A book of five short stories. Some are witty and frivolous, some are poignant and one is based on my Dad's diary as he sailed to the UK to be a Spitfire pilot in 1940.
This is a book of quirky short stories.
Something for everyone, spoof, humour, passion, fear, hatred, beauty and bravery. If you know someone who loves to get lost in a good short story, this is for them.
Stirred Not Shaken - Cam McIntosh is a fictional deep cover spy for the CIA, then something goes terribly wrong and he finds himself in the strangest place on earth, talking to Poirot and mixing a martini for Bond, James Bond.
My Two Germans - Two people meet in front of an Albrecht Durer portrait in the Louve and start up a conversation. The results are astonishing and rock the art world to its core. A satisfying story of good triumphing over the greatest evil mankind has ever known.
No Such Luck - Sit on a beach and mind your own business and before you know it a Master of Fate arrives and you're considering what you'd do with just one wish.
Death's Pantry Door - What goes through the head of a food critic as she lies dying? Delicious memories.
For King and Country - based on a letter sent home by a young New Zealand Spitfire pilot on his way to fight in World War II. It begins almost like a holiday cruise and ends watching Liverpool burn as U boats try to sink the boat and he can hear men screaming in the water.
Excerpt
"No Such Luck"
If you cease to be alone in the place where you go to be alone, does that mean it no longer works as the place you go to, to be alone? Does it then become the place you go to, but find someone else is there?
That wasn’t the matter she’d come here to ponder, but the sight of a stranger walking up the beach towards her brought the question firmly into her mind. And the question caused her some irritation.
She sat on a wooden seat at the edge of the grass overlooking the beach. The tide was almost out and the late afternoon sun sparkled off the dark mud flats revealed by the receding ocean. There were some large rock pools at one end of the beach and it always satisfied her to think that even though the tide pulled the sea away from the land, salt water remained in the pools and sustained life for thousands of tiny creatures. As a child she’d gone rock pooling with her father and she could still hear him saying, in his deep reassuring voice, “if you pick it up put it down in the same place, how would you like it if someone came along and moved your house down the road?” There was a group of rowdy seagulls fighting over the last crumbs of someone’s afternoon tea. One large bird chased the others away, head thrust forward, feathers ruffled and wings flapping. The harsh rasp of its anger reverberated through the still air.
This was her ‘thinking place.’ Winter or Summer or somewhere in between, she would dress for the weather and walk the wide expanse of sand, then sit down on the battered wooden seat and think. Her long blonde hair was tied back in a ponytail so that it wouldn’t be whipped by the wind into her face. The seat had a high back which suited her tall body; she could put her hands behind her head and cross her legs at the ankles and be comfortable. Here she could mull over the problems that plagued her life and ask her parents for guidance. If she listened hard enough she was sure she could hear their voices and even if her friends told her it was gut instinct and she should learn to trust her own judgement, she knew better.
Still he came, struggling through the piles of soft sand above the high water mark. She looked away and hoped her indifference would discourage him from coming the whole way. No such luck.
“Hello”, he greeted her brightly.
She gave him a perfunctory smile.
“Hope you don’t mind if I share your seat for awhile.”
It wasn’t framed as a question and as he spoke he sat down heavily. He was about her age and height, with short black hair and a large blue jacket.
“Wind’s getting up, once the sun goes down I should imagine it gets cold quite quickly.”
Damn it, why do strangers always talk about the weather? You have to make a comment back. Every week-day morning she got into the lift and some stranger made an inane comment about the weather and she felt obliged to answer. For a mad second she scanned her brain in case the phrase, “I’m sorry I don’t speak English” popped into it, preferably in some exotic language he was unlikely to speak. No such luck.
“Yes, it does. But I’m nearly done so it won’t worry me. Wouldn’t stay out after dark though.”
He nodded.
“I’ll bear that in mind. Sorry to sound so trite, but do you come here often?”
“Almost every day.”
He swept his hand across the view.
“I can understand why. Is it your thinking place?”
She turned towards him.
“Why do you ask that?” Her tone of voice was sharp. He needed to know that he’d overstepped the boundaries of casual conversation between strangers. His face was pale but his chin was covered in dark stubble. His eyes were very blue and they looked straight into hers. His gaze was unnerving and she didn’t want to hold it.
“I know more about you than you realise.”
Was he an escapee from some lunatic asylum? If he pulled a knife on her there was no-one else in sight. She tried to defuse the strange moment and gave a little laugh.
“Am I that transparent? You can walk up here, sit down and know all about me?”
He smiled and his eyes never left her face.
“No, it’s my job.”
He’s a PI or a cop or a writer.
“Which is?”
“A master of fate.”
No, he IS an inmate from a lunatic asylum. All I wanted was a quiet think, no such luck.
“A what?” She tried to sound interested. Now would be a really good time for her cell phone to ring.
“Don’t worry, nobody knows about us until we cross your path and for most people we never do. What do you know about the genie?”
Ok, time to play along. She shrugged.
“They live in lamps?”
He nodded.
“And they give people?”
“Ah, three wishes?”
“And they don’t exist. A genie is a fairytale character, Brothers Grimm, Arabian Knights, Aladdin...a way of granting humans wishes. But like many fairy tales and myths they come from sacred texts and they have their roots in truth. The truth behind the genie myth is a master of fate.”
It was nonsense, so why did it sound so damn plausible?
“What...what exactly do you do?”
“Well, Samantha, I do what a genie does. I grant wishes.”
A prickle of fear stirred in her brain and seemed to run down her spine like icy water. How fast could she run? How far was it to the car?
“How do you know my name?”
“As I said, I know more about you than you realise. If I didn’t, how could I grant you a wish?”
Maybe she could play along and say goodbye and just walk away.
“What kind of wish?”
“Oh there’re many kinds. In your case, a time wish, the chance to change things.”
“In the past?”
If only, no such luck.
“Or the present or the future. But most people choose the past, a chance to go back and change one thing. Humans seem preoccupied with the past.”
“About my life.”
It wasn’t a question. He nodded slowly.
“If you like, or about the world.”
She pondered this for a moment.
“You mean like, go back and shoot Hitler before he grabs power?”
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