Abyss & Apex

 

A Most Unusual Proposal

To be published in Story Unlikely's June issue (first week of June).

Not only is this story "A Most Unusual Proposal", but it's a most unusual genre for Philip Brian Hall - an Edwardian comedy of manners. A sort of Saki / P G Wodehouse style of tale. 

There are no spaceships. There are no magicians. The only battle involved is the battle of the sexes.

Worth reading for the novelty value alone!

Anyone can read it by signing up for free:

Home page:   https://www.storyunlikely.com/

Coming soon - Fourth and Starlight

 

I'm very pleased to announce that my story 'The Long Con' will appear in the new Starlight anthology, Fourth and Starlight, edited by Elizabeth Ticknor, who has also produced the cover art (left).

I'm really fond of this story, which marked a considerable step forward for me as a writer.  It was the first time I'd attempted to write a story about a female protagonist who suffered discrimination on account of being female.

The woman in question is a con artist from a family of con artists.  So far, so good, but the family happen to consider that only men can be proficient in their trade.  Our heroine is determined to prove them wrong, no matter what low tricks she has to stoop to!

According to the PR blurb, this book will be "An illustrated anthology featuring compelling new voices and rising stars in the genres of science fiction and fantasy." And me, I suppose, since I'm not exactly either a new voice nor a rising star.  But you never know, do you.

Anyway the Kickstarter page is here, so you can sign up to be notified when it launches, if you like.

Second Coming

I'm pleased to report that my story 'Second Coming' received an honourable mention in Issue #35 of the On the Premises magazine competition.

You can read it free online https://onthepremises.com/issues/issue-35/issue-35-honor3/

The photograph on the left, needless to say, is not a royal palace in Egyptian Thebes, but it sort of gives you the idea.
I am indebted to Messrs Sigmund Freud and Ahmed Osman. The former first suggest that Moses was an Egyptian rather than a Hebrew. The latter has produced good evidence to support the specific Egyptian identity that I eventually settled on.

The challenge for this edition of On the Premises was to write a story about a situation in which there is more than one of something there should be only one of.

Well how about Ruler of the World?

The Eleventh Commandment

A lean period in the first half of this year, but I'm pleased to report my crime story 'The Eleventh Commandment' appears in this month's Gumshoe Review. It's free to read on line.


This is my first published crime story without any Science Fiction story without and science fiction or fantasy elements. However, given that crime sells better than SciFi, maybe that's a move in the right direction, you never know.


Just to reassure any readers keen to see my latest SF, I am still working on trying to get more of them into print - about forty more to be exact. One acceptance has been awaiting publication for so long I've almost forgotten about it myself!

Pirates and Ghosts

Nicely in time for Christmas shopping, here is the exciting new Flame Tree anthology Pirates & Ghosts.

This features my story Heavy Weather, a tale of the Royal Navy during the Seven Years' War (1756-1763), in which an impecunious lieutenant gets more than he bargains for when appointed salvage master of an unmanned vessel.

As usual from this publisher it's a beautiful hardback book that anyone would be delighted to own.

I don’t know whether it’s some kind of genetic inheritance from my sailor father, who died while I was still a toddler, but I've always been fascinated by the sea, and particularly by the age of sail. 

With all our technological advantages today, the sea can still catch us out if we don’t treat it with respect. The daring of the men who challenged the sea in ships made of wood, at the mercy of wind and weather, finding their way by measuring the angle of the sun and the stars, deserves our admiration. And if the way to hear a tall tale in a dockyard tavern is to stand an ancient mariner a glass or two of rum, by my reckoning it’s cheap at the price.

Third & Starlight - Kickstarter

The Kickstarter for the forthcoming Third and Starlight anthology is now live.

All sorts of nice goodies on offer for people willing to help defray the costs of this project.

Among these rewards are included some free ebook  copies of my novel The Prophets of Baal.

What greater inducement could there possibly be?

Well, just in case you don't think I'm the greatest science fiction author since Asimov, there are are lot of other free ebooks on offer too.

Just a reminder that all the authors in this volume are semi-finalists or better in the Writers of the Future Competition.

Since I seem to have disqualilied myself from further participation in the competition as a result of my recent flood of published stories, I'm not going to improve on my semi-finalist placing.

But I'm nevertheless honoured to share the Table of Contents with these guys!

Please do take a look at the Kickstarter page!

Interview with the editor, Dr Robert Finegold.

More Alternative Truths

As someone who taught philosophy for a couple of decades, I am regularly fascinated by attempts to define truth.

It is commonly assumed that the truth of anything is single and incontrovertible; all we have to do is find out what it is. Once we've done that, we can be quite confident that anyone holding an alternative view is just plain wrong.

But as Protagoras painstakingly explained to anyone who'd listen 2,500 years ago, that's not how the world actually works. Man is the measure of all things.

For example, since I live in Scotland I'm relatively unaccustomed to high temperatures. On holiday in Greece this past summer, I found the weather too hot to be borne and retired hastiliy to the air-conditioned cool of the Archaeological Museum. Outside, Greeks who found the weather no great challenge were engaged in strenuous physical labour repairing the road. So was the weather too hot or not?

Well, it was too hot for me and not too hot for them; we were both right and this particular truth turns out to be relative, not absolute.

Fast forward a couple of millennia from Protagoras and we find Spinoza comparing truth to a scene witnessed by different people through different coloured glass. This was the inspiration for ‘A Sonnet on Truth’ which appears in the forthcoming anthology ‘More Alternative Truths’ (see above.)

Although I’ve had poetry published before and once won the poetry competition held in association with my local Falkirk Tryst Festival, I’ve never before had a poem published in a paying market. I hope you like it.

Actually I was very surprised to make the Table of Contents here twice. The second piece is a short story entitled ‘Conspiracy of Silence’. This explores the perennial argument between the two groups of historians who, when I was at university, we used to call the Conspiracy School and the Cock-up School. Are recent events the outcome of someone’s dastardly plot or just another mess resulting from human incompetence? Well who knows?

I hope you enjoy this one too, as well as all the other pieces in this anthology inspired by recent events in US politics.

The Black Horse

I'm pleased to announce that my story The Black Horse is to appear in the forthcoming Third Flatiron anthology Strange Beasties, out later this month. The anthology is available for pre-order on Amazon.

I love writing about the legends of localities where I've lived or which I know well. This is a tale of the North Yorkshire Moors in the late eighteenth century.

All the village names of this part of the world still bring nostalgia for my university years when a group of us made regular trips to attempt The Lyke Wake Walk.

It's also a tale of horse racing and of course I've done a fair bit of that too, so I feel on safe ground here, which is more than can be said for the story's protagonist!

This is my second sale to Third Flatiron. Some readers may recall that the first, Time's Winged Chariot, subsequently did well in a reader poll, so we'll hope the new story will enjoy similar success.

Third & Starlight!

An anthology of 14 tales of wonder by award winning authors, finalists, and semi-finalists (e.g. Writers of the Future, Hugo, Cambell, Aurealis, and others). This year's collection of science fiction and fantasy stories from these impressive new talents:

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction: Back and Foreword----------- Robert B. Finegold, MD
The Memory of Huckleberries -------------- Rebecca Birch
The Temptation of Father Francis ----------Nick T. Chan and Jennifer Campbell-Hicks

The Waiting Room ------------------  Philip Brian Hall

Last Time For Everything -------------------- K. L. Schwengel
Skinners ----------------------------------------  Rachelle Harp
Amma's Wishes -------------------------------  M. E. Garber
Three Flash ------------------------------------  Dustin Adams
A Green Tongue ------------------------------   Frank Dutkiewicz
A Matter For Interpretation -----------------   M. Elizabeth Ticknor
The Root Bridges of Haemae --------------- Sean Monaghan
Red is the Color of My True Love's Hair -- William R. D. Wood
Bad Actors -------------------------------------   Julie Frost
In the Heart of the Flesh --------------------   Scott Parkin
Shattered Vessels -----------------------------  Kary English and Robert B.Finegold, MD

Iron Hail

I'm very pleased to report that my short story Iron Hail is included in the Zombies Need Brains anthology All Hail Our Robot Conquerors. This is available now for pre-order on Amazon and due for release on Friday 1st September.

 RRRAWRRR!!! ZZZZZZTTTTT!!! ZZZZAAAAPPPPP!!!

The robots of the 50s and 60s science fiction movies and novels captured our hearts and our imaginations. Their clunky, bulbous bodies with their clear domed heads, whirling antennae, and randomly flashing lights staggered ponderously across the screen and page and into our souls—whether as a constant companion or as the invading army threatening to exterminate our world. We can never return to that innocent time, where the robots could be identified by their burning red eyes or our trusty robot sidekick would warn us instantly of danger— Or can we?

With a touch of nostalgia and a little tongue-in-cheek humor, here are fifteen stories from today’s leading science fiction and fantasy authors that take us back to the time of evil robot overlords, invading armies, and not-quite-trustworthy mechanical companions. Join Julie E. Czerneda, Brandon Daubs, Tanya Huff, Brian Trent, L.E. Modesitt, Jr., Jason Palmatier, Jez Patterson, Gini Koch, Lauren Fox, Sharon Lee & Steve Miller, Philip Brian Hall, Rosemary Edghill, R. Overwater, Helen French, and Seanan McGuire as we step into the future with a nod to the past. Hold on to those stun guns. You may need them!

Phantaxis - Free Today until Sunday

A reminder that the digital version of Phantaxis' August edition is available for free download from today until Sunday.

My story is called The Ship of Theseus. I hope you enjoy it.

A Braw Song For Burns Night

I am delighted to report the publication of my latest story by Recompose magazine, edition #2 'Ritualistic Pompadour'.

This is a modern Scottish tale, developing a theme I first came up with as a piece of homework during my time with Falkirk Writers Circle.

Although it's my sixth professional rate sale, being less than 1,000 words it counts as a Flash piece (like two of the others) and so I still hang on to my eligibility for the Writers of the Future competition, at least for now. I've eight Honorable Mentions and a Silver HM, but the final still proves elusive. Maybe Quarter 4 of Volume 33, which ends this month - you never know your luck.

Anyway I hope people will flock to buy the latest Recompose. Because you do all want struggling authors to eat, don't you?

The Trial of Monsieur Lazare

This is my month for failing to notice I've been published.  It does seem rather remarkable that an author would encounter two of his own stories on line on consecutive days, but there you are.

Just like Temporal Paradox I was aware of the impending publication of The Trial of Monsieur Lazare but I did not realise it had already happened.

One beneficial effect of taking a lot of interest in all things French is a reasonable familiarity with the structure of the French judicial system, which has significant differences from that of the UK.

In this story a businessman is taken in for questioning by an examining magistrate.  His problem is that he hasn't committed any crime and he has no idea what it's all about.

You can read the story free on line in AE The Canadian Science Fiction Review. I hope you enjoy it.

The Ultimate Temporal Paradox

It may itself seem something of a temporal paradox, but it has taken me five days to notice that my story The Ultimate Temporal Paradox was published on Monday in Sci Phil Journal.

Usually I notice a publication because the publisher pays for the story, but this one attracts a royalty instead, so  Jason Rennie (the publisher) and I will be much obliged if readers sign up in countless quadrillions.  One story a week is published free to read on the the web and you need to be a subscriber to read the second. I suppose you could say therefore that this week my story is the free sample.

I am quite fond of this story, tortuous logic and all, which in fact grew out of the first short story for adults that I submitted to the competition associated with the annual Falkirk Tryst Festival.

Some considerable time later I finally realised why the story did not work as originally drafted. Sadly it was nowhere near complicated enough!

I do hope readers will judge that I have now corrected this monstrous shortcoming.

Cosmic Roots and Eldritch Shores

My story The Wild Hunt of Sliabh Mannan is up today at Cosmic Roots and Eldritch Shores.

This is the only story I have ever written about Sliabh Mannan, where I live, and I find it remarkable how the landscape and the story have become intertwined in my mind. I have the greatest difficulty in remembering that I did actually make it up. As far as I'm concerned this is so clearly the way it happened that it belongs in a history book and I half believe that's where I found it.

As a result of this strange psychological effect, I suspect I now have a deeper insight into the way in which myths and historical events became almost indistinguishable in the ancient world, either the Muses or the shades of the characters or both being responsible for the inspiration and no other written records existing.

Last of the Spice Schooners

I'm delighted to report the availability for download of the first of my stories to be podcast.

Gallery of Curiosities has produced Episode 22 of its steampunk series, this one featuring my Victorian horror story Last of the Spice Schooners narrated by Vic Mullins.

I have to warn you that this story is not for the squeamish or those of a nervous disposition! On the other hand it would have made a great Hammer Films production back in the good old days of creepy cinema.

One morning an ancient schooner, filthy, moldering and riddled with ship-worm, was found moored illegally at an out-of-the-way and long-disused old berth in The Pool of London...

Download the podcast here if you dare.

It's Come to Our Attention

On 20th February the Third Flatiron anthology It's Come to our Attention will be published.

The Kindle version is currently available for download here. The anthology will also be available on Smashwords and print on demand.

I'm looking forward to seeing my story Time's Winged Chariot along with the work of Pauline J. Alama, James H. Zorn, Wendy Nikel, Hunter Liguore, Nyki Blatchley, James Dorr, Greg Beatty, Terri Bruce, Joel Richards, Marie DesJardin, Arthur M. Doweyko, E. M. Eastick, and Lisa Timpf.

This is only the second story of mine to be published after being workshopped in an online writers' group. (The first one was The Old Man on the Green.)

Workshops are private forums where emerging writers offer critiques of each other's work. I often think that other writers are the hardest critics in the world, but the vast majority mean well and you can always learn from criticism, even if you don't always agree with it.

I do hope that readers will appreciate the outcome in this case, since this story emerged from the workshop a very different manuscript from the one that went in.

I like it, but then of course I would say that, wouldn't I?

Chilling Ghost Stories

Available worldwide, it is hoped, around the end of next month will be three books of a Gothic Fantasy series from Flame Tree Publishing. Books will also be on sale directly at flametreepublishing.com. Why should you especially want to bear this in mind?  Because the first in the series, Chilling Ghost Stories, features a tale written by me.

As you might expect, I do not tend to write traditional ghost stories and 'The Waiting Room' is definitely not traditional. It is however in some high class company in the forthcoming volume, so I hope you will all rush down to your local bookseller and reserve yourselves a copy.

Better still buy several copies and give them to all your friends for Christmas.  Have your Christmas shopping finished by September.  Now don't say you never find any good advice on this blog!

Miaow do you do?

Now come along, you can’t expect me to believe that you didn’t know cats could talk. I mean, everyone knows that cats are much more intelligent than people, don’t they, and people can talk.

Well, yes, now you come to mention it the conversation of some people is a trifle limited. My Aunt Tabitha; she was the one who stayed in Cowcaddens, you know; she once told me that the local people there only ever learned one adjective, but that they were so pleased to have learned it that they used it over and over again, every fourth or fifth word, so that it became meaningless; you know, the way that a cat might say “you know” or a rather dull human might say “er…” Apparently this adjective began with f, but it wasn’t a clever word such as “F-eline” or “F-rolicsome”; not even a moderately clever word such as “F-ornicating”, though apparently it was a synonym for that. My Aunt Tabitha, you know, was always too F-astidious to mention what the word actually was; she called it “the F-word.” Personally I know rather a lot of adjectives beginning with f, but then of course, I am a cat.

I suppose what you really mean to say, in your limited human way, is that you are surprised that a cat would condescend to talk to you. It is true that the majority of cats can’t bring themselves to do such a thing. They go through their entire lives without uttering a word in human hearing. They have very delicate empathy with human sensitivities, you know, and they are only too well aware that people feel themselves sufficiently inferior to cats already, without being subjected to the further indignity of having their ignorance exposed in conversation. My Aunt Tabitha used to say that, even for an intelligent human, talking to a cat would be rather like a Rangers supporter talking to Einstein. No! Einstein was not that foreign coach who was hired by Celtic; he was that foreign coach who was hired by Princeton. No, Princeton don’t play in the English League, they play in the Ivy League.

I had better get to the point. Well then, I suppose that you could say that the whole problem started when my people, (you know, those are the humans that I keep as pets; they do useful things like opening cans and lighting fires for me in the winter?) well, they brought home a dog. Now I can cope with dogs; they aren’t very smart, even less smart than humans, but as a general rule they understand simple instructions that come reinforced with a swift right hook to the nose, claws extended – know what I mean? Well that’s all very well for elementary house rules such as who gets to eat first, or who gets to lie closer to the stove, but legally binding job demarcation lines are really too complicated for a dog. I have to say that I did my best to explain the principles of mouse-hunting, but I could see by the glazed expression on his face that the mutt really wasn’t taking it in.

“The whole point,” I said slowly, “is not to kill the mouse. If you kill the mouse, then it stops running, you see, and it’s far less fun hunting it if you have to throw it up in the air first and then run after it.”

“But I run after a ball when my person throws it, and that’s fun,” said the stupid dog.

“You don’t understand,” I replied patiently, “If you throw the mouse it can only travel in straight lines. When it’s running it can jink about and turn corners and stuff, and that makes the hunt much more interesting.”

Well the clown said that he would try to remember, didn’t he? But what happened? The next night there’s a mouse in the kitchen, and I cunningly head it off from running back to its hole, don’t I? And so the mouse hides behind a wide-open door, you know, one that’s opened right back on itself so that there’s just this narrowing V-shape for the mouse to run into? So I’m just about to adopt the classic position, where the mouse is stuck up the narrow end and I’m blocking the wide end, staring at it and frightening it to death with my penetrating gaze, when this stupid dog jumps in and grabs the mouse! I ask you; just grabs the mouse without so much as a by-your-leave!

You can tell that this dog doesn’t know there’s a recession can’t you? I mean there are livelihoods at stake here. In my capacity as local shop steward of the Feline Artisan Rodent Manipulators and Carnivorous Allied Trades Society (FARMCATS for short,) I lodged a formal protest right away, I don’t mind telling you. “All my members want at the end of the day” I said firmly “Is a fair day’s stalk for a fair day’s slay.” But it didn’t do any good, you know, because the mouse was already dead, wasn’t it?

Well, as you can imagine, I was feeling properly humiliated by this, because my absurd people told the dog how clever he was for catching a mouse. For goodness’ sake, as though there was any skill in catching a mouse! All the skill lies in prolonging the hunt; even a human should know that. Oh, you didn’t know that either, eh? Well I can’t say that I’m surprised.

In any case, to cut a long story short, I decided to go and sulk in the stables, didn’t I? “Let them see if the miserable mastiff can fluke more than one mouse,” I said. “You’ll see, they’ll be over-run with rodents and pleading for my return in no time.” But, in fact, no sooner had I stepped outside the back door when there’s this dreadful twittering noise and this crazy swallow dives on me from twenty feet in the air. He zooms past about three inches from my head and climbs up into the air again chattering some rubbish about the stables having been occupied by hirundine popular forces and being out of bounds to cats for the duration of the nesting season.

Now if you think it’s tough explaining something to a dog, you should have a go at trying to get through to a bird-brain. This guy had a completely one track mind; every time I would leave the house, the same thing would happen; twittering, dive bombing and a political lecture about the avian master race. I couldn’t go and sun myself on the lawn; I couldn’t move from one shrubbery to another in a leisurely field-mouse hunt without this numbskull diving on me out of the clouds. I think he’d been watching a lot of those old war movies, you know, where the German Stukas roll over and dive bomb the refugees with a great wailing of those huge sirens that they had fitted in their air intakes. You’ve seen them, haven’t you? Eeeee–yowwwwwwww–boom! And then zoom back up into the sky. Oh good, that’s something you do know about! Maybe you’re not quite as green as you’re cabbage looking?

So now I not only had this stupid dog parading about the house and crowing about how he’d beaten the cat in a mouse hunt, I also had this stupid bird parading about outside the house and bragging how his Stuka act was protecting all the little swallows. I ask you, as though I would have eaten any of his stupid hatchlings – well, not more than my fair share anyway. I mean, you must be able to see that the situation was intolerable? What I needed was a master stroke that the dog could never pull off and that would teach that bird a lesson. As my great-great–ever-so-many-greats grandfather famously said to Cleopatra, “You want to be careful with that snake, lady, you could fall right on your asp!” So I went off and did some research on the Intercat, didn’t I? Simple really.

Anyway, as I told a completely crestfallen dog afterwards, a wise cat once observed that there are old swallows and there are bold swallows, but there are very few old, bold swallows. I bet you didn't know that the Ju87 Stuka had to be fitted with automatic dive brakes that pulled up the nose at the end of a bombing run? This was because the G forces at that point were so great that the pilots could black out. For a critical couple of seconds the aircraft was actually flying itself and therefore its behaviour was very predictable for ack-ack gunners. Not a lot of people know that.

Considering what happened when I put my research into practice, we are bound to conclude that not a lot of swallows know that either.