Daughters of Lilith

Lilith copyright  Shane Coppage

Lilith, for those who don't know, is a mythical figure from... well, just about everywhere.  The legends start with her in the Garden of Eden, where she was Adam's first wife.  She was made from the earth, like him, and although she was his partner - she bore him children - she refused to submit to his authority.  She argued that they were made from the same source, the same earth, and therefore they were equals.


Angry, Adam rejected her, and asked for another mate.  God then fashioned Eve from Adam's side ('rib' is a contentious translation) and bade Eve to be Adam's help mate, not his equal.


Lilith went off, in a high temper.  Or was banished: depends which text you read, and how you read it.  Her children were named illegitimate, fae, vampires, or demons; those of the shadows.  Lilith is often depicted as a temptress, a sly person, a poisonous woman.  As opposed to the woman who said 'No' to being told to what to do by her rightful master, the man.


Lilith, despised, slandered, seen as evil... represents in many of the myths and legends all the things women are not supposed to be.  Unlike Eve, whose problem was her very femaleness, her weakness, Lilith is a pain in the butt for being strong.  Eve gets sucked in by the serpent, to eat the apple.  And further, she could persuade Adam to it it also.  In some depictions, the serpent that tempted Eve is actually Lilith, removing all sin from male responsibility in the first place.  The serpent that tempts the weak woman, is in fact, the stronger woman.  Sin, falling from the grace of God, is woman's fault, no matter how you view either Lilith, or Eve.  So women must carry the burden on that original sin (the pain of child birth is often quoted as Eve's punishment for her weakness.)

The Serpent Lilith Tempts Eve (Sistine Chapel)

Eve is weak.  Like Pandora, it's giving into temptation that causes misery and pain to escape the box.  Lilith, however, is active: strong, powerful, treacherous.  Lilith is a protagonist.  She makes things happen.  Lilith's will, her agency, was the problem to start with.


So we have a wonderful dichotomy.  If you are a strong and rebellious women, you're a baddy.  If you are a true helpmate to the male, your 'lack' makes you weak and susceptible to persuasion to badness.  It's no accident that the eating of the apple allowed the children of god in the garden of Eden to notice they were naked (and thus make them cover up their 'shame').  Knowledge, is sinful.  Innocence, is ignorance and obedience.


I've been thinking a lot, lately, about being a woman, and a writer of horror.  Of how people still say things like "Gosh, how can you write horror, you're a woman?"  As if the dark, the darkness, the shadows, are only a male affair.  Despite the best attempts of our famous writers with vaginas, who have written horror in the past.  Despite the supposed march forward of equality.  There are still those who think that writers with vaginas should only write romance, erotica, children's novels, cook books and knitting patterns.  Apart from how annoying that must be if you are a writer with a vagina who writes romances, cookery books and knitting patterns (Hi Kathleen!), there is also the rather one sided view of such things.  It's not as is writers with a penis don't write such things.  Romance, erotica, cook books and knitting books are all written by men.   No one tells Gordon Ramsey he's less of a man, for writing cook books.


But women are still questioned about being writers of horror.  As if writers with vaginas should somehow conform to the Eve image: the helpmate, the other side, pulled from man, and only work on the touchy feely, 'female' side of life.  I don't conform to the Eve image.  I'm more of a Lilith person.  I write about shadows and darkness.  Both as a writer, a human being, and as a creator of female characters, I'm a Daughter of Lilith.


I have no problem with Eve, and her daughters.  I know women who do believe their role is to complete the male partnership in their life, and create a whole unit of family from which to move on, raise children, grow a world, under a Godly life style.  I have no truck with that.  Just like I have no truck with women who wear the veil to show their belief in God.  I just have truck with people - men or women - who insist that women are the helpmate, who require submission, and who think they can legislate woman's bodies and sexuality as being public property.  I am perfectly happy for women to choose to be helpmates, and to fulfill their roles as Daughters of Eve.

Lilith

As long as I get to say 'No'.


As long as I get to say "That's not me."


As long as I get to be a Daughter of Lilith, and we get rid of all the nonsense about being a writer of women who say no, as being somehow not female.


Lots of women in fiction will pretend to be Daughters of Lilith.  They'll even think they are a Daughter of Lilith!  They spend a lot of time in the narrative saying 'no' 'no' 'no' 'no' but at the end of the tale, she falls into the arms of her lover, her protector, knowing she's safe forever.  If she fights through the narrative with her perky breasts and flawless skin, only to find her self in loving arms at the end, safe in the knowledge that her turmoil is over and she has finally found peace and safety... she's a Daughter of Eve.


If she's wondering how long the idyll will last, before life breaks back in and she has to get up and do something, she's a Daughter of Lilith.  


And she doesn't need to be in horror.  She can be in the romance, in the child's book, in the chick lit book.  I'd argue that Hermione is a Daughter of Lilith, as is J.K Rowling.  Although being a horror writer, I'm really interested in seeing other writers or horror, discuss their female characters in this Lilith paradigm I'm setting out here.


Characters can also be a little bit of both, of course.  Both Lilith and Eve.  Real people are that complex, so characters can be too.  But are the writers Daughters of Lilith?  Is Anne Rice?  (I'd say yes, based on Gabrielle, Lestat's mother, who simply goes feral.)  Is Bella?  I have no idea, as I've not read the books, but from the memes I've seen, she is perceived by some as a Daughter of Eve, happily giving up her all to her hero.  Is she?

Hecate

It's a tricky business, being a powerful woman in a narrative.  Particularly in terms of being sexual, as opposed to sexy.  The Lilith myth has become a short hand for the Dark Women who is very naughty and sleeps around a lot.  Dangerous sex, but sex for the taking.  The dark power is part of her sexuality.  A sexual predator who just happens to be available.  The Woman Who Said No, reduced to the woman with the poison pellet in her pocket, and who shrieks "Yes, yes, yes, do it one more time!"  but refuses to wash the dishes.

We all have to wash the dishes.   No, really.


I'm not interested in powerful women in the narrative who are heroines.  I'm interested in powerful women in the narrative who are heroes.  And who negotiate the challenges of how to be the active person, and the woman, on her own terms.  Who maintains her sense of self and identity, despite her sexuality and her physical attributes.  She may enjoy them, she may not.  But they are hers.  


I'm interested in how writers with vaginas cope with the idea that horror and crime are 'men's genres'.  And how they cope with being writers of 'women's genres'.  It's about the writing, really.


I'd also like to see how Daughters of Lilith cope with being female - having that vagina.  How motherhood can be negotiated.  How sexual feeling and need is part of their own identity, and not the major defining element of who she is in the world.  How to negotiate an 'other half' and still be herself.


And, of course, how this can be negotiated regardless of gender.  Daughters of Lilith have to negotiate how they accommodate a partner, an 'other', a lover, a life... regardless of the gender of the partner.  

How to be sexual, and not a sex toy.  How to have power, and not be a hag.  How to be sexual, have power, and agency, and not be a barbie doll with black hair and a snake tattoo or a broken down old biddy with a twitch.


So, this is an open invite, for all writers with vaginas to sumbit guest posts to this blog, on Daughters of Lilith in written fiction.


I look forward to your early reply.


Morgan


Daughters of Lilith


Female writers who write about dark female characters, strong powers, shadows, pain, women and their working through a world of struggle.  Women who strive to overcome.  Women who survive.  Women who find their sense of self, and maintain it, against the odds.


It's a stab in the dark definition, open to suggestions and corrections.


Edit:  A Daughter of Lilith is not a help mate to another person.  She retains her own agency, and requires that as an equal share, in any partnership.  Caroline Ingles in Little House on the Praire, is a Daughter of Eve.  She fully accepts and understands, and is happy with, being Charles's help mate  This does not mean she is weak, or unhappy.  Laura Ingles Wilder, argues and rescues her husband from bad decisions.  She's a Daughter of Lilith.  It does not mean she is not caring, and a good mother, or a good wife.  Just that she has a different paradigm.


A Daughter of Lilith can be any woman, in any type of fiction.  That's the point!


SUBMISSION GUIDELINES


1)  You must be a writer with a vagina.  Unless you are Joss Whedon.  If you are Joss Whedon, you can submit whatever the hell you want to. 


Crass comments about how you have a vagina in a jar on your desk, or you own your wife's, does that count, automatically negates you.


2)  Submissions under 1000 words.  Must be edited and properly spell checked.  If you leave a mistake in it, a mistake goes out.  Simples!


3)  Up to four images.


4)  You must start with a small preface about who you are, what you write, and give links to your sites.  You may mention up to three works of your own.


5)  You may write about...
             yourself as a writer
                other women as writers
                    your own characters
                        other writer's characters


You may simply pose a question, with your own thoughts, and open it up for debate.  For instance "Is Jane Eyre a Daughter of Lilith?"  


(I'd argue yes, but I can see the argument for her being a Daughter of Eve.)

Daughters of Lilith posts will go out once a week.  

First Come, First Served.

Submissions Here

Sample Sunday May 13th

Something a little different this week.  In part, this piece is in response to current parenting trends that deem a child is an unruly influence on the lives of adults, to be controlled, restricted, trained.  Most parents have done some of the things that Alma deems to be ‘perfect parenting’, I doubt any have done them all.  I hope not, at least.  In the current welter of conflicting advice on ‘how to... raise a child’ mothers in particular are stuck in an unending grind of feeling they don’t know what to do, and trying out the latest ‘advice’ to show them a pathway.  Most, however, soon find their own instincts and realise what is, or isn’t, working for them.  I took the ‘cry it out’ advice seriously and put my baby to sleep in a room of its own to ‘teach’ it to sleep.  And promptly took the baby out fifteen minutes later and never did such a thing again.  So, as I said, this story is, in part, about what’s going on the media around us, to tell us how to raise a child.

          But only in part.   The other part is the exaggerated world view of the horror writer.  And, like all writers, I lie.   I take factual happenings and twist them, meld them, blend them, and add a narrative arc: the skeleton of a storyline that has a beginning, middle, and end.  I take one small aspect and magnify it, making it larger than it could be, should be, in real life.  I also order the events to suit my pen.  Life itself is rarely so neat, so well contained, so finite.  Therefore, in some ways this story is unsatisfying, as although it ties up the loose ends and take us to a finite moment of resolution, the situation does not end.  The characters live on in their own story, finishing their lives without us.   I think the horror of the years that follow the final words, are more troubling to the mind than what is here.  I think about Alma often, and hope that her daughter makes a better escape than the one she thinks she has achieved.  I’d say ‘enjoy’, but that’s the wrong word.  Enjoy your journey then, in this story, if not the events...

Alma Mater

            ‘What is that stench, how can she make such a foul odour?’ 

            Although quiet, and polite, Alma’s husband could hear the repulsion in her tone: could hear her muscles clenching and her body turning to piano wire as she spoke.

            ‘Don’t speak like that in front of Catherine, she can hear you.’  Acutely aware of his wife’s moods, his own words were muted and light, with an attempt at humour.  He smiled down at three week old Catherine, and rubbed her belly with a light tickle.

            ‘Oh don’t do that, she doesn’t want a poo-ey hand touching her.  Haven’t you finished?’

            James had indeed finished changing the nappy.  Poor Catherine had seemed a little constipated, and had squealed and cried and turned bright red as she howled.  He’d come home from work to be greeted by the shrieks from the pram in the outer porch whilst Alma had been finishing making dinner in the kitchen.

            Alma liked dinner to be on the table in front of him as he walked in the door at 6.15.  The screeching from Catherine had been matched by the icy silence from Alma, as he entered at 5.55.  Prior to his daughter’s birth, he’d have hung around at the train station until he could walk in the door at the correct moment.  Now, his desire to hold his daughter in his arms, lift her up and cuddle her, and have that bit more time with her before she was sentenced to the bedroom at 7.15, over rode other considerations.

            Alma was furious on two counts.  One, he’d come home ‘early’ and two, dinner wasn’t nearly ready.  Catherine, it transpired, had been an absolute nightmare all day.  Crying, refusing to sleep, refusing to swallow all her bottle, and deliberately vomiting up her milk on her nice clean clothes.

            ‘Honestly James, she is just like you.  She never listens and does exactly what she wants.’  Alma had stirred the bolognaise sauce she was working on with such speed it slopped out onto the cooker.

            ‘Now look what she’s made me do!’  Alma took the saucepan off the ring and washed down the cooker top before putting it back on and continuing the frantic swirling.

            James had smiled a smile of consolation and comfort, picked up Catherine and taken her upstairs.  Twenty minutes later, with her tummy rubbed and her legs bicycled up and down, she’d finally managed to get rid of the thing that was hurting her, and had stopped crying.  James had cleaned her up and was just about to put the new nappy on, when Alma had arrived to comment on the smell, and to state that dinner was on the table.  James thanked his wife and carried Catherine back down the stairs.  He placed her in the little Moses basket his mother had given them, and watched her look around as he ate his spaghetti.

            ‘I wish you wouldn’t keep looking at her like that, she’ll get spoiled.  She has to learn she’s not the centre of the Universe.’

            James smiled and carried on eating, carried on gazing at his beloved Catherine.

*

            The shrieks were ear piercing.  James felt his nerve begin to break.  He’d been pacing the living room for over an hour, despite Alma’s promises that it wouldn’t go on for more than ten minutes.  So far he’d kept to his side of the bargain: not to interfere, not to intrude on her authority as the mother.  But the feeling of his skin searing off his body, and fear knotting up his stomach, was becoming impossible to ignore.  Every one of Catherine’s screams and wails was killing him.  He could feel his heart jumping in response.  He gave in to his instincts and went upstairs.

            Alma was sitting outside the nursery, reading her Women’s Weekly.  She’d put her chair in front of the door, barring the way.  She looked up at him as he emerged onto the landing.  Her eyes rolled and the magazine was put down with a huff.

            ‘Oh for goodness sake, James!  She’s perfectly all right!’ 

            ‘She doesn’t sound all right.’  He’d had to raise his voice to be heard above the cries.

            ‘She is warm, well fed, safe and comfortable.  I double filled her bottle to get her through the night and her nappy is dry.  There is nothing wrong with her.’

            ‘She’s lonely!’  His voice raised until it was almost matching Alma’s extortions.

            ‘She’s in a TEMPER.  You don’t propose to raise a spoilt brat, do you?’

            ‘She’s six months old, how can she be spoiled?’

            ‘Easily, with you around.  Always picking her up, cuddling her, telling her what a good girl she is.  Always rushing to her for the slightest whimper.  You’ve caused this!’

            James stared at his wife.  The schism that existed in their world had never seemed so great, so profound.

            ‘How can you bear to hear her in pain like this?’

            ‘She is not in pain.  She’s in a temper, and heaven knows, if we don’t control it now, we’ll have worse to come.’  Alma seemed not to hear the pain in James’s voice.  ‘She has to learn to sleep, and this is how she’ll do it.  Not by being mollycoddled by you.’

            Alma picked the magazine back up and purposely stared at the pages.  James had been dismissed.  Short of physically pushing her out of the chair to get to the nursery, there was nothing he could do.  He stormed back down the stairs, pulled his coat off the hook, and left.

            ‘Another night at the pub whilst I do the hard work.’ Alma spoke out loud, as if addressing the baby through the door.

            ‘Now see what you have done...’

*

            James opened the door at 6.13.  ‘I’m home!’

            Alma smiled her greeting, and her thanks, as she placed the dinner out on the table.

            ‘Smells good!’ said James, as he hung up his coat.  ‘I’ll just wash my hands.’  He ducked into the down stairs toilet that Alma had had installed under the stairs.  She was immensely pleased with this civilised addition to the house.  James would have preferred... well, quite a lot of things, actually, but it was keeping Alma happy.

            Alma was settling Catherine into the high chair, as he seated himself.  Beef Cobbler was one of his favourites: once again, Alma was showing her thanks for him giving in on the extension.

            ‘Well, how have my girls been today?’

            Frost formed in the air as Alma launched into her tirade of how trying her day had been.  James tried to tune it out, and concentrate on Catherine, who was playing with a rattle he’d bought for her, but it was difficult.

            ‘...And then she spit up all over her new bib.  I’d starched it too, when I ironed it, and she got bits in the little embroidery roses.  I’ll never get them looking that good again...’

            ‘Tut,’ said James, quietly.  He winked at Catherine.  Alma didn’t pause for breath.

            ‘... so I tried the new banana one, and she spat that out too.  I mean, what child doesn’t like mashed banana?  It took me an hour to get that jar into her.  I was exhausted by the time for her nap, and then she threw up all over her clean bedding, so I had to re-feed her and do the bed linen...’

            James spooned down his dinner, trying to juggle his attention between the women in his life.  Alma would erupt if she felt she wasn’t getting enough, or that Catherine was getting too much.  All he wanted was to beam and smile at Catherine, and talk to her in little whispers and tickle her until she started to hiccup with laughter.  He nodded and smiled at Alma enough times to keep her mollified whilst giving Catherine his secret smile and pulling faces that Alma couldn’t see.  Catherine giggled.  Alma droned on...

            ‘Claire was round, and she said little Emily never spits out her food, and every scrap is taken from the jar...and heaven knows Emily doesn’t manage to stink out the room every time she breathes...’

            Catherine dropped the rattle on the floor as she squealed in laughter. 

            ‘That’s it, that’s the third time today.’ As James had leaned down to pick up the rattle, Alma swooped up Catherine.  A sharp slap and a sharper cry rent the air, and James’s heart.

            ‘Never, never, never, do that again.’  On each ‘never’, Alma slapped the back of Catherine’s hand hard.  Catherine’s howls became screams, as Alma whisked her up the stairs.  ‘When will you learn?’

            James looked at his beef congealing into the gravy, as he heard the uproar upstairs as Catherine was stripped of her clothes, pushed and pulled into a sleep suit, and the door firmly closed on her cries.  By the time Alma came back downstairs he was in the pub.

           

*

            ‘There, who is a pretty girl, then?’  James finished buttoning Catherine’s coat and stood up to look at her.  How could she be so grown up?  She looked tiny and vulnerable in her school uniform, which like all first school uniforms was too big for her.  Catherine looked up at her Daddy with adoring eyes and smiled.

            ‘Will I do then, Daddy?’

            James laughed, and was just about to speak, when Alma came rushing into the hall.

            ‘Oh, for goodness sake, aren’t you ready yet?  We’ll be late.  Catherine, what is that bird’s nest on top of your head?  You don’t think it’s a hairstyle, do you?’  She shot James the look, the one that made it clear that Daddy was an idiot and how could he call that pigtails?  James ignored her and leaned down to try and adjust the approved school ribbons.

            ‘Oh don’t make it worse!’  Alma slapped James’s hand out of the way, pulling the ribbons off.  Cathy squealed.

            ‘Oh be quiet, I didn’t hurt you.’  She unpicked the pigtails and pulled a brush through, starting again, in double quick time.  As she twisted the first layer in deeply, pulling the hair tightly into the scalp, Cathy squealed again.  Alma slapped her bare legs with the palm of her hand.

            ‘Don’t argue back.  I’ve told you, you have to suffer for beauty, you better get used to it now.  I’m not having everyone looking down on us as your hair falls out half-way through the day.  I’ve told you, you have to finish the day as neat as you start it.  Is that clear?’

            Cathy nodded, her eyes brimming with tears.  James turned away, breathing deeply.

            ‘There, that’s much better.  Make sure the ribbons don’t come out, won’t you, sweetheart?’  Alma dropped down to Cathy’s height.

            ‘You know Mummy loves you, don’t you, darling?  I just want the best for you.’  James turned back to his look at his girls.  Tears were brimming in Alma’s eyes and her voice was choked.  James patted her on the shoulder.

            ‘She’ll do her best, won’t you, Cathy?’

            ‘There’s no ‘Cathy’ in this house, is there, Catherine...?’  Alma’s tone had returned to its usual cadence of disapproval and frustration.

            ‘No, Mummy, only a Catherine.’  Cathy sing songed back to her.

            ‘And don’t you forget that at school today.  If the girls call you Cathy, you tell them politely and nicely, that your name is CATH-ER-INE.  Is that clear?’

            ‘Yes, Mummy.’

            ‘Good girl, well then, let’s get going, we can’t be late!’

            Alma had already instructed James that he was not to get out of the car at the school gates.

            ‘None of the other fathers even turn up.  Of course, I’d need my own car to be able drop her off myself.’

            ‘We can’t afford another car and the school fees.  The uniform alone cost enough to buy you a little banger.’

            ‘A banger!  You’d let your wife drive a second hand car?  Well, that shouldn’t surprise me...’

            James had taken in a deep breath and counted to twenty.  Once, he’d only needed to count to ten.  He had wondered what would happen if he ever needed to get to thirty...

            She looked so small, and fragile, as Alma led her across the school yard to the lines of children waiting patiently.  The Nuns looked so tall in their habits, so severe.  He hated that Alma had won this battle; every instinct in him wanted him to get out the car, gather his little treasure up in his arms and take her away as quickly as he could.  With a final instruction of some sort Alma let go her hand and backed off to hover with the ring of mothers looking on anxiously.  Alma wasn’t anxious.  She beamed with pride and happiness at the sight of her Catherine in the long line of silent little girls, who looked as if they had been made from a biscuit cutter; with their identical hats, blazers, satchels and pigtails.  The Nun on the top step of the school doorway rang a large hand-bell she carried.  The lines started to move into the school, older girls first. 

            James watched as his perfect child, his little girl, his lover of cuddles and tickles, stood the longest and marched in last: the baby class.

            He gunned the car up to life.  The revving disturbed the silence that had fallen on the playground as the mothers had nodded and smiled to each other.  Alma’s eyebrows rose up and she shot him another icy gaze.  He ignored it, and when she finally got into the car, he wrecked the gears as he tried to drive off quickly.  The car shuddered and stalled.  He jabbed the pedal down and pulled the key round hard.

            ‘Careful.  You don’t want to flood the engine.’

            He remained silent as he slowly started to count to fifty.

If you want to finish this story, you'll find Alma Mater in Fragments.

Osier Publishing   Amazon UK   Amazon USA     Smashwords

Sample Sunday May 6th

This is the opening section of The Fool, an occult thriller novella in the Fragments collection.

Maryam Michael woke as she always did, in the dark.  She left her curtains open so that when she woke, the night was in the room with her.  Sometimes this meant she awoke in perfect darkness with a cloudy sky robbing all the night of light.  At other times she woke in brilliant moonlight, so bright she could see her reflection in her dressing table mirror.  This morning the shallow dark of a star-studded sky greeted her, and she rose and stared out her window, beginning her day with starlight and chanting.  Here, in the quiet of her country retreat, there was no artificial light on the horizon, nothing to interfere with the sky and her communion with it.

After so many years enclosed, she had come to love the expanse of an unfettered sky.  When she had left her cell behind, with all its quiet memories and soul devoted comforts, she had immediately relished the freedom of the sky.  For years her sky had been small, distant, dissected into squares.  A thing that she could glimpse now and then but which was out there, outwith the walls of her inner life.  Now she embraced it as an equal, although she shied from that as an analogy; how could any single, insignificant human soul be equal to the sky?

Like everything in her new life, her routine, her habit, was a mixture of old and new.  Carefully preserving the aspects that she’d found useful, adding to them new rituals and experiences that enriched who she now was.  Therefore when she finished her chanting and had rung the temple bell that hung at her window three times, she bowed to the sky and went through to her toilette.  A warm shower, the body washed and the hair cleaned through, she returned to her boudoir to dress.  Rather than the ritual of prayer that once accompanied the taking off of her night attire and its immediate replacement with her day attire, she relished the freedom to sit naked at her mirror and dance cosmetics across her skin.  The lightest of touches of moisturisers and foundation, a faint blush to the cheeks, a perfect contour of shade across her storm grey eyes, the lick of dark mascara defining her long lashes and a minute sheen of soft colour across her lip.

Her hair, as short as it ever had been, fell into perfect layers, a testament to scissors as sharp as the talent of the hairdresser that had yielded them.  It required but one comb through to settle smoothly, revealing her cheekbones in a way striking to any women of her age.  A cloistered youth had left her with excellent skin and when she had taken off her coif her shock of silver hair had been a surprise.  Then it had been unusual for a woman to go gray so completely by the time she had entered her 40s.  Now she was unusual only in that she choose not to colour it to mimic youth.  Her youth still came from inside.  She found that her age gave her a gravitas that she had sorely needed early in her life and valued tremendously now it had arrived.  It was not something she was prepared to deny or to hide.

She dressed in delicate satin and lace underwear, bespoke to her slender body, and finished with house pyjamas and a long house coat in linen.  Today would be spent in paperwork and she would appreciate the soft warmth and flow of the casual lines.  She had always enjoyed the feel of cloth as she moved and relished that she could now indulge her tastes in any fabric and colour.

Although she rarely chose colour: her pyjamas were black and her housecoat grey.  Monochrome was still a feature of her attire.  She slipped soft leather slippers on and went downstairs to the kitchen.  The aroma from the coffee maker drew her in and she poured herself a bowl.  The timer was set so that she invariably arrived just as the last few precious drops trickled into the jug.  She breathed in the warmth, holding the bowl in both hands and tip-toed over the flagstone floor, slipping into her study without waking up the Irish wolfhound that slept across the back door.  Edith, her housekeeper, would wake the behemoth when she pushed open the door in a couple of hours.  Once, Cullain would have woken the second she rose and would have been at the kitchen door whining and scratching when she came down.  Now, even the gurgling of the machine barely caused an eyelid to flutter.  He was getting old and knew he would be ignored until she’d eaten.  So he stayed asleep and she got more work done: it suited them both.

She had two reports to file for the Vatican and two articles to translate from Aramaic, both for an American university.  The Aramaic texts were proving to be difficult and she put her just awake mind to them first.  After an hour, when her forehead had begun to pound, she fetched more coffee and switched to sorting out the references.  She hated referencing her work and always had to make herself do it as she went, in order to prevent two weeks of agony at the end.  Referencing was always a time for her to consider her faults and sins; she often felt doing them was some sort of penance.

By the time Edith arrived two hours after that, bringing fresh croissants and bread, Maryam was grey with fatigue.  It was good fatigue, but her head hurt and her eyes stung.  Edith tutted at her as she called her through for a warming bowl of sweet oatmeal.  Maryam ignored the tutting, eating her portion whilst scratching the back of Cullain’s hairy ears.  Edith was not backward in coming forward with her ideas about how hard work, tiny amounts of food and very little sleep would ruin a person’s health.  Maryam, who’d found that slightly less sleep than you needed, combined with slightly less food than you needed and a good solid day’s work kept you agile and fit, ignored her.  Edith fed Cullain his breakfast as Maryam finished hers by dunking a croissant in another bowl of hot coffee: sweet indulgence was good for the body and the soul.

She changed into her outside clothes and donned her thick boots and took Cullain out for his morning tramp through the woods and hills.  It was brisk and none too warm, clouds scudded by and wind pulled at them both, but it was refreshing.  Cullain came alive on his walks and there was great pleasure in watching him enjoy the scents and intrigues of other wildlife and the undergrowth.  Her legs were aching when she returned two hours later and the aroma of the quail Edith was preparing for luncheon was delectable.  A shower, and then an hour or so of more translation before eating... and then she could spend the afternoon reading for leisure.  As she started up the stairs the phone rang.  Edith popped her head around the kitchen door as she answered and tutted.  The switch to Italian and her tone were unmistakable.  Edith returned to the kitchen, clanging pots and pans.  Madame was going on her travels again, and this lunch and the dinner she was half way through preparing would now be fed to the beast.  How on earth was she going to get her layabout son to walk Madame’s wolf dog at this time of year?

When Maryam finished the conversation, she phoned the local taxi company and requested they pick her up in thirty minutes, to drive her to Marseille.  Edith did some more banging as she packed a decent lunch for Madame.

Thirty minutes was tight, but she could make one of the afternoon’s TGVs to Lille if she hurried.  Maryam downloaded the files the Cardinal promised had been sent through, and packed up her electronics and their all important leads: laptop, phone, chargers and electricity converters for the various European voltages.  She showered the sweat off, dressed, and packed her clothing and personal items in under ten minutes.  Her work kit was always full and ready to go; Edith took the three cases outside whilst she hugged Cullain goodbye.  Cullain whimpered and look sorrowful but was asleep before she left the kitchen.  She picked up her heavy wool coat with its scarves and gloves in the pockets as she left.  The driver was eager, intent on carving a few minutes off the hour drive; the local drivers loved to compete on such runs.  Edith looked grim as Maryam waved goodbye to her and Maryam felt that grimness inside: she detested being called to work on a murder.           

Fragments

Fragments is now available to buy.


As I stated in my last blog post, if you buy direct from my publisher you will get over 5000 words of extra content free.  For Fragments, it's a piece entitled 'Show, Not Tell' and it gives you the original version of the opening of the novella in the collection - The Fool.


The Fool is occult thriller, concerning a murder in a church in London.  In the extra content, you can compare the published version on the story, with the original draft.  It's an illuminating read on how I write - how my initial drafts are stories where I tend to tell the reader what happens, and then I go back and re-work the story to add in more detail and layers, turning it into a 'show' piece - I show the reader how people reacted, not tell them.


Only Osier Publishing has the extra content.  You can click the cover of Fragment on the top right hand column here, or click here.  Osier is via Paypal.


You can also buy Fragments on ebook from Amazon and from Smashwords.


When you buy from Osier, you can choose between a kindle format, an ePub or a PDF.  You do not need a kindle or an ebook reader.


When you click to buy, you'll be asked whcih file type, then taken to paypal.


When you've paid, an email with a link will be sent to you.  When you click the link, you'll go online and the file will download onto your computer.


If you have a kindle, or an ebook reader, and you've bought either a kindle file (mobi) and an ePub file, you move that file over to your kindle/reader.


If you bought the PDF, you can read the file directly on your computer.


It couldn't be simpler.


Enjoy.

Publishing Changes & Extra Content Editions

My publisher has revamped their site, and their name.  Sarah Barnard, who puts up we me admirably, has relaunched under the title Osier Publishing.  Very cool new name, with all sorts of new growth, pagan and mystical connections that I'm very pleased to be a part of.

As part of the re-launch, Osier is now supplying kindle/ebook/PDf downloads of all its titles, directly from the site. 


So both Changeling, and Fragments, will now be available from Osier.  Fragments should be out this week.


In order to make it a really good deal, and to reflect that Osier is selling in-house books, Sarah came up with the idea of  adding Extra Content to the editions bought from Osier.


I thought it was a great idea, and from today, you can buy Changeling direct from Osier, with an extra 5000 plus word document attached.  It's called 'Un-Princing the Dark'.  It contains the first ever page written of Changeling, as well as two long section that never made it into the book.


The new pieces show an older, more traditional view of the vampire/captive dynamic.  Dreyfuss is a wee bit more Dark Prince and Joanne a wee bit more accepting of his various character tricks.  A wee bit.

When you compare these pieces with the final text, you can see how hard I had to work to take the 'Prince' out of Dreyfuss, and just leave the 'Dark'.  It does say a lot about our culture that when you put a powerful madman in front of a young woman, there is an expectation of some level of romance and 'saving' going on.  The Beauty and the Beast.  


Well, I went for pure Beast.  But the excerpts show different paths that were taken earlier on.

There will also be 5000 plus words of extra content in Fragments.  I'll tell you more about that, when we've got it up and running on Osier this week.