Terry had walked down a mountain for three hours, crossed a raging river in a boat with a cow, and hitched a ride to Rishikesh in a lorry driven by a very chatty man who believed in reincarnation and eye-contact, neither of which made for good road sense.
Yek. The truck stops in the blackness. Saïd doesn't need light to see the driver jump from his cab, to hear hands brush against each other then rub against his thighs. A lighter flicks, the front door of the lorry closes and Saïd is left to count.
Do. It started differently. In a truck, still, but with hope and clean clothes. Soraya was still glowing and ensconced in her new motherhood. She clutched Saiod to her breast and kept him tucked in to her jacket as the tyres hit bumps in the road. Saba and Sadaf looked from mother to father and back to each other, hidden in those private games that only twins can have with each other. A family of S-words, sad and scared and saturated with dreams of a better life. The five tickets to Turkey cost forty thousand pounds, money that Grandfather Sook had saved since before the Russians came. Saïd keeps his back straight, jaw set, and counts the countries, watches the borders as they fly past.
The world stopped turning a long time ago, and no-one knows why. Whatever force, or impetus, that drives us suddenly disappeared. Whatever cosmic hand that spins the planet withdrew. It’s difficult to understand. There’s plenty about it in the ancient books, of course, but nobody reads those any more. Nobody reads much of anything any more. We barely have enough fuel to light the hospitals and the council chambers – there’s not enough to go around. We have one lamp in the house, and we only light it for one hour a day, at dinner time. There’s no light for reading. There’s no light for anything.
Like a satellite dish or a well-positioned coriander plant, I face south. The plants in the garden, which I can see below me, beyond the window-pane, flourish, as a consequence of all the sunshine they receive. On sunny days in summer it is as though I can hear the photons falling in a tumult, in a great rain, on the supplicatory leaves. To my mind’s ear the plants’ furious manufacture of energy from the raw sunlight rattles like a factory full of looms.
I am a gecko. I have a feeling, however, that I was not always a gecko.
Well, we didn't predict a riot, but we soldiered on through on Tuesday 9th, and we've got the stories to prove it!
All the stories read on Tuesday are going up now on YouTube: check http://www.youtube.com/liarsleague as we'll be uploading them over the next few days ...
There's geckos and gurus, translators in love, men on the run and a world without sun. And not a looter in sight.
STORIES CHOSEN Speaking in Tongues by Rebecca Gould *NEW AUTHOR* Ten Steps from Nangarhar by Helen Dring *NEW AUTHOR* Let There Be Light by James Smyth Fucking Hippies by Samuel Wright In the Shadow of the High Gable by Richard Smyth
And if you want an idea of the sort of high quality fiction you're in for, take a gander at July's stories and videos, below ...
Journalist Catriona Troth came along to our Twist & Turn night, reviewed it and interviewed Katy, Liam, Cliff and author/actor Carrie. See what she said in her article for WordsWithJam here.
BUY OUR AUTHORS' NEW BOOKS!
Longtime contributors Niall Boyce, Jonathan Pinnock & Richard Smyth all have books out which you'd be well advised to buy, then read, then buy for others. All genres are catered for, from novels (Niall's Veronica Britton) and short stories (Jonathan's Dot Dash) to nonfiction (Richard's Bumfodder)
KATY LIAR'S DEBUT NOVEL
Liar Katy Darby's debut novel, a Victorian drama called The Unpierced Heart (previously titled The Whores' Asylum) is now out in Penguin paperback. It's had nice reviews in The Independent on Sunday, Sunday Times & Metro (4*).
OUR INTERVIEW WITH ANNEXE MAG!
They came, they saw, they asked us a bunch of interesting questions. Interview by Nick of Annexe Magazine with Katy of LL: here
