Scenes of Mild Peril by David Court Book Tour and Giveaway :)
Scenes
of Mild Peril
by
David Court
Genre:
Horror
/ Sci-fi / Satire , Short Stories
Across
thirty disquieting stories, we'll encounter such tales as,
"Sovereign's Last Hurrah", featuring a team of retired
super-powered villains embarking on one last caper with their
legendary super-hero rival.
"A
Comedian Walks into a Bar", in which a hungry and ambitious
amateur learns that the fabled secret of comedy may come at too high
a cost. "83", where the interview for a dream job
becomes a nightmare, and "In Vino Veritas, In Vino Mors",
where a dying wine collector takes part in a very special tasting
session, courtesy of a very special visitor.
You'll
encounter possessed little fingers, magic swords, sanity-defying
factories, stranded astronauts, lovecraftian librarians, virulent
plagues, and pork scratchings ... all with a twist in the tale,
courtesy of the equally twisted mind of David Court.
Check
out the podcasts here!
In
Vino Veritas, In Vino Mors
To
hear him tell his tales was to be there yourself. Here was I, a being
considerably older than Albarossa, who had only seen a fraction of
the world—both known and unknown—in comparison. He spoke of
sentient fungi from different worlds (whose tubers could be distilled
into quite a reasonably flavoured spirit, apparently) in the same
breath that he’d talk about the complexity of finding and
fermenting mandrake roots (blending them with honey and molasses was
one of his trade secrets). He’d stolen fruits and herbs with
mystical powers from kings, barons, and holy men and had fought with
ghosts, ghouls, and formless things with unpronounceable names. The
evening flew by as more bottles from his exquisite collection were
opened and openly quaffed—each bottle had an origin story as
delicious and as addictive as the drink itself.
Perspective
On
a sliding scale from zero to catastrophe, this was pretty much off
the scale. On a particularly quiet day at the helm, he’d gone to
the trouble of working it out. At the end of his calculations, he had
confirmed his suspicions—nearly eighty percent of the rules and
guidelines in the Navy Spacefaring manual could be summed up in two
simple words.
Shit
happens.
Heroes and Villains … there
was almost mutual respect between us, back then. The good guys would
try not to rough us up too much before turning us in, and we villains
would always do our best to make our convoluted death traps
escapable. We villains didn’t used to kill people. It was mostly
just about stealing stuff. Today it’s hard to tell the good guys
from the bad. They’re all angst-ridden brooders clad in black or
purple with guns and knives. An old-school puzzler like me wouldn’t
have a fighting chance these days. How would it be possible to be a
decent schemer when everybody and their super-pet has access to a
dozen or more search-engines?
The
Digit That Was Death
I’ve
been thinking about it a lot recently, and I’d happily bet you a
week’s wages I could tell you the most common last words spoken by
people just before they die. All you romantics out there would love
it to be something like a muttered heartfelt “I love you,”
followed by a death rattle and the smile that provokes an “Aww.
He’s at peace now,” but I’m sure it’s not that. Do
you know what I bet the most common last words are? “Watch
this.”
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Dagon
It
was only when I was quietly mumbling the preparatory prayers and
rituals that I remembered one last item. I crossed myself, walked
over to my locker, and carefully took it from its special place on
the shelf. The lump hammer was devoid of any magical or eldritch
qualities, but the layers of blackened dried blood coating its leaden
metal sang its worth. I had nicknamed the lump hammer “Kathy”
after my ex-wife, as both were short, dull, and capable of fucking
you up.
Apply
Within
At
first, she thought it to be a trick of the light, but then realised
that the shadow itself had form and weight. A child’s hand emerged,
but as it moved into the
light she could
see each of the fat stubby fingers was a single, thin, red tendril
folded over itself. The fingers extended to their full length and
grasped at the air. The thing emerged in much the same manner,
spreading and unfolding itself to its full size. Hannah
was frozen in fear and could do nothing but watch as the whole thing
now stood in front of the door, perched on top of impossibly thin
limbs. The horror was bright red, thick indents across its surface
marking muscle—a thin thing which for all intents and purposes
looked like a child’s drawing of a stick man, albeit one with the
face of an infant. It swayed where it
stood, as though
it were acclimatising to its form. Eyes on a face of raw muscle and
sinew darted around the room as the child’s mouth opened and closed
noiselessly. It
blinked in the light for a few moments before it noticed her—two
baby blue eyes narrowed; they stared at her as the mouth opened
again. “Mama.”
Let It Cry
Try
as he might, even with a third
slug of poitÃn burning its way through his innards, Turlough Hylle
couldn’t shake the last image he’d had of those poor unfortunate
souls. The last thing he had seen as he lifted the hammer to nail the
final plank across the window were the bright blue eyes of Ciara and
her infant Bradan staring back at him. Not the pleading eyes of
somebody begging for both their lives, just the blank and tired
expression of somebody resigned to their fate. That somehow made it
that much worse.
Turlough
placed the small pottery beaker down on the table and looked around
the inn, his heart aching. There was not a person in here who had not
lost a friend or a family member in this latest visitation of the
plague, and the mood in here was a sombre one. As little as ten days
ago, the inn would have been filled with both people and
music—somebody would be playing a harp or beating on a bodhrán,
and there’d always be someone who’d had a little too much of the
strong stuff merrily singing along. Now the only music was that of a
broken voice singing a haunted and mournful lament to the dead. The
few occupants stared down at their drinks so as not to meet each
other’s gaze, and a fog of thick pipe smoke clung to the rafters
like a rain cloud.
David
Court is a short story author and novelist, whose works have appeared
in over a dozen venues including Tales to Terrify, Strangely Funny,
Fears Accomplice and The Voices Within. Whilst primarily a horror
writer, he also writes science fiction, poetry and satire.
His
writing style has been described as "Darkly cynical" and
"Quirky and highly readable" and David can't bring himself
to disagree with either of those statements.
Growing
up in the UK in the eighties, David's earliest influences were the
books of Stephen King and Clive Barker, and the films of John
Carpenter and George Romero. The first wave of Video Nasties may also
have had a profound effect on his psyche.
As
well as being a proud VIP writer for Stitched Smile Publications,
David works as a Software Developer and lives in Coventry with his
wife, three cats and an ever-growing beard. David's wife once asked
him if he'd write about how great she was. David replied that he
would, because he specialized in short fiction. Despite that, they
are still married.
Favourite
foods and music?
I’m
a keen cook - I do a Jambalaya and Lasagne to die for - but I’m
really fond of a decent curry, which, being stuck in the Midlands,
there’s no shortage of. Music wise, my tastes are pretty eclectic
- film soundtracks when I’m writing, various bits of electronica
and industrial stuff the rest of the time, but I’ll listen to
anything. I don’t believe in guilty pleasures in music - if you
like it, why feel guilty? I used to be a complete musical snob but
think I’ve grown out of that. Life’s too short – if you like
it, don’t feel guilty.
What
makes you laugh or cry?
Comedy-wise,
I’m a real fan of dark humour, so League of Gentlemen and Rick &
Morty are right up my street. Classic British Comedy is also my
weakness. Crying? I seem to blub at the drop of a hat but the two
things guaranteed to get me bawling like an infant are (a) The very
end of Silent Running and (b) the bit where John William’s music
swells and the bikes take off into the air in E.T. Both reduce me to
an absolute sobbing wreck. I can’t look at a watering can or hear
Joan Baez without sniffling now.
What do
you do to unwind and relax?
I’m
a huge fan of movies, so a lot of my time – when I’m not writing
or reading – is spent watching films. As a huge geek, I’m also a
huge fan of board-games. The sort of games that take about eight
hours to play and involve way too many dice. I’m also – as my
stomach and beard will attest to – way too fond of craft beer.
Describe
yourself in 5 words or less!
Kind.
Sarcastic. Shy. Excitable. Happy. Innumerate.
When did
you first consider yourself a writer?
For
as long as I can remember, I’ve enjoyed telling stories. Once upon
a time that used to be through table-top roleplaying – I’d invent
worlds and situations for my group to play in. I started writing a
few pieces of short fiction based around some of those characters,
but they were pretty much only for my viewing only.
A
while back, I got involved with a (sadly now defunct) online fiction
forum. One of those places where you submit your stories, and
readers and other authors get the chance to comment and provide a
critique of your work. I submitted a short horror story I’d written
(solely for fun, never intended for publication) and it went down
really well. So I wrote another story, and another – and became
somewhat addicted to the reaction.
As
writers, all we really ever crave is the adulation of our audiences,
regardless of how we package it. Buoyed by the positive responses to
my stories, it gave me the courage to submit one of them (that first
one, The
Shadow Cast by the World,
which became the lead story in my first collection) to a publisher,
and it was accepted.
I
guess it was then I thought “Yeah, I’m a writer
now”. That feeling rarely lasts though – I go meandering through
phases veering from over-confidence to horrible impostor syndrome.
But yeah, I guess I’m a writer now
Do you
have a favorite movie?
This
is a tricky one and my answer tends to vary to questions such as
this, but I always end up gravitating back to Aliens.
I’ve always said that it’s about as close to cinematic perfection
as you can get – the plot, the pacing, the acting, the SFX. And it
also does the rare thing of being an excellent sequel to an equally
excellent film. It’s a film I come back to again and again, and
it’s one of those films that if it’s ever on television, I have
to watch the whole thing again. Even though I own them all on Blu-ray
and can watch them any time I like
Depending
on my biorhythmic cycle for any particular day, feel free to replace
this answer with The
Thing, The Princess Bride, The Empire Strikes Back or
Children of Men. And
many, many more.
Which of
your novels can you imagine made into a movie?
If
Hollywood is reading, “Any of them. Any of them would make a
perfect movie, and my rates are relatively cheap. Call me.”
Honestly though, the one I’m working on at the moment – It’s
called “The High Room”, and it’s a deviation from my standard
stuff – literary fiction, as opposed to my typical genre stuff.
It’s a semi-autobiographical coming of age story set in the
Midlands, UK during the eighties and is some seriously heavy stuff.
It’d make a great gritty drama, but wouldn’t be easy viewing. I
wrote it to provide some catharsis following my mum dying, and it
evolved into something I hadn’t expected. It’d be the sort of
drama that would end with a voiceover going “If you’ve been
affected by any of the issues in this film…”
As a
writer, what would you choose as your mascot/avatar/spirit animal?
I
don’t need a spirit animal, I’ve got three actual ones who decide
to bother me every time I commit myself to writing. Three cats
(Lilith, Aslan and Twist) who only find my lap appealing when I’m
sat at my computer about to dedicate myself to a serious writing
session. Spirit animals would probably be considerably less fuss –
certainly less miaowy and scratchy. And they don’t need litter
trays emptying.
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