Siobhian R. Hodges, "Untitled Decade"

 

Siobhian R. Hodges is a Leicestershire writer, author of the Young Adult novel Killing a Dead Man and anthology Untitled Decade. Siobhian has a BA in Creative Writing and Film Studies from De Montfort University and an MA in Creative Writing from Loughborough University. During her studies, she was both scriptwriter and script editor for Gatling Gun Productions (the not-for-profit film company she set up alongside her dad and sister). She has since written, edited and supervised several scripts, and even directed her own book trailer under the production company. With her experience in and passion for film, Siobhian’s novels and short stories can often be described as cinematic. In her free time, Siobhian enjoys reading and taking long walks in the countryside with her daughter and fiancé. Her favourite authors are Patrick Ness and Kevin Brooks – if you haven’t read their work, you definitely should! Killing a Dead Man was published in October 2019. Siobhian is currently busy working on her next big project. Her website is here. 

About Untitled Decade
By the end of each decade, we all have stories to tell. Here are mine …

A coming-of-age anthology like no other ... This part-fiction, part-memoir anthology spans the years of the author’s youth with a unique collection of twelve individual short stories. Like an encrypted diary, each story was written between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five and reflects the events that she (like many) faced during that time. 

With moments of heart, humour and horror, Untitled Decade is a personal exploration of a young adult’s imagination. This anthology will draw you in with its twisty, fast-paced stories as much as the relatable journal accounts.

From Untitled Decade, by Siobhian R. Hodges

“Just shut the f**k up.” His words, cold as ice, slap me like the hit I knew was to come. His eyes were glazed over from the joint he’d finished half an hour ago and his hands were shaking in unwarranted anger. But I couldn’t back down. It’s not the way I was raised.

“All I was saying,” I said, as calm as I could, “was that everyone deserves the right to vote.” 

He presses a button on his laptop, pausing the game he’d been playing. “Yes, but you’re missing the point,” he said.

“Which is …?”

“That some people are stupid and don’t know what they’re voting for.”

I shrug. “Still doesn’t mean you should take away their vote.”

He slams his hand down hard on his desk, making the line of ash hanging from the incense stick break off. Shame, I was seeing how long it could hold on.

“What the hell do you know about politics anyway?” he said.

“More than some, less than others,” I admit. “But I’m not arguing politics. I’m on about people’s rights to –”

“Just SHUT UP!”

He stood up from his computer chair and I instinctively rose from the settee I’d been slouched on. He came at me, spittle flying from his dry lips. “Dumb bitch, you think you know everything, don’t you?”

I could feel my knees trembling. Maybe I should have kept my mouth shut. “I don’t think I know everything,” I said.

“Damn right, you don’t,” he said. “Because you’re stupid too.”

“No I’m not.”

“YES YOU ARE!”

I flinch, and then he begins closing the gap between us. Not good.

I stuff my phone into my jeans back pocket and keep moving: down the hall, past the kitchenette … until I eventually back into the front door of our flat.

Alison Moore, "Eastmouth and Other Stories"

Alison Moore, photograph by Beth Walsh photography

Alison Moore’s short stories have been included in Best British Short Stories and Best British Horror and broadcast on BBC Radio. They have been collected in The Pre-War House and Other Stories, whose title story won the New Writer Novella Prize, and in Eastmouth and Other Stories. Her debut novel, The Lighthouse, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Awards, winning the McKitterick Prize. She recently published her fifth novel, The Retreat, and a trilogy for children, beginning with Sunny and the Ghosts. Her website is here.

About Eastmouth and Other Stories, by Alison Moore

Alison Moore’s debut collection, The Pre-War House and Other Stories, gathered together stories written prior to the publication of her first novel. Eastmouth and Other Stories is her second collection, featuring stories from the subsequent decade, including stories first published in Shadows and Tall Trees, The Spectral Book of Horror Stories, The Shadow Booth, and elsewhere, as well as new, unpublished work.

You can see more about Eastmouth and Other Stories on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read an excerpt from the title story. 

From Eastmouth and Other Stories

Eastmouth

Sonia stands on the slabs of the promenade, looking out across the pebbly beach. It is like so many of the seaside resorts from her childhood. She remembers one whose tarred pebbles left their sticky blackness on her bare feet and legs and the seat of her swimsuit. She had to be scrubbed red raw in the bath at the B&B. Her hands are wrapped around the railings, whose old paint is flaking off. When she lets go, her palms will smell of rust.

The visibility is poor. She can’t see land beyond Eastmouth.

‘I’ve missed the sound of the gulls,’ says Peter, watching them circling overhead.

He says this, thinks Sonia, as if he has not heard them for years, but during the time they’ve been at university, he got the train home most weekends. Sonia does not think she would have missed the gulls. She is used to the Midlands and to city life.

She lets go of the railings and they walk on down the promenade. Sonia, in a thin, brightly coloured jacket, has dressed for warmer weather. Shivering, she huddles into herself. ‘Let’s get you home,’ says Peter. For the last half hour of their journey, while the train was pulling in and all the way from the station he’s been saying things like that: ‘We’re almost home,’ and, ‘Won’t it be nice to be home?’ as if this were her home too. Their suitcases, pulled on wheels behind them, are noisy on the crooked slabs. ‘They’ll know we’re here,’ says Peter.

‘Who will?’ asks Sonia.

‘Everyone,’ says Peter.

Sonia, looking around, sees a lone figure in the bay window of a retirement home, and a woman in a transparent mac sitting on a bench in a shelter. Peter nods at the woman as they pass.

Charles G Lauder Jr, "The Aesthetics of Breath"

Charles G Lauder Jr was born in San Antonio, Texas, lived for a few years each on America’s East and West Coasts, and moved to south Leicestershire, UK, in 2000. His poems have been published widely in print and online, and in his two pamphlets Bleeds (Crystal Clear Creators, 2012) and Camouflaged Beasts (BLER, 2017). From 2014 to 2018, he was the Assistant Editor for The Interpreter’s House, and for over twenty-five years he has copy-edited academic books on literature, history, medicine, and science. His debut poetry collection is The Aesthetics of Breath (V. Press, 2019). He is on Twitter @cglauder

About The Aesthetics of Breath, by Charles G Lauder Jr

The Aesthetics of Breath, my debut poetry collection and most recent book, focuses on history, both public and personal. Some of the poems are about well-known historical figures like Einstein and Napoleon, as well as America's past, whereas others are about my Texas childhood. Quite a few explore masculinity and my relationship with my father, and what it means to live as an ex-pat for the past two decades. The book ends with a sequence of a dozen poems about family relationships and home.

From The Aesthetics of Breath

Time and Distance

There’s a doppelganger in my house,
taller, slimmer, mistaken for me
over the phone. He cries like I do

but that serrated tongue can cut
those closest to him, hissing out
when he’s cornered and angry.

He brings up Star Wars and Doctor Who,
he knows I like to talk about them,
as if he’s learning, but avoids girls and sex.

He won’t swear, prefers the sweetness
of sugar and fudge; at fourteen,
I was dared and haven’t stopped since.

I protest I am more than number tricks,
facts and figures about space and light,
or what Tudors ate for dinner. Maybe

he is more than I ever could be.
Friends say he’s a time traveller,
that he’s really me from the past,

but surely I would remember this.
Is he proof of a parallel universe 
bleeding into ours? I know what’s next:

rebellion into booze, weed, and speed,
though he can’t stand the taste of beer.
He’ll discover his father’s feet,

gravity-tacky, are made of clay,
have never left earth. There will
be time and distance between them.

Sir Walter Raleigh of Bexar County, Texas

Returned from England I bestow this gift of grandchildren

like valuable treasure laid at your feet   you the king and queen

          and I magus explorer buccaneer spy

          blown in from the cold of the New World

                   after seven eight years

                   with natives half-naked half-crazed.

Their DNA is a cypher spelling out rough and tumble gorse

          hawthorn and bramble shredding the balls of thumbs

                   ancient ponds where witches floated and innocent drowned

                   great warriors asleep underground await to be woken

                              steed-shaped headlands stampede into the sea

                                        seawater spewing from black nostrils.

The dead   revered in song and story around the fire of a once

magnificent empire trading in flesh opium and tea

           lost generations buried in mud   burned by mustard

           dance as shadows on these chalky faces wild as dandelion and nettle

             she on all fours roars and hisses      scratches at the air

                     he poised and on guard   finger pointed and cocked.

***

On the journey here through Detroit to Oklahoma

then a two-storey train down into Texas

           they marveled at how high we were   mountains of snow

           replaced by a sun so hot it burned their ears as we landed.

Wires crisscross overhead like a cage   snakes hide at their feet 

at the museum they circle round mammoth and saber-tooth

           hunched down and looking for the moment

           to spring   then pose beside their fresh kills.

Your feast of grilled cheese sandwiches tastes of rubber

pickles too bitter   bacon thin and greasy   their first doughnut

            takes them two days to finish before they finally give up

                       and chase each other for miles.

Night is as bright as day   lit up door to door with Christmas lights

front-lawn inflatable Santas snowmen and kings   they clap

            and shout    try to catch fake snow on their tongue

                        but turn down your offer of church.

***

 

You notice a change of accent when I translate

that I’ve lost my bearings   how to find the corner store

            my old school   where old girlfriends lived.

            America has grown small in my absence

                       a fear and hysteria grips the kidneys

                       so hard no one can piss

                       without a loaded pistol in hand.

You think he’s gone over   painted his skin

bowed down to trees and standing stones

           tossed coins and armour into the river

           to appease angry gods    and take me to the preacher

                      who tells me there is no saviour but Jesus.

What should I confess? That I stood naked in a circle

about the fire handfasted to a daughter of Mercia

            calling forth spirits of the forest

            to fill my limbs while I fill her

                        with my seed and the air

                        with mud-moon howls,

yielding this ragwort   this cornflower   their fevered heads

buzz with my memories of glass and steel cities   fibre-optic

            highways    of drive-thrus   drive-ins    gated driveways

                      of starting over   the pelts from their backs

                      traded for new clothes   new name   new face.