THE USONIAN | Harrison Blackman | Substack

Notes from 'Grendel'

"The Art of Fiction" may not be the best writing manual for the 21st century

Feb 19 • Harrison Blackman

The ‘First’ Winter Olympics

How Chamonix 1924 iced out a rival Nordic competition

Feb 12 • Harrison Blackman

Dead clankers tell no tales

A look inside the Tesla Diner, Hollywood's latest flop

Feb 5 • Harrison Blackman

The last battle in the bone war

How an Ivy League museum met its extinction

Jan 29 • Harrison Blackman

The Voyage of the Narwhal

Or, the voyage of the soap opera

Jan 22 • Harrison Blackman

Clanker City

Dead clankers tell no tales

A look inside the Tesla Diner, Hollywood's latest flop

Feb 5 • Harrison Blackman

An AI story in the style of... myself

"A blend of atmospheric detail, psychological tension, and speculative unease"

Jan 8 • Harrison Blackman

The more you Waymo

On the robotaxi's arrival—and what it's like to take one

Dec 18, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

"The Cortège" and our ambiguous cybernetic present

Welcome to "Clanker City": an exploration of automation's impact on Los Angeles

Oct 2, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The World Planner

The visionary in the marsh

Doxiadis and the dream of Eastwick, Philadelphia

Mar 6, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The void and the infinite

The mysterious Lagos Handbook, Rem Koolhaas, and Doxiadis Associates

Jan 30, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Doxiadis at the turning point

Constantinos Doxiadis and the Marshall Plan in Greece

Jan 2, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The modern ruins at Porto Rafti

The saga of C.A. Doxiadis' demolished architectural masterpiece

Jun 22, 2023 • Harrison Blackman

A hundred years an architect

The last interview with international architect Athanasios Hadjopoulos

Mar 30, 2023 • Harrison Blackman

Interviews

Case Q. Kerns's "Habitat"

An inventive debut sci-fi novel reminiscent of David Mitchell and Philip K. Dick

Aug 7, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The Wildcat Behind Glass

Karen Emmerich on her new translation of Alki Zei's classic novel

Jun 26, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Sophus Helle on his translation of the world's first author

May 8, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Alex Christofi's spellbinding journey into Cypriot history

Apr 17, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

After 1177 B.C.

Eric Cline on the survival of civilizations after the Bronze Age collapse

Mar 20, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Narrative Architecture

Notes from 'Grendel'

"The Art of Fiction" may not be the best writing manual for the 21st century

Feb 19 • Harrison Blackman

The Voyage of the Narwhal

Or, the voyage of the soap opera

Jan 22 • Harrison Blackman

The Master and Margarita

Paratexts, villains and ambiguities in Mikhail Bulgakov's masterpiece

Nov 13, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The granddaddy of them all

From "The Thing" to "Prometheus," all sci-fi horror owes Lovecraft a cold one

Oct 9, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

A closer look at maybe the weirdest novel ever

Sep 11, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Usonian+

The ‘First’ Winter Olympics

How Chamonix 1924 iced out a rival Nordic competition

Feb 12 • Harrison Blackman

The last battle in the bone war

How an Ivy League museum met its extinction

Jan 29 • Harrison Blackman

A tour-guide ordeal at the summit of Mount Wilson

Nov 27, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Now Entering the Real Twin Peaks

"That gum you like is going to come back in style"

Aug 28, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Now Entering Oppenheimer Land

If Oppie only knew that Los Alamos would end up a creepy strip mall

Jul 31, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The Cyprus Files

Famagusta, the eco-city?

Famagusta Collage, Pt. IV: Looking ahead at the future of Varosha

Apr 10, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

Heritage under siege

How USAID's dissolution undermines efforts to preserve global heritage

Feb 13, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

After two years, a homecoming in the island of Aphrodite

Jul 11, 2024 • Harrison Blackman

The architect who wants to be the mayor

A 2022 interview with Giannis Armeftis, candidate for mayor of Limassol

May 9, 2024 • Harrison Blackman

The Limassol Carnival

When a city's cultural heritage is intangible

Mar 7, 2024 • Harrison Blackman

Recent posts

An AI story in the style of... myself

"A blend of atmospheric detail, psychological tension, and speculative unease"

Jan 8 • Harrison Blackman

Remembrance of things past

The Usonian looks back at 2025

Dec 24, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

The more you Waymo

On the robotaxi's arrival—and what it's like to take one

Dec 18, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

A tour-guide ordeal at the summit of Mount Wilson

Nov 27, 2025 • Harrison Blackman

More from Harrison Blackman

Professional Website

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