UK Ghost Story Festival 2026

Very pleased to say I'll be taking part in the UK Ghost Story Festival next year at the Quad in Derby, organised as ever by the indefatigable Alex Davis.

There's a whole host of talented writers there, including a few good writing chums of mine I'm looking forward to catching up with. I will be doing a panel and running a writing workshop on Ghost Stories & Ambiguity which you can sign up for here - but do check out the full lineup of events!

World Fantasy Con

World Fantasy Con, in Brighton, was an absolute blast. I bought a load of books, chatted with a load of talented people, took part in the NewCon Press launch for Blood In The Bricks (featuring my story 'The Call'), drank some v. expensive beers in the hotel bar, and had some of the best Chinese food I've ever had.

More importantly, as ever with these events I came back tired, but exhilarated that I'm part, in whatever small a way, of a community of such creative and friendly writers. There's always an afterglow from Fantasy Con and similar events where that positivity and enthusiasm for writing persists for a bit back into my real life and I'm spurred on to write and submit more than normal. I'm hoping to make that feeling last as long as possible this year. So here's some photos, to try and trick my brain that I'm still there...

View from the stage at NewCon Press launch.

The best Chinese food.

Brighton looking photogenic & creepy.

NewCon launch.

Did I mention the Chinese food?

Ending an evening with sophisticated literary chat drunken garbage.

A Strange Little Story...

I have a "Strange Little Story" coming soon in the substack of the same name from excellent writer and good egg David Surface. Make sure you're subscribed, if for some crazed reason you're not already: Strange Little Stories.

The story, along with a short chat between David and me, can be found here.

'The Call' in BLOOD IN THE BRICKS

 Really pleased to announce that my story, 'The Call' is part of the lineup for the forthcoming anthology Blood In The Bricks from NewCon Press, and edited by Neil Williamson. It's a book of urban folk horror, and being launched at World Fantasycon in Brighton in October. The blurb, preorder links, and the stellar lineup are below:

Tales of the city redolent with ritual and drenched in dread.

Folk Horror is primarily associated with isolated settings and weird beliefs. Traditionally the isolated setting is rural, but our cities have been around for a long time too, their histories constructed layer upon layer, their secrets long kept and buried deep. And there are other types of isolation than geographical remoteness: housing schemes and suburbs, gilded business districts and gated communities, industrial wastelands and crumbling tower blocks...

Who knows what our old bricks were made of or what lies beneath our brightly lit pavements? Who knows what superstitions have been passed down the generations and who knows what goes on behind the locked doors of the community centre?

Down Street – James Bennett
Danse Macabre – Kim Lakin
Hagstone – Tracy Fahey
Gerädert Fühlen – Steve Toase
The Inverse Nurse – Ian Whates
Open Studios – E Saxey
Escape Notice – Tim Major
Larking – Phil Sloman
When the Blood Runs Dry – Lyndsey Croal
A Tiding – Timothy J Jarvis
Our Sister of Blackthorn – Dan Coxon
One of The Rotten Ones – Matthew Hopkins
The Rope Swing – Penny Jones
A Pinch of Salt – Joanna Corrance
A Body’s Got to Have Hope – Angela Slatter
The Call – James Everington
Fulfilment – Harvey Welles & Phil Raines
Extraction – Don Redwood
Flip – Ray Cluley

Blood in the Bricks is available as a paperback, an ebook, and as a signed limited edition hardback signed by all the contributing authors.