Our next author in the spotlight is Rachel Fox, whose stirring tale of love and horror is featured in Hearts Asunder. Here’s an excerpt:
“Happy Valentine’s Maureen!” Bob held out a bunch of daffodils towards his wife.
Maureen shuffled the eggs in the pan and turned to look briefly at the drooping flowers.
“Put them in the sink Bob and take your shoes off, honestly look at all the mud you’ve brought in. I thought you’d be a help when you retired, not making more work for me.”
“I thought you’d like them.” He huffed as he sat down.
“Roses, Bob.”
“What?”
“You give roses for Valentine’s day.”
“I don’t like to cut my roses Maureen, you know that and anyway, they’re not ready yet, it’s only February.”
“Well, the shops manage to find them.”
Bob rolled his eyes as he opened the back door and eased his garden shoes off. He looked around the garden and smiled. Snow drops were pushing their miniature heads through the earth, nodding towards him in the breeze. Daffodils clustered around the silver birch at the end of the garden and next to them was his pride and joy, his roses. He pulled the door shut and turned back to Maureen who was watching him.
“You love that garden more than me.” She said. He didn’t argue.
This compelling author is a supernatural and horror writer who lives in London, England. After writing for her own amusement for many years she started posting her short stories on ABCTales.com, an online community of writers, and to her surprise she found that people liked them.
She recently won the AuthorTrope ‘I made the darkness’ Halloween writing contest for her short story ‘The Exchange.’ Her story ‘Crepuscular’ is featured in the ‘Grim Keepers’ Anthology which is available on Smashwords and Amazon, as is the Anthology ‘Festive Frights’ which features her short story ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning.’
Her first novel ‘The Herring Hanger’ is due for release soon.
Here’s what Ms. Fox had to say about our queries:
- Have you got a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?
To be honest not really, I can’t say it’s always been happy endings but definitely no horror stories (that I am willing to discuss!).
- What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination?
Love is such a complicated emotion and can have negative and even sinister undertones more; obsession, possession, resentment… it’s a kind of madness so it ties in nicely with horror. I also like the idea of taking something that is meant to be the ultimate expression of all things good and wonderful and turning it on its head.
- What was the source of your Valentine’s Day horror story?
I love the characters in my story ‘Roses for Valentine’s’ I think they remind me of a lot of my parents friends when I was growing up. I wanted to take a mundane situation and take to a surreal place, and highlight the perils of obsession. I’m not sure what the inspiration was, the characters came first and they told their own story, I just went with it.
To learn more about Rachel, you can visit her sites and contact her here:
Website: www.rachelfox.co.uk
Facebook: www.facebook.com/rachelfox.fictionpage
Twitter: @racheljstirling
Email: rachelfoxfiction@gmail.com