Paul St John Mackintosh is a jolly stimulating chap. He has many imaginative ideas, and he has strong opinions; he has written all sorts of interesting stuff, and a conversation with him never bores. Last year he added to his CV with a brand new RPG game based on the works and ‘world’ of M R James. We wanted to talk to him about this, but then we drifted into a much longer and serious conversation about weird and horror fiction, so we’re doing this interview in two halves. Or in halves, basically. Why we needed to say ‘two’ is beyond us.

Today’s offering is therefore Part One, all about the Monty-inspired game and what Paul’s up to in general…

MONTY AND ROLEPLAYING

greydogtales: First of all, we’d like to talk about something in which you’ve recently had a lot of involvement – gaming. Were you a gamer in your youth, or is this a later development? And what formats do you prefer – board games, online RPGS or tabletop RPGs?

paul: I had a brief adolescent period of RPG playing while still at school, back in the late Seventies and Eighties when the first games that really defined the field – Dungeons and Dragons, Call of Cthulhu, Traveller, etc. – were first coming out. Then that went into abeyance literally for decades, although I’ve played PC games enthusiastically and pretty much relentlessly. I rediscovered RPG gaming only in the past five years or so – principally thanks to writing and reading Lovecraftian and weird fiction. Pretty much through random Googling, I discovered that roleplaying games had advanced intellectually and creatively by leaps and bounds over the intervening decades, and that some RPG creators and writers were producing horror fiction as good as, if not better than, many weird and horror writers who were saving themselves entirely for literary and genre outlets. Plus, the whole field has dipped far more deeply and widely into cultural, historical, intellectual and literary sources than it had when I first encountered it. So I’m very happy and comfortable to be part of the reborn RPG scene.

Additionally, since we’re going to be talking plenty about weird and Lovecraftian fiction in a separate article, it’s my view that the current resurgence of both (if they’re not one and the same) owes far more to Call of Cthulhu and roleplaying games in general than those who only work the literary/genre fiction side of the street are aware of. For all the work done by Arkham House and the scholars diligently striving to confirm H.P. Lovecraft’s literary status, it’s not just their work that got Cthulhu plushies into almost every home, and made tentacle-waving gods and Deep Ones cliches of popular culture: it’s also the influence of a classic roleplaying game.

Call of Cthulhu was one of the earliest of the great pioneering vintage of RPGs, appearing in 1981, and it’s worn astonishingly well, remaining only just behind Dungeons and Dragons in popularity. (Perhaps All Things Lovecraft would have risen to their present eminence without CoC, but somehow I doubt it.) A sad proportion of its players admit to never having read a single work by Lovecraft; but I do wonder how many Lovecraftian fiction writers, editors, critics and publishers have never played Call of Cthulhu? I believe the cross-fertilization and the mutual debt deserves to be fully understood and acknowledged on both sides.

greydogtales: What attracted you to the basic concept of roleplaying games – the interactions with others, the problem solving, or the chance to inhabit a different character?

paul: It’s always been imagination: the opportunity to create different characters, different settings, different worlds. I’m a huge devotee of imagination itself, sui generis, as a creative faculty, almost regardless of the media it works with – whether “imagined fantasy” or “taken from life.” RPGs allow me an immensely fruitful, stimulating, and purely fun way to exercise that faculty.

That said, what I tend to enjoy most in RPGs is the opportunity to tell stories – both individually and collaboratively with other players. Any writer or critic who is concerned about the tyranny of the authorial voice should spend a little time playing or running RPGs. M. John Harrison has opined that: “the reader performs most of the act of writing” – that’s never been truer than in RPGs. A writer of RPG scenarios is essentially creating a scaffolding for collective improv, which comes alive at its best with the engagement of really imaginative players who create and contribute just as much of the final creative realization.

As it happens, my rediscovery of RPGs was facilitated by the fact that the hobby took a big turn into “Narrativist” versus “Simulationist” systems. In other words, the rules and mechanics of RPGs, first derived from pure tabletop wargames that attempted to simulate the dynamics of real combat, were revised and reconceived to support the dynamics of storytelling and narrative instead. It’s like the difference between sitting in an airline pilot training flight simulator, and sitting through a screening of Top Gun. There’s still something of a split in the RPG world between devotees of the two approaches – although of course both have their merits and are mutually interdependent. But you can guess which one really played up [sic.] to my talents and enthusiasms as a writer.

Also, the RPG hobby has entered an indie period where a huge number of fun and fascinating ideas are being worked on by creators outside the mainstream, using self-publishing and online community resources. Concurrently, the whole hobby has grown immensely more inclusive, socially aware, LGBT-focused, and generally coming out of Mom’s basement – despite shrill objections from the Neanderthal old guard in some quarters. That’s a trend we’ve seen in genre media across the board (no pun intended…), and RPGs, like comics or PC games or genre fiction, have emerged far stronger for it.

It’s also simply a question of purpose and focus. Games are meant to entertain. Fine, Thomas Ligotti, no less, has declared that “literature is entertainment or it is nothing,” and I heartily endorse that. But it’s even more comforting to be writing a game without various headfucking concerns that you ought to be doing justice to your inspiration, or saving humanity, or rejuvenating the language, or Getting Famous, or crusading for the insulted and injured, etc etc. The solipsistic fantasy of the Lonely Agonized Creative Struggle gets a lot more ludicrous when you’re rolling dice.

greydogtales: As we mention in the introduction, the major project you undertook last year was development of an investigative RPG relating to the disquieting world of that classic author of the supernatural, M R James. What was it that spurred you to take this on?

paul: Ironically, it was a kickback against the dominance of Call of Cthulhu and Lovecraftian horror in RPGs. You’ve got all the great legacy of folk horror, and of the classic ghost story by James and his peers, and yet in RPGs this stuff was either under-represented, or twisted and nerdtroped into Lovecraftian modes to make it palatable to gamers conditioned by CoC. I thought the great tradition of horror deserved to be enjoyed and appreciated on its own merits, rather than distorted through a narrowly Lovecraftian lens. So I went ahead and wrote Casting the Runes, using the investigative type of game system that’s been developed to tackle these kinds of stories effectively, and the whole thing slotted into place so neatly that I’m still amazed that no one tried it before. I offered it to a game publisher, and got signed up almost immediately, even though it was my first time writing an RPG game.

greydogtales: How did the process differ from your previous literary projects? We presume this was a much more complicated business.

paul: Surprisingly, it wasn’t all that different. I tend to incorporate a lot of research into my writing anyway, so the detail-crunching was remarkably similar. Plus, by the time I got around to writing Casting the Runes, I’d already digested the game system so thoroughly that I could adjust to it almost without thinking.

There’s one more part of the process that is absolutely worth mentioning for the benefit of writers everywhere: RPGs pay more. Not always, not more than a major book deal, but I certainly found I was netting bigger PayPal transfers for my RPG writing than I ever did for my weird fiction. That may be a reflection on my relative writing skills, but I do suspect it’s about the financial dynamics of the respective media. RPG players will happily fork out $15-20 for a PDF-only version of the latest reasonably popular game, and substantially more for hardback and printed versions. It’s not unknown for deluxe editions of well-regarded games and supplements to sell out at three-figure cover prices. With that kind of money driving the RPG industry, writers can sometimes benefit quite well from RPG writing – I certainly recommend it as a potentially lucrative alternative to screenwriting or blogging.

greydogtales: Are M. R. James enthusiasts commonly game players, or do you feel more that you’ve drawn other gamers into the MRJ ‘world’?

paul: In my experience, many Jamesians (or Full Montys, or whatever you want to call them) are as much strangers to RPGs as many Lovecraftians are to Call of Cthulhu. I suspect that the traffic between gamers and readers is about the same in both directions, but I wouldn’t be surprised if more horror RPG players were aware of MRJ already. Monty is a classic after all, and RPG playing is still far less popular than plain reading.

MACKINTOSH AND WORK

greydogtales: So, you now have a fairly wide-ranging back catalogue, and number of roles – poet, writer, game developer, journalist. Are these roles equal, or do you yearn for one to be paramount?

paul: I look on those all as subsets of writer, and I want them all to flourish as reflections of that. The few times I’ve held one up above the others have turned out, in retrospect, to be big mistakes, so I’d rather keep pushing them all forward, and see how they work out. That said, I’d love for them all to be picked up equally and appreciated equally, rather than one or other gaining such prominence that people start to define me by it, and leave the others languishing in the shade. But that’s not my call.

greydogtales: On one specific strand, you have the second of your inventive ‘ghost adjuster’ tales coming out in Occult Detective Magazine soon. Playing around, or planning a series/cycle of these?

paul: Oh, I definitely want to churn out a cycle of Ghost Adjuster stories. Those tales allow me to tackle a few topics I’m really engaged by – the modern status of Scotland, the Caledonian Anti-syzygy (a.k.a. the Jekyll-and-Hyde dichotomy that Scots struggle with), the reality (or not) of human consciousness, etc. It’s not the only type of occult detective story that interests me, but I’ve certainly got a few outlines in my mind for that series that I plan to work up into full stories eventually.

greydogtales: What next for Paul StJohn Mackintosh? Do you have new projects or new ideas for your work that you’d like to share?

paul: I’ve currently got one dark urban fantasy novel half-written, one science-fiction-ish novel of oneiric unreality just begun, and a bunch of half-written short stories I want to get around to finishing soon. I have one completed historical novel I want to find a publisher for, as well as the first novel in that urban fantasy series. I’ve got one sonnet cycle of poems based on the Major Arcana of the Tarot and one cycle of modern Scottish supernatural ballads that I’m trying to find publishers for. On the RPG side, I’ve got one more complete game I’ve just about finished for a game publisher, and another under development. And I’m sure that more inspirations, ideas, and projects will keep bubbling up from the creative stinkpot of my brain. So I don’t expect to get a rest any time soon.

greydogtales: Many thanks, Paul, for joining us again.

Paul StJohn Mackintosh lives in France and works in Geneva. His writing can be found at his Amazon page: https://www.amazon.com/Paul-StJohn-Mackintosh/e/B00CEH18BM/.

His RPG Casting the Runes can be found at: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/334163/Casting-the-Runes-Occult-Investigation-in-the-World-of-M-R-James.

PART TWO of our interview will follow along on here in a while, when we’ll be discussing the nature of genre, Lovecraftian themes, storytelling, and all sorts…

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“A lovely, dark treat. The stories here are beautifully written, with a rich and believable diversity of settings, characters, and voices.”

“Linwood Grant clearly demonstrates his mastery of the weird in a breathtaking array of stories that can’t be neatly categorized but are nevertheless wonderful… Highly recommended.”

UK for paperback: Amazon

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You’ll probably have heard of authors Nnedi Okorafor and Tananarive Due, and you maybe know of Helen Oyeyemi or Eden Royce; you really should have read Octavia E. Butler, who was a Grandmistress of SFF/horror. If you keep your eyes open, though, and if you’re willing to investigate, you can find many other talented Black women writers who are powering away out there in the speculative and horror fields.

We’ve been fortunate to get to know a number of these writers, and have enjoyed every minute, so today we’re going to highlight new stuff from just four whose fiction you can check out – B Sharise Moore, Nicole Givens Kurtz, Valjeanne Jeffers, and Penelope Flynn. Which means we’re missing out many others, so we’ll apologise in advance – time, space and our remaining memory cells are all against us…

1) B SHARISE MOORE

B Sharise Moore delighted us this year with her novel Dr Marvellus Djinn’s Odd Scholars.

When famed magician, Dr. Marvellus Djinn, selects a motley crew of talented teens to tour her theme park of magic and mythological creatures, all are elated for the opportunity. Once they arrive, the odd scholars realize Dr. Djinn is more than just a wealthy magician eager to provide Colored folks with an escape from Jim Crow. From cotton candy teleportation to haunted obelisks and swallowing monsters, The Motherland packs a thrilling, and dangerous, punch.

We read the ARC from MVMedia, intrigued by the cover, and gosh, we read it through in one. Our view, in summary? Well, we had no hesitation in writing this ‘official’ blurb:

“1920s America. The Motherland, a magical theme park for coloured people is about to open, and four gifted Black teens, drawn together through a series of competitions, win entry. In this tale of powers and powders, Moore’s skilful writing brings together likeable characters, a maelstrom of magicks, and a hope for justice, as the youngsters come up with the sort of mad idea which only youngsters can – to save the park and improve the world. And at the front of the show, but perhaps also behind everything, stands the wonderful Dr Marvellus Djinn. Themes of generational history and injustice serve only to heighten the wild adventure, in a YA book for adults, and an adult book for teens. Thoroughly enjoyable, like a Harry Potter heist-movie with a real purpose.”

What’s perhaps most interesting about Dr Marvellus Djinn’s Odd Scholars is the way in which Moore does two things at once, as we hint above. Anyone could read this book, no problem, as a lively alternative timeline adventure through the fantastical, with fun new ideas and monsters you may not have encountered before. Plenty of strange devices and unexpected encounters; the characters are more genuine and engaging than in many YA novels, and you always have an intriguing mystery about who Djinn is (and even how many people you meet in the book might be Dr Marvellus Djinn in one guise or another). However…

Without preaching or halting the adventure, Moore also introduces you to Black history and historical figures, to issues of terrible wrongs, and to the great and small prejudices people harbour. This is handled really well, and is interesting and accessible to readers of any colour – it’s about people, people – but if you feel inclined, as we always do, you have enough there to pursue serious historical and social threads later. Quite an achievement.

As soon as we finished the book, we thought ‘Yeah this should be filmed or televised’, and lo and behold, only this week there’s been an announcement – Dr. Marvellus Djinn’s Odd Scholars is in development at a major television network and it’s being adapted by Sharise Moore herself and her co-writer Devan Renea.

We wish them great fortune with the project.

Author site here: https://bsharisemoore.com/

Dr Marvellus Djinn’s Odd Scholars

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and on amazon uk:

2) NICOLE GIVENS KURTZ

Nicole Givens Kurtz is a bit of a powerhouse, because not only does she write in a number of genres – weird western, crime/thriller, cyberfunk, SFF and horror – she also runs Mocha Memoirs Press. Although you’ll find her short stories all over the place, you can also check out her Kingdom of Aves concept in the first novel of the series, Kill Three Birds, and now, for 2021, A Theft Most Fowl.

Sent to investigate a strange murder in a quiet remote egg, can Hawk Tasifa find the killer before she becomes the next target? Prentice Tasifa is an investigative hawk whose been deployed from The Order to the small egg of Gould, a mountain village. A missing girl had been found dead. Hawks investigate strange and difficult situations throughout the kingdom of Aves. They can “see the unseen,” by accessing a unique ability to activate hawk-like vision, a trait they carry through their bloodlines.

When Prentice arrives in Gould, she soon discovers that there isn’t just one bird dead, but three. Has the hidden town’s secrets contributed to the deaths? Did the victim’s controversial relationship?

There’s a serial killer operating in little known Gould, and she has to find the person before she ends up next.

from Kill Three Birds

In one sense these are murder mysteries, and can be seen as a good read at that, but behind them lies a complex world which occasionally makes you wonder if you’ve grasped it properly. The whole ‘Kingdom of Aves’ is based around goddess worship, settlements called ‘eggs’ and a system of castes and quite formal societal roles.

Prentice Tasifa, mentioned above, is a hawk, and seems – unlike some of the other castes – to have fully functional wings, yet she is human/humanoid. She has magic, but at a cost – for example, the more she uses her ‘hawk’ sight to discovered things other people miss, the worse her natural eyesight gets; utilising blood magic strains her. Eagles act as routine law enforcement officers; vultures apparently perform services related to funerary arrangements and the sick, and so on.

Kurtz has both been very inventive and set herself quite a challenge with these books. We want to see where they go.

Other World Pulp, her author site, is here: https://nicolegivenskurtz.net/

A Theft Most Fowl

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More about Mocha Memoirs and news of their latest and forthcoming books here:

https://mochamemoirspress.com/

3) VALJEANNE JEFFERS

We couldn’t ignore Valjeanne Jeffers, not the least because she writes (amongst other things) occult detective fiction, one of our favourite sub-genres. You’re most likely to have come across her Mona Livelong stories, with three books as of this year. The latest is Mona Livelong: Paranormal Detective III: The Case of the Vanishing Child

The threads of a blood chilling mystery … A world torn in half. A young black man desperate to avenge his murdered brethren. A white supremacist with the terrifying power to alter reality. And a little girl trapped in the eye of the storm. Detective Mona Livelong takes on her most dangerous case yet, as she races to save the life of an innocent child, and countless others hanging in the balance.

The world of Mona Livelong, unlike Nicole Kurtz’s distinctive secondary world of the Aves, is a steampunk/alternative history one. The United States has split into North America – still with prejudices and problems, but multi-cultural – and what its founders call True America, a dog-eared echo of the Confederacy clinging to out-dated social boundaries and racial restrictions. Harking back to Sharise Moore, Jeffers doesn’t hesitate to lay out the disadvantages and the inequities her Black characters face, but again, these make the story richer rather than derail it. She doesn’t hit you over the head with steampunk aspects, either – these are merely slid in as part of the background.

Mona herself is at heart a sorceress, rather than a conjure-woman, and deals with demonic and spirit-world threats as well as hauntings. All she likes to admit to most clients is that she’s a paranormal detective, and then see what happens next. From fighting possessions to seeking help from the more powerful ghosts of her acquaintance, from setting wards to lashing out wildly with power, Mona Livelong just about does the lot. As well as the inevitable necessities of dealing with life, the official police force (the Constables) and all… Good reads with a likeable protagonist.

ASIDE: We should admit that we have a particular soft spot for Ms Jeffers, because we have heard her speak, and she has the very voice we imagine when we write our Mamma Lucy conjure-woman tales.

Visit Valjeanne at: www.vjeffersandqveal.com

Mona Livelong: Paranormal Detective III

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4) PENELOPE FLYNN

Of the four Black women writers we mention today, Penelope Flynn is the newest to us, and we haven’t, sadly, had time to read her longer stuff yet, only short pieces. Her most recent work is what you might call both vampiric and vampire-adjacent, with SFF elements and some classic horror touches. Flynn says:

“The concept of the hybrids who are called Renfields actually arose from the character Renfield in Bram Stoker’s Dracula. I posited that if there was one “Renfield” who was an acolyte of Dracula why couldn’t there be an entire family of Renfields (who weren’t insane) that managed the affairs of an affluent society of vampires? This was the beginnings of The Chronicles of Renfields.

“Renfields have created a veritable empire which includes their traditional wing and Renfield International, the corporate wing. Renfields are located on every habitable continent and cater to the needs of Revenants* of every culture and creed.”

*Revenants in this context are not of this world. They come from another dimension, a universe called the A’Obeinur.

The Chronicles of Renfields: Regarding Koescu (2019) tells the Renfield/Revenant tale from the perspective of an ageing Revenant who is given a new lease on life. The Chronicles of Renfields: The First Book of Ramona which was released in 2020 tells the tale of Ramona Stone-Tejan-Forza, the heir apparent, to climb the Renfields ladder to become the clan’s corporate and traditional arms.

Find out more at: www.PenelopeFlynn.com

The Chronicles of Renfields: The First Book of Ramona

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Nicole Givens Kurtz also edited and published the recent groundbreaking anthology SLAY: Stories of the Vampire Noire, which included tales by Valjeanne Jeffers and Penelope Flynn.

SLAY on Amazon UK

SLAy on Amazon US

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Being ardent admirers of the work of Montague Rhodes James, we can never resist his lure for long. And whilst we re-read his tales on a regular basis, there are times when speculation cannot be restrained. As the great man himself once wrote:

“It has amused me sometimes to think of the stories which have crossed my mind from time to time and never materialised properly. Never properly: for some of them I have actually written down, and they repose in a drawer somewhere.”

Thus we have occasionally dared to tread in something akin to that drawer, often putting our foot through the bottom of it. Today we explore (for the most part) MRJ’s tales of his fictional cathedral town of Buntlebury, in Suffolk.

1) A STROLL IN SUFFOLK

From various marginalia, Buntlebury seems to be based on the real location of Bury St Edmunds – ‘buntle’ being derived from the Old English byndele, ‘fastening together’ and ‘bury’ being an obvious borrowing, as well as a common place-name suffix, meaning an enclosure. The name Buntlebury is therefore one of MRJ’s wry internal references, as it binds together or encloses several of the stories over which he had some doubts.

We first encounter the location in an untitled and somewhat illegible draft (1891?) which demonstrates how James cannibalised his own ideas for later stories. Note here the casual mention of items and motifs which would feature in other, completed tales:

It could never be said of Mr Pilkington that he exhibited the slightest interest in an invigorating [investigative?] stroll – or even that he would stir himself as far as the cathedral close on foot should a hansom to be had, if truth be told. That his young photographically-minded friend Emmanuel Treves [Poldark, cross out] had persuaded him to contemplate a walking holiday through Suffolk was therefore an astonishment to many in Buntlebury.

“It is… quite a large county,” Mr Pilkington’s landlady confided, whilst measuring starch for her lodger’s collars. “Quite large indeed.”

Mr Pilkington made no reply, for his mind was aswim with the visions which young Treves had placed before him. Ancient and curious mounds which had scarcely been catalogued by the Suffolk Archaeological Society; quaint parish churches which held certain inscriptions, each a warning to the inquisitive, and most of all, the bookshops of Suffolk, which Treves assured him held folios of considerable arcane import, obscure yet canonical gospels, rare unexpurgated copies of the Scrapbook of Solomon, [several other book titles scratched over] and so much more…

And thus it was, despite all protestations and glimmers [dwimmers?] of commonsense, that Mr Pilkington and his companion left Buntlebury equipped only with an oddly inscribed whistle, a marvellously wrought figure of a cat from the cathedral pulpit, a stone carved with seven and a half eyes, a pair of rather heavy binoculars, and a sheet for any spare bed they might encounter.

“For indeed,” said Mr Pilkington to the bemused station-master as they waited for the train to East Bergholt, “What harm can befall us? Why, I have seen the most charming mezzotint of the old manor house which will be our ‘base camp’ as you old soldiers might call it – and scarce any of the figures depicted thereon show the slightest sign of having murdered any children…”

NOTE: Mr Pilkington, named presumably after James Pilkington (1520–1576), the first Protestant Bishop of Durham, does not appear again in MRJ’s stories, abandoned for a more knowledgeable character, Canon Foxthrup of Buntlebury Cathedral.

Canon Foxthrup is both a churchman and an antiquarian, establishing typical Jamesian themes, and turns up in a number of the partial papers. Two may be worthy of presentation, in supposed chronological order:

AN EPISODE NOT VERY NEAR BARCHESTER

It was on the very last day of April, 189- that I was summoned to call upon my noted antiquarian friend Canon Foxthrup of Buntlebury Cathedral. I was not displeased, for I also thought this an opportunity to discuss with him a recent find of mine – an intricately fashioned but defaced egg-strainer, possibly from the reign of Æthelflæd*, Lady of Mercia, unearthed from a long barrow in Derbyshire (where it should not, by its relatively younger nature, have been).

However, on being let into his modest rooms by his daily, I was informed that the revered gentleman was somewhat distressed; I naturally hastened to his study to enquire if I could be of assistance.

There, in the powder-dry air, and surrounded by empty shelves of polished walnut (the canon had a difficult relationship with books, but a fascination with dove-tail joints), I found him scratching away at his desk in a most urgent fashion with his quill pen; Indian ink was spattered over the other papers around him, and – indeed – over a goodly portion of his lined face. Even his extensive whiskers had taken on a more dusky hue than usual.

“Bettleworth, dear Mr Bettleworth,” he said, without looking up. “I am so grateful that you have come. Would you happen to have any silver upon you?”

Rummaging through my pockets, I happened upon a solitary ‘barmaid’s grief’ or double-florin, and passed the item to him – upon which act he slipped the coin onto his tongue, took a draught of ink from the un-stoppered bottle, and swallowed.

“My new doctor, you see.” He sighed. “It was only after I had paid a substantial retainer that I discovered he was a doctor of metallurgy. Still, you never know.”

“Ah, quite. Foxthrup, Mrs Crumble seemed to believe you of troubled spirit. A lack of suitable coinage, or…”

“Do you know the date, Bettleworth?”

I blinked. “Why, yes. It is the fruit of Phoenix dactylifera, a species of palm which is also popular for its fronds, and a source of cellulose – not to be confused with the red date, or Ziziphus jujuba, commonly grown in–”

“Precisely – the thirtieth of April!” The good canon sat back, spilling more ink. “The harbinger of that most curious practice, the Walpurgisnacht ‘sabbath’ conducted in mockery of St Walpurga’s intercessions against witchcraft, with–”

“Yes,” I cried. “That same Walpurga who died exactly one hundred and forty years before Æthelflæd of Mercia’s triumph over the town of Derby, and its release from Danish rule. Then… that curiously wrought egg-strainer I so recently discovered is intimately, even malignly, connected to your studies and to this baleful night!”

Canon Foxthrup peered at me over his glasses. “No. Not in any way whatsoever. Really, Bettleworth, you are such a fabulist. I called you because I had forgotten my Great-Aunt Hortense’s birthday, which is today, and was hoping that you might take my hastily written apology over to her in person.” He held up the stained sheet of paper.

Deflated, I sat down. “This isn’t going to make a very good story for the next college dinner, is it?” I said at last.

The kindly canon licked ink from his lower lip, and smiled. “I would opine, Bettleworth, that from my considerable experience as a scholar and a clergyman, it would be utter tosh.”

Which it is, dear reader.

*Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians (c. 870 – 12 June 918) ruled Mercia in the English Midlands from 911 until her death. She was the eldest daughter of Alfred the Great, king of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex, and his wife Ealhswith.

A TRUE TALE

In early September of 190-, Canon Foxthrup found himself one evening settled in the Senior Common Room at St Carapace’s College, a large sherry perched at his side. We may gainfully and accurately use that precise expression ‘found himself’, because his avowed intent had been to travel back to Buntlebury that same night. The sheer bustle of scholars after dinner, however, had propelled him hence and into a large leather armchair, leaving him little room – physically or otherwise – to object.

Opposite him, on a strangely carved stool which owed more to Queen Anne than it was likely to admit, sat the canon’s old acquaintance, Dr Rimble.

“I know you to be a chap of broad interests and an open mind.” said Rimble, “Did I ever tell you about the odd experience I had whilst out of college last year?”

The canon confessed that he had not been so honoured, grasped his glass of sherry – oloroso with a touch of woodworm – and prepared himself…

“It was in India, you know.” As he spoke, Rimble cleaned his half-moon glasses on a spare undergraduate essay. “I was on a bicycling holiday near the Nepalese border, a challenging endeavour (considering the terrain) which had already seen me through seven bicycles when I came across one of those dak bungalows which are common in the area. The khansamah, or caretaker, was a simple fellow, whose main interest was the removal of the Raj through the mathematical republicanism of Jean-Jacques Rousseau – but he claimed to cook an excellent kedgeree.

“When I had unpacked, I enquired as to there being any sites of interest in the area. The khansamah confessed that – excepting the ruined Jesuit station, a cursed temple dedicated to Agni the Living, a twelfth century shrine to Prester John, and a series of caves occupied by militant theosophists – there was little to see.

“I therefore resigned myself to an uneventful stay, yet the very first night, stretched out on a simple rattan bed, I was subject to the most curious tugging at my nightshirt, as if some person had urgent need of me. Barely awake, I opened my eyes, intending to chide the khansamah, but there was no one there! An ochre Indian moon threw its light across the empty room, and I hastened to look beneath the bed, but again, discovered nothing. I must have dozed off once more, but surely only moments later, I felt that tugging again.

“Recalling my friend Mr Pilkington’s disturbing experiences with a damp tea towel in a fisherman’s hut at Cleethorpes the previous term, I wondered if I too was being subject to less than natural influences. The rest of my sleep was, as you might imagine, less than satisfactory, and until dawn I turned and shuddered under the sheet, certain that a presence stood over me.

“My mood was further depressed when, dressing myself, I discovered that the khansamah was nowhere to be found. Not only that, but both tyres were missing from my bicycle! Had that mysterious tugging been a sign from some tutelary spirit that I was about to be dispossessed of my sole means of transport? Were the attenuated souls of long-dead Jesuits still watching over any beleaguered white man in those hills? I could not be sure.”

Canon Foxthrup refilled both their glasses. “And what happened next, Rimble?”

The good doctor peered at the canon over his glasses.

“As it happens, the khansamah returned not long after, and explained that – noticing I had a number of punctures – he had taken the tyres to the local bicycle repair shop, and they were now fully inflated and durable. Feeling unnerved, I asked him if he had ever encountered any unnatural influences or disturbances at the dak bungalow? To which he replied that he had not, nor had any previous guests reported such.”

“Most vexing. And the sensations you experienced?”

“Well, my sister later opined that the fish in the kedgeree was probably ‘off’, leading to dreams indistinguishable from our carefully-nurtured reality – but she also later admitted that on the very same night, she had been trying repeatedly to pull the kitchen cat out of the tallboy, where it had wedged itself whilst in search of more herring.”

Rimble shuddered, a distant look in his watery eyes: ‘Tugging away at the damnable creature!’ were her exact words. ‘Tugging away at the damnable creature!’ So who knows? Who knows?”

Canon Foxthrup’s own conclusion, subsequent to some moments’ reflection, and on realising that the sherry decanter was empty, was that if you drank enough oloroso, you could believe anything…

2) SOME IMPROPRIETIES

Here we must tread more carefully. The archives hold also the first few paragraphs of two stories which James must have rejected as being too improper or salacious to complete. By modern standards, they are tame enough, but for sheltered college men, they would not have done:

THE WEST WINDOW

It had long been remarked that the 17th century West Window of Buntlebury Cathedral, depicting as it did three minor saints wearing naught but mistletoe over their privates, had been an unfortunate commission. Whilst certain broad-minded souls opined that some obscure parable might be illustrated by the stained glass in question, common talk in the choir dismissed the entire matter as a result of the generous cellar of the Dean at the time of installation, the Very Reverend Bartelmy Groan, a gentleman said to be often in his cups. Dean Groan’s intemperate relationship with the vine, so the story went, had always been at its worst when the white berries of the mistletoe shone bright upon the bough…

Thus it came about that, during one bleak December in 189-, the noted scholar and antiquarian Canon Foxthrup of Buntlebury was charged with responding to the latest heated petition concerning the West Window. On this unwelcome task the good canon thought long and hard, and finally enquired, of certain craftsmen know to him, if the mistletoes leaves, being fashioned from curiously dull lead, might be peeled away. He did so with some perturbation, caught between the vague hope that an instructive mystery might be revealed, and the equal possibility that the modestly posed saints might, by such an act, be made too immodest for even the hardiest of the congregation.

Reminding himself of the old adage Timendi causa est nescire, and being a gentle but implacable foe of said Ignorance, Canon Foxthrup at last found his steel, and gave instructions that the task should be undertaken only in the hours of darkness, preferably by artisans who had been married long enough to have lost all interest in matters of carnality…

[‘Dear me, no, no…’ scrawled at the end of this fragment in MRJ’s hand]

UNTITLED

Whilst Mr Thackstead had a poor eye for chancel work, and his knowledge of pre-Reformation church architecture was somewhat weak, he was known as one of the most lubricious antiquarians in Suffolk. His rubbings of the rector’s daughter at Preston St Mary, and his acquisition of several curious piece of Belgian stained glass from the widow of the late incumbent at Kettlebaston were considered (by some) to be triumphs of his calling.

Mr Thackstead, a little over six foot tall and inclined to stoop, was hardly likely to be aware that the painter of these pieces, Jean-Baptiste Capronnier*, had also an unfortunate interest in those more carnal activities of which my friend, Canon Foxthrup, once remarked: ‘I may be considered pro-Creation, but I have never entirely approved of procreation.’

Thus it was that the combination of Mr Thackstead’s ‘natural tendencies’ and the residual desires of Capronnier led, inevitably, to the tale I am about to unfold, which would not – I think – suit any of the younger gentlemen present…

*Jean-Baptiste Capronnier (1 February 1814 – 31 July 1891), a Belgian stained glass painter.

3) ON OTHER AUTHORS

James had quite strong views on some of his contemporaries in the literary world: “Arthur Machen has a nasty after-taste: rather a foul mind I think, but clever as they make ’em.” He disliked the style of Lovecraft’s critical writings, had a dislike of Modernism, and once described James Joyce as a “charlatan”. We can find only two rough pieces which are relevant to this article.

The first one demonstrates that MRJ was willing to experiment, at least away from the public eye. We are certain that this was never meant for others’ eyes, and was constructed along the lines of that old question ‘How can you know that you hate broccoli, if you have never tried it?’ The piece seems to date itself to the nineteen twenties, presumably after the publication of Joyce’s Ulysses, and seeks to capture the essence of his own ‘A Warning to the Curious’ in a style which no doubt left a sour taste in his throat. It appears that he never attempted this again.

CURIOSITY IS THE WARNING OF IT, TO BE SURE

The linen, the good Irish linen, all a-crumple and snot-faced staring, and it reminding him of Mother Caitlin’s winding sheet, her trussed up like a post-mistress fallen in love with her own wrapping paper. Parkin’s face gurgled, and with each flutter of the fine white cloth, some distant, dusty Ithaca drowned and left a Penelope muttering about the milk having turned again.

– To argue with a bed-sheet is like playing poker with a Jesuit, as Black Padraic said to his cats, not that they were sober enough between their whiskers to listen. I’ll have none of it, but I’ll keep a cheery whistle on these nicotine lips, by Tom, Dick and Harry.

The Colonel thrusts meaty, musty hands into stout tweed pockets, scowling.

– Whistle? Whistle! What is this that comes to the bleary boys and their tunes, however much they prance and wheedle? Naught but an old Devil who’s short on the gas-meter, and daren’t poke in the poor-box. Those Gadites and Simeonites and their pretty little goats, they’d not have been so easy lost had they turned and said boo to any passing Assyrian.

– True words. I’ll give him threepence, then, and a kick up the arse when he shows his face.

Reaching for the flat-iron, the Colonel grinned with all the courage of last night’s porter and a rambunctious kipper that had straddled the breakfast plate.

– We’ll strike him Greek, and make a Trojan of him yet!

– We’ll tune the ocean, and tan his hide. Let me find my trousers first, though, or he’ll follow like a donkey, staring at the moon of my fine backside…

The second seems to be a late attempt by MRJ to moderate H P Lovecraft’s approach and subject matter through use of James’s more restrained style:

A LOOSE CANON

There is a certain pleasing cruelty in the remarks of children, especially those of tender years, who view the world with a logic which would not disgrace many Oxford professors. “Mama, if Emily – whom yesterday cook called an intemperate little b – , may play outside this afternoon, then why mayn’t I?”

Such approaches to ratiocination certainly pleased Canon Foxthrup, late of Buntlebury Cathedral, and fortified him in his resolve to travel to New England in the spring of 191-. He felt – rightly or wrongly – that a robust line in reasoning would serve well to deal with the apparently brash colonial mind, a mind unlikely to be swayed by English understatement and subtlety of phrase.

This bold step had been prompted, initially, by conversation with a stout, wide-lipped chorister of the Buntlebury stalls. The chorister, normally reticent, had assured him that in New England could be found some interesting examples of how communal worship had developed in the colonies since the earliest days of settlement. As Canon Foxthrup had tired of his studies into the various alarming baptismal rites encountered in the smaller villages of East Suffolk – and of lengthy debates over the correct shape for apostle spoons – this had seemed a capital idea.

Thus prepared, the good canon embarked on the long voyage to the quaint – and no doubt delightful – Massachusetts seaport of Innsmouth*…

*A clear reference to Lovecraft’s ‘The Shadow over Innsmouth’, written in 1931. As this was not published until much later, we must assume that HPL sent James an early draft of his own.

But enough, enough! cries the good Canon Foxthrup. We shall leave you, dear listener, with a final note that you will find more unlikely revelations in our detailed biography of MRJ’s little-known sister, Miriam Rose James:

THE OTHER M R JAMES

JOHN LINWOOD GRANT’S LATEST COLLECTION IS AVAILABLE NOW THROUGH AMAZON UK & US, AND THROUGH THE PUBLISHER, JOURNALSTONE.

UK for paperback: Amazon

UK for ebook: Journalstone

An update on our initial launch of ODM #0 a couple of weeks ago, when only .pdf was available.  Today we have download links for both .epub and .mobi formats. And we offer not only tons of our usual occult detective stories, but a dark and fabulous Inspector Philemon mystery, a reprint donated by the rather well-known Mr Mike Carey – ‘We’ll Always Have Paris’…

WE'LL ALWAYS HAVE PARIS

I will take the trouble to set this out for you, because I feel it’s important that you understand. I must ask you to listen and to refrain from asking questions while I speak. I believe the most pertinent issues between us will be very clearly explained in the course of my story. If at the end of it you still find yourself puzzled, unclear as to why you are about to die, then in that respect and that respect alone you will have good reason to reproach me.

In the 14th arrondissement of the city, close to the Brooklyn Bridge and the Alhambra, there is – or used to be; it is hard to be categorical – a patisserie whose terrace looks out directly onto the Seine. It had been my custom ever since I found the place to have a breakfast croissant there, watching the lazily ambling waters of the river while the particulars of the cases on which I was currently working flowed through my brain with a similar lack of haste or direction. This ritual had afforded me many valuable insights, and I had come to rely on it more and more in these recent times of turbulence and irreplaceable loss.

So naturally, this was where the latest body had been found...

If you didn’t see our previous announcement, this is a bumper new issue – over 100,000 words – featuring both unpublished stories and reprints new to the magazine’s pages, all generously offered by some terrific authors to promote the magazine. None of these tales have appeared in ODM before, and one or two are otherwise hard to find.

ODM #0 is completely FREE as a thank you to loyal readers over the last few years, and – for newcomers – as a taste of what the magazine does. This special issue includes stories by:

• Mike Carey
• Sam L Edwards
• Joshua M Reynolds
• Bev Allen
• Paul Finch
• Willie Meikle
• E J Stevens
• I A Watson
• Jilly Paddock
• John Linwood Grant
• Mike Chinn
• Adrian Cole
• Rosemary Pardoe

Plus a host of non-fiction articles and reviews by G W Thomas, Tim Prasil, Dave Panchyk, and Dave Brzeski. With art by Autumn Barlow, Adam Benet Shaw and Enrique Meseguer.

ODM #0 is now available at no cost in .mobi and .epub formats.

A limited edition print edition may follow later.

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Occult Detective Magazine #0 EPUB

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