Category Archives: amreading

Tales from the notepads

“And todays date is?”

Grunted laughter… “it matters not.”

“It matters not? We are in the third decade of third millennium, yet you speak of observing a battle in the first. By my reconning some fourteen hundred years ago.”

“it is still no dream.”

“What is it then, if not a dream?”

“A memory…” Continue reading

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Dear Edgar 28~ The Murders in the Rue Morgue

At some point in your life you will have learned of this story, you will most likely not recollect when and how you learn of it, but you know of the story. ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue’ is one of those stories that is part of the zeitgeist of humanity. It is a story so intrinsic to our collective culture, so ingrain within us, so referenced and repeated, that it exists beyond itself. Continue reading

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Dear Edgar 27: The Man of the Crowd

 It was well said of a certain German book that “er lasst sich nicht lesen” –it does not permit itself to be read. There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. Men die nightly in their … Continue reading

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Miscast in petticoats

Lucifer Mandrake, Arcanist to the court of St James, by appointment of Queen Victoria Saxe-Coburg, is not having his best day. Someone has been resurrecting dead peers of the realm. The House of Lords is now inhabited by the undead. Sooner or later, someone is bound to notice. Well probably. Is this just a plot to derail The Witchcraft Bill? Or is it something more insidious, such as a plan to remove Victoria as head of state and replace her with the King of Hanover? Continue reading

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Dear Edgar 16 ~ The Business Man

At home, on the shelf above my desk, just to the left of the raven black quill and owl tormented ink stand, and in front of the leather bound scroll case of dubious origin, I have a porcelain phrenology skull, … Continue reading

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The Unleashening of Ben Sawyer

Ben Sawyer is a fellow Harvey writer and novelist. His Holly Trinity novels are unique, delightful and set in the ancient ghost haunted city of York, a place for which I have no small affection. It has been something of … Continue reading

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Cocktails in the Cosmos

I am to blame, at least in a small way, for something delightful. This has been known to happen before… Occasionally I think people just need someone to blame and I am convenient as I have an occasionally loud personality, … Continue reading

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Post-Newtonian Magic

When writing fantasy, be it high, low, grim dark, romantic, steampunk, urban or whatever, a writer can’t just throw words at a page and see what sticks. Well, that is not entirely true, that is in fact quite often the … Continue reading

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Dear Edgar ~ 24 The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion

In 1831, some 8 years before dear Edgar put pen to paper to scribe this tale, Reverend William Miller predicted the world would end with the second coming of Christ within thirteen years, and thus founded his own religious movement Millerism. As the date of what he termed ‘The Second Advent’ approached his movement grew from a small obscure movement in the early 1830’s to becomes a large national movement of up to half a million people. While Miller himself refused to nail down the actual date most became convinced its would be mid April 1844. Continue reading

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Dear Edgar ~23 William Wilson

“In me didst thou exist—and in my death, see … how utterly thou hast murdered thyself.” William Wilson is a tale with more than one interpretation, which possibly accounts for the remarkable number of adaptions of a story which is … Continue reading

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