It had taken a week of solid work – every evening after dinner – but it was finally done. It was beautiful. A proper display cupboard for the Collectors’ Edition dolls she’d been buying for years. She’d already had the cupboard, a lovely glass-fronted antique. It had just needed some decoration, to put each of …
The leaves on the palm trees outside his hotel window waved mockingly on the afternoon breeze. ‘Here you are in paradise’ they seemed to say, ‘but all you can do is pace about your too-large-for-one hotel room, talk on your phone, and tap on your computer.’ And the room was too large for one person, …
It was a quiet morning until the call from Jason Bandswitch, the Manor was in uproar. Lady Charlotte had disappeared. He was waiting outside for me as I made it to the end of the drive (newly gravelled thankfully, the rain’s been back in force, and the previous surface was a mud pit), his face …
An exercise from Ursula Le Guin's Steering the Craft book - write a piece of narrative with no punctuation... People were all around her shouting dancing singing hugging kissing laughing and all she could see was the sky with its low grey clouds that wanted to rain but were being kept off by the blast …
I had the most delightfully strange conversation with the Queen Bee this morning. For those who don’t know, the queen of my sentient bees will occasionally decide to wander my garden, and the woods beyond, in something vaguely approaching humanoid form. Tall and thin, with a pale, pointed face, eyes of pure black, and small …
“You have to, you’re doing your Leaver’s presentation this week.” “Which is why I’m not going. What am I going to tell them? That I’m going to spend my future career pushing a broom around my Mum’s coffee shop?” Janet rolled her eyes, then propped one hip on the desk in front of mine, arms …
Leanne winced as she heard the voice outside her studio, loud enough that probably didn’t need the phone she was speaking into. Geraldine was coming to keep her company while she worked, again. What that actually meant was that Geraldine would harass her with questions and opinions from the moment she opened the door to …
Alex breathed in and centred himself, if Grandma could chop wood, a hale and healthy man in his twenties would have no problem. The axe felt strange in his hands, warm, heavy in a way that spoke more of possibility than actual heft. The wooden handle worn smooth from years of use, the steel head, …
Grandad was a hoarder. He picked up the oddest things at second-hand shops, and charity places, and car boot sales, always saying. “You never know when something like this will come in handy.” Everything was then taken down to the old shed at the back of the garden, where no one but Grandad ever went. …
I got a call from our local locksmith’s assistant, Jeremiah Singh, this morning. Before you ask, his father’s from India, I’m not sure which region, and his mother’s from a long-time local family. They met in town, in a pub, when someone insulted Mr Singh and the now Mrs Singh belted the insulter over the …
The DNA of Stories 