Kathryn Aldridge-Morris, "Cold Toast"

Kathryn Aldridge-Morris is a Bristol-based writer whose debut collection of flash fiction Cold Toast has recently been published by Dahlia Books. Her work has been published in various anthologies and literary magazines, including the Aesthetica Creative Writing Annual, Pithead Chapel, The Four Faced Liar, Stanchion Magazine, and elsewhere. She has won the Bath Flash Fiction Award, The Forge's Flash Nonfiction competition, Lucent Dreaming’s flash contest, and Manchester Writing School’s QuietManDave Prize, and her work was selected for the Wigleaf Top 50 in 2023 and 2025. She is currently working on a novella-in-flash, supported by an Arts Council England DYCP Award. Her author website is here. 

About Cold Toast, by Kathryn Aldridge-Morris
Rooted in 70s and 80s Britain, this evocative flash fiction collection captures the moments when girls and women first glimpsed their own power – or lack of it.

Set against a backdrop of smoky kitchens, playground politics, and flickering TV sets, these stories trace the quiet rebellions and uneasy compromises of lives shaped by expectation and constraint. Two women discuss an unfaithful husband at the school gates. A father trades his daughter’s first kiss for a fishing trip. A girl becomes convinced the silent calls to her home are from the Yorkshire Ripper.

By turns tender, raw, and defiant, this collection lays bare the tension between freedom and conformity, love and survival, and what it meant to come of age in a world that wasn’t always ready for you.

You can read more about Cold Toast on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read a sample flash fiction from the collection. 

From Cold Toast
Note: this flash fiction, ‘Double Lives,’ appears in Cold Toast and was the winner of Manchester Writing School and Manchester School of Theatre’s ‘QuietManDave Prize’ in 2022, and also appears in Fuel: An anthology of prize-winning flash fictions to raise funds for fuel poverty, edited by Tania Hershman. It is written in the form of a breathless sentence.

Double Lives

I see Gwen at the school gates and she does this thing where she’s looking but not seeing and I’m not in the mood so I wave my hands in her face and she says sorry, but she’s still got this unseeing expression and I ask is everything ok? and she says yeah, if finding out your husband’s living with another woman in the arse end of Wales is ok, and I say what, you mean your husband Rhys? and she nods, and says yes, my husband Rhys, and it’s a crazy way for us to be carrying on because she only has one husband, but I’m not getting it, so I say Rhys Rhys? and she says, Rhys Rhys, and I feel a kind of vertigo because it was only last March when I noticed how he’d started hanging back after dropping the kids off, how easy it was to talk to him about all the stuff no one else ever wants to talk about, like how we all create our own prisons and how we’ll bring our kids up to know there are more choices out there, how I was the only mother he spoke to, the only mother whose jokes he laughed at, and how good it felt to crack a crooked smile in the face Gwen always described as being like a slapped backside―and I think they’ve been together since they were fifteen, to be honest, I had thought a lot about that, about getting to your forties and only sleeping with one other person and if Rhys had ever thought about sleeping with other women before―before that first crazy time―and Gwen says she’s going to get a test from the pharmacy because how many other women has he been sleeping with, and I’m like, you think there could have been more? and she shrugs, and I’m getting this weird double vision thing where the canopies on the horse chestnuts in front of us aren’t lined up with the trunks and my left arm starts going numb, and I say, I’m not feeling too good and she says, Rhys told me you got migraines, and says, bye then, so I say, bye then, and watch her go; double-Gwen surrounded by an aura of fucked electrical impulses only I can see.

Abi Hynes, "Monstrous Longing"

Abi Hynes is an award-winning drama and fiction writer based in Manchester, UK. She wrote the first four episodes of historical audio drama Dark Harbour for Audible, and is currently developing many original dramas for TV. Her script Long Lost was on the Brit List in 2022, and she has recently adapted Anne of Green Gables for audio drama for Audible, starring Catherine O'Hara and Victor Garber and narrated by Sandra Oh.

As a playwright, her work has been staged in theatres across the UK, and she works regularly with LGBT History Month, bringing forgotten queer stories to life on stage. Her short stories have appeared in a wide variety of journals, magazines and anthologies; she won the Cambridge Short Story Prize in 2020, and her debut short story collection, Monstrous Longing, was published by Dahlia Books in October 2023.

About Monstrous Longing

A desperate mother buys a love potion to win back her daughter’s affection. An actress has a forbidden encounter with her animal body double. An idyllic new home comes with an unexpected lodger – a poltergeist.

Exploring themes of desire, womanhood, and obsession, Abi Hynes’s collection of short stories is sometimes funny, sometimes uncanny, but never too far from the truth.

You can read more about Monstrous Longing on the publisher's website herehere. Below, you can read an excerpt from one of the stories in the collection. 

From Monstrous Longing, by Abi Hynes

From "The Something"

It was hard for Andrea to pinpoint the exact moment she became aware of the Something in her house. It had always had a sort of personality, squat little new-build that it was. Its roots spread deeper than was immediately obvious from outside. Its kitchen delved into the ground in a bizarrely old-fashioned design that left its little windows peeping just above the front lawn, offering an ankle-only view of passers-by to whoever did the washing up.

Other aspects of its layout seemed to defy logic and good sense. The two first floor bedrooms connected with each other, corridor-style. You had to pass through the ensuite to reach either of them, rending the guest room ... Well. Bloody inappopriate for guests.

The house asserted its own character with a pleasing confidence. It was one of the reasons Andrea had bought it. (An impulsive purchase, a Fuck it, why shouldn’t I? Giving off that dizzy rush of power. I am master of my own destiny!) Quickly, the house felt like a companion. It was co-conspirator in her emancipation from sharing unsatisfying flats with unsatisfying friends. She liked the Something, especially coming home on quiet, dark nights. The house’s confidence was catching.

The Something started small. It was the towel she noticed first (though there might have been other things before. Andrea could be dreamy. Unobservant). Clean and dry and folded neatly on a now-closed toilet lid. It was an unambiguous gesture, as there was no question of Andrea having put it there herself. Her towels were never folded, never carried in preparation to the bathroom. Her journey, dripping and shivering, to the airing cupboard in the guest bedroom, and then back, was part of her morning routine.

As a gesture, it didn’t frighten her. Her house wasn’t like old houses. It didn’t groan and whistle and scrape when the wind got up. It only sat there, resolutely silent, its burglar alarm and double-glazing primed against intruders, all its corners clean and cheerful. The Something was not a grisly intruder, Andrea was sure. It was just … the house itself.

Rebecca Burns, "Kezia & Rosie"

 

Rebecca Burns is an award-winning writer of short stories. Her story collections – Catching the Barramundi (2012) and The Settling Earth (2014) – were both longlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Award. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2011 and 2020, winner of the Fowey Festival of Words and Music Short Story Competition in 2013 (and runner-up in 2014), winner of the Black Pear Press Short Story Competition in 2014 and, in 2016, was listed for competitions including the Evesham Festival of Words and Music, the Chipping Norton Festival, the Sunderland Short Story Award, and the Green Lady Press Short Story Award. She has also been profiled as part of the University of Leicester’s “Grassroutes Project,” a project that showcases transcultural writers in the county.

Her debut novel, The Bishop’s Girl, was published by Odyssey Books in September 2016, followed by: a third short story collection, Artefacts and Other Stories, in 2017; a sequel novel to The Settling Earth, called Beyond the Bay, was published in 2018. Her first novella, Quilaq, was published by Next Chapter in 2020. Kezia and Rosie is her seventh book.

Her website is here, and you can follow her on Twitter at @Bekki66 and on Facebook at Rebecca Burns.

About Kezia & Rosie

When sisters Kezia and Rosie arrive at their grandparents' house in the summer of 1986 they aren’t sure when they’ll see their Mum and Dad again. 

While her younger sister Rosie is content playing on the allotment gate and having picnics in the garden, Kezia begins to realise that things aren’t quite what they seem. While embraced in Granddad and Grandma’s loving care, it's not long before seven-year old Kezia begins to notice strange looks between them, hushed whispers, and secret phone calls. She realises she must step into the frightening adult world if she is to make sense of her parents' troubled marriage.   

Written in beautifully delicate prose, Rebecca Burns' collection of linked short stories explores how a child learns to navigate new familial territory, the heartache of uncertainty, and a growing understanding of what, exactly, real love means.

From Kezia & Rosie, by Rebecca Burns

This is the best part of a weekend breakfast. When they first came to stay, the sight of creamy fat streaked with brown in the dripping pot made Kezia feel sick. It looked like earwax. Rosie point-blank refused to touch it. But even Grandma eats it on toast, so Kezia tried it. She found she liked the coffee-coloured blobs most of all, for they tasted of meat. Grandad puts a plate of toast in front of her and she takes the earthenware pot and smears dripping on top. He watches and nods. 

‘Good lass. That’ll put hairs on your chest.’ 

Another of his sayings, she’s heard it before. She’s supposed to say in return – ‘but I’m a girl’ – and, because it’s her birthday and she doesn’t feel sad, Kezia does. Then a thought occurs and the words are out before she can stop them.

‘Did my mum like beef dripping when she was little?’ 

Grandad pauses over the frying pan. A frown on his face, which he tries to hide. The toast is a brick in Kezia’s mouth. The feeling of heaviness which has clung to her for days, except for this most precious of mornings, slams back into her. 

‘Not really,’ Grandad says eventually. ‘Your Uncle Andy did.’ 

‘What about mushrooms?’ Kezia can’t believe she’s asking more. But, as it’s her birthday, she wonders if Grandad will open up and tell her something about her mother. It’s bright and early and sun streams through the kitchen window, turning the bottle of washing-up liquid into a collection of emeralds, and the clock ticks round like a steady companion. Kezia can see lint and dust in the air; it seems as if the house has momentarily slipped free of its mooring on Vernon Street, free of its place in the row of pre-war semi-detached houses with identical front lawns and paths and on the 318 bus route into town. At this very moment while Rosie and Grandma sleep upstairs, 3 Vernon Street is a floating space where anything might happen or be said. 

Grandad sighs and turns off the gas under the frying pan. He sits down opposite Kezia. He places a thick hand against the silver teapot and pours himself a fresh mug. 

‘This has been an upside down few weeks for you girls, hasn’t it?’ he says. ‘I don’t think you’re really interested in whether your mum liked dripping or mushrooms.’

Mona Dash, "Let Us Look Elsewhere"

Mona Dash is the author of  A Roll of the Dice : A Story of Loss, Love and Genetics (Linen Press, 2019) winner of the Eyelands International Book Awards for memoir, and the very recent, Let Us Look Elsewhere (Dahlia Books, June 2021). Her other published books are A Certain Way, Untamed Heart, and Dawn-drops. Her work has been listed in leading competitions such as Novel London 20, SI Leeds Literary award, Fish, Bath, Bristol, Leicester Writes and Asian Writer. She has been widely published in international journals and more than twenty anthologies. A graduate in Telecoms Engineering, she holds an MBA, and also a Masters in Creative Writing (with distinction). She works  in a global tech company and lives in London. www.monadash.net

About Let Us Look Elsewhere, by Mona Dash

A young boy refuses to ferry his boat. A woman orders a British accent to fit in. A lover sends messages into the void.  

Disconnection and desire go hand in hand in this powerful collection.  From the bustling streets of Mumbai to the glitz and glamour of Vegas, and the everyday streets of London, these beautifully observed stories explore human frailties and triumph.

This is a collection of fourteen short stories, many of which were listed in various short story competitions and an earlier version of the entire collection was also shortlisted in the SI Leeds literary award. 

The settings are in turn exotic, remote and also familiar; and whether it is in the Arctic region, or a little village in Odisha, there are two themes stitching the stories. Firstly, multiple and diverse identities, the travesty of belonging and feeling like an outsider: many of the stories explore situational belonging and identity, such as 'Natural Accents,' 'Golems of Prague,' 'Temple Cleaner,' 'The Sense of Skin,' 'Boatboy.' Though 'Boatboy' is different, as it is the only one based on a real incident in history.

Desire, passion, sensuality, especially of women: this is the second theme running through the collection. The women in the stories are trying to find themselves, often through love, intimacy; they are sometimes rebelling against the spaces they have been forced into. This exploration into the complexity of a woman’s mind and her often ambiguous secret world is explored through the stories like 'Lovers in a Room,' 'Secrets,' 'Watching the Aurora,' 'Inside the City,' 'Formations,' 'Fitted Lids,' 'That which is unreal,' 'Why does the cricket sing?'

You can read more about Let Us Look Elsewhere on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read a sample from the collection.

From Let Us Look Elsewhere

From 'The Sense of Skin' 

I watched Ana sleep, her mouth open, the butterfly tattoo on her shoulder poised to fly. Her skin, lavender soapscented, paper-dry, dolphin-cold. I spooned her and she continued sleeping. 

The morning had been busy, with several animals to do. Foxes, rabbits, minks; tool sharpened, inserted into the skin like a needle, taken off like a sock, skin discarded like clothes. We’d learnt from our fathers and uncles who worked on the farm and came home in the evenings, their breath like ice, to the crackling fire in the living room. They brought back pelt that was slightly damaged and unfit to be sold, so we always had warm rugs, furs on our mothers’ and aunts’ shoulders. They brought back cold cuts of rabbit to pickle or eat with coarse dark rye bread. Here in Ostrobothnia, the scent of skin was always alive. 

At home, in the evening I filleted the fish, scales collecting on the blade, while Ana watched me, lips parted, teeth uneven like small pebbles. Ana loves animals, she’s the kind who walks other people’s dogs, rehomes straggly cats and lets spiders spin webs in dark corners of the house. 

‘Do you skin your animals alive?’ she asked, her bright green eyes trying to hide her disgust. It wasn’t the first time she had questioned, or the first time I’d explained.

‘We look after our animals. They die peacefully before we skin. Besides, live animals fight back and can hurt with sharp 6 claws, their fur could get damaged.’ 

‘Over-fed, then slaughtered and skinned. Nice.’ 

‘Have you been talking to the Oikeutta eläimille again?’ 

‘I don’t need to talk to animal activists. Don’t you think I know? Those Arctic foxes in small cages. You ever seen the fear on their faces?’

‘It’s not that bad at all.’ I was sure she had been talking to someone.

‘I went for a walk the other day, over to your cousin’s side of the farm. The poor foxes, they don’t even howl anymore. Scared to silence. They can smell the scent of dying skin.’ 

‘I can take you for a tour if you want. Please don’t walk around like that on your own.’ She worried me for an instant, I needed to be careful about what she saw.