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Writing

North: Chapter 6

6: Everything the Finders Found (Part Two) Three Months Ago cold coming they had of it, through hard travelling and a blizzard which bit into their cheeks and stung their eyes, the snow made violent by the more violent winds. The two Finders came slowly up the side of the mountain, their tread weary and…

Opulent hotel lobby

North: Chapter 5

5: In The Climate of Struggle (Part One) Now The Night Manager, plush and neatly arranged as Marcus knew the rest of the hotel would be, had been waiting nervously for him. As Marcus crossed the lobby towards him, the man noticed him and took a crisp white handkerchief from his breast pocket. He pressed…

Close-up of man's eye

North: Chapter 4

4: Marcus Now In the time it takes him to slowly blink three times, Marcus has catalogued almost one hundred objects in the room which, should he need to, his dark and agile hands can later turn to weaponry. The first blink and his mind measures the lobby’s dimensions, retrieves the opulent topography of its…

Fountain pen and note

Writing Exercise: The First Time I Felt Dispensable

In 2015 I joined a short-lived writers’ group, hosted in a coffee shop several miles away. The host was an English teacher and ahead of the of the few occasions we met, she would set us a prompt to write to. This was one of them: ‘The First Time I Felt Indispensable’. She wrote me…

Futuristic city

North: Chapter 3

3: North Now Night in City and information moved through its wide streets like a breeze of colours. Night in City and City, like the night, spread for miles in every direction: white building beside white building beside white building, so tall that they rested their spires in high clouds made cyan by the streetlamps…

Abandoned hospital on snowy mountainside

North: Chapter 2

2: Everything the Finders Found (Part One) Three Months Ago cold coming they had of it, through hard travelling and a blizzard which bit into their cheeks and stung their eyes, the snow made violent by the more violent winds. The two Finders came slowly up the side of the mountain, their tread weary and…

North: Chapter 1

1: North Three Months Ago To the North came the first of the cold winds and it chased and corralled the snow before it. From the high places at the top of the world, it lifted itself and moved across the glaciers, above a river, and beneath the stars, with an icy speed and purpose.…