Authors Electric

Tromso, 24th January, 2026 Cloud iridescence The Northern Lights have featured in many children's books, especially Philip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy. I have been fascinated by natural phenomena in the sky, from rainbows to cloud iridescence, which I was fortunate enough to see in Costa Rica. We were white water rafting, so I didn't have my camera with me and had to rely on the cameraman provided by the company. His photo doesn't do it justice, but it does give you some idea of the living rainbow that undulated around a cauliflower-shaped cloud.      As a child, after reading about Ernest Shackleton and looking at drawings of the Antarctic sky, the thought of ever seeing the aurora was an impossible dream. It's only the arrival of cell phones that has made them so accessible, as anyone can record them when, as this year, there has been unusual solar activity and they have been seen a lot further south. Needless to say, I missed every occurrence as living close...

What is it about snow? Is it the fact that it changes your winter world overnight, from something grubby and grey to this amazingly beautiful white extravaganza? That the noise levels go down, as falling snow muffles the air and lying snow deadens surfaces underfoot? Or the chaos that ensues over here in the UK (the buses still run to the second in Tromso) and a reminder that we’re not nearly as in control of the natural world as we’d like to think? I’ve always loved the stuff, and a winter without any, such as 2014/15, left me with the feeling that a year hadn’t really passed.             I’m a hopeless skier, but I’ve enjoyed the little I’ve done. I always enjoyed using the sledge my dad made me when I was a kid, and the few times I’ve managed to have a snowy holiday abroad have been magical. But, much as my nine fruitless attempts to see a leopard, my search for snow has frequently been doomed to failure. I tried this winter...