Tuesday 23 September 2014

Captains Stupendous

Captains Stupendous (2014)
Telos Publishing

Too Much Travel Can Flatten the Mind...

"So you want to know about the Faraway Brothers, do you? Born somewhere in Gascony, they were, in the 1880s, all three of them birthed at the same time from the same womb of the same mother. Grew up in the same household, they did too, eating the same food, reading the same books, counting the legs on the same spider because the family couldn’t afford a real clock; but later they went their separate ways. Scipio took to the sea, to ships, islands and women; Distanto took to the air, to balloons, islands and women; Neary, unluckiest of the triplets, remained on land, taking only to locomotives and stations and chastity. Many adventures they all had and often their paths crossed and sometimes they clashed and the consequences were always totally STUPENDOUS!"

Contents:

This book is a novel made up of the following three linked novellas:
The Coandă Effect * The Gargantuan Legion * The Apedog Incident

Wednesday 3 September 2014

The Lunar Tickle

The Lunar Tickle (2014)
Dog Horn Publishing


The Lives and Spacetimes of Thornton Excelsior...

“Thornton Excelsior is a man but he’s not an individual, he’s a multitude, an ensemble of avatars of himself that can exist in any place at any time. His mission is to do all possible things and most impossible ones. Give him a feather and he will tickle the moon until it laughs; give him a laugh and he will sell it in the market for a story; give him a story and he will give you a book of them. This book. A book to make full moons giggle.”

Contents:

An Inconvenient Fruit * The Maze * Hatstands on Zanzibar * The Porcelain Pig * Mad March Stylist * Tears of the Mutant Jesters *The Paradoxical Pachyderms * The Integers * The Shrug * The Longest Name * The Esplanade * The Rotten Otter * The Ducks of Hazard * Knight on a Bear Mountain * The Cheeky Monkey * The Melody Tree * The Reversed Comma * Black Ops * The Burning Ears * The Gates of Corn and Toffee * Whether the Weatherman * Note to Oneself * Said the Spook * The Notorious Unclemuncher * Read All About It * Putting Things Off * The Canapés of Wrath * The Plug * The Queue * Fossils * The Heat Death of Mr Universe * The Infringement * The Television * The Lock of Love *Sheer Lunar Sea * My Bearable Smugness

Note: the story entitled 'Tears of the Mutant Jesters' is a slightly rewritten version of a tale originally called 'The Appendix'

Tuesday 6 May 2014

Bottled Love Story

Bottled Love Story (2014)
Gloomy Seahorse Press

"Love can't be bottled but it might arrive in a bottle... Love is a game like chess but with smiles, winks, laughs and kisses for pieces... Love is a problem. Is there a solution?

Cult author Rhys Hughes answers this question and resolves all the paradoxes in his new novelette. Join the woman who has no need for romance and the sailor from another age as they simultaneously attempt to accept and avoid the designs of destiny."

Contents:

This book contains the novelette 'Bottled Love Story' and is distinctive for making extensive use of typographical tricks, unusual layouts, pictures as part of the story, etc.

Tuesday 25 February 2014

Rhysop's Fables

Rhysop's Fables (2014)
Gloomy Seahorse Press


"Tired of being given good advice in fables and parables by wise men, sages and gurus?

Why not try Rhysop's Fables instead, a set of 207 unhelpful and irresponsible fables? There are no messages here telling you how best to live your life. That kind of thing is entirely up to you! The philosophy of Rhysop's Fables is that there are no answers to life because life is not a question...

Join a cast of crows, clouds, aardvarks, snails, robots, foxes, dinosaurs, ghosts, pickle jars and many other beings and things in the great quest to fail to unravel the mysteries of existence! You won't regret it; and even if you do, you won't regret your regret!"

Contents:

Foreword * Rhysop's Fables * The Parable of the Homeless Fable * Rhysop's Return * Afterword

Wednesday 19 February 2014

The Sticky Situations of Zwicky Fingers

The Sticky Situations of Zwicky Fingers (2014)
Gloomy Seahorse Press

"Zwicky Fingers is a giant fruit bat detective who lives in the past, present and future simultaneously. He is often consulted by the police force when there are paradoxical, lateral or impossible crimes to be solved. His sticky situations are ten tricky cases, one for each finger of two hands; but hands belonging to whom? That's just one of the mysteries you may or may not encounter when you join Zwicky on this decathlon of Calvinoesque whimsies!"

Contents:

The Trail Separation * The Reverse Midas* The Tetrahedron Offensive * The Name of the Nose * The Experimenter's Chagrin * Mr Hyde and Dr Seek * This Werewolf Prefers Muesli * The Sock Camels * The Haggler of Affection * The Lap of Your Gaze

Wednesday 12 February 2014

Flash in the Pantheon

Flash in the Pantheon (2014)
Gloomy Seahorse Press

A collection of 123 flash fictions by a writer who has made his reputation as a devoted champion of the short story form. None of the stories in this book are longer than 999 words; most are under 500 words; some are less than 100. The very short story is a noble literary tradition and includes such renowned names as Kafka, Chekhov, O Henry, Frederic Brown, Daniil Kharms and Brian Aldiss among its greatest practitioners. Ranging the spectrum of the imagination and encompassing a diverse range of styles and moods including fantasy, science fiction, humour, irony, whimsy and satire, this collection is perfect for the contemporary reader in our modern busy world.

"If only I'd had Flash in the Pantheon with me when I hitchhiked through Germany in 1959! I did have Fredric Brown's Nightmares & Geezenstacks flash fictions, to which Rhys Hughes tips his hat—but half way down the Rhine I ran out of flash; and I don't mean torch battery. Many of Hughes' microstories imply much, served with wit and whimsy and word-relish, high spirits and bittersweet twists—like a candied anchovy in a shot glass of rum; and some are very punny. Hughes would have kept me going till I got to the Hofbräuhaus." - IAN WATSON

The Gloomy Seahorse

The Gloomy Seahorse (2014)
Gloomy Seahorse Press

A book of poetry by Rhys Hughes with more than seventy poems selected from the past twenty years of his writing career and divided into four approximate categories: absurdism, mystical, science fiction and lovey-dovey, followed by an afterword.

Contents:

Doughnut Go Gently * A Single Soul * My Head Fell into the Cabbage Soup * Nipple Song * Madras Guillotine * The Bones of Jones * Mothers * Ode to Auburnity She Was Peculiar in the Evenings * The Wild Hunt * Lord of Socks * Information Tongs * Madeleine is Her Own Filling Burbank with a Biryani: Bleistein with an Aloo Kofta * Ubu’s Ablutions * Autumn Ennui * Acrophobia in Acre * The Searcher * The Hungover Ruba’iyat * Iguana * Tuning in to Someone Else's Headache * The Cloudy Cider Drinker * More Loss Of Course * Ice Floes in Eden * Grandmother Time * The Damnation of Chris de Burgh * Three Augurs * Gogmagogical * Charles and Diode * Tea for Shoe * You Gave Me Cashew Nuts * The Fall of Rome * Absolutely the Last Monster to Be Boiled in a Pot at My House * Language Lesson * Gothic Looking Glass * The Gloomy Seahorse * The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Vindaloo * Monkey From a Cannon * My Eye Fell into the Bath * The Doors of Her Face * Jump * Khufu * Obtuse Angels * All Had Wide Eyes * Corkscrew * Old Mother Hubbard’s Alopecia Demands a Second-Hand Periwig * The Knight of Whatever * Witness * The Pedestrian's Complaint * Muffin Worry * My Bicycle is Really Yours * Brian the Actor * Huw Rees * The North Face of the Ego * Eyesore Isotopes * It's All Fenugreek to Me * My Girlfriend Left Me in India * Black and White * Tortillas on Sugarloaf * My Foot Walked Off Without Me * Dogdays * Uncommon Prayer * Highly-Strung Women * Snoutferatu * Mutant Fair * I Froth a Lot * Consuming Passion * The Certainty That the Plane is Going to Crash * Sunflower * The Avant-Gardener * My Thumb Has Stuck Fast in Your Ship * The Compass of Digestion * The Vikings are Invading my House * I Can Walk Faster Than a Bicycle * A Girl Like a Doric Column * Hydra Eyebrows * Sensible Ode to an Absurd Moon * Afterword