New story published in Strange Stories Volume 1

Strange Stories Vol 1Released yesterday, 14 January, was Strange Stories Volume 1, the first in a new bi-annual series of fantastical, pulpy stories from Forty-Two Books. Edited by Daniel Cureton, the anthology is available in paperback and hardback editions only at the time of writing and weighs in at more than six hundred pages, across forty-eight stories.

Among them is my story, ‘The Dry Flood,’ a story set in Valencia, Spain and inspired by the tragic events of the great Turia flood which occurred there in the 1950s.

The story finds police detective Rodrigo Lopez facing up to a repeat of his only ever unsolved case – one which defies logic and points to something very strange happening, in modern-day Valencia.

I hope readers will enjoy it. The protagonist, in particular, is one of my favourite characters I’ve ever written.

You can grab your copy, here.

Warding is Reborn

Two and a bit years ago, when I started taking this writing thing seriously (after a lifetime of being a wannabe writer but never putting the work in!) I wrote some terrible stories, some mediocre stories and some that floated between the two.

Then, I wrote ‘Warding.’

I think every writer has that first piece that they write and think: “Okay, I’m onto something here.”

‘Warding’ was mine.

Written off the back of seeing the compelling submission call for Below the Stairs: Tales from the Cellar, I submitted the story and – in spite of the length of the tale (around eleven thousand words) – Steve Dillon of Things in the Well opted to take a chance on me and my tale.

BelowtheStairsAnd that was my first step toward being a ‘real’ writer.

I’m still new. Still learning all the time. Still improving. But still proud of ‘Warding’, too.

As such, I commissioned a piece of cover art, by Graphics in Design and set about writing some author notes and a short introduction so that, two years later, I could get ‘Warding’ back out into the world.

So here it is, for just 99p/99¢ or a similarly low price, depending upon your territory as well as being available for FREE on Kindle unlimited. I hope you enjoy it.

Get your copy here.

Warding Cover VF-3