1 THE PROFESSIONAL DUMMY DEEP IN THE bowels of the London Palladium, Argyll Street was a corridor filled with dressing rooms. Each dressing room door had a bright gold star painted on its outside. On one particular door, the name of the act currently occupying the room was papered beneath its gold star: The Great Bentley and his Talking...
1 A HEARTLESS CRIME Aberdeen. Friday, 2nd August 2013 DARKNESS FINALLY FELL and began to cool the effects of a sweltering day as a light breeze swept down a tranquil Sunnyside Road near the University of Aberdeen. The huge grey-stoned tenements that lined one side of the street hid a ghastly secret … Two streets away, a pair of police...
1 Anthony the Ant Gets Lost THE SUN WAS dropping heavily, huge and red, at the end of a summer’s day. Anthony was an ant, and Anthony was lost, very lost indeed. “Oh dear,” moaned Anthony, “The sun is disappearing, and the stars are coming out to twinkle, and I’m lost.” Anthony stopped walking, sat on a pebble,...
PROLOGUE ONCE UPON A … Hmm? What is that missing word? In the world way, way into the future, everyone has forgotten it! For this is a fairytale from the future and not from the past—although a Fairy of the Past does come in to it! In this future where Amy Ivystone lives, thick forests, lonely mountains and roaring rivers dominate...
1 THE NEO MIRROR Anil Choudhry knew that no moving parts and a relatively flat design meant escape from poverty. His determination—his obsession—had cost him everything. So here he was, all alone in his government sponsored work-unit applying his moulding machinery to the formula and materials that should produce a near as damn it flat section of mirror, two...
1 72 FRITH STREET THERE ONCE WAS a young girl, only six years old and very short for her age. She was the smallest girl in her school, and her name was Sally Murphy. She was an only child and lived with her father Martin Murphy. On the very day she was born, her mother died. Sally always asked, “Was...
1 MAGICAL BEGINNINGS “Mum, this is the end, isn’t it?” said seven-year-old Tammy, looking with her big sad green eyes at her mother. “The end of what?” asked her mother, who also had big green eyes, but her green eyes showed no signs of sadness, in fact, quite the opposite, her big green eyes showed signs of playful excitement. “The...