A Danish painter is driven into exile by his father. But he can never escape the chains of the family's dark secrets.

Apparently, this story was going to be 'disqualified with merit' from an Earlyworks Press competition...but that was too ridiculous...so they gave it Second Prize! It's on of the stories in Talking To Owls (Pewter Rose Press) and you can hear it read on Vimeo.

A collection of twenty five flash fictions. Most of these were written during 2016/17 although a handful date from earlier. The Flash Fiction label is a mixed blessing, not least because it doesn’t seem to have settled down yet into any specific meaning. Discussion centres around that word flash. American originators of the term meant the flash of a single white page being turned. Some writers I know feel the story should have some sort of jolt, or flash, at the end: Ta Dah! All except one of the stories here are less than 500 words. Other than that, they are simply short stories, as varied as any other group of stories I might produce, joined perhaps by the one facet I look for in all short stories, however long or short, that they have a narrator who knows why he, she, or it, is telling the story!

Double the rent or half a flat. Your choice.

Some things are better left unfound. After weeks working offshore and away from his wife, a man waits to be reunited with her in a hired cottage. However, she's running late and into the void of her absence comes a feeling that something is wrong, and a persistent chill that won't just leave him be.

During her anniversary holiday in Egypt, Judy decides that one honeymoon is one too many, and it's time for a change.

The partition doors. The other side scored with a frenzy of deep, narrow lines. Like the scratches of lunatic hypodermics. The message. That insane message.