Thomas Brown's Blog, page 4

Damned Words 14

Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:

Empty Stone
Jon Olson

He is weak, the large gash in his stomach slowly killing him, yet he crawls onward. Gripping dirt, the dying man pulls himself closer. His eyes rest upon the stone carvings; upon the angel. There he hopes to feel his lord’s embrace; to feel salvation. Fingertips reach out, touching it, feeling nothing. A groan escapes his lips, morphing into a scream. Pain engulfs his body, growing cold, announcing the arrival of the beast. Any hope of salvation fades as the foul one laughs. It’s just empty stone. Another false idol. Grinning, the foul one tears out the dying man’s throat.

Of god and guise




Joseph A. Pinto

What fear say you?

To which I reply possess no fear, nor cowardice, for that matter. I am of an esoteric order, keeper of the indulger of dust and decay. To my god I owe nothing but respect. I…

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What Is Pen Of The Damned?

“We read,” he says quietly, remembering an old quote from a book buried now beneath a grave marked Lewis, “to know we are not alone.” Then he opens his mouth, draws breath, begins reading from the pages in his hands, and twelve people listen patiently, and for a chapter or two in a cold, dark tomb know peace. – The Library

Pen of the Damned is a group of eleven writers dedicated to celebrating dark fiction. Each week we take turns to post a short piece of prose or poetry. The only stipulation is that we explore themes of horror or angst. This is the kind of fiction we most enjoy writing, and it is the kind of writing our readers expect.

While we are united by our passion for dark themes, we each represent our own styles and niches. One or two of our number are predisposed to a little poetry. Others prefer the more traditional horror tale. Some celebrate crime noir, others surreal prose. Over the years we have enjoyed the company of a number of interesting characters, from wolf lords and zombie kings to our ladies of darkness. It is from this variety of speculative brands that Pen of the Damned (@PenOfTheDamned) draws its strength.

What is Pen of the Damned?

For me, the most beautiful aspect of the writing group is community. Most writers know what it means to feel alone from time to time, or if not alone then isolated. Most people are familiar with this feeling. Pen of the Damned is a place where we can share our work with both readers and writers. Sometimes the thought of sharing a piece of writing can feel terrifying, but it is only by sharing our work that we can find out more about ourselves, from the technicalities of our writing to the thoughts knocking cobbled tunes against the insides of our skulls. By sharing we grow as people and as writers, and any group or community that nurtures this learning is on to a good thing.

If dark fiction is your kind of thing, swing by for a couple of Tuesdays and see if any of our writers catch your imagination. (We tried catching our readers’ eyes, but they kept rolling away under the furniture.)

Thank you for reading. What Is Pen Of The Damned? is the second post in a series drawing from my writing experiences. To stay up to date with all my latest posts, follow me on Facebook here.
Twitter: @TJBrown89 

This Year In Writing

“If something burns your soul with passion and desire, it’s your duty to be reduced to ashes by it. Any other form of existence will be yet another dull book in the library of life.” Charles Bukowski

A year can be defined by many things: days, weeks, months, lifestyle changes, and zodiac animals. To the Chinese, 2015 is the year of the Goat; a time of peacefulness and reconciliation. I’m not sure whether current affairs are quite supportive of this idea, but it’s a nice one.

For me, 2015 has been a year of writing. Writing has been a huge part of my life for over ten years now. (Fourteen, to be precise. I still have that first short story, in a drawer under my bed.) In this time writing has meant a number of different things to me: hobby, therapy, university module, publishing venture, friend in the dark. It still does mean all these things, depending on what and for whom I’m writing. As of 2015, I can also add ‘job’ to this list.

Writing for Zest

Back in January I was fortunate enough to notice a job advert for a content marketing role with a local digital marketing agency. I loved the sound of the job. I loved the look and feel of the company. Better still, the vacancy described me. After nearly five years in retail, I was eager to apply my writing in a professional capacity. I knew after the first interview, waiting at the bus stop for my Thames Travel chariot, that I wanted the role.

It was the best part of two weeks between my second interview and Alex’s response. Every day saw me more and more anxious. I was in the bath when I received the confirmation email. I’ll never forget the words.

“I’d like to offer you something.”

Wet and naked and locked in the bathroom, the immediacy of my excitement was matched only by the ridiculousness of the situation.

I started in March. My mornings are spent answering emails over fat mugs of tea or coffee. Throughout the day I might compose blog posts, articles, press releases or website copy for any of our various clients. The job role has already changed a huge amount from the position initially advertised, but I am still writing. I am still practising creativity on a daily basis. And I am still loving it.

Writing for Southampton

2015 is also the first year of my PhD. Around twenty months ago I enrolled on a postgraduate creative writing course at the University of Southampton. I have grown up with the university, completing both my BA and MA there, so it seemed like the natural choice. I love the city, and the department is strong.

Learning is crucial to growth and development, and writing is no exception. I blogged about it in an article for Zest, ‘Sculpting Success: Learning And Self-Improvement’. My thesis is a short story collection, informed by a critical commentary helping to explain my research. It might not be the same kind of copy I am producing for Zest, but this is no bad thing. Writing is adaptive, and it is responsive, and it benefits from practice, no matter what form this takes. 

Writing for me

When not drafting commercial copy, or academic writing, I still write for pleasure. I think I will always write, and there are certainly overlaps.

Every so often, when I have met my quota of articles about steelworks, nutrition and mechanical lube, the Zest team release my shackles, splash me with coffee, and let me loose on the Zest blog. It has fast become my favourite part of the job; where for a few hundred words I can write about anything and everything that I think matters when it comes to content, creativity and self-expression. We all have our little niches, and these are mine.

Outside of work, I continue to write fiction. It is my constant. The shittiest day can inspire the brightest writing. The darkest writing can help to make sense of the shittiest days. Tom Waits says something along these lines, I think: “bad writing reduces the quality of our suffering”. I make no excuses for the territories my writing strays into; themes of horror and angst have always seemed an intrinsic part of creative writing for me; the bones of my stories, clothed in fictitious flesh.

“This is an exquisitely written novel; deft, poised, and with a writer’s ear for the rhythms of the world around us. Featherbones does the always-difficult job of making the strange familiar, while asking us to attend again to the things we think we know.” William May, author

Throughout 2015 I have put the finishing touches on my second book. I spent the best part of eighteen months writing it. It’s not long and it’s not a conventional read but it’s straight from the heart and I can’t ask for anything more from a piece of writing. FEATHERBONES touches on themes of identity, mental health, the city, the sea, birds and angels. It is a book about people, and dreams, and modern life. I hope someone finds it moving.

This year in writing

There was a time, not so long ago, when ‘writer’ as a label felt incredibly strange to me. To be introduced as a writer remains an uncomfortable moment; the term implies a whole host of stereotypes and assumptions that I don’t associate myself with. I am always reserved when it comes to labelling someone something. And yet, as of March I am officially a writer. If Zest has done one thing this year, if the move into writing for a living has done one thing, it is this; to give me more confidence in what I do, and who I am.

Writing still feels lonely. The blank page is still terrifying. There are times when I ask myself, “why?” The answer, I think, is that we are what we repeatedly do, and I can’t seem to stop.

I read a little more about the year of the Goat. It’s also a year for creativity, for mindfulness and dependability. Perhaps there is something to this zodiac business. Perhaps not. I’ll keep writing, regardless.

Thank you for reading. This Year In Writing is the first post in a series looking at everything writing-related. To stay up to date with all my latest posts, follow me on Facebook here.
Twitter: @TJBrown89

Salamander

Thomas Brown:

From the talented Magenta Nero:

Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:

“Fulfill your divine potential. Connect with your higher self and spirit guides. Manifest the life you want,” read the brochure.

It sounded like a good idea at the time, but sitting there, in a circle of misfits, Jess regretted going along and wondered how she could politely excuse herself.

A woman with long white hair rang a little bell to announce the meditation was about to begin. People hushed their soft chatter. They nestled on their cushions, getting comfortable.

“Okay. Let’s begin. My name is Isadora. I will be leading the guided meditation with you tonight.”

Isadora glanced around the room, smiling warmly. She wore long flowing clothes in shades of pink and white. Her neck and fingers were adorned with gemstones. Jess hated her immediately.

“Let’s close our eyes. Begin by taking a deep breath. In through the nose, out through the mouth. And another deep breath in…and out…

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Damned Words 13

Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:

Silently, Deliberately
Jon Olson

Every day, like a moth to a flame, I revisit this spot, eager to see it again. Leaning back against the tree, I gaze out onto the horizon. My eyes scan left to right, right to left. It was here, on this small protrusion of land, I saw it hovering silently, deliberately above the Atlantic water. Mechanical, organic, frightening and alluring all rolled into one. For hours I watched with morbid fascination until it finally disappeared into the sky. Since then, my dreams, every waking moment, have been obsessing over it. So here I sit, waiting, hoping, for its return.

Burn To Your Core




Joseph A. Pinto

And still I survive here; and I am charred; and I am lifeless without ever having died. You surround me with portrait skies my limbs can never touch; only the water to nourish me, delivered by beak of bird…

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War Criminal

Thomas Brown:

An inspired story from Pen of the Damned’s Tyr Kieran.

Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:

The calm evening teemed with latent purpose. Warm lights glowed in the windows of surrounding suburban homes as families finished their supper and settled down in front of their televisions for the night’s sitcoms and news casts. Nothing moved outside, but the gentle scraping-tumble of fallen leaves along the curb.

Nothing moved, but much was watching. More than a dozen pairs of eyes peered from the shadows of cold cars and unlatched sheds, all focused on the same house.

Inside, a wrinkled man stood under the yellow light of a bathroom sconce. He selected a couple pills from the medicine cabinet and downed them with an oversized swallow of scotch. With a trembling hand, he wiped the overflow from his chin. Deep creases, darkened by time and things that cannot be unseen, underscored his faded blue eyes. Averting his own gaze, he frowned and tossed the glass into the…

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Silence

Thomas Brown:

Beautiful, haunting prose from the talented Joseph Pinto:

Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:

Beneath the shovel, the earth turned easily; he could taste its peaty grittiness along his tongue. The groping fingers of a rainstorm lightly stroked his neck.

He had found the shovel deep in the yard, down near the corner of the shed, at the end of the trail that led him where now he stood. He had followed that trail; it matted the grass down, bent the grass blades, beckoning him forward; there, like an x marking the spot, the shovel, driven into the ground. The top of the handle muddied a shade darker than the rest of the wood; well used.

From their home, his wife cried, cleaving the lulling silence much as the shovel cleaved the lawn.

Together, they had chosen this idyllic neighborhood, his wife and he, for its rolling hills, colonial houses, for its grocery store where the butcher memorized names, memorized meat cuts for…

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Some Reading….

Thomas Brown:

A wonderful review of LYNNWOOD this week, by Angry Grey Cat Reads:

Originally posted on The Angry Grey Cat Reads:

The Good Wife by Stewart O’Nan is a book that I saw featured on a List Challenges list (of course, I can’t remember which one) .Years ago I read another book with the same title by Jane Porter.  Jane Porter’s book was a straight up romance/women’s fiction, this “Good Wife” is not.

Stewart O’Nan’s The Good Wife is about the strength of a marriage that is tested beyond belief.  A pregnant Patty receives a phone call in the middle of the night, not the stereotypical call about an accident or a death, this is a call about her husband’s involvement in a crime, a serious crime.  The book then follows Patty as she and her marriage survive against immense obstacles.  Her husband’s trial, the denial of bail, incarceration, the appeal process, and relocations to prisons hours away from Patty’s home are interspersed with the regular life trials, crappy jobs, living…

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FEATHERBONES

I’m absolutely delighted to be able to say that my second book, FEATHERBONES, is finally flapping its tattered wings for take-off.

Paperbacks will be available from February 2016, but you can expect e-books some time before then. If you have appreciated my writing in the past, and would be so kind as to write a review for me, advance review copies should be available through NetGalley towards the end of the summer.

What is FEATHERBONES?

Like LYNNWOOD before it, the book is dark fiction, although this time we’re taking a walk through Southampton’s streets, and occasionally into its past. It’s a story full of personal feeling and expression, so tread carefully, lest you wake one night to whispers in your ear and the beating of ragged wings at the foot of your bed.

More details to follow. Thank you to everyone who has stuck by me and dipped into my writing from time to time. Writing, and the support of readers, continues to mean the world to me.

You can find out more about me and my writing here.

Dark Monstrosities

Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:

The alley is dark, but if I want to get back to the hotel before the heavy rains come, this is the fastest route to take. My shadow is joined by a second shadow, and I instinctively turn around to see who is following me. There is no one there. Shit! I’m doing one of those double shadow things where I cast a shadow in front of me, and a second shadow forms behind me.

I laugh as the crazy antics play out before my eyes. The shadow in the rear looks like it’s trying to catch the one in front. The dark heads bob and weave, one going to the front while the other one goes to the rear. Run and chase, the one in the rear never standing a chance of catching the other one, no matter how the light filtering through the alley catches my body…

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