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Showing posts from 2011

Schrödinger's mistress

Surfing Twitter the other day and came across a competition to win a copy of new horror anthology City of Hell.  All you had to do was write a 100 word flash piece with the theme of a door. For some reason my mind thought of  Schrödinger's cat and evolved into the below. (Pleased to say it was a winning entry!). Schrödinger's mistress I walked out on her two years ago. I walked out as she lay there bleeding in that windowless room. The blood pooling around her as she clutched the butcher’s knife driven into her abdomen. I walked out across the sticky carpet whilst she stared imploringly at me, desperate to understand why; her life slowly ebbing away. I walked out on her and locked the door. It was the only way to keep her alive. Every day since I stand and stare at that door, pausing as I go to open it, then turn away. Sometimes I hear her crying.

The hardest thing I've written

Below is a piece I submitted for a Flash Fiction entry a while back for Lily Childs' Feardom. It came up in conversation with some friends down the pub this weekend and I was surprised by how choked up I still feel when I think about it. Anyway, I thought I would place it here amongst my musings for you to read. Fortunately the story is fiction. Loss Each day is more wretched than the last. Sipping shot after burning shot of whisky dulls the pain but it cannot change the past. "Daddy, come play with my cars." "In a minute" I shouted from the kitchen as I munched on my cereal. "Now Daddy" "In a minute Stephen" I didn't realise he could open the front door on his own. I didn't realise until I heard the sirens.

Friday Flash

I have a little pleasure of mine which entertains me every week.  It is Lily Childs' Feardom and her weekly Friday Prediction. She teases us with three simple words, different each week, to poke and prod at until we can cajole them into being friends with another 97 words to form a flash fiction for the 'delights' of others. I've been doing this for several months now and feel part of a wonderful community of talented writers who all come out to play on a weekly basis. The stories are varied and always excellent with Lily acting as a 'judge' to award the honour of winner to the best story each week. What I really like is the friendly atmosphere that exists and the encouragement of everyone about each others' writing. It has improved my writing, teaching me the value of each word and also seeing how others play so wonderfully with the same boundaries given to you. It is open to anyone who would like to play so do visit http://lilychildsfeardom.blogspot.

Review of The Office of Lost and Found by Vincent Holland-Keen

My review of The Office of Lost and Found as posted on Geek Syndicate The Office of Lost and Found by Vincent Holland-Keen  (pub. Anarchy Books .) The Office of Lost and Found (TOOLF) is a dark comedy in the vein of Robert Rankin and Douglas Adams. Thomas Locke has a talent for finding things.  His boss, the dark shadowy figure that is Lafarge, is exceptionally good at making them disappear.  But we’re not talking handbags, dogs and car keys here.  Oh no.  We’re talking people re-incarnated as toasters, the joy of childhood and the Gods themselves. Throw into the mix Veronica Drysdale who hires Locke to find her missing husband Vincent and uncovers a lifetime of deceit and stolen emotions when her dishwasher innocuously breaks down. TOOLF comes across as an amalgamation of a number of short stories all connected by Thomas and Veronica with Lafarge and the villainous Vincent as key supporting players throughout.  We are carried along a wandering path where household goods and ornaments

Reviews

Thought I would start to put up some of my reviews on this site which have previously appeared on http://www.geeksyndicate.co.uk/ . Let' start with the wonderful John Dies at the End: John Dies at the End by David Wong (ISBN 978-0-312-55513-9) I am sitting here trying to pull my thoughts together for this review of John Dies at the End (or JDATE as I’ll call it from now on) and I’m struggling to know where to begin.  Not because it is a bad book – quite the opposite – but because there is so much going on here. Ok, let’s start with the basics.  JDATE is a comedy horror that works and it works very well.  David Wong and the eponymous John are two college dropouts living in ‘Undisclosed,’ America trying to hold down jobs and fight off the coming apocalypse.  Now to frame this properly I need to get you in the right mental state, try and define the style.  Right… think Evil Dead meets Clerks, throw in some Resident Evil, a shot of South Park and then a few mind altering drugs,

Who? - complete story (see post below for details of how this started)

Phil: The room around me is cold and musty, the primary colour on the walls seems to be a mouldy grey illuminated by a 40 watt bulb hanging unshaded from the ceiling. Daylight, how I crave daylight. My only solace is being able to sit here at this excuse for a desk and write, putting my thoughts down, trying to drag some semblance of the truth out. They said it might make me remember, that it could be cathartic, whatever that means, but I don't know. Still, I prefer this to their other methods of helping me remember. They've kept me here for what must be weeks now and still I don't know why they're holding me. Hell, I don't even know who I am most of the time! All I know for certain is the routine. Have to do the routine. No question about that. I have the bruises to show for it when I don't follow the routine. There’s someone at the door, the key’s sticking in the lock the way it always does. Jiggle, jiggle, once more, jiggle and, yes, and there goes the

Who? - A collaborative chain story (is that the right phrase?)

Back in February this year I decided to write the opening to a story on the Geek Syndicate forums and leave it open for others to come along and build the story with me.  There were only two rules: Be true to what others had written before; you just can't dismiss something because it doesn't fit where you thought things were going. Leave two posts between your last post and your next one to allow others to play. This was one of the strangest and most obsessive things of my life.  I knew where I wanted this story to go but saw it lurch from side to side, twisting and turning like a cornered snake.  All this was to the good as the story went in directions I had never envisaged and became so much better for it.  I kept logging in to see if someone had added anything new, desperate to see where we were headed now on the good ship Who?; destination unknown.  When my turn came it allowed me to practice my writing in a safe environment, letting me flex my writer's muscle. The i

Where did my blog go?

Ok, my last blog vanished mysteriously from my account so, as there was not much there have decided to start from scratch.  Slightly annoying but no died because of it right.  Did they?