‘Bedside Manner’ was originally penned for a 100-word microfiction competition. Little Anne woke up screaming. Her forehead glistened as she wrapped her thin arms around herself and shivered. ‘Nightmares again?’ I asked softly. We were used to the routine by now: Anne would awake screaming and I would come and sit on the corner of the bed. Downstairs, her mother and father hurled abuse. A plate smashed, followed by loud…
Spirits In Your Area is an interconnected anthology of urban fantasy stories, mostly set in Australia and Greater Oceania. This collection of stories reimagines classic fairy tales and folk ghost stories in a dark, quirky, and surreal way. It’s like The Witcher meets The Castle. Set in a world very similar to our own, Spirits in Your Area is about humans who must wrestle with their understanding of death, loss, family, and…
I stopped for petrol at a Shell service station that was nestled beneath the highway overpass. It was midnight, and the station was only illuminated by the distant orange lights of overhead street lamps, and the occasional white-hot flash of a car rudely rounding the bend with its high-beams on. I’d been listening to Cream on the radio as they crooned about someone named Ulysses. The album had gone platinum…
Emberfall was shortlisted for the Audrey Daybrook Short Story Prize (Round 3, 2019). I kick the side of my griffin-mount, and he responds with a gentle, spiralled descent to the autumnal forest below. My fingers, clutching desperately to his neck-feathers, feel icy in the roaring wind. We corkscrew at the last second before crashing into the loam forest floor, and I hit the ground running. Ahead of me, the goblin…
