Atmospheric Fantasy

  I've written another odd one. An obvious experiment in terms of style, but I hope the idea works well enough... January 1 st : A new year is a time to make new beginnings and form new habits. So I am going to try and keep a diary of my thoughts and feelings. I feel like the years are starting to blur together too much. It would be good in twenty years time to look back at this and be able to remember each day distinctly. I found a quote online that I think is appropriate: “Last year’s words belong to last year’s language. And next year’s words await another voice.” - T.S. Eliot January 3 rd : Missed a day. Nothing much has happened though, back to work tomorrow, and then I suppose the year will begin properly. January 9 th : I'm really not sure what I should be writing about! Fear of the blank page, I suppose. Perhaps I should try writing exercises? I'll do them in another book or I'll waste this one. May 30 th : So much for resolutio

  An odd one today, inspired by some thoughts on the present political moment, spectacle and hyper-reality and the strange subgenre of the 'Nazisploitation' film. Enjoy with caution. Last Orgy of the 13th Reich       The muzzle of Commander Schmidt's pistol tasted of gun oil and burned powder, undercut with metallic blood and salt urine from when he had discharged it not twenty minutes before inside the subhuman woman, his favourite from among the joy division. She lay now, brown eyes staring glassily at the ceiling upon his silken sheets, midnight black hair fanned out beneath her, once lustrous skin already the colour of muddy ash. He removed the gun from his mouth with a sob, ashamed at his own cowardice as he took another swig from the bottle of cognac he held in his other hand before staggering to his feet, heading across his quarters to his desk and pushing the corpse of his radio operator from the chair. He wiped the bloody foam and the glinting remains

Note: In a flash, after a tremendously busy year when I haven't finished anything, writer's block melts away for a moment, and a new short tale emerges. I don't want to say too much about this one up front, except that it is the first story that I have consciously set in my fictional English county of Dwimmershire, and that there will possibly be some more to follow, though as always scheduling and timeliness are far from guranteed.  The Cliff Walker          I often wonder what it is that 'makes' a suicide spot. Is it just a semi-random accumulation of infamy around some place, each act of self-annihilation leading inexorably to another, or is there something more inherent, some genius loci that draws people to certain landmarks, something beyond the simple availability of means? There are surely many woods where hanging corpses are almost never found, many high places from which people rarely hurl themselves. Perhaps there is something in the air, or the

This is my entry for the Undercooked Analysis Podcast's 'Ritual Pasta' challenge, which involves writing a short (50-1,500 word) horror story centered around a 'detailed ritual': Happier Times I cannot possibly recall how many times I have done my little Ritual. I don’t know if I discovered it, or if it was taught to me, or whether it is simply something I have always held within me from whenever it was that I was born. My past becomes more and more confused the further back I go, a patchwork of dreams and nightmares, shifting uncertainly, and always coming apart at the edges; the mismatched threads of a tapestry constantly unravelling even as I strive to patch and expand it with fresh experience. Only my special Ritual remains constant, a golden seam that anchors whatever it is that is really me into my body. There are few other certain memories before a couple of years ago, when I took up my current occupation. In some ways, hospice work has been good