‘Much Dithering in Little Botheringham’ is an everyday tale of village life and vampires, from Jane Jago and E.M. Swift-Hook.

The volume of chatter was all but deafening and even when Agnes brought in plates of cheese and crisp brown rolls and a crock of yellow butter the volume just seemed to go up.
Jamelia stuck a plate in her hand. “Grab some food and we’ll go sit in the window seat. You can observe the gruesome foursome from a safe distance.”
Ginny did as suggested and slowly began to sort out the characters in her head. The four who stood around the table and howled with laughter at their own jokes were, she thought, the extroverts of the family. They appeared to be having a whale of a time although most of the gags were filthy enough to have her blushing even from the other side of the room. She found Jamelia’s presence a comfort and when they finished eating it seemed perfectly natural to have their own quiet conversation about Ginny’s new status.
Jamelia finished with a smile. “So you see it’s not scary at all. And those four are as good as gold. They just need to let rip every now and again. They aren’t like us.”
“What do you mean, us?”
“You and me, Ginny. We’re used to hiding stuff. Those four live on the extreme outside of their skins so it comes hard to them. This is like a catharsis for them.”
“Yes. I can see that.” She took a breath and reminded herself that sharing was a good thing to do. “I used to hide behind the words I wrote on my lifestyle blog and the persona of Virginia Creeper. I guess I only really hit real problems when I couldn’t do that anymore. Not being able to write my blog meant I’d lost my place to hide. But you?”
Jamelia’s mouth twisted. “Oh me? Trained in law because all my cousins were doctors and my parents wanted to outdo them. Given in marriage to a man twenty years my senior with heavy fists. Widowed at forty. Expected to return to my father’s house and be my stepmother’s unpaid servant whilst working flat out to earn their keep. Met Em. Got Made. Told my father to find another fool. Alone now save for my nest sisters. It will be nice to have a sister of a more contemplative turn of mind.”
Ginny felt a rush of empathy and friendship for the proud beauty at her side but understood it behoved her to tread carefully. “I expect you will find me a sad trial. Most people seem to…”
Jamelia gave her arm a squeeze. “You are too hard on yourself, you know?”
The door opened quietly and Em came in. There was no fanfare nor noise nor anything, but the atmosphere changed immediately. What had seemed like a pissup now felt to have purpose and import.
“I don’t know how she does it, either,” Jamelia breathed.
Agnes took one look at Em’s face and stuck a glass in her hand. Em necked whatever it was in one go and sighed.
“I fragging well hate demons.”
“I guess we all do. But Ishmael is the best at what he does.” Lilian spike sturdily and Em smiled.
“I guess he is, but he stinks of hell and brimstone.”
Agnes handed her another drink. “You going to tell us then?”
“Yes. But nobody interrupts please.” She held up a hand to add visual impact to her request. “Alright, what we know is this. DumpCorp somehow thinks it is perfectly okay to turn people out of their homes in order to make an imposing entranceway to its latest ‘leisure facility’. According to the planning application it already owns all the land. I rather doubt the truth of that assertion. And even if it is true for Harmful-Galoshes’ land, the housing association does not have the power to sell the estate. According to a certain not particularly tame hotshot lawyer, the association runs the housing on behalf of a charitable trust. The trustees being the chair of the parish council, the bishop, and a representative of the tenants. Which means. With our lawyer friend nominated to represent the tenants, and the bishop on side even if HG has voted to sell he is outvoted. So actually they are stuffed. They just don’t know it.
“What we plan to do is confront DumpCorp’s earthly representative when he comes to gloat. Ginny is our parish council mole who will give us the details.”
Then bedlam broke out. Everyone seemed to be shouting at once. Only it wasn’t everyone. It was Agnes, Lilian, Ellen, and Petunia.
“They will shut up in a while,” Jamelia promised. “In the meantime I’m going out for a smoke. Are you coming? You can enjoy some fresh air or join me having a fag. Can’t do you any harm now.”
“Fresh air sounds good,” Ginny agreed, and still holding her drink she followed her new sister and friend into the garden.

Two days later the company Ginny was in was far less comfortable than that of her new nest sisters. Sitting in the plush conference room in the Bedchester Council offices which she had found following the directions of Major Harmsley-Gunn (“Can’t be slumming it in the village hall, what?”), she looked at her fellow Parish Councillors and realised they were all representatives of the extremely wealthy demographic of the village. They gave her odd, distant, smiles as if uncertain why she was even there and talked amongst themselves ignoring her completely.
Harmsley-Gunn arrived in company of a man whose face made Ginny’s guts cramp. The spiderlike, bespeckled Dominic Schilling. For a moment their gazes locked and she had a terrible dread that he might recognise her. But his look swept on and past, taking far more interest in the blonde sitting next to her who was wearing Versace and Dior and with a heavy diamond dripping from each earring.
The introductions were made quickly and no one objected when Harmsley-Gunn announced that they were being joined by new resident Virginia Cropper. Again no reaction from Schilling, but then he would only have known her by her married name.
“Right,” the Major said when the pre-meeting formalities and minute reading had all been done, recorded by the silent and capable parish clerk. “Now let’s make sure those crazy old bitches of the Ladies Association can’t stop us making this sale and bringing fresh blood and prosperity to the village. Mr. Schilling is here to tell us how to do it.”
Ginny sat back beside the Major, said nothing when his silver ferruled cane slipped off the table and landed unnoticed in her large canvas bag, and took many notes.

Part 27 of Much Dithering in Little Botheringham by Jane Jago and E.M. Swift-Hook, will be here next week.

After summer’s glory and October’s golden leaves
In comes bleak November and gaunt, skeletal trees
The winds blow hard, like steel is hard
With neither stint nor quarter
The cold comes in, winter begins
Jack Frost starts his slaughter.

There’s never, in November owt of soft or mellow
It’s not cheery December, coming with a hearty bellow
The mist in swathes, makes people wraiths
And bites with chilling ease
The dark days come, no warmth, no sun
No care that it should please.

Some take the time for fireworks, some for thanksgiving,
Most feel the creep of cold and dark with woeful misgiving
For like a dirge, November’s purge
Sweeps out the summer’s gains
And in its place, no trace of grace
Sets hail and freezing rains.

E.M. Swift-Hook

Her phone rang as she made her way onto the platform of the station, and her first instinct was to ignore the call and phone whoever back when she got home. But then she remembered her boyfriend, Tom, was cooking for her that night. He might have a question that needed answering while he was still at the store shopping for ingredients, so she decided to at least see who it was. Sure enough, Tom’s smiling face was on the screen. She boarded the train with a group of others, then answered.
“Hey, Hun.” It was hard not to sound put out, knowing what his call was likely to be about, but she tried.
“Hey. Sorry, but I totally forgot which veggie you said paired well with salmon? And am I getting white rice or brown?”
He was hopeless. Wonderful … but hopeless. “It’s asparagus, love. And brown rice.”
“Right. I bloody knew it. I’m gonna kill Kyle.”
“Kyle? Don’t tell me you’ve been taking cooking advice from him agai—”
There it was—a flash of horror in the otherwise mundane surroundings, black eyes locked onto hers. Panic hit and her heart rate shot up. She quickly looked around at the other passengers, hoping to find one whose expression matched the way she was feeling. But no one appeared to be remotely disturbed. They carried on looking at their phones or staring blankly out the window. She tried to find the mask in the crowd again, but as always, it was gone.
“Julie…?”
Tom’s voice reached her as if from somewhere in the distance.
“Julie, you still there?”
“Yeah … I’m here.”
“You okay? You sort of stopped mid-sentence.”
“Yeah, just remembered something, sorry.”
She hadn’t told him about the masked face to save him worrying to death, or even worse, getting hurt or into trouble doing something foolish that should be left to the police. But maybe tonight she would need to speak up about it. Not the cheeriest dinner table conversation, but this was starting to really frighten her, and he had the right to know something that was impacting her life in such a severe way.
“Alright,” he said, though Julie could tell he was doubtful. “Well, I’ll leave you to it so I can finish shopping. See you in a bit.”
“See you soon.”
The train stopped at Barking, and she got off with a few others. Normally she took the bus from there to her flat, but tonight she decided it was worth paying the extra and hailing a cab to make sure she wasn’t followed straight to her home. The sound of rain beating the ground prompted her to get out her umbrella as she left the covered station behind and went around the corner for a black cab. Most of her friends used Uber, but Julie always felt more secure in a traditional taxi. Thankfully, one was sat waiting. She walked towards it and opened the door.
As she got in, folding her umbrella first, the cabbie was yelling at someone through his open window.
“Oi, mate. What yer think yer doin’?”
She shut the car door and looked through the rain-streaked window to see what was happening. There was a man at the driver’s window, bundled up in raincoat with his collar lifted. It was too dark to see his face in any detail.
“Back off,” the cabbie yelled when the man didn’t move. “I’m already ‘ired. You’ll need ter find yerself another—”
The man thrust his arm in the window.
Something flashed in the light of an overhead streetlamp.
Blood spattered the windscreen and the cabbie slumped over the steering wheel.
Julie screamed and fumbled to open the door to jump out but was shoved back in by a gloved hand. Menacing black eyes held her gaze as a man crouched down to enter the car. She fumbled with the latch on the passenger side door, kicking at the man with her flats. He managed to grab one of her feet, and no matter how hard she tried to kick at him with the other, it didn’t seem to do any good. He wagged a finger at her with his free hand.
“Now, Julie, that’s not very nice.” He reached into a coat pocket and pulled out a knife. “And I was so hoping we could be friends.”

‘Haunted By Darkness’ by Ian Bristow is one of the spooky stories and poems to get you in the Halloween mood today in Haunted – the Sparkly Badgers spooky anthology which is free to download. The artwork is also by Ian, check out his Art with Ian YouTube channel for more.

I never thought to fear the dark
Ne’er thought that there could be
A creature in the dark of night
More terrible than me
I was the hunt that split the dawn
That roused them from their homes
That drowned them in the water deep
That burned their evil bones
I and mine rode proud and tall
And took our duty straight
We dragged them from their covens
There, to face their lawful fate
Until the night I rode alone
Until they dragged me down
From my horse with evil force
Till I lay on the ground
They kicked me with their cobbled boots
And stabbed me with their knives
How could it be that such as me
Fell victim to old wives
And even as I prayed for aid
They tied me to a tree
I knew then from their laughter
They would make an end of me
And now I ride a spectral horse
A creature with no home
As on the gibbet slowly swing
My empty mortal bones

©️jj 2020

An extract from  How To Start Writing A Book brought to you courtesy of E.M. Swift-Hook and Jane Jago.

Here we go again.

Yes, it’s me Jacintha Farquhar. I had hoped that I’d not have to come up with another one of these. I was kicking back with a Pernod and Pimms spritzer enjoying the blazing sun in the back garden and admiring the abs on my new next-door neighbour as he was up a ladder fixing something on his roof, topless. But then the peace was broken by a call from that pompous prat I have the misfortune to have to claim as my son. He is back to being his obnoxious self as if nothing had happened to dent his massive ego.
The good news is I am spared his presence for another week, as he has decided to take a short ‘cultural cruise’ of some other Greek islands with someone called Stavros. The bad news is that it means I have to get out my iPad and come up with something vaguely intelligent to say to you lot.
I hope you bloody appreciate it!

Life Lessons for Writers – Three: People

And by ‘people’ I also mean aliens if you write that science fiction stuff Moons is so fond of. They are people too. And so are those elves and dwarves – and vampires. In fact, any character you ever write, even a talking computer, is going to be people. So you might as well listen up as too many of you wannabes don’t have the first idea about any kind of people except those who are exactly like you.
Oh yes, you might write about some poor orphaned starveling who is abused by the world, but does she think and act like someone who’s been through that kind of experience? Or just your weak and idealised imagination of what it might be like? I mean, how many genuinely damaged people do you count in your close circle? If the answer is ‘Well, Olivia’s parents divorced and she had to give up her horse riding lessons which left her traumatised for life’ or something similar, then you need to rethink writing that starveling. You. Have. No. Idea. And if you don’t, then no amount of effing imagination is going to fill in the gaps.
And, no I’m not saying you can only write about your own level of privileged life, I’m saying get out there and meet the kind of people you want to write about. Go to that dive bar, visit that job centre, help out at that homeless shelter, and find out what the people you want to write into your stories are really like. And the same the other way around. You want to know how the better off think, go along to the local posh golf club and listen in on their banter, hear what they really talk about. A useful tip here is go volunteer to visit an old people’s homes – chat with them. You’ll get the full monty on life across the spectrum, I promise you.
Don’t be like my naive and self-righteous prig of a son who firmly believes that he understands all people because he is one.
Oh, if you can’t bring yourself to actually go to those places and interact with real people, then you can at least read about them. That’s what the more precious twonks amongst those who call themselves writers (yes Moons, I’m looking at you) that I know seem to do. Most are too bloody afraid of real people to go out and actually talk to them.

Right. I’m done. If my sodding son is not back by next week I’ll be posting cocktail recipes with naked pictures of me drinking them. You have been warned.

Now bugger off!

Jacintha Farquar, unfortunate mother of Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV

With the biggers around all the time, gnome life was shit. Elmo lost it first. He threw himself into the cement pond and sunk to the bottom where the heavily chlorinated water began peeling off his paint.

His peers stood around the edge of the unnatural blueness.

Big Edna broke the silence.

“We needs a game to play.”

“We does?”

“Unless we wants to wind up like Elmo.”

“What game?”

Eric grinned.

“A pissing contest?”

When the biggers awoke the next morning, there was  gnome in the swimming pool and about a hundred circles of dead grass in the lawn.

©️jj 2020

She struggled into wakefulness, aware in every fibre of her being that something was very wrong. She was laying on what felt like a wooden bench with her hands crossed on her stomach. Some effort had been made to make her comfortable as there was a cushion under her head and a light blanket over her body. The sound of feet on a wooden floor cautioned her to lay doggo.
“She’s still asleep.”
“Leave her then. Orders was not to touch her. Ole Eagle Feather wants her for himself.”
The feet retreated and she heard the sound of a door being shut. Not being anyone’s fool she kept herself still and her breathing even, her patience was rewarded by the creak of leather as whoever else was in the room breathed quietly. In the end he moved over to her and she could feel the weight of his stare.
“Durn fool woman,” he muttered, “why’d you have to go and make an enemy of that evil bastard.”
Then he moved away and Mir heard him go out and shut the door behind him. This time there was also the unmistakable clunk of a locking bar.
Mir sat up cautiously to find herself alone in a wooden-walled room. Alone. Where was Cuchilo? Worry for him settled on her like a heavy cloak threatening her ability to breathe properly. She was afraid and she badly wanted to cry but she pushed those weaknesses roughly aside. Wherever Cuchilo was he was almost bound to be needing her help and a hysterical woman would be no help to nobody. No. Right now she needed to think. To her surprise she wasn’t tied up and, aside from taking away her boots, and the knives hidden in them, it seemed like very little attempt had been made to secure her.
It went without saying that the knife sheath at her belt was empty as was the one between her shoulder blades. On the bright side, though, whoever had searched her had been too polite to find the slender blades sewn into her stays. She crept over to the window to find it glassless but barred with stout black iron. Her spirit sunk. How the hell was she going to get out, and what had they done with Cuchilo?
Her head dropped and she felt the cold hand of despair at the back of her neck. For a second she was almost done, but then logic raised its head. There was indeed a cold breeze playing with the hair at the nape of her neck, but where was it coming from?

The Redhead, The Rogue & The Railroad by Jane Jago is now available on pre-order.

Pearls of wisdom from an octogenarian who’s seen it all…

Excess Packaging

I. Do. Not. Believe. This!

Arrived, today, a huge cardboard box from that online shop that sells everything  (we used to have door stop catalogues that did much the same but now it’s all instant and online).

Within said box, twenty-three yards of brown paper packing material scrunched up to carefully cushion the contents should the box be shaken up or dropped. 

And the contents? The precious cargo that needs such delicate care and protection?

No. Not the new pottery plant holder for the cheese plant in the tiny glass-roofed extension my late husband insisted on investing in and I laughingly refer to as ‘the conservatory’. Not even the set of glass tumblers I have reluctantly ordered, having had the last one go the way of all glass.

No. The contents was…

One pillow. Common or garden ‘use with bed’ variety, stuffed with foam and about as fragile as my dog’s rubber throwing toys. 

Come on people, get a grip!

The words of the incantation whirled through the trees on the brisk wind. Branches creaked and groaned as they came to life, turning into limbs, shrinking down to size. Skin replacing bark, and feet replacing roots,  when they freed themselves from the ground. The feeling of being able to move, to walk away from a spot the they had been rooted to since being planted. The feeling of the wind in their newly formed hair. Being able to touch their new skin, soft and smooth. Being able to touch anything, if the truth be told, was a wondrous, but daunting feeling – something that would take time to get used to.
In their human form, the tall fir trees of the Sarandorn forest, led by the only female among them, came to stand before the man who chanted the spell that woke them. The female had been blessed with the looks of an angel, and the others were built to cause damage. The man, dressed in black, his head concealed by an overhanging hood, stood silent as the female and her army stopped in front of him. His job was almost done. It only remained to issue them an instruction, as they were now his to command.
The female, who the man in black named Saphira, stepped forward on the wave of his hand. She didn’t need to be told, she knew the signal was hers as she felt the pull from the flick of his wrist. She watched him warily as he stepped into her eyeline and took down his hood, revealing the thickest head of black hair. His face bore scars so deep that you could see the cheek bone in some areas. Saphira gazed on the man who’d become her master with a sense of pity and wondered why he had used the incantation to wake them. She tried to find her voice, but only a whisper came from her newly formed lips.
“Your voice will come, my child, but first I need you to listen to me.”
His tone sounded soft, but there was a certain coldness about it.
Saphira stood and absorbed the man’s words and prepared for more words to fall from his lips.
“My name is Brum Inkle. I come from a long line of druids who have, over the years, tried to rid ourselves of the ones who are trying to kill our natural way of being. I have brought you to life for one reason, and one reason only – to avenge my people and your own brethren, your saplings and all that nature has given. For too long, I have watched you and your kind suffer at the hands of humans. it is now your time. Go forth into the night and gain your revenge.”
Saphira tilted her head in confusion. She didn’t know what he was saying. No one had harmed them. They were fine, and she knew of no harm coming to her brethren. She had only been in human form for a few brief moments.
“I see from your confusion that you have no idea what has been happening to the trees on this world, so let me enlighten you. For centuries now, humans have been chopping the forest trees down for their own use. You have thus far been lucky. It was only a matter of time before you felt the woodman’s axe, and now you can gain the upper hand. The incantation has given you and your army the power to turn anything you touch into wood, then revenge is yours for the taking.”
Saphira and her army accepted Brum’s words in their minds and headed toward the nearest village, where Brum had said that most of the occupants were woodsmen and that the whole place had to be destroyed before anymore of Mother nature’s majestic firs were lost to their axes. Screams began to ring out across the small valley where the village sat, and shadows of men lined the border. Each wielded an axe, and waited.
Observing from a distance, but never turning back, Saphira continued her charge, although her head was telling her that something was wrong. Even to her new mind, the villagers seemed a little too prepared for their arrival, but the opportunity to turn back was gone, they had been seen.
Saphira and her army found themselves surrounded. She knew then ithad been a set up from the start, as Brum ran to join the axe wielders for the impending battle of wills. The woodsmen surged forward, and others approached from behind, hemming in the transformed firs, who rooted themselves to the spot and waited for what fate had in store for them.
Brum approached Saphira, a twisted, evil smile dancing across his lips.
“You didn’t really think this was about you gaining revenge, did you?” His voice was colder than the night air. “It was all about us getting you closer to the village, hence the spell to set you free from your wooden prisons. Winter is drawing near, and the villagers need wood to burn on their fires. Why should they have to endure the deathly cold temperatures to venture to the forest, when they can have the source of their warmth here?”
Saphira gasped and a single tear ran down her cheek. Helpless and trapped, as her family turned back to the firs that they once were, by the touch of one finger on their skin. They had no chance to fight, as the touch came from behind. Brum looked on Saphira and brought his hand up to touch her face, pausing for a moment before breaking the spell by the touch of his fingers. The next screams she heard were her own as she began the painful transformation back to a tree, ready for death.

LN Denison is a writer of near-future dystopian sci-fi. You can catch up with her on Goodreads, Facebook and Twitter.

Big bigger got someone to come and make a mess of the orchard. There was sandpits and holes with plastic cups inside.

He spent hours there hitting a ball with a stick.

The gnomes were fascinated, but the moles were incensed. It seems them cups echoed something rotten and woke up baby mole.

They stood it for a week.

Early one morning Big stuck his hand into a cup to get the ball he had just knocked in there.

His screamed and ran with blood pouring from his hand.

Mole looked out of the cup and showed his sharp teeth…

©️jj 2020