Fading Fast

My short story titled "Fading Fast" has recently been published in the anthology Weird Alchemy, and as usual I'm blogging a few words about how the piece came to be written. There may be spoilers within.

"Fading Fast" is one of ten stories I've written on the subject of grief. These will appear in a short collection titled "Tokens Of Grief" which will be published by PS Publishing sometime in 2027. The inspiration for the collection as a whole unfortunately came about due to the death of my father in February 2025. Whilst I appeared to accept this eventuality at the time, it really hit me in October that year and subsequently the devastation relentlessly ploughed through me. What else is a writer to do but assimilate that grief through fiction, to find a creative cathartic path to the other side? However I didn't want to limit myself with stories about grief of the loss of a loved one. There are other forms of grief that we eventually inhabit, after all.

"Fading Fast" is a story about fainting, considering the possibility that with each faint a little piece of the person who fainted is lost. The idea for this story came about when I fainted at a book signing in February this year (most embarrassing!). This led me to reflect on other occasions when I'd fainted (or almost fainted), and some of those true instances find themselves into the story. Here, I focus on the relationship between a brother and a sister working through their father's belongings following his disappearance, with the sister also having experienced fainting in her past.

Here's an extract:

“The second time I nearly fainted I was also at school. In Mr Carr’s biology lesson, on the second floor. Again, it was a hot day. We were grouped together at the front of the class. Mr Carr had placed plastic sheeting on a long table, upon which rested the lung of a cow. He was inflating and deflating it by blowing air through a clear tube. To my recollection he was doing this action through his mouth, but that can’t be right, can it? He must have had a small set of bellows, or something. Anyway, however he did it, the action of the lung breathing independently of a body, coupled with the smell and the otherworldliness of the physical organ, began to affect me. The cold sweat was on me again, that unsteadiness. I remember rocking into the boy standing next to me – I have no idea, now, of his name – and of him saying something like ‘hey’, before the sensation passed and I didn’t make a nuisance of myself.”

Regular readers of this blog will know I usually listen to music through headphones whilst writing. In this case, it was the album "The Beggar" by Swans, on repeat.

In addition to my short story, "Weird Alchemy" features stories by Eric J. Guignard, Gail-Nina Anderson, David A. Sutton, Sylvie Soul, Lily Childs, Gordon Linzer, Marion Pitman, Teika Marija-Smits, Garry Kilworth, Tom Johnstone, Colleen Anderson, Malda Marlys, Gary Couzens, Rosanne Rabinowitz, Simon Bestwick, Elizabeth Guilt, Simon MacCulloch, and Stan Nicholls. The anthology is published by Alchemy Press and is available to buy here

Why The Dead Dream

My short story titled "Why The Dead Dream" has recently been published in issue #2 of Velvet Tarantula magazine, and as usual I'm blogging a few words about how the piece came to be written. There may be spoilers within.

"Why The Dead Dream" is one of ten stories I've written on the subject of grief. These will appear in a short collection titled "Tokens Of Grief" which has been accepted by a publisher that I am not yet at liberty to name (more information on this once contracts are signed). The inspiration for the collection as a whole unfortunately came about due to the death of my father in February 2025. Whilst I appeared to accept this eventuality at the time, it really hit me in October that year and subsequently the devastation relentlessly ploughed through me. What else is a writer to do but assimilate that grief through fiction, to find a creative cathartic path to the other side? However I didn't want to limit myself with stories about grief of the loss of a loved one. There are other forms of grief that we eventually inhabit, after all.

"Why The Dead Dream" came about from my consideration - as an atheist - as to what we might expect from an afterlife. Whenever we imagine our deaths, we view them from another's perspective, which is really our perspective on that another. Yet we wouldn't have that perspective at all. We wouldn't even have that "Nothingness, non-existence, black emptiness..." consideration as in Woody Allen's "Love And Death". My understanding isn't simply that death is an absence of everything, but that also it is an absence of nothing. "Why The Dead Dream" is therefore a stream of consciousness piece, an unspooling of ideas, which attempts to mimic what I imagine might be the final impulsive thoughts of a dying brain, trying to assimilate it all before it eventually stops.

Here's an extract:

How can that bread be so expensive. It’s not even baked. You’d rather lie on your back on the grass. Yet then you’d miss those ladybirds. Even one of those would be too large for most pockets. You remember you left the key on the rollercoaster. Everyone is wearing a different pair of trousers. How do you make a noise silently? Sometimes all you desire is to insert a pencil into the reel of a cassette tape and slowly turn it anti-clockwise. You know that smell. It encourages you.

They bleed out of the air. Mannikins etched onto paper using lemon juice and a scratchy nib. They’re coming for you. Right now. Those eggshells have come in handy. You scrunch them, fingers gripped against palms. Such a thin strip of membrane to collate them in patterns of scorched earth. Those cracks will widen. They’ll never get past them now.

Regular readers of this blog will know I usually listen to music through headphones whilst writing. In this case, it was the album "23" by Blonde Redhead, on repeat (a record I return to often).

In addition to my short story, Velvet Tarantula #2 features stories by Bryn Del Mano, Andrew Humphrey, Caroline Dias Monteiro, Jet Black, KB Willson, Joe Váradi, Natasha Sheldon and Claire Maley. To reiterate, Velvet Tarantula #2 is available to buy as a print magazine here

Weather Reports

My short story titled "Weather Reports" was recently published online at House Magazine (Salt Publishing) and as usual I'm blogging a few words about how the piece came to be written. There may be spoilers within.

"Weather Reports" is one of a series of stories I've written riffing off French New Wave cinema (my other stories published in this series include Mont Blanc, Betaville, Hiroshima Was Another Word For Love Then and The Good Men). In this story, my starting point is the 1964 Jacques Demy film, "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg", with a character – a TV weather girl – whose existence has been heavily influenced by the movie to such an extent that her life somewhat mirrors the film; although you don't need to know the film to appreciate the story.

Here's an extract:

When Marianne emerges from the offices of France Bleu Cotentin on Rue Alexandre Piedagnel she is almost blown off her feet. Rain batters the plastic yellow jacket she had plucked off the coat stand that morning, but rather foolishly – for a weather girl – she had forgotten her umbrella. Every characteristic in the port town is dimpled by raindrops: the foaming sea surface, the puddle-reflected buildings, sailors’ bare forearms, and an astonishing array of coloured fabric.

Marianne wishes she might burst into song: to detail this aspect purely and eloquently. Yet unlike the characters in her favourite film – Les Parapluies de Cherbourg – she has neither the voice nor the advantage of lipsynced dubbing. Instead she hurries silently, the wind threatening to sideswipe her legs, as she walks briskly from the radio station where she has delivered her broadcast - passing the umbrella shop that has appropriated the film’s name - and enters a café opposite the garage forecourt. From here, over a medium-sized bowl of coffee within which she dips her croissant, she indulges fantasies of love.

Regular readers of this blog will know I usually listen to music through headphones whilst writing, and this entire story was written whilst listening (perhaps unsurprisingly) to Michel Legrand's score for The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.

To reiterate, "Weather Reports" is available to read online for free, at House Magazine published by Salt Publishing. Do so here.

Nether

My short story titled "Nether" has recently been published in the digital magazine ParSec, and as usual I'm blogging a few words about how the piece came to be written. There may be spoilers within.

"Nether" is one of ten stories which I've written on the subject of grief. These will appear in a short collection titled "Tokens Of Grief" which has been accepted by a publisher that I am not yet at liberty to name (more information on this once contracts are signed). The inspiration for the collection as a whole unfortunately came about due to the death of my father in February 2025. Whilst I appeared to accept this eventuality at the time, it really hit me in October that year and subsequently the devastation relentlessly ploughed through me. What else is a writer to do but assimilate that grief through fiction, to find a creative cathartic path to the other side? However I didn't want to limit myself with stories about grief of the loss of a loved one. There are other forms of grief that we eventually inhabit, after all.

"Nether" is the story of a relationship break-up, where the male of the couple is struggling to understand his partner's motivations. The grief of that kind of separation is very real indeed, but - as you'll have guessed from the cover of ParSec #16 above - this is also an SF story, and within my story couples are physically attached upon marriage, one side of each bonded to their partner's, in the manner of some Siamese twins. Therefore a decision to subsequently separate not only invokes the usual emotional responses, but also a physical detachment. Couples often refer to their partner as 'my other half'. I decided to explore what would happen if this were literally the case.

Here's an extract:

Nether was a word that had been appropriated for divorced couples. Not in the most common definition of lower, but the previously lesser used inferior. The number of inferiors were on the increase, Beth explained, the word no longer held the stigma that it used to. Thomas couldn’t shuck from his head the image of being torn apart by wild horses. They had eaten separate meals that evening, watched different movies wearing headphones. He could already predict the insidious ways in which Beth might incrementally shift them apart. This wasn’t paranoia, it was happening. He had read reports where couples had separated unofficially, usually by violent means, but even in acquiescence there was no solace. Waves of grief began to wash through him in otherwise tender moments. Beth’s fingers inadvertently touching his, positioning their leg on the pouffe, the warmth that flowed between their joint blood vessels. Previously – the day before, even – such interstices had filled his heart with an inordinate amount of exquisite joy. Now they were bittersweet, tarnished, yet remained unavoidable. He could hardly go into the next room.

Regular readers of this blog will know I usually listen to music through headphones whilst writing. In this case, I didn't listen to music, but Deep Layered Brown Noise on YouTube.

In addition to articles, book reviews, and other comment, ParSec #16 features stories by Daniel Bennett, David Cleden, Eugenia Triantafyllou, Teika Marija Smits, Dev Agarwal, Dafydd McKimm, Reggie Oliver, and Cécile Cristofari. To reiterate, ParSec #16 is available to buy as a digital magazine here

Somnambulant Hearts

My thirteenth collection of short stories, "Somnambulant Hearts", was published last month by Black Shuck Books. The collection contains seventeen short stories, mostly centered around the 'liminal space of the in-between' (or however slipstream is being defined nowadays). In keeping with most of my short fiction, much is alluded to rather than fully stated. Out of those stories, fifteen have been previously published and two are original to the collection. For this blog post, I thought I'd focus on the two stories which are new. Story notes for the others would have appeared on this site when they were first published, should you wish to seek those out.

Onto the originals. "Sundowning" refers to the condition which those with dementia can suffer from, whereby heightened confusion, anxiety and agitation can occur later in the day, perhaps due to fatigue. My story depicts a relationship where one of the couple becomes less lucid as described, their dementia worsening to the point where recognition lapses. However, there is a framework to the story that indicates the relationship was not what it seemed. What is it like to understand something about your past but are no longer able to redeem the future? This is the crux of that story.

An extract: 

We walked the seafront at Cromer. She leant into me. The warmth of our bodies connecting at this midway point, where Siamese twins might be conjoined. It was a burgeoning spring day, the 23rd March 20__. It was over a year and two months from our initial date. Midweek, out of season, the sea seemed aware. We stopped and leant against a railing, tiny traces of rust and flecked white paint transferring to our coats, and sought the horizon. Rose’s gaze held halfway, as if a pane of glass halted her vision somewhere within the view. My eyes were drawn to the pier: that wooden extension to the land which resembled a King Canute dare. Come and get me if you think you’re hard enough. But there was no battle to be won against the sea. I remember thinking how long it would take for the world to reclaim itself from mankind, should something ever happen to us. I pressed into Rose. A pressed Rose. Like something found within the pages of a journal. Nothing would ever happen to us.

The departure point of the second original story, "Inversion Layer", came whilst watching the TV show Bargain Hunt. There was a segment within the show where the presenter visited a model village which is an exact replica of the village in which it is sited (at Bourton-on-the-Water in the Cotswolds). The real village is replicated in detail, so much so that when businesses are renamed then the corresponding signs are changed in the model village. Inevitably that threw up a lot of story ideas, and coupled with a brother who doesn't exist, it became quite straightforward to move the story into an interesting direction.

An extract:

He could visualise his brother here. Perhaps he would have rented one of the rooms in the Old New Inn itself, unlike Ben and Gemma who were lodged in the outskirts. There was a ten per cent discount on lunches if you combined the village with the pub. He was sensible like that. Would have thought ahead. Ben wondered if the discount applied to those who stayed in the model village itself. In the miniature version of the Old New Inn there was also a model of the model village, and within that model another model. This was what fascinated him the most.

He dropped to a crouch. Gemma’s hand on his shoulder, steadying him.

“What have you seen?”

It was an odd question. One that didn’t deserve an answer. In each of the two churches, choirs were singing. Ben wondered whether in addition to changing shop signs the residents were also updated whenever someone moved in or out. It seemed unlikely, but the concept nagged.

I should mention that in both the stories above, and, thinking about it, in quite a few of the other stories, the main male characters are quite unpleasant and find themselves caught in realities not wholly of their own making; although in addition there are many stories with much more positive outcomes. The title of the collection comes from the story "My Somnambulant Heart", which seemed to fit the book's themes as a whole.

"Somnambulant Hearts" is available as a paperback or e-book from Black Shuck Books. Pick up a copy in either format here.

Best Experimental Short Film (Armadillotown)

A couple of months ago I blogged here about the making of my short film, "Armadillotown", mentioning that it had made the final selection in the upcoming Sykehouse Film & Writers' Festival. That festival took place over the weekend of the 16th-17th May, and the film was premiered at the event. Despite my initial trepidation, the film found an enthusiastic audience and I had some lovely feedback. It was such a brilliant, well-organised event, perfect for my first showing of the film!

Then to cap it all off, later that evening "Armadillotown" won first place in the Best Experimental Short category. Which was an absolute blast!

photo credit © Terry Scott

My thanks to organisers Samantha Lee Howe and David J. Howe, plus the judges, and everyone else who made it such a great weekend. Bookings are open now for the 2027 festival and I would encourage everyone to sign up for the event. I had a great time mixing with other filmmakers, writers, actors, and so on, in a relaxing and creative setting and I highly recommend it. Sign up for next year here.

The Good Men

My short story titled "The Good Men" has recently been published as a single story chapbook by Salò Press, and as usual I'm blogging a few words about how the piece came to be written. There may be spoilers within.

Whilst Salò Press is better known as a poetry publisher, they have dabbled in short stories from time to time and recently decided to develop an imprint dedicated to single short story chapbooks under the name of The Infidelites (their poetry imprint is The Flirtations...). Confession time, my partner, Sophie, runs Salò Press, however she asked me to submit something and after two rejected stories she chose this one (so not quite nepotism in that regard). The other stories launched simultaneously are by James Cooper, Aliya Whiteley, C.A. Yates and Dan Coxon.

"The Good Men" is one of a series of stories I've written riffing off French New Wave cinema (my other stories published in this series include Mont Blanc, Betaville and Hiroshima Was Another Word For Love Then). In this story, my starting point is the 1962 Claude Chabrol film, "Les Bonnes Femmes", but with the genders reversed and the action relocated from a Parisian domestic appliance store to a Birmingham garage; although you don't need to know the film to appreciate the story.

Here's an extract:

The Kia has leather seats that smell of freshly mown animal.

She has her hand on his knee as they exit the outskirts of Birmingham, only lifting in a motion to change gears. This Sunday morning is clement, but overcast. Grey predominates as though they are driving through black and white film, although Jacob reminds himself that there was always colour, just not the equipment to record it.

Some kind people have said the following:

The Good Men possesses a raw, jump-cut poetry and a sense of barely restrained existential crisis. The disaffected, somewhat lost characters seem to be searching for something that can never be found. The New Wave reimagined as the last wave as they are subsumed by inertia and ennui. - Gary McMahon, author of The Grieving Stones

In The Good Men, a superb switchback ride of a story, Hook displays yet again his mastery of the form, marrying a cinematic aesthetic with an admirable sense of control and economy, creating a subversive gem. - Andrew Humphrey, author of Debris

Hook observes his characters like a cinematographer. The words convey, in precise and telling detail, the mundanity of self-oppression. These mechanic(al) lives are full but paradoxically empty. The story is driven by sensuality and pursuit but somehow, behind the mask, it aches with a longing and an undefined sadness. - Stephen Volk, author of The Good Unknown

Regular readers of this blog will know I usually listen to music through headphones whilst writing, and this entire story was written whilst listening (perhaps unsurprisingly) to Paul Misraki's score for Les Bonne Femmes.

To reiterate, "The Good Men" is available to buy as a standalone short story chapbook for £5/£9 over at Salò Press