Simon Kurt Unsworth - The Martledge Variations

[andydecker]

Simon Kurt Unsworth - The Martledge Variations (Black Shucks Books, 2018,136 pages)

The village of Martledge has a long history, and there are ghosts. Paranormal investigator Nakata comes to town to conduct an experiment. He puts three tales of ghostly doings on the net and sits back.

The Dancers: Widower Minahane buys the piano of dead recluse Ellie Whinfell. Unfortunately it is haunted.

The Smiling Man: Old Dent is dead and buried, the townspeople thought him a bit of a lecher. Now the graveyard of St Clements is full. Too make room, the vicar and his sexton are digging old bones up and dump them into a mass-grave. Dent's ghost doesn't take this kindly and begins harassing woman.

The Meadows: Luke and Bethany visit her favourite spot at the river for some nightly fun. And encounter some ghosts.

In the bridging sequence Nakata is … thinking a lot about ghosts and things.

In the afterword, the writer reveals that the stories are based on existing myths in and around the village of Chorlton, for which Martledge is a stand in. His investigator Nakata was already featured in some of older works.


Black Shuck Shadows is a perfect way to get introduced to contemporary writers, especially the inexpensive Ebook editions. Thanks for Dem to feature them on the board.

I choose Unsworth because I seldom can resist paranormal investigators. But this is not the best introdiction of the character. There are a lot of references to earlier tales, but as the character is not doing much in this, all was a bit too vague for me.

On the whole I liked the writing more than the content. The Dancers was – for me – the best of the stories, a creepy and atmospheric tale. But a haunted piano is always a good topic. The rest didn't do much for me.

[Dr Strange]

Unsworth's Quiet Houses (2011) is a "portmanteu collection" of haunted house stories that introduced Nakata. I remember enjoying it a lot, will maybe try a re-read and post some summaries/comments here.

[dem bones]

The Black Shuck Shadows series to date

2016

1. Paul Kane - The Spirits of Christmas

The Spirits of Christmas
Humbuggered
Snowbound

2017

2. Joseph D’Lacey -Tales of New Mexico

The Gathering of Sheaves
The Vespertine

3. Thana Niveau - Unquiet Waters

To Drown the World
The Reflection
Rapture of the Deep
Where the Water Comes In

4. Paul Kane - The Life Cycle

Nightlife
Half-Life
Lifetime
Another Life

2018

5. Gary Fry- The Death of Boys

Zappers
Cat-B
The House of the Rising Son

6. Phil Sloman - Broken on the Inside

Broken on the Inside
Discomfort Food
The Man Who Fed the Foxes
There Was an Old Man
Virtually Famous

7. Simon Kurt Unsworth- The Martledge Variations

The Dancers
The Smiling Man
The Meadows

8. Simon Bestwick - Singing Back the Dark

The Psalm
Hard Time Killing Floor Blues
And All the Souls in Hell Shall Sing
Moon Going Down
Effigies of Glass

9. Andrew David Barker - Winter Freits

Polar Vortex
The House on Lidderman Street
Christopher

2019

10. Paul Kane - The Dead

Dead Time
Dead Reckoning
Dead End

11. Andrew Hook - The Forest of Dead Children

Shipwrecked in the Heart of the City
The Rhythm of Beauty
My Tormentors
The ______ of ____ ________
The Harvest

12. Gary McMahon - At Home in the Shadows

Text Found on a Defunct Webpage
The Chair
The Table
On the Walls
Open House

13. Jenny Jones - Suffer Little Children

Beneath Still Waters
The Changeling
Swansong
Swimming Out to Sea
It’s Not Just How Beautiful They Are
Waxing

14. Anna Taborska - Shadowcats

I, Cat
The Cat Sitter
Schrödinger’s Human
Bagpuss
Marked

15. Mark Howard Jones - Flowers of War

Travelling Across the City in Autumn
Landfall
The Cobwebbed Bird House
A War Unfought

2020

16. Charlotte Bond - The Watcher in the Woods

Hessian Sky
A Wolf in the House
The Wild Hunt
Teeth in the Shadows
The Watcher in the Woods

17. Kit Power - Voices

Baptism
Like a Charm
Big Dog
All Loving, All Knowing
Enemies
Pulling Teeth
The Hand

18. Tina Rath - The Adventures of Mr Polkington

Mr Polkington and the Vanishing Salesman
Mr Polkington and the Bride of Death
Mr Polkington and the Wrong Turning

19. Dan Coxon - Green Fingers

Invasive Species
By Black Snow She Wept
The Pale Men
We Live in Dirt
Green Fingers
Among the Pines

20. Sean Hogan - Three Mothers, One Father

The Devil
Bruno Legnani
Trelkovsky
Lucas Medev
Dean Corso
Justine
The Woman
Francesco Dellamorte
Elizabeth Báthory
Mater Suspiriorum
Mater Tenebrarum
Mater Lachrymarum

21. Simon Kurt Unsworth & Benjamin Kurt Unsworth - Uneasy Beginnings

Button
A Lust for Ghosts
Excision
Happy Families
Dog
Interim Report on an Incident at an Asylum
Plastic

2021

22. Aliya Whiteley - Fearsome Creatures

Day of the Dog
The Lovers That Lie Down in Fields
Luisa Opines
Wrapped
A Very Modern Monster

23. Reggie Oliver - Stages of Fear

Beside the Shrill Sea
The Copper Wig
Puss Cat
The Skins
Blind Man’s Box
Collectable

24. David A. Sutton - En Vacances

The House of Cats
Those of Rhenea
Dead Water
Tomb of the Janissaries
The Holidaymakers
The Dew Shadows

25. Simon Bestwick - Nine Ghosts

As White as Bone
The Wedding Hand
Truth and Consequences
The Suicide Chairs
Dab and Sole
And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda
A Constant Sound of Thunder
Tonight the War is Over
The Cage

26. George Sandison - Hinterlands

Offcuts
Keel
The Provenance of Objects
Anthems of Light and Leaving
Blocks
Stock Photography Metadata Talking Blues
I Got the Worm
My Throat is Not a Ladder
What the Skink Told Me
City Hounds

27. Rachel Knightley - Beyond Glass

The Other Woman, Part 1
Not the Fire, Just the Light
Wolf in the Mirror
Green Lady
Ash’s Creatures
The Other Woman, Part 2

28. Simon Avery - A Box Full of Darkness

A Box Full of Darkness
Violent Men, Lonely Men
Lost and Found
Perfidious Albion

***

[andydecker]

Thanks for listing them up.

I like the concept. It gives writers a chance to introduce themselves, even if I am not sure if the concentration on specific themes is always the best approach.

 I wonder if such books would have sold back then. Imagine a "micro-collection" of Norman P. Kaufmann or Alex White.

[dem bones]

May 14, 2022 15:56:17 GMT andydecker said:

I like the concept. It gives writers a chance to introduce themselves, even if I am not sure if the concentration on specific themes is always the best approach.

Yes, that would be my one mild criticism.

May 14, 2022 15:56:17 GMT andydecker said:

I wonder if such books would have sold back then. Imagine a "micro-collection" of Norman P. Kaufmann or Alex White.

Would love that to happen! Maybe Black Shuck could consider a retro-Shadows range?