Animals of October

We are decamped at a friend's house to look after her cats while she's away. This is an annual occurrence. There is a dog in this mix who is uncontrollable when it comes to firework season, so our friends take her away somewhere remote in the hope of avoiding the bangs and booms. Mostyn is one of two cats at this abode and just look at him: as regal and as glorious as they come. He's a friendly fella with a wild streak and a show-off attitude. He is quite used to Hannah and I as his occasional carers because we are a key node in a network of pals who feed each other's pets at times of holidaying. Arrangements are made, keys are exchanged, bags of treats are left on kitchen counters alongside complex instructions about medicines that need to be administered or specific foods for specific creatures. Curiously, at times, it feels like we see more of each other's animals than we do of each other.   All of this is currently allowed according to COVID rules, but will not ...

As this blog winds its way down to its end, I have some exciting and delightful news. Yesterday I signed a contract to have my collection of animal-based short stories published at some point in 2021. These are the weird tales I've been peddling for the last six or seven years as individual pieces, and I'm absolutely stoked that they're finally being corralled together into a collected menagerie. The collection will be titled Fauna  and will be published by a super-cool, socially conscious independent press (I won't say who they are yet as they want to finalise their 2021 catalogue and announce it all properly together). It will include stories about a mimed elephant, time-travelling horses, a mysterious panda, guinea pigs in the underworld, vengeful birds, and a pig with skin made of bacon. They are, true to form, very weird stories that don't necessarily behave in the way that stories should - but that's kind of the point. When it comes to animals, we have our...

A rare outing last night to have a substantial meal with some alcohol and a bit of time among some art. We took ourselves down to HOME, Manchester's latest arts hub success story, the evolution of the legendary Cornerhouse cinema. Usually a place buzzing like the proverbial Manchester bee, now just doing the best it can in spite of everything. They've managed to get their theatre and cinema programmes up and running again, and they have the luxury of a spacious restaurant and bar for their lockdown-approved food provision. We were there, predominantly, to scoot around their art gallery, which has reopened with a new exhibition this weekend. It is a triptych of three solo exhibitions united by their use of illustration and their themes relevant to the current situation : Mike S Redmond and Faye Coral Johnson's Bubbling Pitch - a series of feverish and lively dream-like sketches, Joy Yamusangie's Blue Glass Fortunes - a striking exploration of the Congolese diaspora in mo...

Frozen, shoulders pressed together, they stared, watching the spot of hillside across the brook where the grass moved, watching something unseen move slowly across the bright green hill, chilling the sunlight and the dancing little brook. "What is it?" Eleanor said in a breath, and Theodora put a strong hand on her wrist. "It's gone," Theodora said clearly, and the sun came back and it was warm again. "It was a rabbit," Theodora said. ~ The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson, p. 54 This is, perhaps, the first apparition in The Haunting of Hill House ; a rabbit, according to the rash and bohemian Theodora, although we don't see the creature, just its wake as it moves the grass. The two women shake it off, but the moment lingers, their first taste of the weird thrill-fear that this lopsided house will continue to bring down upon them. I read page 54, and most of the other pages of the novel, in breathless thrill yesterday, while my own rabbit Fi...