Recommendation: Cottingley by Alison Littlewood

"Dear Sir Arthur Conan Doyle..."

So begins this new novella from Alison Littlewood, the second in the 2017 NewCon press horror range. And it makes a nice contrast with the first, Case Of The Bedevilled Poet by Simon Clark. Clark's novella played with the fictionality of Sherlock Holmes; Alison Littlewood's Cottingley offers a fictionlised version of Holmes's creator.

Doyle himself does not appear onstage in this story, but it is based around a well-known chapter in his life, that of the Cottingley fairies. Famously, Doyle was taken in by these fakes, but in Littlewood's novella fairies are real; but they aren't as innocent as those in the famous photos. Instead, this tale explores the darker side of fairie lore. Littlewood's fairies don't seem evil or good so much as alien and other: beings that might entrance or harm us for their own unfathomable motives.

The story is told in the form of letters written by a Thomas Fairclough, a resident of Cottingley, who lives with his daughter in law and grandchild (his son having perished in WW1). They encounter shinning beings near the local brook, and despite the beauty of what they encounter even here there's traces of the unease to come. An unease only heightened when Fairclough returns home with the dead body of one of the creatures for reasons (he says) of science. Despite the story being related entirely via Fairclough's letters to Doyle and his associate Mr. Gardner (we never get to read their replies) we see both the good side of his character and his foibles—a certain vanity, perhaps, in his being the one to discover of the fairies, and a desire for the respect of great men like Conan Doyle. But Fairclough is a brave man, too, and it isn't long before he is put to the test...

It will be no surprise to long time readers of this blog how much I like Littlewood's fiction, and Cottingley is no exception. It expertly evokes both its setting and the characters' emotional lives; it's impeccably paced, perfectly structured, and a genuine page-turner. I devoured it in one sitting. Make sure you pick up a copy.

(UK | US)

Recommendation: Case Of The Bedevilled Poet by Simon Clark

Case Of The Bedevilled Poet is the first in a new line of horror novellas from NewCon Press. It tells the story of Jack Cofton, a poet in London during the Blitz who, in a compelling opening scene, narrowly escapes death from a Nazi bomb.

But after this escape, Crofton's life becomes decidedly strange: an off-duty soldier insults and attacks him, and complete strangers all start repeating the same words to him: "And suffer you shall before you die." London suddenly seems filled with a sense of threat and violence which, while ambiguous, is directed towards Crofton. Seeking shelter in a pub, he encounters two old men who, preposterously, claim to be the real Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. Crofton doesn't believe them of course, but he's in no position to turn down their aid...

As the above makes clear, there's a lot of plates set spinning in this story, and if the author was less talented all we'd have would be a load of smashed crockery. Fortunately, Simon Clark is too accomplished for that to happen, in part because the setting of London under siege by the Luftwaffe is so convincingly realised, both in terms of the concrete details and the depiction of the British public under fire. The characters of 'Holmes' and 'Watson' are also well done; a potentially absurd scenario actually becomes the source of pathos as the story progresses.

On one level, Case Of The Bedevilled Poet is a fast-paced, plot-driven tale, racing along with the same narrative verve as the Sherlock Holmes stories themselves. But at the same time there's weighty thematic concerns raised, in particular the idea that the 'death drive' (based on Freud's theories of a universal urge towards self-destruction) is behind both the violence directed towards Crofton and the world-wide conflagration of WW2 as a whole.

Overall, Case Of The Bedevilled Poet is an exhilerating read, and a fine start this range of NewCon Press novellas. (UK | US)