New Year, New Stories

In these first few months of 2019, I'll be having two new stories published.  First up, Raking Light will appear in the first issue of the re-launched Sanitarium Magazine. This story is about a young man named Marco mourning the death of his closest friend whilst having to restore a painting by a famous artist for the gallery he works for.  The discovery of odd symbols on the back of the painting, and a mysterious visitor to the gallery who appears to be growing younger, leads Marco to wonder if he can in fact cheat death.

Sanitarium Magazine No.1 will be available from 18th January.

Continuing the painterly theme, my story The Last Salvador, kicks things of in the anthology Twice-Told: A Collection of Doubles edited C.M. Muller.  This story re-imagines the childhood of a certain Surrealist, blending facts, fiction, and imagery from some of the artist's own work.  I'm very proud that my story gets to start things off in what I'm sure will be a wonderful book which also contains stories by Charles Wilkinson, Craig Wallwork, Tim Major, Farah Rose Smith,

and Steve Rasnic Tem, amongst others.

Twice-Told: A Collection of Doubles is already available for pre-order, but will be officially released on 2nd February.

Visions of the Autumn Country

October is approaching fast, which means the release of another of C.M. Muller's Nightscript anthologies.  This October 1st volume 4 will arrive, and I'm delighted to say that I have a story of my own included in the book.  It has been a pleasure to be involved in one of C.M. Muller's projects, his enthusiasm and attention to detail is inspiring.  Having bought all three of the previous volumes, I was well aware that when you invest in a copy of Nightscript you are guaranteed a quality, lovingly-made book full of carefully chosen, and carefully sequenced, tales.

C.M. Muller is also a writer of strange tales with many impressive publication credits, and you can find more about his work, as well as the Nightscript anthologies and his other projects, here.

My story in Nightscript 4, Visions of the Autumn Country, was partly inspired by the artwork of my friend, David Whitlam.  I've know Dave since we were at University together in the late 1990s, and I've watched him sharpen his singular vision over the years.  I've always thought Dave was creating his own interior landscape - a landscape of the imagination, almost another world - and it was this idea that I used as a jumping off point for this story.

Anyone who wants to take a stroll through David Whitlam's imagination can do so on his website here.  Warning - you might want to leave a breadcrumb trail.

The Other Side

A quick short fiction update: My story, The Other Side, about the dangers of the internet, peer pressure, teenage romance, and alternative dimensions, has been published online in Horla: The Home of Intelligent Horror.  My thanks to editor Matthew Rees for accepting this one.