This week, we finally managed to install our new (not new ) item of furniture - a mid-18th Century grandfather clock. It's not bright and shiny like more modern ones, but a dark oak with a warm patina which the beeswax polish is drawing out. In order to set it up, we had to do a certain amount of research - how to hang the pendulum, where the weight went on the endless chain - and it got me thinking... where and when did certain divisions of time come from? The time periods which I have written either had household clocks or didn't, I have not written novels from the time of their invention. Clocks have been around for a long time, and the obsession with measuring time in an ordered fashion dates back to at least the ancient Sumerians. It was they who established a circular reading of time and, I imagine, the sixty seconds/minutes came about as much because it was an easy way to divide a circle as anything else. But it wasn't until much later that the precision of seconds ...
Hello and welcome to this series of blogs for #HistFicThurs!
In 2024, I made the decision that I was going to pull together a few different short stories which I have written and then put them together into a book. My hope is that this book will be released in October this year. October is not only Spooky Month, it is also my favourite month, and I can’t wait to share these stories with you to celebrate.
In the meantime, I’ve decided that each month I will introduce you to one of the stories which is in the book. They are all historical fiction, as I believe Gothic Horror is best between 1800 and 1920. Perhaps, very occasionally, my work might stray slightly away from this timeframe, but there is something about the rapid development of technology and communication during this period which makes it perfect for Gothic Horror. I always like characters receiving telegrams, or experiencing electric lights for the first time.
Furthermore, the Victorian makes for an excellent character. Be they a repressed man or a wild woman, there is something about the upbringing and society which seems to invite the supernatural. The repressed man is my favourite: he is so sure he is right, so confident because of the amount of times society has told him he is right, that he has the furthest to fall. This is something which I also explored in The Folly at Raighvan Park, which was released in 2023 and was received warmly by readers and reviewers.
There is also the practicality of where they live, as well. During Victorian times, it remained usual for a certain class of people to live in absurdly big houses, with a staff which worked tirelessly around them for very little reward. Shows like Downton Abbey have attempted to convince us that there were overlaps between the family and their servants, but I think that is simply utilising our 21st century lens. However, expect to find housekeepers, butlers, and valets in these stories: these are the roles (along with lady’s maids) where there would, at least, have been conversations between the two classes.
Many of these stories pay homage to the great Gothic tales by M. R. James. Perhaps the most terrifying story I ever heard was his Warning to the Curious. It was read to me by my eldest sister when I was about 11 or 12, and it scarred me for life. The language James used made everything seem so plausible, as though it really was a factual account. Many years later, I discovered that Seaburgh, where the story takes place, was tightly based on Aldeburgh in Suffolk, where many generations of our ancestors were born, lived, died, and are now buried in the very same churchyard as James mentions in his story. In fact, when Ginny and I visited Aldeburgh last year, we collected a couple of pebbles from the beach to take home with us, and commented sarcastically that “surely nothing bad can come from taking away a part of Aldeburgh with us!”
Anyway, this was just supposed to be an introduction to my upcoming short story collection, and the blog posts which I will be sharing every month. I hope you’ll drop by and read them, and that they whet your appetite for some scary stories once Spooky Season is upon us. If you would like an ARC for writing a review, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with me.
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