(David Mitchell's brilliant novel of six interlocking but related stories)

This is a fascinating book to read - six seemingly unconnected stories which are inextricably linked to each other. The book takes us from the Pacific Ocean in the 1830s through the USA and Europe in mid 20th century and ends on a futuristic and post-apocalyptic Hawaii...brilliant stuff from David Mitchell, one of the UK's most promising contemporary authors

This is a quick grab shot - I didn't have the big camera with me, but luckily always keep the old Fuji in the glove compartment for just this sort of photographic emergency :o). After a wet and dismal morning, the rain stopped quite quickly, revealing a beautiful skyscape of blue winter's sky and fluffy clouds. It was the first blue sky I'd seen for several days, so was all the more beautiful for that...

Back home, I opened the RAW file into ACR, increased the Clarity and added a gentle Curve. Into CS3 where I converted to B&W; I adjusted the Levels slightly until I got the contrast right, then reduced the noise a bit (Fuji RAW files from the S5500 are pretty noisy, even at ISO100). And that's about it! It was interesting working with a Fuji RAW file again - although the principles of editing are the same as any RAW file, there is a huge difference in what you can do between a D300 NEF and a RAW file from a seven year old Fuji P&S camera. Definitely a case of less is more, and even shot in RAW format at low ISO, the Fuji's output broke up in editing - you can see the posterisation quite clearly in the dark sky at top left...apologies for that!

Saturday 30th's high-in-the-sky entry to the Challenge; click here for other monochromed Pbasers in January