‘I absolutely loved this book. Powerful and poignant, VIRO packs a punch. Sad and haunting, VIRO is a new take on the zombie genre.The characters are dynamic and interesting, finding strength despite their horrifying circumstances. Jake is a character that will stick with you long after the final page. The action sequences are thrilling. I was on the edge of my seat!’
Tag: Horror Fiction
-
Voices from beyond.
Imaginary friends.
Unsettling sights.
New houses.
Dead dogs.
The scares go on and on.
Off the Radio
‘I haven’t seen this for years,’ Mum said. ‘I used to record music off the radio with it.’
We were in the attic. I didn’t know what it was. Mum saw I was confused.
‘It’s my old cassette player.’
Mum picked up something else from the tin. It was a small box with two wheels on it. There was some writing on it. Mum read it out loud.
‘Top of the Charts, May 1982.’
She showed me the player.
‘You push this button.’
A door in the top popped up.
‘You put the cassette inside.’
Mum pushed the small box into the slot. She put the lid down. There was a clear plastic window. There was also a row of buttons along the bottom. One said ‘Rec.’ Another said ‘Play.’ Mum pushed down the ‘Play’ button.’
I looked through the plastic window. The two wheels started turning. Mum was all excited. She was smiling. This made me excited too. I smiled at her. She hugged me.
‘This makes me feel like a teenager again.’
A wobbly voice came out of the recorder. It was strange and angry.
‘?eM dEbRUtsiD OuY evAH yHw .DLrOw eHT lLa 4 MrAH sI tNAw I Lla’
Share this:
-
Voices from beyond.
Imaginary friends.
Unsettling sights.
New houses.
Dead dogs.
The scares go on and on.
The Taylor Detective Agency
My name is Ellis. My friends and me are detectives. Olaf and Izzy and Windy. We are the Taylor Detective Agency. We all live on the same street and meet every day under the Waiting Tree in my garden. We do lots of detective things. These are the stories of our adventures.
It is Tuesday morning and there is no sunshine. I am sitting under the Waiting Tree waiting. We meet every morning in the summer holidays. We are a team. We work together well. That makes us better detectives. It was my Dad’s idea to form the agency to give me and him something to do. I carried the notepad and a pencil. He carried a camera and a telephone. We would walk around the streets near my house looking for clues. Once we found some pieces of pasta that must have fallen from a shopping bag. Dad said that was the Case of the Broken Spaghetti.
Another time we found a dead bird – Dad called it the Case of the Bird That Doesn’t Fly Anymore. I would write down any important details in my notebook and phone them through to Mum at home.
‘Mum, we have found a dead bird – D-E-A-D.’
I spelled out the word carefully so that she could write everything down.
‘We request permission to proceed with the investigation.’
‘Roger that,’ said Mum. ‘Permission to proceed.’
Olaf is my best friend. He lives next door and only has to climb over the garden wall to meet me under the Waiting Tree.
‘I think I saw something important today,’ he says. ‘I was looking out my window and I saw it.’
I get out my notepad and pencil.
‘Now begin at the beginning and tell me what you saw,’ I say.
‘It was Mister Birdfoot,’ says Olaf. ‘He had a big box that he put into the boot of his car.’
Mister Birdfoot lived next door to Olaf and all the kids in the street think he is a bit mad. He has bright red hair and lived alone. Mum said his wife had died recently. Just like my dad.
‘Why would Mister Birdfoot have a big box?’ asks Olaf. ‘What has he got inside it?’
I say I don’t know. Windy appears.
‘Hi Windy,’ we say. ‘Mister Birdfoot has got a big box and we are wondering what is in it.’
‘I don’t know,’ says Windy. ‘It sounds like a job for the Taylor Detective Agency.’
Windy thinks that we should sneak into Mr. Birdfoot’s house and take a look.
‘We should sneak into Mr. Birdfoot’s house and take a look.’
Olaf doesn’t like the idea of that. He thinks we might get caught.
‘I don’t like the idea of that. What if we get caught?’
‘Get caught doing what?’ asks Izzy who has just sat down next to me.
‘Sneaking into Mr. Birdfoot’s house,’ I say. ‘Olaf saw a big box and we think it is a mystery for us to solve.’
‘I hope so’ says Izzy. ‘I love us solving mysteries.’
‘I have a plan,’ says Windy. ‘We should all sit on the bench opposite Mr. Birdfoot’s house and wait to see what happens next.’
‘Follow me,’ says Olaf. ‘Don’t forget your notepad, Ellis.’
‘I have it here,’ I say, patting my small rucksack. ‘I’ve also got my pencil and a tape measure.’
‘Why a tape measure?’ asks Izzy.
‘Just in case,’ I say. ‘My dad always said you never know what you might need to know.’
It makes me happy to remember what my dad used to say. But it makes me sad that he’s not here anymore to say it.
‘I’ve got four apples,’ says Izzy. ‘One for each of us as always.’
‘I think that my bottle has some water left in it,’ says Windy. He shakes it to see. We all hear the slosh.
It was later. We had been waiting a long time. All the apples were gone. And the water. I felt a bit strange.
‘Maybe we shouldn’t be doing this.’
Olaf pointed at some bushes.
‘Would you feel better if we were hiding?’
‘Hiding,’ said Izzy. ‘I love hiding. Let’s do that.’
I looked at the bushes. They were big. It would be safe there.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Let’s hide in those bushes.’
‘We can still see Mr Birdfoot’s house,’ said Olaf, ‘but he won’t see us.’
It was more later when Mr Birdfoot finally came home. He stopped his car.
‘Ssssh!,’ said Olaf. He put his fingers to his lips.
Mr Birdfoot opened the boot of his car. He looked around. He didn’t want anyone to see him. We kept watching. I felt scared and safe together.
Mr Birdfoot got out the big box. It was really heavy. He looked around again. The box had all red stuff coming out of it. The red stuff fell on the pavement. Mr Birdfoot went inside his garage. When he came back he had a big brush and a bucket of water. He scrubbed the red stuff on the pavement until it went away.
It was the next day. Me and my friends sat under the Waiting Tree. Olaf and Izzy and Windy. We talked about Mr Birdfoot.
‘Who carries a box of red stuff around in their car?’ Olaf says.
‘I don’t know,’ said Izzy.
‘Me neither. I don’t understand.’
Windy had an idea.
‘I think this is definitely a job for the Taylor Detective Agency.’
‘Me too,’ said all of us.
Share this:
-
Hi Everybody
Ahead of publishing a new anthology of children’s horror short stories, I’m road testing some of them. Here’s the eponymous story which opens the anthology. Let me know what you think.
Thanks
The Sounding Rocks
Jake didn’t like the Sounding Rocks. He said they sounded like crumbling pain. Like when you have toothache and you can hear it as well as feel it. Like that. Like sharp jagged bits of stone all jabbing in your mind at once and all together. He called them the Sounding Rocks.
‘I don’t like the Sounding Rocks. They put bad feelings in my ears at night.’
Jake’s mum smiled. What else could she do? It was all a mum or dad could do most of the time. Jake kept talking.
‘They sound all hateful when I hear them.’
Jake’s mum loved living by the sea. It was a cottage on the beach that she loved as a kid and promised she would buy if she ever got the chance. She got the chance. So she and Jake now lived in the cottage on the beach by the sea.
‘Just think of all that fun we’ll have on the beach, Jake. Splashing and chasing and laughing and singing.’
But Jake hated the beach. It hurt his feet. There was one small patch of sand. It was normally covered by the sea. Jake only saw it occasionally. There was never the right time to play on it. The rest of the beach was stones. Jake hated the beach.
‘I never get the chance to play on the sand, Mum. Only on the stones.’
‘That’s because of the tides. I can’t control when the sand is there or not. Only the moon can do that. And gravity.’
What did Jake care about gravity? All he wanted was to leave the cottage and go back to the city where they came from.
‘We were happy in the city, Mum. We didn’t have to hear the Sounding Stones.’
‘But we heard all sorts of other nasty noises, like helicopters and sirens and car alarms.’
‘They weren’t nasty noises, Mum. They were just the sounds of the city.’
Jake’s Mum knew he missed his dad. But the cancer had been so quick. Almost just a weekend. A wonky weekend; Thursday morning until Sunday morning. A clean break felt like the best thing for everyone. Selling the house meant that she could buy the cottage and still have enough to live on until Jake was at school full-time.
‘It is only one summer and then you’ll be making new friends at school.’
‘I don’t want new friends. I want my old friends. And Dad.’
‘I know, darling. So do I.’
Mum didn’t know but Jake woke every night to check if the sand was there to play on. He could see the beach from his window. It was just over the road. Sometimes it was too dark for him to see properly. Or too cold for him to want to go outside. But one night it was just right and when Jake looked out he saw the sand shining in the moonlight. He knew he had to go outside.
Jake opened his window, grabbed his bucket and spade and climbed out. He tiptoed across the road and walked down the beach. It was late at night and the stones crunched. He thought Mum would hear him. She stayed asleep.
Jake reached the sand. He put down his bucket. He knelt beside it. He raised his spade. He was ready to dig the sand.
‘Oh no you don’t,’ said the Sounding Stones. ‘That’s our sand and you can’t play with it.’
‘Why not? It’s only on the beach.’
‘You’re not dead. Only dead people can play with the sand.’
‘But I don’t want to be dead, I just want to play with the sand.’
‘Well, you can’t,’ said the Stones.
Jake thought for a minute.
‘My dad’s dead, could he play?’
‘Of course he could. Only dead people can play with our sand.’
Jake kept thinking.
‘If my Dad was playing with the sand, could I play with him?’
‘Only if you were dead.’
The next morning Jake spoke to his mum.
‘The Sounding Rocks said I had to be dead to play with their sand. They said Dad could play with it because he was dead but I couldn’t play with him because I’m not.’
Jake’s mum was frightened.
‘When did the rocks tell you this?’
‘Last night when I asked them.’
‘Why would you ask them that?’
‘Because they said it was their sand and I couldn’t play with it.’
Jake told his mum what he had been doing. She hugged him.
‘Why didn’t you ask me to come with you?’
‘Because you were asleep.’
‘You could have woken me, Darling. You didn’t need to go to the beach on your own.’
‘I wanted you to be pleased that I was playing on the beach. I know how much it means to you.’
She hugged Jake again.
‘It does, Jake, it really does, but there’s no need to creep out in the middle of the night without waking me. I’ll come with you next time. Maybe I can speak to them.’
Jake was thoughtful.
‘I know, Mum. I’m sorry.’
It was a while before the sand was there again. This time Jake and his mum climbed out his window and crossed over the road. They tiptoed over the crunchy stones. The moon made the sand all shiny. Jake put down his bucket. He knelt down beside it. Mum knelt down too. Jake raised the spade.
‘Oh no you don’t,’ said the stones. ‘We told you before about playing with our sand.’
‘But I’m with him this time,’ said Jake’s mum. ‘Please let him dig your sand.’
The Sounding Stones were not happy.
‘We don’t mind you digging our sand but your son is not allowed. Rules are rules, after all. If everyone just did what they wanted then there would just be chaos.’
Share this:
BARNABY TAYLOR 