The Holographer’s Atlas

Rob and Elroy, Amsterdam ’79 I am eight years old and I have learned to stay at school during lunch. The guest family my mother pays has three sons, and I prefer not to go back there at midday. I prefer the girls who take the piss out of my exquisite table manners, my Burberry…

Benidorm 1989- Part 2 (COMC Interlude)

A true‑story interlude from The Holographer’s Atlas (COMC universe), set between Book VII and VIII. After a few days he asked me to call my father. He said it simply, the way he did everything — no preamble, no theatre. He wanted to take me back to Italy with him. To his village above Milan, his family,…

Benidorm, 1989 – Part I (COMC Interlude)

A true‑story interlude from The Holographer’s Atlas (COMC universe), set between Book VII and VIII. I was nineteen. I want to say that first, before anything else, because nineteen explains a great deal and excuses nothing and is simply the truth of who was standing on that beach when Paloma said, estos son nuestros amigos italianos, and…