opening weekend of "Thunderbirds - The Big Screen and Beyond" at Slough Museum, 3-4 October 2026.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

What an absolutely perfect afternoon for a walk through the back lanes of Beckton. I feel even luckier than ever to be alive today.

Beckton, East London, in its autumnal colours under a vivid, cloudless blue sky on a warm afternoon in late September.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

#SomethingBeautiful - the irresistibly loveable flying gurnard. Hayao #Miyazaki never designed a flying machine like this, but Antonin #Gaudi might have. Photo © Beckmannjan / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0

The flying gurnard doesn't fly high or far, and only along the ocean bed on the Mediterranean and on the Atlantic fringes. But the magnificent flourish of those wings, and their beautiful adoment of bright blue spots, makes it a breathtaking sight. 'Gurnard" comes from the French word for grunting, because the water moving through its swim bladder makes little grunting sounds.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

#SomethingBeautiful - the colour-shifting ethereally gorgeous dancer known as the leafy seadragon. If I were privileged to be a dragon's chosen rider, this would be my preference. ©James Rosindell / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0

The leafy seadragon floats among the kelp forests off south and west Australia like a glorious fringed and tasselled scarf or the dagged sleeve of a renaissance beauty's gown. Its colours change at will and its fronds help to conceal it amid the foliage. It's often mistaken for a seahorse but it's more closely related to the pipefish, bridging the two species.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Prime Minister, please reflect (as should they) that Lords John Reid and Richard Walker each cost the nation more per day than a State pensioner costs per week, and that a considerable sum might also be saved by abolishing the House of Lords. Glass houses and stones, eh?

An article in The i, 9 September 2026, in which two Labour peers with Ministers' pensions, a £371 per day attendance allowance and subsidised food and drink, find the idea of State pensioners on a maximum £12.570 per year getting a little further from the breadline thanks to the triple lock on pensions unaffordable.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Just look at this glorious Kirby creation. What a character! What a costume!

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

#SomethingBeautiful "Harvest Gold" by 17yo Étienne Francey was Highly Commended in the Natural History Museum's Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition. It captures the beauty of a tiny, rarely seen and wholly benevolent creature.

A harvest mouse on an ear of wheat in a field near the village of Coussy, Switzerland. Photo Étienne Francey c CHNature2012

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

Just spent the morning at the V&A with Elsa Schiaparelli, Daniel Rosebery and some drop dead sexy bodhisattvas. Now sitting outside an Exhibition Road cafe like a true flâneuse.

A table with a glass and a green bottle, all dappled with sun shining through the foliage around the cafe. I call it "Still Life with Lucky People"

Beautiful green plants in terracotta pots and wooden troughs around the cafe, creating a terrace on Exhibition Road.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

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?

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

#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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 13/02/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 03/02/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 20/01/2026

Thanks to everyone who's sharing the news of my book launch! Spreading the word about new books is one of the best things you can do for an author. Buying the book is great, and talking about it is great, and social media shares can add many extra sales!

Poster for the book launch event for The Manga Bible features the book cover and a photo of the author (photo: Megaera Amis) with details of the launch event.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 20/01/2026

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 08/01/2026

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

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 29/12/2025

Triffic Steve Kyte cover for the UK paperback.

Steve Kyte art showing Tom Baker at lower left

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

#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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 18/12/2025

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 11/12/2025

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 03/12/2025

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 11/11/2025

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.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 26/10/2025

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.

Marc Chagall, costumes for 'Daphnis et Chlöe', designed for the Paris Opera Ballet production set to the music of Maurice Ravel and choreographed by George Skibine. A young man and woman sketched in Greek drapery and flower garlands of red, green and purple on a beige ground, with a small figure resembling a satyr wearing a green curly wig with horns and playing a pair of auloi. The aulos is a Greek reed pipe seen in many classical images and often played as a pair, creating the appearance of a single forked instrument unless one looks closely.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 18/10/2025

I remember when The Sun was a real campaigning newspaper - but it still has away with a nudge, a wink and a killer headline.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 12/10/2025

The sheer magic overload of Ryde's #ChristmasImaginarium made me six years old again. Located near the pier and the epic comic shop #FantasticStore - so convenient for carting your shopping back to the ferry!

Fabulous kings and legendary heroes - a whole brigade of nutcracker toys in Ryde's Christmas Imaginarium.

The larger nutcracker toys stand on the floor, glittering in uniforms or red and blue and green, with fur shakoe hats or golden crowns.

Christmas fantasies of all kinds - gingerbread houses, mechanical toys, oh my!

An Angel of Peace amid Santas, robins, snowmen and kings.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

I just can't get over how beautiful the Bangor coast and countryside are. Or how lovely the people are. Or how good the food is.

A huge old tree in Strickland Glen, many-branched and surrounded by woodland that filters the sunlight into dancing, magical patterns.

Gorse in full golden-yellow bloom along the coast, looking down Belfast Lough to the sea on a perfect blue-and-golden day.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 27/09/2025

Hello my darling butterflies - I hope your weekend is as beautiful as it can be and leaves you feeling as contented as these adorable pigs, living the life of Riley at the Ulster Folk Museum.

Two beautiful pigs enjoying the life all pigs should have in their own natural space with water, shelter and lovely mud to wallow in if it gets too hot.

The Ulster Folk Museum is home to animals as well as buildings. They live as farm animals used to, in natural surroundings with plenty of space to behave however they like.

Pigs are social animals and these two are enjoying another lovely quiet day in an open field with hedges to keep Museum visitors at a distance and food, water and shelter close at hand.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 20/09/2025

Jonathan Freedland's brilliant Guardian opinion piece has this photo and the reminder that #NigelFarage thinks #VladimirPutin is fab and that #LizTruss 's economy wrecker was a great Budget.

#Clacton MP #NigelFarage smiling at the camera and wearing a MAGA baseball cap at a Donald Trump rally in the US on 4 November 2024.

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Helen McCarthy @glider.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

This is a good day to watch a film that says don't give in to fascism. Maybe stream it on a big background, like the walls of Windsor Castle?

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