Can I tell you a story?

A kangaroo told me there was a hole in the stars, and the sight of it made me afraid... Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patron on Patreon! Patrons receive bonus stories not found here (there are many waiting for you already, and another added every four weeks), and other goodies - including my undying thanks. Literally undying... even a...

A quiet, gentle tale of the librarian at the library at the end of the world, who lends a book to a man from across the edge of the world. Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patron on Patreon! Patrons receive bonus stories not found here (there are many waiting for you already, and another added every four weeks), and other goodies - inclu...

There were twin cities, once. Because of the stone they could quarry, one city was black and the other was white. They were called by those that lived there The City of Shadows and the City of Light, though their official names had far less poetry in them. They sat on either side of a great tidal river that was so wide it was hard to see one bank from the other. Jem and Ez met in their boats in th...

I’m sitting on my uncle’s headstone, drinking a glass of claret. He always used to tell me: be careful what you wish for, which never made much sense to me. Why on earth would I want to do that? Wish wildly, wish with abandon – that’s always been much more my style. Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patron on Patreon! Patrons receive bonu...

I sit on the shore with a photograph I've never seen before, remembering another photograph, that tore my family apart. My therapist says I need closure, but I'm pretty sure that hope is dead. Pandora's white moth, crushed underneath the rest of the mess when she finally opens the box... Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patro...

Bolt doesn't know what kind of man he is, or what kind of man he'd like to be. The stories he tells about himself change each time they're told, until he no longer knows the truth of them. He goes back to his own beginnings, and he's not sure if the woman he takes from the darkness is a betrayal or a rescue... perhaps he will never find out. Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy t...

I’m an invader. I’m going to find my way through the maze town, built to confuse and protect the palace. I’m going to get into the palace. And I did it. It was too easy. But I didn’t have the sense to be afraid until it was too late… Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patron on Patreon! Patrons receive bonus stories not found here (there a...

Mia posts drawings into the Complaints Department letterbox, but so many of her conversations are one sided, it never occurs to her that perhaps someone might talk back until she starts finding drawings all over the city. Drawings almost the same as her own, except for one thing - in these new drawings, she isn't alone, isn't unseen. Slowly, she starts to feel less alone... This is the eig...

This is a sequel story to one from way back - "The Summoning". In this episode, I have some special guests to help me with the dialogue - many thanks to Carol and Megan. The girl who summoned a fire spirit and left with it for a life of adventure is back, and she's in trouble - she trapped the spirit in a bottle at the bottom of the ocean, and because her life is tied to the spirits,...

Come Rain Or Shine, The Mail Will Arrive On Time But what if it’s eaten by a bunch of piranhas while being rowed across a deadly moat to the castle mailbox? Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patron on Patreon! Patrons receive bonus stories not found here (there are many waiting for you already, and another added every four weeks), and oth...

Norah steals into the museum, intent on stealing something. Through a different window, Zebadiah does the same. They’re after an urn that might contain a blessing, or a curse – which it is depends on the answer to the question: what if you got exactly what you wanted? Who will end up with the urn? And will they receive a blessing, or a curse? Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If yo...

I found a ticket to an unusual circus and got lost in a hall of mirrors, and I didn’t like what they showed me. The ringmaster told me this was no ordinary circus – that everyone there was the act they came to see. He asked me if I liked my act and I had to say no, I didn’t like it at all. To which he replied: if you don’t like your act, change it… Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story....

Every day, just before sunrise, Chance flips a coin. The stakes are high. Heads, time continues. Tails, it’s the end of days… Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – become a podcast patron on Patreon! Patrons receive bonus stories not found here (there are many waiting for you already, and another added every four weeks), and other goodies - including my undyi...

Aleida is afraid of the jungle. The way it’s crawling with life – vines and lichens and insects and animals, all striving and pulsing and reaching. If she stands still for long enough, she’ll be eaten alive. And it wouldn’t be personal – it’d just be because she was there. Her uncle sends her into the jungle at night, searching for glowing mushrooms, and Aleida is sure there are hundreds, thousand...

Morgan loves the railway. The platform, the ticket office, the waiting room, the shining rails. The trains, running neatly to the schedule, keeping time. At the same time, Morgan hates the railway. The platform, the ticket office, the waiting room, the shining rails. The rigidity of the timetable, the neat columns of hours and minutes dictating the movements of the lumbering trains, the way his da...

The Complaints Department is back for their seventh instalment. Joseph is living the wrong life. Every day he gets up, puts on a clean white shirt and neat black trousers and goes to sit in an office, answering telephones, aching with longing for something more. He comes across the Complaints Department by accident and doesn’t believe that it’s real – he thinks it’s enough to take an action that m...

One thing Zig knows is that she can get used to anything. When Zig’s parents get divorced, she’s sent to live with her Aunt Mez where things are very different – just until the dust settles, her father says, and Zig imagines dust blanketing everything. Living with Aunt Mez, Zig finds out that she's bigger on the inside, gets a rabbit called Catastrophe and learns that there's more than one...

Joren is in the biscuit aisle, trying to decide between Mint Cream and Monte Carlo. Unbeknown to him, he’s about to walk through a door that used to lead to a fairy wood but has been rerouted to Hell, where he will meet a singularly unhelpful angel. Will he ever find his way back? Will he ever get to buy his biscuits? Listen, and find out… Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you d...

Magnus is fighting demons in the lane behind the houses. Lionel is inside, making scones. Every day, Magnus asks the same question, and though it breaks Lionel’s heart to have to give the same answer, he dreads the day that Magnus stops asking… Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – perhaps you’d like to support the podcast on Patreon? Patrons receive bonus st...

Caleb is haunted by a troubled past – lost innocence and the ghost of the man he killed. His longing to return to the youth he was before it all went wrong drives him to the Dead Letter Office, in search of a song his grandmother used to sing. There, he’s faced with a choice of five doors. Will the door he chooses lead him to what he seeks? This is a special episode, because it features the Dead L...

Summer tends the labyrinth – a gentle, ground dwelling path with one way in and one way out. The maze is a different creature – walls too high to reach, dead ends and no centre… and, of course, the Minotaur. When she finds herself trapped in the terror of the maze, will she find her way through, or will the Minotaur find her first? Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and w...

Fiona finds the Complaints Department letterbox by watching a stranger post a letter in what looks like a holy moment. Longing for a moment of her own, she pushes a hastily written complaint through the flap. She doesn’t get her holy moment, but what she does get is Silas, bent on being “benevolently confusing” – and she finds a different way of looking at herself and at the world. Thanks for list...

Lefindra is named for a flower that doesn’t exist. She’s bored, restless, itching for a change she can’t define. So when Maxent tricks her onto a stolen yacht in search of a fruit that will grant his heart’s desire, what else is she to say but ‘yes’? Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the story. If you do, and want more – perhaps you’d like to support the podcast on Patreon? Patrons receive bo...

Locke is regretting his decision to accept the invitation of a stranger before he’s even left his house. He’s regretting it more when he’s pushed through a wall by two large men, into the darkness beyond. Locke has met the Surrealists, and he only has one real choice, but will he take it, and surrender to the evening and the chaotic characters he meets? Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy the s...

Menny is standing on a rooftop in the rain, irritated by everything. He’s waiting for the sun to come out so he can paint the rainbow across the sky. But Menny is colourblind and the rain has washed the ‘this way up’ arrow from the lid of his tin of rainbow paint and if he gets it wrong, he’ll be out of a job… can he trust the leprechaun who leaves the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow to help...