Liars' League

MAGIC & MAYHEM Hallowe'en Stories on Tuesday 12th October

Carve the pumpkin and bob the apples! We've picked a treat-bag of ghoulish fictional goodies to creep your flesh and chill your bones for our MAGIC & MAYHEM Hallowe'en special (click for Facebook event) on Tuesday 12th October at The Phoenix!

There are ghosts, gods, maybe-murderesses, birthday magic, Middle Ages maulings, undead D&D players & a special appearance by Buffy - plus our horrific literary quiz, & all the FREE sweets you can cram in your face. And as ever, tickets are only £5!

WINNING STORIES for MAGIC & MAYHEM

The Fear by Emma Grae, read by Lois Tucker
Mister Merlin by Sally Wild, read by Stephen Butterton
Time Gentlemen Please by Stephen Kehoe, read by Oliver Yellop
The Pumpkin and the Vampire by Hannah Hoare, read by Miranda Harrison
Set for Life by Zannier Alejandra, read by Keleigh Wolf

PLUS bonus 6th story: The Trial of Goodwife Cutler by Ken Towl, read by Silas Hawkins

VENUE, TICKETS & EVENT INFO

The show is on Tuesday 12th October. Doors open at 6.30pm for a 7.30pm start. Please book tickets online in advance (see below) - that's the best way to make sure you get a seat (and a treat ...) 

The venue is the basement bar, downstairs at:
The Phoenix pub
37 Cavendish Square,
London W1G 0PP (tube: Oxford Circus).

Access info: stairs down to the basement, no lift unfortunately.

 

Render Unto Caesar by Tom Heaton

Render Unto Caesar MP3

Read by Greg Page

The address was ‘Cobbes, Fetters Lane’, but no one on Fetters Lane had heard of ‘Cobbes’, until at last I stopped a grey-haired old dear who was being pulled along by two eager Norfolk terriers.

‘The Cobbes? The loggers?’ she said.

‘The what?’

‘They sell firewood,’ she said.

Do they now? I thought.

She sucked her lips as if thinking something over. ‘Two hundred yards that way, there’s a cattle grid. Park there, cross the field and find the track going up the hill at the end. The Cobbes’ place is on the left, but they don’t take to visitors.’

A Piece of Me by Matt Kimmich

A Piece of Me MP3

Read by Anton Thompson-McCormick

I am sitting in front of the television, on my favourite chair. It’s been an uneventful day. Now, while I am sitting there, the doorbell rings. This in itself is unusual, because I’m not expecting anyone. I get up, walk towards the door and look through the fisheye. There’s a man outside, dressed in a blue uniform, almost like a postman’s uniform. He also has that typical unconcentrated ‘postman’ look on his face, like he’s already thinking about what he’ll do once the job is done. As I said, I’m not expecting anyone, so this is a bit of a surprise.

I open the door, and he gives me a flat look.

“Mr-” He glances at the pad he’s holding and says my name.

“Yes?”

“I’m here for your thumb.”

Raising Taxes by Jennifer Rickard

Raising Taxes MP3

Read by Louisa Gummer

You're two days dead when they come and see me. They say they have to visit that early because if they're going to perform a Raising, they need to freeze the deceased as soon as possible. But it's not a coincidence that they're also visiting when the grief is still raw. It means they're more likely to get a signature, because at that point you’d agree to anything to bring the person back into your life.

They didn't have to apply that tactic to me, because I decided to sign as soon as you flat-lined. As soon as the hospital rang me and told me about your moment of inattention and that speeding car.

Number 35 by Joshua Osto

Number 35 MP3

Read by Lin Sagovsky

I’ve lived on Lonsdale Road my whole life. My brother lives across the street and three doors down, in the house that we both grew up in. When I married Harry I made sure we moved onto Lonsdale Road. It wouldn’t feel right to live anywhere else, and birds of a feather need to stick together, they say. But there’s been so much trouble these last years, to do with number thirty-seven. Then Harry let me down Christmas just gone, after the party at Devan’s, sucking on that young girl’s ear like some kind of pervert. He was drunk though, and thought it was all a laugh.

I’d thought it was all over.

A year before that they arrested Cresswell. They found all sorts in the basement, stuff that you wouldn’t want to think of. Not just bodies but bits of bodies. Some people said that they weren’t surprised; that Cresswell had one of those faces. Not like my Harry, who has the face of a naughty cherub.

“It’s because I’ve led a blameless life,” he says to me. He’s a cheeky one.

LifePlan by Liam Hogan

LifePlan MP3

Read by Carrie Cohen

It has long been a problem that has plagued actuaries, politicians and indeed, prudent individuals such as yourselves. Planning, for an uncertain future. How much should you pay into your pension not knowing how long, or indeed, if you'll ever claim it? How much should you set aside for periods of unemployment? For healthcare issues? For assisted living?

Until now, this thorniest of problems has been tackled - but far from solved - by the crudest of tools, by the bluntest of instruments: statistics. Your life expectancy and other, similar data are simply averaged. Which means that the man who dies the morning of his retirement party is subsidising the woman celebrating her 100^th birthday surrounded by friends and family and with a congratulatory message from the Queen.

October event: DEATH & TAXES Hallowe'en special, Tue 10th October

You've seen the pumpkin costumes at the checkouts, you've clocked the skull-shaped sweets in the shops ... Yes, Hallowe'en is coming - and to celebrate the terror and horror of the season, our October event theme is DEATH & TAXES (click for Facebook event).

 

Here's the podcast from the night, the videos are on YouTube and the story texts and author & actor bios lurk sinisterly here. 

 

We selected six spine-shuddering stories to chill the very marrow of your bones: whether you're a bereaved lover or an insurance hawker, a hapless (soon to be limbless) couch potato or officially dead - from rural pig-farm to suburban slaughterhouse, there was no escape from Death & Taxes! The show took place on Tuesday 10th October, starting at 7.30pm (doors open at 7pm), and as ever it was a spookily cheap £5 admission. What's to be scared of?

 

DEATH & TAXES WINNING STORIES 

The R27s by Anna Savory *NEW AUTHOR*, read by Susan Moisan
A Piece of Me by Matt Kimmich *NEW AUTHOR*, read by Anton Thompson-McCormick
LifePlan by Liam Hogan, read by Carrie Cohen
Render Unto Caesar by Tom Heaton, read by Greg Page
Raising Taxes by Jennifer Rickard, read by Louisa Gummer
Number 35 by Joshua Osto read by Lin Sagovsky

 

The night will also feature our infamous book quiz, with some seriously dark novels as prizes, inflatable bats, orange tinsel and (of course) buckets of ghoulish candy. Tickets cost £5 on the door (cash only, no advance booking) and seating is unreserved - so best to get there a bit ahead of time if you want a good table. Accessibility note: access to the basement bar is via stairs - there's no lift, alas. 

The venue is downstairs at:
The Phoenix
37 Cavendish Square 
London 
W1G 0PP

(The Phoenix is five minutes' walk from Oxford Circus tube station, which is on the Victoria, Bakerloo and Central lines). Map here.

The Dead Wives' Club by Ilora Choudhury

The Dead Wives' Club MP3

Read by Gloria Sanders

George Vandemeer Jr., one of the most successful American writer-directors of his time, with a string of blockbusters to his name— but as yet no Academy Awards— was asleep in his palatial villa in the Hollywood Hills, dreaming pleasantly about his latest conquest, when he heard the distinct sound of a gun being cocked in his ear.

“Wake up.”

He opened his eyes to see a nine-millimetre Beretta pointed at his face. A woman’s face came into focus, peering at him with a deadpan expression.

“Gaaah! What the fuck—?”

He jumped, falling back against his monogrammed satin pillows. Three other figures were gathered around his bed, shrouded in darkness. There was something distinctly menacing about them — dark, morbid, brooding. A powerful, rotten smell assaulted his senses, like dead cat.

What's For You Won't Pass You By by Simon Sylvester

What's for you won't pass you by MP3

Read by Cliff Chapman

Once I became aware of the scarecrow, I could think of nothing else. It was a few weeks after the harvest, approaching Hallowe’en, and one of the children had carved him a pumpkin for a head. I yelled at them for wasting good food, but they lied to my face and said they hadn’t done a thing, so I refused them supper. My wife argued, saying that they were good children, honest children. I replied that all people get the things that they deserve, and when she protested, I yelled at her, too, until she began to cry. I tried to comfort her, but she shrugged off my arm. I glanced up and glimpsed the pumpkin face at the edge of the field. The leering, jeering, moonface scarecrow watched me through the window. He’d seen it all. I marched outside, snatched the pumpkin from the pole, and tossed it into the corn stubble.

Next morning, the head was back on the stick. Some vermin had nibbled at the pumpkin overnight, so his smile was a little wider, his eyes withered in the corners. He was even more mocking than before. I simmered at the defiance, but — if it meant that much to the children — then so be it. I swallowed it down and set about my work in the fields.

First Date by Matthew Robinson

First Date MP3

Read by Clareine Cronin

            “You must be the embalmer,” she says.

            “You must be the gravedigger,” he says. “It’s nice to finally meet you.” They sit under a bare yellow bulb, knees near touching. She notices the care he puts into dressing his salad, his manipulation of knife and fork — how his hands turn leaves. He admires her spooning of soup — working across the bowl until empty. The economy of it.

            “Supposing this date goes well,” he says, “what happens next?”

            “That’s easy,” she says, “we decide where to live.”

            “Well I do have the mortuary, lots of bedrooms, steady income, but there is nothing better than the outdoors to grow a family. Perhaps your boneyard would be best.”

Hefted by Gary Evans

Spring? Doesn't feel like spring. These fields are colder now than they were in winter. 

Hands all swollen, fingers fat and red.

Unless I just wasn't feeling the cold this much in winter.

Don't think about the cold. Work quickly, carefully mind. Don't hack at it. Let the knife do the work and don't think about the cold.

I pin the lamb down flat on its back, legs in the air. Around all four legs I knife circles skindeep.

I pinch the skin under the lamb's throat and stab into it, making sure I don't hit any veins and squirt blood everywhere like I did last time. I glide the knife through the skin covering the lamb's little belly all the way from throat to arse.

Baggage by Sophie Bloom

Baggage MP3

Read by Susan Moisan

With hindsight, I can’t believe I agreed to cook Steve a romantic dinner – his first encounter with my cooking, and my flat – on Hallowe’en night: it really was begging for trouble. I suppose I didn’t want to spoil it. We’d only been seeing each other a few weeks, and after a chain of disastrous relationships with sticky ends, I was starting to feel optimistic about Steve.

Advantage #1: Steve was a fireman – which, sizzling calendars aside, meant he worked funny hours too, and didn’t mind meeting on midweek daytimes or at midnight after a late shift. Plus, the way I cooked, I might need his firefighting skills in the kitchen.

Advantage #2: he was into me, but not too much. He didn’t surreptitiously sniff my hair or hoard my nail-clippings, and so far I hadn’t discovered a shrine in his toilet.

I am a Worm by George Huntington

Read by Tim Larkfield

It is the warm spot, where I am nestled. The cranny between the palate and cribiform plate. I occupy the pleasant moist section close to your brain. The warm air filtering through is delectable, maybe you’ve felt me wriggle from time to time. The sensation is utterly delightful, I must say. I love what you’ve done with the place and I really couldn’t ask for more. I do live a very peaceful life, you’ll be glad to hear.

Your nasal cavity is my lodging. I sure am sorry to trouble you with all of this. I do hope that I didn’t remove too many hairs, though they did tickle me so. Still, they’ve often provided a firm anchor for my pedipalps to latch onto. Usually it was when you blew your nose. Such a distasteful practice. Honestly, it causes me great inconvenience. I’ve noticed that as I’ve grown bigger you’ve been doing that more often. Is it my antenna that makes you itch?

Flesh & Bone for Hallowe'en, Tuesday 11th October

Whew! The bodycount in the Flesh & Bone submissions pile was impressive (or perhaps alarming) - one of our biggest themes in recent months. Nevertheless our fearless judges hacked their way through a ton of gore to emerge, bloody but unbowed, brandishing the following winning stories in their dripping hands ...

FLESH & BONE STORIES
(click title for Facebook event)

First Date by Matthew Robinson NEW AUTHOR read by Clareine Cronin

The Dead Wives' Club by Ilora Choudhury NEW AUTHOR read by Gloria Sanders

Hefted by Gary Evans NEW AUTHOR read by Alex Mann

Baggage by Sophie Bloom NEW AUTHOR read by Susan Moisan

I Am A Worm by George "Aitch" Huntington NEW AUTHOR read by Tim Larkfield

What's for You Won't Pass You By by Simon Sylvester read by Cliff Chapman

 

This Hallowe'en month we're serving up plenty of fresh meat in the form of authors brand new to Liars' League, as well as embalmers and gravediggers in love, vengeful Hollywood wives, worms, livestock, bodyswaps, zombies, ghosts, revenants, and (naturally) loads of spooky sweets! We will also have a terrifying array of brand new horror and thriller books to win in our infamous interval literary quiz. 

Doors open at 7pm for a 7.30 start and it's just £5/your immortal soul on the door (cash only).We usually finish around 9.30 and stick around for a drink after. Seating is first come first served - so it's an idea to get there a bit ahead of time if you want a good table - but if you have a party of five or more you can reserve a table by calling 07808 939535. 

The venue is downstairs at:
The Phoenix
37 Cavendish Square
London
W1G 0PP

(The Phoenix is five minutes' walk from Oxford Circus tube station, which is on the Victoria, Bakerloo and Central lines). Map here

Mother's Milk by J.A. Hopper

Mother's Milk MP3

Read by Elizabeth Bower

Everybody said the first baby was the hardest. All the books told you what to expect, then completely undermined that by saying every baby was different and that really, nobody knew what to expect. Her friends' experiences with their own kids had ranged from the nightmarish to the transcendental – but in all Jo's NCT classes, breastfeeding coffee mornings (not that you were really supposed to drink it) and furtive internet searches, she'd never come across anything like this.

 

Beasts of London by Dan Coxon

Beasts of London MP3

Read by Lionel Laurent

Niall doesn’t mean to forget the milk. Nobody means to forget anything. But he tells himself to check the fridge before the moon comes again, and he doesn’t do that. He forgets, and now there’s no milk. No biscuits either. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

He runs through a quick inventory as he stands at the door. Cycle helmet, shoulder bag, claw hammer. Child’s cricket bat, unmarked, with five six-inch nails splitting the willow.

 

The Magic Slate by Pat Black

The Magic Slate MP3

Read by Lois Tucker

Terri tied back her hair, and slid a heavy jacket on over the top of her scruffies. It was time to trail Ben down to the corner shop. This was how a wet Wednesday went during the school holidays when Terri needed cigarettes.

The boy didn’t want to go, wriggling while Terri fitted his wellies, truculent as a puppy straining at the leash. In the shop itself – only a matter of yards away, but an epic journey on days like this – Ben drifted over to the stand featuring the cheapo toys, bizarre plastic confections in garish blue, orange and neon pink.

 

 

Locked In by Liam Hogan

Read by Carrie Cohen

I suppose you could call what I have: ‘Locked-In syndrome.’ I’d ask a doctor, a neurosurgeon perhaps, if I could, which I can’t, and if they weren’t in such short supply.

It’s always the way with epidemics. Medical staff get hit hardest. First responders as well: the Police and the paramedics, and then the Army, and finally anyone stupid enough to volunteer.

Ahh... that’d be me. Won’t be doing that again.

 

 

Kalimantan by Lisa Beyt

Read by Nicky Diss

They followed Tenabi through the rainforest for eight days before they glimpsed the first mountain. The flesh on their feet remained raw and their faces were striped with earth and perspiration. They carried as much as they could manage, their belongings trailing behind them like the tail-end of a runaway kite.

After the third day, the echo of foreign voices gave way to the song of the cicadae. In the newfound quiet, the children vocalised their losses without restraint. It would take time before they would learn why the adults did not look back.

 

 

The Hotel Entrance by Brindley Hallam Dennis

Read by Silas Hawkins

I don't believe in ghosts, I said.

So how do you explain it? He raised a quizzical eyebrow.

The fact is, whatever you don't understand, because you aren't in possession of all the facts, seems like magic, or the supernatural, I told him.

 

 

Signs & Omens (for Hallowe'en!) Tuesday 13th October

BOO!

It's that time of year again, when ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night ooze from under the bed and down to the Phoenix's subterranean bar for our pre-Hallowe'en SIGNS & OMENS event on Tuesday 13th October. We've got a truly fiendish line-up for you this month, with zombies and werewolves and haunted hotels, monsters and cannibal vampires, oh my! And here they are:

 

SIGNS & OMENS WINNING STORIES

Kalimantan by Lisa Beyt *NEW AUTHOR*, read by Nicky Diss

Mother's Milk by J. A. Hopper *NEW AUTHOR*, read by Liz Bower

Beasts of London by Dan Coxon *NEW AUTHOR*, read by Lionel Laurent *NEW ACTOR*

The Magic Slate by Pat Black, read by Lois Tucker

Locked In by Liam Hogan, read by Carrie Cohen

The Hotel Entrance by Brindley Hallam Dennis, read by Silas Hawkins

 

Doors open at 7pm, we kick off at 7.30 and tickets are £5 on the door (venue details below). As is traditional, the night will also feature scary sweeties, the terrifyingly tough interval quiz, and an unholy trinity of dark and sinister books to be won. See you there - if you dare ...

 

WHERE & WHEN?

Signs & Omens for Hallowe'en

Tuesday 13th October at 7.30pm, £5 on the door.

Venue: Downstairs at The Phoenix

37 Cavendish Square
London W1G 0PP
www.phoenixcavendishsquare.co.uk