The Man on the Moon

The latest story of mine to be published is The Man on the Moon - a short tale about the lies people tell to protect their children and the potential consequences of those lies - which appears online in Summer 2017 edition of The Menacing Hedge.  Anyone who's interested can read it here.

Like alot of people, I've had a long time fascination with the moon - it being the most observable rock out in space beyond our own, and I'm sure this won't be the last time it appears in my fiction.

My thanks to the team at Menacing Hedge for accepting this story.

Hear published in Cat's Breakfast anthology

My sci-fi short story, Hear, has been published in the Third Flatiron anthology 'Cat's Breakfast'.  The story concerns a pop song that causes people to feel inexplicably sad and restless, and a teenage girl who attempts to understand why.

The lineup for the anthology also features, among others, Edward Ahern, an excellent writer who I've previously published in the Dark Lane Anthologies.

Thanks to editor Juliana Rew for purchasing my story for the anthology.

A Thousand Hours

My short story, 'A Thousand Hours', appears in a new anthology from UK-based publisher Mantle Lane Press called Mrs Rochester's Attic: Tales of Madness, Strange Love, and Deep, Dark Secrets.  Check out that awesome cover!

The title of the book says it all really, so there isn't anything more for me to add except to say that my own story is a near-future tale of a lonely sales rep named Ryker and the new love of his life, Gen.  To say more would give the story away.  Except below:

“I didn’t used to believe in it,” Ryker would tell people whenever he got the opportunity.  “But now I do because I’ve found it.  I’ve found it with her.  With Gen.  Sure I’ve had feelings before, right?  But not like this.  Never like this.  There’s not the smallest doubt in my mind that what Gen and I have is true love.  The kind of love you hear about in all the songs.  The kind of love you never really understand until you’ve felt it.  Something real.”


Many thanks to editor Matthew Pegg for including my story in this great-looking book.

The Real Rachel Winterbourne

My short story The Real Rachel Winterbourne has been published on Perihelion Science Fiction online magazine.  The story concerns a man named Jim, whose supermodel wife Rachel agrees to make clones of herself so that the clones can be sold to the highest bidder.  When his marriage breaks down Jim begins to wonder if Rachel has in fact left him, switching herself with one of the clones, and eventually sets out on a quest to discover the truth.

In my mind, this story was set in the same near-future world as Voids, the novella I co-authored with Martin Greaves

The Real Rachel Winterbourne is free to read online here.

I'm proud of this story, so I'm happy it found a good home at Perihelion.  My thanks to Editor-in-Chief Sam Bellotto Jr for purchasing it.

Life Among The Insects

March will see the publication of a couple of the sci-fi short stories I wrote last year. First up will be my story of human cloning, The Real Rachel Winterbourne, which will appear online in Perihelion Magazine on March 12th.

Then on 28th March, Dark Designs: Tales of Mad Science will be released by Shadow Work Publishing.  The book will open with my story Life Among the Insects.  This is the story of Catherine, a scientist working at a government facility studying various types of chameleonic creatures, including some top secret life-forms that are kept below ground.  

Profits from the sale of Dark Designs will go to a great cause: Doctors Without Borders.

You can see the cover art and Table of Contents for Dark Designs above.  My thanks to the good people at Shadow Work Publishing for including my story.

Five of my favourite short stories read in 2016

In lieu of some kind of year end list (and coming a bit late anyway) I thought I'd just list here five great speculative short stories that I read last year.

1. For Two Songs by Rebecca Lloyd
The final story in Rebecca Lloyd's 'Ragman and other Family Curses' from Egaeus Press, this is a creepy and original story revolving around sibling rivalry and the Victorian practice of taking portraits of the dead.  One of the best subtle creepy shorts I've read for awhile.

2. Vacui Magia by L.S. Johnson
A poignant tale of yearning and loss, beautifully told by L.S. Johnson in the style of an instruction manual, here a witch endeavours to give her fading mother the grandchild she always wished for by some rather unconventional means.

This haunting tale is also the title story from Johnson's excellent debut collection of stories.

3. Honey Moon by D.P.Watt
From the collection 'Almost Insentient, Almost Divine' from Undertow Books, and for me the standout and the most conventional story in the book. This is the tale of a young couple honeymooning in a borrowed cottage where their initial reticence towards each other is eventually overtaken by pagan forces. I have to be honest and say that I found this book a bit of a trial, perhaps because Watt's tales are better read and mulled over one at a time rather than as a collection, but this story certainly leaps off the page.

4. Roadkill by Robert Shearman
After a disastrous attempt at conducting an affair, a woman on the way home with her lover runs over a kind of bat-rabbit thing which may or may not represent love.  A story everyone can relate to (?).

5. Magritte's Secret Agent by Tanith Lee
A peculiar slant on the mermaid tale by the late, great Tanith Lee.  This takes it's inspiration from Magritte's painting of a stranded merman with the head of a fish and legs of a man (rather than the other way around).  The story tells of a shop worker who becomes enamoured of a beautiful but unresponsive young man in a wheelchair, and the efforts she eventually makes to set him free.

Hopeless Games by Golden Death Music

I'd like to write a review of the album Form and Truth Frequency by the ultra-talented Michael Ramey aka Golden Death Music once I've fully ingested it.  In the meantime, here for your enjoyment is my current favourite tune from the album: Hopeless Games.