My short story, ‘Some Girls are Bigger than Others’ was included in Paint a Vulgar Picture: Fiction Inspired by the Smiths an anthology edited by Peter Wild, published by Serpent’s Tail and available here, among other places.
A flash fiction of mine, ‘The Wrong Sort of Shoes’ was comissioned by Jo Bell for her Bugged project, and published in the Bugged anthology – available in print and digital editions here.
For National Flash Fiction Day 2012 I published a new flash – ‘Hammer’ – in the Jawbreakers anthology along with stories from Vanessa Gebbie, Tania Hershman, Ian Rankin and Ali Smith. You can order your copy here.
I’ve also had a number of stories, flash fictions and unreliable memoirs published on-line and you can read them, for free, by clicking on the links below. (Early-career stuff to follow…)
‘A Bin Bag Full Of Compost’ – published at Dogmatika Magazine
There’s a smell in the front room. They accuse each other of causing it, and carve suggestions into the soap. Dovebar says You Stink. Hannah washes her knees, wears the insult away and thinks about going missing and making him sorry. She will spend the rest of her life in Cleveleys drinking cocktails and nodding at bingo callers.
‘I Boycott American Apparel’ – published at Rainy City Stories
If you’re northern, it means you’re from Manchester, doesn’t it? I don’t correct them anymore. Which means I’m lying in an attempt to be… what would it be? Metropolitan? I don’t think I’ve ever said that word out loud before.
‘What’s so Special About Kansas?’ – a collaboration published at Beat The Dust
In an act of desperation, Ed stuck a pin in the map, but when he opened his eyes, oddly, his first thought was not how the hell was he going to get to Kansas City, but rather, who was the poor bastard he’d just stabbed to death there with his pin.
‘Boss of Me’ – published at The Pygmy Giant
Do not cut your own hair even though it is free. Take a proper packed lunch, not cold toast and left over noodles. Do not name the photocopier. Don’t have sex with anyone. Don’t get bored and colour in your fingernails with highlighter pen. Do not draw pictures of the boss on the computer and forward them to everyone. Don’t smoke. Don’t write poems on your hands. Don’t colour in your nipples with red biro. Do not masturbate in the toilets during your lunch break or otherwise.
‘My Boss Is In The Photocopier’ –published at The Pygmy Giant
All I know is that when I got to work there was something tapping behind the panel you have to take out if you want to clear a paper-jam, and the woman who answers the phone told me not to touch it. I knew it was the boss because her desk was empty.
‘My Boss is Amazing’ – published at The Pygmy Giant
I am going to follow my boss home in my car. I am going to drive past where she lives and watch her park. Then I am going to drive around the corner and park my own car somewhere secret.
‘My New House Hates Me’ – published at Lit Up Magazine
She suddenly wants to tell the woman about the kebab wrapper that blew through her door and right into the hallway that first morning. It brushed against her shoes smelling of onion and mayonnaise and when she picked it up the transparent grease stains made a picture of a foetus, curled around its own blind unblinking eye.
‘We Can’t Remember my Name’ – published at Robot Melon
You should eat more dark green foods. They’ve got iron in them. They help your red blood cells carry oxygen.
‘Take-away’ published at Gargling with Vimto
I lied to the police. That isn’t something I ever considered doing before, but it was easier than I thought. I might have blushed, I might have stuttered – but it was 4.14 in the morning, I was wearing monkey pyjamas and it would have been strange if I hadn’t.
‘I Hope You Are Wearing Your Red Coat’ – published at Robot Melon
I don’t need to have a boyfriend anyway. I can watch porn on the internet whenever I like, for free. He is not essential. I try to picture him in my mind. I can’t even be certain what colour hair he has got. I could probably identify him by smell but that is not going to be an option.
‘There is Wrapping Paper on my Skirt’ – published at the Laura Hird Showcase
I get in, pull the curtain, and sit down. My cagoule crinkles loudly. It crinkles louder as I rub my hand over my chest and lean my head against the wobbly dividing wall between my changing cubicle and the next one along. I have already made a mistake because I have come in here to try on what I was hoping would be a new pair of shoes. I realise now, too late, that this is unusual.
‘Thumb’ – published at Beat The Dust
I’m thinking about that marzipan, although it isn’t, I’ve realised, marzipan at all. It is very milky coffee, it is uncooked pasta. Horlicks. She is a very healthy colour. Horlicks. If I had thought of it earlier I could have told her about it. I could have licked my thumb and touched her skin and said you know the first time I ever saw you I thought you had skin the colour of Horlicks. I try to imagine what she would have done, what her laugh would have sounded like. Happy, or like the baby birds in the back bedroom?
‘Mars and Venus’ – published at Six Sentences
We’re arguing again: he thinks we should give ourselves up and I think we should hide the body and move to Wigan.
‘I Can’t Stand Being Disappointed’ – published at Six Sentences
It’s probably too late for me to be up drinking wine when I’ve got work tomorrow but it’s a good job I am because around midnight the letter box clicks as if something’s just been pushed through it.
‘No-one As Dope As Me’ – published at Un-Made Up
This thing that Oscar does, riding a little bike up and down bumps in the road: at first I found it attractive. The idea of it, him out in the darkening night, wheelies and what-ever-they’re called up and down near the docks, the multi-storey car park, special parks with concrete ramps where kids loiter to watch him and sometimes chat. There’s a girl he sees there a lot, Shannon, who is eleven and fat and leans over railings eating crisps and lollies made of gelatine and E-numbers.
‘Twisted’ at Un-Made Up
People should be wary of stopping to talk to strangers. Especially at night-time. Especially when tipsy. Especially blond girls in red riding coats with shoes not designed for a quick getaway.
‘Frogstools’ at Un-Made Up
There are too many of us in here behind this curtain; it catches on people’s backs and billows out. I try to take my mind away from what is happening by listening to the mother in the next cubicle tell the doctor about her three-year-old’s unexplained vaginal bleeding.
‘Flea Chic’ at Un-Made Up
He’s sounding like a victim now, saying: “When that girl who I was seeing said she wanted to have a baby I thought this woman loves me, she loves me, and it is only natural she should be having feelings like this.”
‘A Whale and A Stork at Windermere’ at Un-Made Up
There was someone else in the water near us too, someone who’d been in there for hours, a tall girl in a pink swim suit, little zip-up aqua shoes. She was bending and splashing as if no one else was there, skinny arse in the air, ankles hitting the rocks, weed sticking to white thighs, graceful like a stork.
