In what has been a hugely busy beginning to 2024, where work and family life have pretty much overwhelmed my ability to write, I’m really grateful to have Gareth Jelley of Interzone publish another one of my stories. This one is called ‘Drink The Kombucha!’ and you can read it as a further adventure in the lives of Moog and X, my odd couple outsiders in East City, first seen in my story ‘The Coming of The Extroverts’ (published in Interzone 294). Even better, this story represents probably my finest hour as a short story writer, as I get to share pages with one of my favourite writers, James Sallis. His story, the digressive and strange ‘Settlers’– which feels, amongst other things, like a dystopian Walden— is worth the cover price of alone. I’ve always intended to write a longer piece about Sallis, but until I find the time to do that, you can see traces of what his work means to me here and here. Suffice to say, appearing alongside him is no small thing.
It’s already shaping up to be a busy year, but I have more Interzone stories on the way and, hopefully, I’ll be putting the finishing touches to my East City novel. More to come on that one…
Absence Club 