Afraid of the Light is an anthology of short stories from some amazing crime writers and it’s published today. Proceeds are going to the Samaritans, a charity needed now more than ever. So to give you a taste of what to expect, I have excerpts from two of the stories – Drowning in Debt by Heather Critchlow and Frantic by Clare Empson. The full list of authors and stories are:

Are you Listening? – Adam Southward

Daddy Dearest – Dominic Nolan

Deathbed, Beth Dead – Elle Croft

Loveable Alan Atcliffe – S R Masters

Sleep Time – Phoebe Morgan

Coming Home – N J Mackay

Sausage Fingers – Victoria Selman

Just a Game – Rachael Blok

Drowning in Debt – Heather Critchlow

To Evil or Not to Evil – Jo Furniss

Sheep’s Clothing – Robert Scragg

Frantic – Clare Empson

Planting Nan – James Delargy

Shadow – Kate Simants

 

The Excerpts

Drowning in Debt by Heather Critchlow

They were expecting a lot—that a handful of days could fix a crisis formed over a decade, but the trip was ‘make or break’. They both knew that. As they stepped off the plane into the tense heat of a Bolivian summer, Lucy allowed herself to believe that it would work.

The rainforest spilled over the distant edge of the runway, threatening to reclaim the slice of tarmac slashed into its miles of endless green. Paul planted a kiss on her shoulder and smiled down at her. The lines creased into his forehead would take longer to release than this trip, but she thought she saw a glimpse of the careless beach bum of their student days. The maverick she had loved before life smacked them in the face. The sight flooded her with relief. Recently it seemed all she did was annoy him.

‘Come on lovebirds, get a move on,’ Jack yelled. Their friend was already pulling plastic-wrapped kayaks and kit bags from the back of the small plane, sunglasses perched on his head like bug eyes. His hyperactivity was even more pronounced than usual: excitement spiraled around him like a vortex.

They manhandled their kit to the 4×4 that would take them to the lodge and, as she squinted against the sun’s glare, Lucy forgot the unopened piles of letters at home. Her phone was mercifully silent, roaming disabled. No creditors could reach them here. Sweat slid down her back but for once it wasn’t due to fear.

Only two weeks ago, she had crouched under the windowsill as a bailiff hammered on their front door, shouting about the execution of a warrant. He had made his way round their tiny cottage, looking for an open window to enter. She knew there wasn’t one, but her hands hadn’t stopped shaking, even hours after he’d left, when Paul came home to find her curled on the floor.

‘See?’ he’d told her, pulling her to her feet then turning his back as she reached for him. ‘We don’t have a choice. They’ll take the house if we don’t do something.’

 

 

Frantic by Clare Empson

The man in Sainsbury’s is standing just far enough away for Matthew not to notice. My husband continues to consider which bottle of wine we should choose for our Saturday night treat while the blood thrums in my ears.

‘Would you prefer white?’ Matthew asks but I am lost and I cannot reply.

‘This is a beautiful wine,’ the man says holding out an elegant bottle of vivid green glass for us to inspect.

‘Alsace?’ Matthew asks, pleased.

He loves a random stranger interaction.

‘Spanish. Albariño. Try it, you won’t be disappointed. I think your wife will like it.’

I look away, scorched, but not before I am physically weakened as if sped through a vortex of age.

‘Nice guy,’ Matthew says conversationally as we leave the store.

And he holds my hand all the way home as if this Saturday evening is the same as all those that have gone before.

Is love the same for everyone, contentment and dependency layered upon each other like a warning?  I am nothing without Matthew, nothing I want to be anyway. It scares me sometimes. We met at university amidst the blur of Nineties rave when the world was briefly transformed. All around us people discarded their inheritance of shame and caution and threw themselves lemming-like at the pleasure abyss. They listened to their bodies when they danced and hugged whomever they chose. Kissing and sweating and grinding and moving, always moving for it was impossible to stop. And there right at the edges of this fearless new world, Matthew and I recognised each other.

He was reading History, not just for his degree, but for life. His bedroom was full of dusty old texts but he could conjure magic from them, projecting us into a forgotten universe as we toured the places he loved. Sir John Soane’s Museum for its oddest exhibits, an elephant’s tooth, I remember, and a human skull. A wood panelled operating theatre from the eighteenth century, its surgical instruments displayed like weapons of torture. We left clubs behind and lay head to toe on his sofa talking until the first beams of morning light flickered at the windows. We dented meadows of long grass with our kissing and touching and reading. We watched skies turn crimson and then black, picking out the constellations one by one as if we were the first couple to do so. Back then, at the beginning, everything had a meaning.

We have a few rituals for our favourite night of the week. Supper on our laps, lasagne or spaghetti with meatballs, the sauce simmered pedantically until the kitchen smells like Italy. The children always choose a film for us to watch and as they’ve got older, the viewing has improved. Tonight it’s an old thriller called Frantic, a fitting title for the swirl of dread that ripples through me.

 

Wow! These both sound amazing! You can buy Afraid of the Light here.

 

The Authors

Heather Critchlow

After studying history and social science at Cambridge University, Heather spent ten years writing and editing B2B magazines, before becoming a freelance writer and media consultant. Her work has appeared in The Times and Dow Jones Financial News as well as a range of specialist titles. Heather lives in St Albans with her husband and two children. Represented by Charlotte Seymour at Andrew Nurnberg Associates, she is working on two literary crime novels.

@h_critchlow

https://www.heathercritchlow.com

 

Clare Empson

Clare Empson is the author of HIM, a dark love story, and MINE, a psychological thriller about a catastrophic reunion between a birth mother and her long-lost son.  She spent the first half of her career working on national newspapers and still freelances for The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail amongst others.

@ClareEmpson2