Editorial – February 2026

This issue is going live on St. David’s Day (Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Sant). Partly in recognition of that, I am reviewing several works of Welsh fantasy. Some of them are written by English and American authors, but others are actually written here, and in one case published here. I do have an additional reason for doing all this, which will doubtless be something I can talk about in due course. But for now, please enjoy my reflections on the representation of Wales in fantasy.

Meanwhile things are very busy at Wizard’s Tower. I have a bunch of books on pre-order already, with more to come very soon. Eastercon is going to be very busy. There will be a book launch. Hopefully I will see some of you there.

Talking of conventions, I am just back from two days at the Plaid Cymru spring conference, which was held in the ICC Wales just off the M4 at Newport. This has occasionally been mentioned as a potential venue for either an Eastercon or Worldcon. Yeah, no.

The building itself is very lovely, though an absolute nightmare if you have hearing difficulties, which I do. But it is designed solely for a car culture. There are some hotel rooms on site, but not enough for a Worldcon and probably too expensive for an Eastercon. There is supposedly an hourly bus from Newport railway station, but really the only way to get there is by car. I stayed in a nearby Premier Inn. You could see the ICC from my hotel, and it was only 0.3 miles away, but there was no way to walk there as there is a gigantic roundabout in the way, with the M4 passing over it. Also the food choices at the venue are very limited. I ended up living off croissants and sausage rolls, which is not a great diet.

So no, if we want to do a convention in Wales, we need a better venue.