Time, Door… and Patience.
Miles Marker in conversation with Michael Conan Herron-Bond (MCHB), author of The Pilgrms’ Bear and The Bear’s Pilgrms: Neon Signs and Lost Drafts
Miles Marker (MM): When we last spoke around The Pilgrms’ Bear, readers were discovering how funny and strangely moving London’s signs could be—Wet Paint, Road Closed, the whole city a primer in paying attention. With The Bear’s Pilgrms, we’re back in that world, but the air feels different. The words feel heavier. What changed on the road between the two?
Michael Conan Herron-Bond (MCHB): The first book taught us to listen. The second asked us to listen harder. We kept the compass—kindness, attention, misread signs—and then we tilted it toward a thornier question: who gets to decide what a story means? Between books there were false starts, better second drafts, and a lot of kettle-time with the Pilgrms. The tone deepened not because we chased gravity, but because we trusted the characters to carry more without dropping the sponge.
MM: In The Pilgrms’ Bear the puzzle was signs. In The Bear’s Pilgrms you layer in “drafts”—offcuts, nearly-scenes, things not meant for daylight. Why widen the field?
MCHB: Because so much of a life—of a story—exists in the wings. The Pilgrms’ Bear asked us to read what’s written; The Bear’s Pilgrms asks us to respect what was nearly written. Drafts are where hope and fear sharpen their pencils. By treating drafts like contraband—handled, moved, misunderstood—we can talk about ownership, authorship, and mercy without turning it into a lecture. And it lets the comedy breathe; nothing is funnier than a Pilgrm trying to file something that refuses to stay filed.
MM: You’re releasing the first six chapters weekly, very much that confident Slow Horses rhythm—people gather on the same day, trade theories, eat something comforting, and wait. Why lean into the serial again?
MCHB: The books are about attention, and attention grows with rhythm. A weekly cadence gives readers room to notice their own signs between chapters. It also suits our cast. Holmes thinks in cases; Watson writes in episodes; the Pilgrms clock in and out; Paddington keeps promises. The form matches the people.
MM: In Book 1, The Pilgrms’ Bear, sharp readers memorised a few lines that felt like house rules. There’s a new refrain in the sequel—“We have a time and a door”—but you resist the easy tag “Best to be early.” Paddington, after all, is politely punctual, not pushy. How do you hold that tension when readers would happily take the chapter a day sooner?
MCHB: With affection—and a little restraint. We settled on: “We have a time and a door. Early tempts; right-on-time is kind.” It honours Aunt Lucy’s common sense and acknowledges the audience’s impatience. The serial asks us to practice what the story preaches: wait with attention, arrive with courtesy. We’re all itching to peek; the book asks us to hold the door until the hour.
MM: Let’s talk Hopkins. Canon gives Stanley Hopkins three promising appearances and then silence. Your Hopkins feels less like a villain and more like a pressure test. Who is he to you?
MCHB: A mirror. He’s the man who heard the pen lift and never return. His motive isn’t greed; it’s witness—the stubborn hope that the wrong draft could count if only he could make us look. He carries the ache of being “almost,” which makes him dangerous in ways that feel human. The Pilgrms recognise that ache; Holmes recognises the method; Paddington recognises the loneliness.
MM: That’s a generous lens. It also makes the comedy feel braver, because it’s not hiding from the sting.
MCHB: Exactly. The joke lands softer when the room is safe. We let the room be safe—then we ask a sharper question. The Pilgrms are still misprints, but they’re useful misprints now. A ledger noticed. An exit clocked. A lighter flicked on purpose. Small competencies that feel like earned grace.
MM: The setting shifts from London’s notices to Hong Kong’s neon. How did you keep it from becoming a postcard?
MCHB: By treating streets like sentences. London is municipal: tidy signs, officious fonts, meaning printed for you. Hong Kong is volume: overlapping signals, markets where unfinished things change hands, light arguing with shadow. We listened, described sparingly, and let small, true details carry weight. The serial format helps; atmosphere arrives in sips, not ladlefuls.
MM: For readers arriving fresh at The Bear’s Pilgrms—no homework from The Pilgrms’ Bear—what do they need to know?
MCHB: Only this: a polite bear has lost a suitcase; two detectives have decided it’s a case; four colleagues keep trying and sometimes—even gloriously—succeed. Start at Chapter One. If you bring echoes from The Pilgrms’ Bear, they’ll hum; if not, the door still opens.
MM: Without spoilers, what threads should we notice as the weeks roll?
MCHB: Four, braided but clear:
Courtesy as counterintelligence—politeness as the move that keeps rooms livable.
Drafts as dangerous truths—not every scrap wants daylight; meaning needs mercy.
Icons old and new—what survives reinvention, and how the young learn to carry fame without breaking it.
Work from the margins—how misprints save the day by staying themselves.
MM: And what did the stretch between The Pilgrms’ Bear and The Bear’s Pilgrms teach you—as MCHB, head over the kettle?
MCHB: That failure is information; that blanks deserve gentleness; that keeping a small promise every week can carry a very large heart. Also that sponge cake has narrative properties we don’t discuss enough.
MM: Final invitation for readers hovering over the subscribe button?
MCHB: Come sit with us. Bring your own week; we’ll bring a chapter on time. We have a time and a door. Early tempts; right-on-time is kind. See you at the hour.
The Notices Ahead (MM)
Reviews are doors. Some open with brass and polish, some with a taped label that says PUSH, and a few pretend to stick so you have to lean your shoulder in. With The Bear’s Pilgrms, the doors have begun to open again—on time, not early—and what drifts out first is recognition: the sequel hasn’t tried to shout past The Pilgrms’ Bear; it has learned to hold the room more quietly.
What the papers (and platforms, and kiosks) seem to agree on is the sequel’s courtesy: a weekly rhythm that lets readers arrive together, and a widening theme that asks who gets to bring a draft through the threshold of meaning. There is wry delight, too, in the titles’ circular mischief—The Pilgrms’ Bear / The Bear’s Pilgrms—as if the series were reminding us that misprints can be methods, and that attention sometimes begins with a double-take.
So here they are, from broadsheets to back offices, from Temple Street to Baker Street: notices pinned to the door as it opens—patiently, precisely—on the hour.
“Not a louder sequel but a wiser one: a comedy of manners that asks who gets to open the door to meaning.”
— The Guardian
“From London’s notices to Hong Kong’s neon, the signage gets louder; the courtesy gets braver.”
— The Times Literary Supplement
“Carrondyle? Herron? Doyle? Bond? Whatever initials MCHB wears, the effect is the same: sly craft with a soft heart.”
— The Spectator
“Right on time, never early: a weekly serial that proves patience is part of the plot.”
— Financial Times
“Old icons, new lights. The sequel keeps its blade sheathed in marmalade—until it doesn’t.”
— The Observer
“Door opens. Crowd hushes. Story enters. Mind the courtesy.”
— Evening Standard
“Circular titles? Dyslexia or design—either way, the misprint becomes the method. The Pilgrms’ Bear / The Bear’s Pilgrms: a tidy palindrome of intent.”
— Back Office Review
“A case file on drafts and dignity—with jokes that land like perfect trains.”
— London Notices
“From Baker Street to Temple Street: same keenness of eye, warmer mercy.”
— South China Morning Post
“Neon as evidence. Steam as motive. Kindness as counterintelligence.”
— Temple Street Ledger
“Best enjoyed one door at a time. Please wait for the chapter to arrive fully at the platform.”
— MTR Platform Announcer
“Exhibit A: a patient bear. Exhibit B: four useful misprints. Verdict: charming, with intent.”
— Scotland Yard Archives
“Dim sum, draft pages, and a detective who finally learns to share the room.”
— K11 Musea Programme Notes
“Not quite Holmes, not quite Watson—still wholly irresistible. The Pilgrms, however, have learned a trick or two.”
— 221B Baker Street Residents’ Association
“‘Courtesy is counterintelligence’—the line we’ll be quoting all year.”
— Transport for London
