Nina Smith's Blog: The Gothic Chicken, page 5

Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance (Part 3)

So far in Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance: Pixie Gloom was having a quiet night at home playing with her poppets and some pins, when Moon Troopers knocked at the door and demanded to search the house. Gloom is not happy...

Gloom and Doom: A Pixie Romance Part 1

Gloom and Doom: A Pixie Romance Part 2

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Stay tuned for the next exciting episode! What has Gloom done? Is Vlad cross with her? What went tinkle?

Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance is brought to you courtesy of the colour black and the number 13.

Starring Megan Weaver as Gloom

Yellow poppet as The Poppet

Vlad the ethical Vampire as Vlad

Jarrad Smith as the Terribly Polite Moon Trooper

Food has feelings too: a treatise on ethical vampirism

Hey, man. How are you? No, I mean really? Everything okay? If not, you want to talk about it? Seriously, I'm here to listen, and all your feelings are valid.

Let me tell you a little about myself. My name's Vlad, and I'm an ethical vampire. Please don't laugh, it's very hurtful. I'm totally serious. Look, I won't go into how it happened, because that story is being told in Gloom and Doom: A Pixie Romance. But I'll tell you why, and how you can join the movement too. Well, if you're a vampire. If you're not, I'd like to invite you into my office for a counselling session, and perhaps we can talk about you voluntarily donating some blood.

Oh wow, sorry man, I'm totally getting ahead of myself. Why ethical vampirism? Well, to put it quite simply, food has feelings too, and we vampires have got to respect that. There's a karmic price to every fairy, or dwarf, or fire elf, or even human you kill, you know? That's why they fight. They totally don't like it when you drink their blood.

And yet, we must drink blood to survive. That's where ethical vampirism comes in. It's a second way: A better way. A cruelty free, karmically neutral path that not only gets you blood without a fight, but makes friends with your food as well!



I first conceived the idea of ethical vampirism while reading my favourite book, Psychiatry for Dummies. It's a great book. I learned everything I know about counselling from it, and I've even founded a practice on the strength of it. You see, for far too long, the evil and despotic muse king kept us under his sway by feeding us all the blood we could consume - but it was poisoned blood, tainted with chemicals that made us easy to manipulate. I won't go further into the whole terrible situation, it's really quite traumatic, except to tell you that we - my brother Dave, myself, and a few trusted friends - broke free by refusing to drink the blood. And that was when it became clear: there is a better way forward for the vampire nation. Using the awesome powers of psychology, we can build bridges with all the tribes, and exchange dealing with your deep-seated issues for a bit of your blood. Especially the fairies. We like the fairies best. You can read more about that in Shiny Things, a totally factual account of this fairy who comes to Shadow and helps us free our king.

So hey, if you're a vampire and you want to know more about ethical vampirism, talk to me, anytime of the night. If you're a fairy or a human, you can talk to me about anything. Anything at all.

Peace man.

-Vlad

Vlad's facebook

-Photos: Megan Weaver

Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance (Part 2)

In Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance Part 1, we found Gloom alone at home playing with poppets as a heavy knocking sounded at the door. Who's there? Are they any match for a pixie with a pin? Find out now...

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Stay tuned for the next exciting episode! Will Gloom survive? Does Vlad have a pineal gland? How big is that pin really?

Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance is brought to you courtesy of the colour black and the number 13.

Starring Megan Weaver as Gloom

Yellow poppet as The Poppet

Vlad the ethical Vampire as Vlad

Jarrad Smith as the Terribly Polite Moon Trooper

My front door as The Door

Recipe: Stuffed Peppers

Stuffed peppers are a popular dish in pixie households; every young child and every sensible adult finds blackening peppers over a hot flame to be a calming practice in a troublingly cheerful world. We try not to let the bright colours of the vegetables bother us too much. It can't be helped. *sigh*

Romesco Sauce

4 medium plum tomatoes

1 large or 2 medium to small sweet bell peppers

1 ¾” to 1” thick slice of crusty bread or dehydrated cloud bread

1/2c blanched whole almonds

1/4c champagne, white wine or sherry vinegar

4 cloves of garlic

1T fresh flat-leaf parsley

1t smoked hot or 1/2 hot and ½ sweet paprika

½ small jalapeno pepper

¼ to 1/3c olive oil

Salt

Roast your peppers over a gas flame to turn them from that awful cheery red to a good, proper shade of black.

Under the broiler or over a low gas flame, roast peppers until blackened on all sides. When completely black, put in a bowl and cover tightly. Leave to cool. When peppers have cooled, peel off the charred skin, quarter, stem and de-seed and set aside.

In an oven or skillet, toast the almonds until browned and fragrant. Let cool, chop roughly and set aside.

In a hot oven or toaster, toast bread or cloud bread until crisp. Cube and set aside to cool.

In a food processor, food mill or mortar and pestle, process the garlic with the almonds and parsley. When mostly smooth, add toasted bread and vinegar, process until smooth.

Cut roast peppers, jalapeno and tomatoes into small to medium dice. Add vegetables to paste and process until mostly smooth. (note: the Moon Troopers took my food processor, and my good black mortar and pestle with the spider patterns. They said I couldn't be trusted with sharp things. Or heavy blunt things. So I just chopped everything up finely with my knives, which I now keep hidden inside a skull locked away in my black box of doom and sorrow.)

In a small skillet, gently warm olive oil and paprika until paprika blooms. Add oil and paprika mixture to sauce and process until the oil is completely incorporated. Salt to taste.

Rice Pilaf

2 cloves garlic

3T olive oil

2c Vegetable Stock

1/4c Dry White Wine

1/2c Wild Rice

1/2c black barley or short-grain rice

1/4c dried cranberries or acai cherries

1 celery stalk with leaves

1 medium to large carrot

½ medium to large sweet bell pepper

1/4c cremini or chanterelle mushrooms

1/4c scallions

1 to 2 small jalapenos

1/4c toasted, chopped almonds

1 to 2 T fresh flat-leaf parsley and 1T fresh basil (if not using celery leaves)

salt and pepper to taste

Mince the garlic.

We sometimes divine the future in pans of black rice. This pan told us something sad is going to happen.

In a medium saucepan gently toast the uncooked grains in the olive oil, adding the garlic about halfway through.

Add the wine and dried cranberries and stir, let cook until fruit has softened slightly.

Chop vegetables into medium to small dice and add to pot along with half the chopped almonds and the vegetable stock.

Bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer, cover and cook until rice is tender and stock has been absorbed.

Add remaining almonds and fresh herbs, adjust seasoning with salt and pepper and set aside to cool.

3 large bell peppers

romesco sauce

rice pilaf

1/2c feta or other crumbly cheese

1/3c vegetable stock

salt and pepper

lemon wedge

Mix 1/2c of the romesco sauce with the stock and set aside.

Liberally pepper the cheese and (if it needs it) add salt.

Preheat oven to 400F/200C/Gas Mark 6. Cut peppers in half lengthwise, stem if desired, and de-seed.

Rub the flesh of the peppers with the lemon wedge and season lightly with salt and pepper.

Add peppered cheese to cooled rice pilaf and toss until well combined.

Stuff the pepper halves with the cheese and pilaf mixture and place stuffed side up in a 3qt baking dish.

Pour stock and romesco sauce mixture into the bottom of the baking dish.

Top the peppers with the remaining romesco sauce. Cover and bake for about 30 minutes.

Uncover, add more cheese to the top of the peppers if desired, and bake an additional 10 minutes.

Serve with a generous dose of gloomy contemplation. Your food might look cheerful, but you don't have to.

With thanks to Kate Reed for the recipe

Shiny Things: Chapter One

CHAPTER ONE

One camera flash stood between her fixed smile and a case of lockjaw. Just one. Krysta Ishtar looked sidelong at her publisher. “How much longer do I have to keep this up?”

Jane Autumn’s face powder cracked in three crooked lines around her bright smile. “As long as you can. Your novel is the first thing to be published in five years that isn’t complete twaddle, dearie, so just keep smiling. Maybe you’ll even sell some copies.”

Krysta bared her teeth into the flash of a particularly obnoxious bright pink camera held by a woman in a hot pink tailored skirt suit and matching stiletto heels. She groaned under her breath. “Pinky’s here.”

“Of course Pinky’s here. A good review in Teen Scream will do you wonders. Teenage girls read too, you know.”

“Yes, but five minutes with Pinky will leave me needing a frontal lobotomy.”

Jane raised her eyebrows and studied Krysta over the glasses perched on the end of her nose. “Speaking of frontal lobotomies, did I not ask you to change your hair colour last week? These publicity photos will be everywhere, you know.”

“I did change it.” Krysta resisted the urge to pat down her hair in front of the cameras.

“I assumed you would dye it to your natural colour.”

“You’d be surprised how close to my natural colour this is.”

“Dear nobody’s natural colour is purple.” Jane took a deep breath, then drew her hand sharply across her neck and stopped smiling.

The cameras stopped, just like that. Krysta relaxed her facial muscles and hid behind a copy of her book.

“Thank you my dears, that will be quite enough. Ms Ishtar will sign books now and be available for interviews by appointment.”

The three photographers packed up their equipment so fast anyone would have thought they didn’t actually want to be taking photos of an unknown author to fill space in the back pages of their magazines.

“Come along dear.” Jane ushered Krysta to a desk set up in a cosy corner of the bookshop. Behind it, on a huge poster of the book cover, a freckle-faced woman with long, dark hair stared off into the distance. The font they’d used spelled out the title of the book in daggers that evaporated into mist at every corner.

She liked it. The Missing Muse, her island of salvation in ten years of writer’s block.

She sat down behind the piles of shiny new books. “What if nobody comes in?”

“Don’t be silly dear, we do book signings for debut authors all the time, there’s always at least one person wanting a signature.”

“Just one?”

“I can’t help the way the market is. Like I said, your book is the first thing I’ve read in years that didn’t make me want to bleach my eyeballs. Maybe all the muses really are missing, who knows?”

“Oh, ha ha.”

Jane winked. “There, you’re all set up. I have to go. Is Drew going to come by and pick you up later?”

“Yeah, as soon as he finishes work.”

“Such a nice young man.”

“My mum’s going to drop in and visit too.”

“Right. I’ll see you later then.”

Krysta grinned after Jane’s retreating form. Her publisher and her mother had been at loggerheads ever since they had that argument about whether or not fairies should have wings.

The grin dropped from her face at the sight of the first person to come teetering over clutching a copy of her book.

Pinky dropped into the chair opposite her, breathless, and laid her book on the table. “Krysta this is so exciting! I can’t wait to read your book!”

Krysta sighed, opened the book and signed it. “Thanks Pinky, I hope you like it.”

“I just know I’m going to love it, I don’t care what your mum said, it’s-”

“What? What did my mum say to you?”

Pinky’s eyes widened. She had on pink eye shadow and pastel pink lipstick, which hurt Krysta’s brain, but hey, the girl liked pink. “Oh, I wasn’t supposed to say anything.”

“What did my mum say? Tell me. Right now.”

Pinky pressed her lips together and shook her head.

“Fine. Let me guess. I shouldn’t have published it because bad things will happen?”

Pinky went a shade paler. “You know she–but–it’s not–”

Krysta shook her head. “Look, I know you guys are close, but you’ve got to understand, nothing bad is going to come of writing fiction, no matter what Mum says. They’re just stories.”

Pinky decompressed her lips, gave her a big smile and picked up her book. “Of course it can’t. I have to go now. I promise I’ll write you a good review for Teen Scream!” She waved cheerily, then trotted away as fast as her heels would let her.

Krysta breathed a sigh of relief. Several sane people came to get their books signed after that. She had a conversation about Tolkien with a curly-haired boy in his early twenties, talked about the weather with an old man on a walking frame, signed a book for a mother with two small children and spent ten minutes entertaining three giggly teen girls.

She’d just signed a book for a skinny blonde when a weird old guy walked into the shop and looked around. He wore a tattered lime green top hat which scraped the roof, had long dark hair streaked with white and a sneer that could have shrivelled daisies. His tailcoat, pants and boots were the same lurid colour as the hat.

Their eyes met for two seconds. Then he wandered off into the bowels of the store.

“Thanks so much!” the blonde said.

Krysta blinked. “What? Oh, no worries.” She slid the signed book across the desk. A ten-year-old boy took her place.

She signed at least another five books before the next lull, where she just had time to wipe sweat off her forehead. Wow. Being nice to people took effort.

Then the old guy in the lime green slammed her book down in front of her, making her jump. “What do you call this?”

Krysta looked up, and up. That god-awful suit looked like he’d been in a fight with sixteen cats. “It’s a book,” she said. “They sell them here.” She pulled it towards her, opened the front cover and signed it. Krysta Ishtar, with love.

The old guy sat down and prodded the book hard with one long, knobbly finger. “I want to know where you got your information. There’s no possible way you could have known all this.”

Freaking hell. Jane had said there’d be weird ones. Krysta sighed. “What you have in your hands is fiction. It’s made up. It’s been a long day and I’m tired, how about you just go be somewhere that’s not here?”

The old guy’s sneer intensified, causing all sorts of interesting lines to develop around his eyes. “Young woman, I did not come here to listen to the obfuscations of a purple-haired-” he stopped, evidently at a loss for words, and flicked a hand at her. “You.”

“Pity.” Krysta checked behind him for someone, anyone. Damn it. Shouldn’t Drew be picking her up soon?

“Don’t interrupt me!” His fist clenched and unclenched on her book.

“Fine. Do go on.” She leaned back in her chair and made a mental note to add a grouchy old grandpa with hideous dress sense to her next book.

“I demand to know who you are!”

“Krysta Ishtar. Says so on my book. And my driver’s licence.”

“Rubbish. There are no Ishtars in Dream and you’re far too tall to be a Bloody Fairy. Although whether you’re actually human is debatable.”

Wow. This should make a fun story when she got home. “Mate, you’re taking my book a bit too seriously. I think it might be past medication time, don’t you?”

“I want to know who told you!” He slammed a fist onto the book. “There’s no way anyone could have known about these things! It’s impossible!”

Krysta flinched. Things stopped being funny when she stopped feeling safe. “I think it’s time you left.”

“My dear girl, I’m not leaving without the identity of your informant.” He picked up the book and shook it at her. “These are state secrets in here, my secrets, and I will have the head of whoever is responsible for this treason!”

Where the hell was Drew when she needed him? She’d have to lock herself in the back room and call the police-

The bell on the bookshop door jangled. Krysta closed her eyes, breathed a sigh of relief and stood up. “Drew?” Her voice rose a note higher thanks to the edge of panic.

“It’s only me!” a female voice called.

The old man shot to his feet as if he’d been electrocuted.

Krysta said a bad word under her breath. She had no desire to put her mother in a room with this guy. “Oh good, you’re going.” She grabbed her bag and slung it over her shoulder for a quick escape.

Hippy Ishtar walked into the light. She stopped on a quick, indrawn breath. Her skin went a shade paler under her tan.

“You.” the old guy raised a quivering finger and pointed it at her. “Why aren’t you dead?”

Want to read more? Shiny Things will be out September 11 on kindle. You can preorder it here.

Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance (Part 1)

Everybody loves a romance, right? This week we're going to start telling the story of what happens when Pixies fall in love - and if you think it won't involve murder, mayhem, vampires, and black lipstick, then you haven't been paying attention.

Doom and Gloom: A Pixie Romance is brought to you courtesy of the colour black and the number 13.

Starring

Megan Weaver as Gloom

Yellow poppet as The Poppet

My front door as The Door

Part 2 coming as soon as I find some vampires who will show up in photos.

A controversial little prophecy

The following page from the contraband material known as Mudface's Book of Prophecy has been the subject of widespread controversy throughout Shadow. Despite the image clearly depicting the muse king, nobody knows what the message refers to, or who "she" might be. Nor are they likely to find out on my watch. "She" is to be kept out of Shadow at all costs.

As to the figure of the man, some muses have denied it is their king at all, or otherwise claimed it to be a forgery and not part of the original book, which is said to have been tampered with. Other less loyal citizens of Shadow have pointed to it as proof that the king's evil is barely understood, even now.

We arrested those citizens and drank their blood. Of course the king is evil, but nobody is allowed to talk about it. Furthermore, the book is banned and reading it is grounds for arrest. If I were you, I would look no further.

-Parthenia, Guild Mistress.

Which Shadow tribe do you belong to?

I made a quiz! Are you a fairy, a muse, a dwarf, a pixie? I want to know

Recipe: Thundercloud Bread

IN order to make Thundercloud Bread, one must spend time staring into the very depths of hell. That's right: fluffy egg whites. Even now my Aunt Agony is in the kitchen weeping at the very thought of such a cheery exhibition.

Thundercloud Bread is, as you may well imagine, a controversial recipe here in Pixietown. Many advocate for the use of black food dye to make it look like good, proper food, but I prefer to save our precious food dye resources for the really important stuff, like my brother Doom's upcoming wedding to his girlfriend Gloom. How could we possibly have a wedding without a black cake? That would be a disaster. Cover your cloud bread in poppy seeds, close your eyes when you eat it and you would never know it was *shudder* all yellow inside.

Cloud Bread

INGREDIENTS

4 eggs

3 1/2T cream cheese, non-dairy cream cheese, unsweetened coconut cream or mashed avocado

1T sugar (optional)

1/4t cream of tartar

poppy and nigella seeds to top (mandatory)

METHOD

Heat oven to 350F/180C/Gas Mark 4.

Oil baking sheet and line with baking paper. Separate the eggs and beat whites and cream of tartar until stiff peaks form.

Beat your egg whites to stiff peaks. If the fluffy whiteness proves too traumatic, add black food dye.

Mix together egg yolks, cream cheese or cream cheese substitute and sugar (if using) until mixture is very smooth and uniform.

If using seeds or herbs to flavor, add them to the yolk mixture. Gently fold into the egg whites, preserving as much volume as possible.

Spoon onto baking sheet into either six equal rounds, or spread onto baking pan and smooth into as even a layer as possible. Sprinkle with a thick layer of poppy seeds to make a nice thick coating of black.

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A nice thick coating of poppy and nigella seeds will turn your Thundercloud Bread a proper, textured shade of black.

Bake for 20 minutes until golden and springy, rotating halfway through. Cool completely on a wire rack and place in airtight container with baking paper between each round (or if you baked a sheet, cut into rectangles when cool and do the same) and refrigerate overnight.

 

 

 

 

With thanks to Kate Reed

Shadow Book 3: Shiny Things – Cover Reveal!

Shadow's great treasure and deadliest weapon, the Apple of Chaos, has been stolen by the ancient and powerful Muse King. His reign of terror grips all Shadow. Masked Moon Troopers storm the land, and entire tribes vanish into thin air. One lone muse remains to fight the menace and protect a secret that could change everything.

In Shadow Book 3: Shiny Things, that secret is blown wide open when the daughter the Muse King never knew about accidentally tips him off to her own existence, triggering a desperate power struggle that could overthrow the tyrant - or destroy everyone she loves.

[image error] Shiny Things is due for release online in August 2016 - watch this space!

(Read Shadow Book 1: Bloody Fairies and Shadow Book 2: Keys and Curses)