Two new short stories

So, over the last two days, I've managed to write two new horror short stories, that I will try to get homes for.

The first is called, The Doctor Is Waiting and is based on two images that came together randomly and started making connections in my twisted little mind. The first situation came from me being sat in a doctor's waiting room, the second came from flicking through some TV channels, desperately trying to find something to watch.

The second story, called Blocked was much stranger and probably originated from a situation that happens across many homes.

The loo was blocked.

Everyone denied doing it, everyone denied never having used the loo in their entire lives (probably a slight exaggeration) but it took my husband three days, many bottles of bleach and lots of dyno-rodding to clear it.

One heck of a blockage at any rate.

Now my toilet is working (hurrah!) and I also got a horror short story from it.

Stories come from the oddest of places, but I never thought I'd get inspired by the loo...

Return from the Dead

Firstly, I would like to apologise for my absence these last few months, but I've been I'll.

I'd like to say that I was struck down by some mysterious illness that turned me into some kind of zombie and then back again, but that would only be half-true.

I've got Menieres Disease, which is a horrible illness in which I suddenly, and without warning, get struck down by dizziness and nausea, sweating and shakes. They can last for hours or minutes, but the after effects of each attack can last days and leaves me staggering around my house like a drunken sailor.

But enough about my misery. I've accepted the condition and a heck of a lot of medications from my doctor to control it and have been busy with the old laptop a bit more.

Two stories submitted today and a hunt for an agent has begun. I've been busy reviewing books for The Horror Zine and proof reading articles for the British Fantasy Society.

Hopefully, I'll be posting a lot more often, once again, to put Hayling Island on the map as a source of spine tingling horror.

The Horror of School Holidays

The school hols are upon me and with four kids to entertain, writing time is suddenly diminished. I'm stretched between my eldest who needs to be surgically removed from his Xbox and my youngest who wants to go anywhere that costs at least £100 for us all to walk through the front doors, never mind go on rides or eat anything.

Considering the fact that I've just shelled out over £100 for a new car battery and over £200 for my stairs to be repaired after OH broke them, the youngest is going to be lucky to get what he wants. (I'm still saving to pay for us to eat for when we go to Center Parcs Longleat in a couple of weeks time)

So...it may be quiet on here for a while. It'll certainly be quiet on the writing front, but, hey ho, maybe it'll help me get past the sticky chapter I'm on after a bit of thinking time, because whenever I have a quiet moment, I'm usually plotting.

Happy school hols to all, no matter what you're doing, though I hope you're having a easier time of it than me.

Liebster Blog Award!

Thanks to The Rotting Zombie I am now the proud owner of a Liebster Blog Award! However, I can only have it as long as I play along with a few rules.

The rules are:
1. Each person must post 11 things about themselves
2. Answer the questions the tagger has set for you
3. Create 11 questions for the people you tag yourself
4. Choose 11 people and link them in your post. Go to their page and tell them
5. No tag backs

So, first of all, here are 11 facts about me:

1. I know Fawlty Towers and Blackadder word for word, every series.
2. I have Coeliac's.
3. I used to breed rats.
4. If I could invite any celebrities to dinner, it would be David Mitchell (the comedian), Stephen Fry, Jimmy Carr and Jeremy Clarkson.
5. I'm a Community First Responder and go to 999 calls.
6. I have always wanted to be a published writer.
7. As a young child, I wanted to be a vet, until I realised I wouldn't be able to euthanise an animal.
8. I have four children.
9. If I could be any animal it would be a wolf or an otter.
10. If I had a choice between being a werewolf or a vampire I'd be a vampire.
11. I'm a qualified English teacher.

Here are the questions, the tagger set for me to answer:

1. What is your favourite zombie film? Shaun of the Dead
2. Place to go in case of zombie apocalypse? A place with lots of guns, so I guess, Nottingham?
3. Apocalypse weapon of choice? Shotgun
4. Song to slay the undead to? Another one bites the dust
5. Where would you go if you could time travel?To watch the pyramids being built.
6. Has anyone actually been to the moon? Not in my family, no.
7. Just what is known as the mysterious radio signal known as UVB76? Don't know, never heard of it.
8. What do you think is the worst way to die? Slowly.
9. Where in time is Carmen Sandiago? In the eighties.
10. Film most excited about seeing in the future? Any Alien or Predator movie.
11. Chicken or the egg? The egg

11 questions for my tagged people to answer:

1. Alien or Predator?
2. If you were an animal what would you be?
3. You are granted one wish before you die. What would it be?
4. What would your epitaph be?
5. Favourite book?
6. Celebs you'd invite to dinner?
7. If you could go back and change one thing in your life, what would it be?
8. Favourite decade so far?
9. Song to play at your funeral?
10. You can take one book to a desert island, what would it be?
11. Live in the desert, or the Arctic?

The Chosen Eleven are:

1. Shaun Jeffrey
2. Random Musings
3. Ginger Nuts of Horror
4. Illogical Contraption
5. CZR's Dungeon Of Horror
6. Grimm Reviewz
7. After Midnight, Behind The Closet Door
8. 13
9. Unflinching Eye
10. Ebook Nightmare
11. A Writer's Corner

So there we go! A hard-won award, but amusing.

Life after Forty

Supposedly, life is meant to begin at forty, though as my family were quick to point out on Saturday, now that I'd hit the big 4 - 0, I could expect to crumble and waste away. Which did happen, to be honest. Woke on the Sunday morning, bit into a piece of toast and half a tooth fell out.

Nice.

Why is it that when a tooth breaks, it feels like there's a whole mountain range of craggy rocks and cravasses in your mouth? It all feels sharp and alien and not your mouth at all?

Anyway, got it sorted.

Am up to about 13k words on the new novel. I ground to a halt for a little while over the last few days - not because I was mourning the loss of being in my thirties, but because there's been so much going on at my kids schools as the year end comes to a close, that I simply have not been able to fit it in.

Mind you, I did pop out and but the new Shaun Hutson novel with my birthday dosh. Couldn't find the new James Herbert Ash yet, but I'm looking. This fella might know where it is...

...would love to ask him. In the meantime, whilst I'm writing, you can amuse yourselves with working out how you think this game might end.



Alien stuff

Now there's one thing - amongst many - that you need to know about me and that is I'm a HUGE fan of the Alien films. (And Predator!) And whilst out surfing the net, before I settled down to write, I got distracted by an amazing site and blog.

Stan Winston's https://www.stanwinstonschool.com/blog

It's amazing. The pictures are cool and had me drooling with delight all over my keyboard. Pictures such as this car:

I want this car. Make no bones about it. The Queen Alien draped lovingly and at her snarling best on your bonnet? Then there was this guitar

I don't even PLAY guitar, but I want it. And then I found the Alien drawn as the Petruvian Alien

As I said, SUCH a COOL site! I could spend ages on there, wishing and wanting, but guess what? I can't. I've got work to do. But I'm warning you all now, if Stan posts anymore great pictures of cool stuff I want then it's gonna be on here.

You don't have to buy me anything, but hey it is my 40th birthday on the 14 July.......

Two great finds and a mediocre movie

As the heavens opened, determined that everyone in the UK would get soaked, I set out from home determined to check out Precinct Books, a second-hand bookstore in the village.

It's a fascinating store. Packed ceiling to floor with piles of books that have been carefully sorted into alphabet order (somewhat) with piles of extra tomes taking up floorspace on the bare, wooden and dusty floors. The books block the light from the windows, so you often find yourself peering through a half-light to read the spines and I came across a couple of great finds.

The first was The Wordsworth Dictionary of the Occult

a beautiful book, with illustrations accompanying the text, showing some of the more arcane concepts within. The second book fascinated me with its title and as it was only 50p, I had to buy it. Guy N Smith's, Satan's Snowdrop

Just loved the cover style. Old and spooky, the way horror books used to look. On the way home, drenched and wondering where the British summer had got to, I decided to do what most UK people do when they get in and that was to make a cup of tea and dry out. However, perusing the Sky guide as I waited for the kettle to boil, I selected a film called The Clinic

It was a debut film, based in Australia about a group of pregnant women who are kidnapped and have their babies removed to be sold on to prospective parents. Each mother has a coloured tag placed within their abdomens, that matches a coloured tag on the babies in the 'nursery' and the one of the mothers is set against the others to remove the tags and the surviving woman is led to believe that if she survives, she can have her baby. Of course this is a lie.

It was an okay movie and though one of the mothers does survive, the film ends in a very strange way and I thought they could have dealt with it differently. However, for a debut horror film by James Rabbatts, I'd give it 3/5 stars.