My year so far has been caught up with sleep deprivation and illness, an inevitable Covid infection turning the last weeks into a zombie state of dead time, old cartoons and black-and-white films on Youtube. I can't believe half of 2022 has slipped away from me. The early months of the year had also seen … Continue reading Interzone Digital
Category: Fiction
Cheap and Tasteless
'The code parlours, the tattoo parlours - all run by one-eyed poets sixty years old, loaded on Carmondy Rose bourbon - the storefront tailor operations and chop joints, their tiny show windows stuffed with animated designs like postage stamps or campaign badges from imaginary wars or bags of innocent coloured candy, were already crowded with … Continue reading Cheap and Tasteless
Hypothetical Games
'From inside all you can hear is the wind outside as it buffets the wire fences. The books line the shelves, programmes are loaded on the computers, the plates in the kitchen are clean and neatly stacked, the meat in the walk-in refrigerators remains intact, the boards games are in the display cabinets, the counters … Continue reading Hypothetical Games
Requiem For An Astronaut
I'm very pleased that my first science fiction novella, Requiem For An Astronaut, has been published by New Con Press. Requiem is set in the environs of East City, the location for my recent SF stories, and features a scientist, Bart, and his search for the lost astronaut Joan Kaminsky. An excerpt follows below. 'I … Continue reading Requiem For An Astronaut
2021
2021 has been a busy year for me, even if it feels I've never really left the same square mile in East London. For one thing, I took on some more work towards the end of last year, which has taken up more time than I anticipated. Another, and far happier reason, is that my … Continue reading 2021
Interzone 290-291
My short story 'An Island For Lost Astronauts' features in the current double issue of Interzone. I'm particularly proud of this one. The story takes place in Rivertown, one of the weird locales of East City, the megalopolis at the centre of some of my recent stories. The astronauts moved amongst us like captive angels. … Continue reading Interzone 290-291
The Great Star
'I dream that I'm back on Earth. It's the last day before going away on the Six Thousand Ship. Everything stands out so clearly, the way it does in grief, when all senses are awakened. There's the sky, pouring out its light, its blue water over the woods I walk through on my way to … Continue reading The Great Star
The Last Pheasant
'"Really, Tichy. Don't be so demonic. Ours is simply a world in which more than twenty billion people live. Did you read today's Herald? The government of Pakistan claims that in this year's famine only 970,000 perished, while the opposition gives a figure of six million. In such a world where are you going to … Continue reading The Last Pheasant
Hill Park
'17, Hill Park lay on the left of the Rye as you looked south, caught between sine bleak low-rise flats and two or three point-blocks built on a hill. A burned out Vauxhall had sagged on to its brake drum in the street outside; the basement area was full of broken furniture - chipboard, Formica, … Continue reading Hill Park
Drowsy Night
'Again the fog was bedding down over San Gabriel. On the blue mountains the sun was still shining. An earthen smut covered the town. Darkness came after. The lights were not switched on that night as a mark of mourning because Don Justo owned the electricity. The dogs kept howling till dawn. Candles brightened the … Continue reading Drowsy Night
Absence Club 