The End - Fifteen Endings to Fifteen Paintings - edited by Ashley Stokes

Review by The Mole

The inspiration behind the short stories in this collection is the artwork of Nicolas Ruston. Fifteen different paintings were created together, all in the same medium and all with one thing in common - they all featured the words "The End". Unthank then charged fifteen authors with coming up with the stories behind those paintings.

An image of the painting appears before the start of each story and its sub title - the story's  title - is added on replacing the number the artist originally gave the piece. The book was launched at an exhibition of the paintings in Norwich earlier this month with readings from some of the authors and even wine - The End Wine - in bottles featuring the images of the paintings and quotations from the stories. Sadly it was a launch I could not attend despite being one I would have loved to.

The first story in the collection reflects on what endings are. With each painting resembling the final scene in an old black and white movie it's easy to imagine what an ending might be, but why be constrained by expectations? - step outside of it and explore other endings - and being from the stable of Unthology that's exactly what these tales do.

Each of these works is a big step away from the other fourteen in both style and content and while melancholy is frequently a major factor it is presented in so many different ways. Being an Untholoholic I expected great things of this book and was not disappointed.

I often reflect on my favourite short story in any anthology - in this case I had fifteen so we won't go into too much detail.

• Loose Ends reflects on the many kinds of ending that there can be but then the other writers add to that list.
• The Slyest of Foxes is the story of an 'incomer' to a small community with insights to share.
• If you have a heart of stone you won't be moved by Coup De Grace - it was a little too close to real for me.
• Perturbation was a style that surprised me in a good way with a story I suspected the end to but found I wasn't quite right.
• Ariel... we've all been there but perhaps don't realise it.
• Chaconne in G Minor is a story of loss that captures that emotion brilliantly.
• What Happens Next is an ironic tale of a change in life that leads to its own ending.
• Burning The Ants is a story that goes to a dark place I'd rather not go - I still loved it though.
• Harbour Lights will leave you reflecting on the depth of true love.
• Decompression Chamber... well it certainly covers endings but it's hard to say much more - another brilliant piece though.
• The Crow... a very unusual tale, a story of an end. Or is it?
• Souls... a tale of justice that will horrify and satisfy - I think.
• The Sense Of An Ending - what is going on here? What would you like to be going on here? What could be going on here?
• All The TVs In Town - a story to creep you out quite a lot and leave you checking what's on TV ...anything will do.
• Nowhere Nothing Fuck-Up... a story that will set you thinking big time.

There isn't one story that doesn't 'belong' and every one will bring something to your reading. Another brilliant idea and collection from Unthank that once again begs the question "What next?". I have seen speculation about the idea of "The End II" but it's difficult to see how it could be as great as this - but this publisher has surprised me too often in the past.

Publisher - Unthank Books
Genre - Adult short story anthology 

Contributors - AJ Ashworth, Gordon Collins, Ailsa Cox, Michael Crossan, Sarah Dobbs, Tania Hershman, Zoe Lambert, Dan Powell, Aiden O’Reilly, UV Ray, Angela Readman, David Rose, Ashley Stokes, Tim Sykes, Jonathan Taylor

Melissa by Jonathan Taylor

review by Maryom

When seven year old Melissa Comb dies in her home in Stoke on Trent, her neighbours all experience the same hallucination - at first a shrieking, headache-inducing noise, which makes them go into the street, followed by uplifting "old-fashioned" music, which spreads a mood of happiness and pride among them. For a short while, the inhabitants of the street come together, putting aside their differences and behaving as old friends. But soon the media move in, followed by scientists trying to pin down the cause of the phenomenon, then religious groups/new age believers set up a camp in the street, and this small part of Stoke becomes a destination for spiritual holiday tours. While all this is unfolding, the only family who DIDN'T hear anything, Melissa's own, are having to come to terms with their loss. Hiding behind their drawn curtains, the Comb family is slowly falling apart...

Melissa avoids the sensational, sentimental, and over-emotional traps and offers an unblinkered view  of a family trying to make sense of tragedy. So far, it's rather like Carys Bray's A Song For Issy Bradley , but whereas the Bradleys for all their differing opinions behave as a family, the Combs lack that cohesion and act as individuals, each filled with frustration, anger and grief. Melissa is definitely a darker yet quirkier read.
Having been the one most closely involved with Melissa's illness, her mother Lizzie is the one most prepared to pick life up, and start again, but another blow that comes through the media's interference almost floors her. Teenaged half-sister Serena doesn't know how to grieve; her mother is abroad, contributing only financially to Serena's life, and father Harry is lost in his own world since Melissa's death. Although they try their best, her friends just don't know how they can help her, and Serena is left to work things out alone. Harry, though, is the one who really can't cope. He just can't see how carrying on is possible but wishes that, like a piece of music, life would end; gradually he retreats into himself - from work, from communication with his family, from the world.

Melissa is a curious read -  it's told in a variety of styles (with snippets from newspapers and scientific journals), it's not as straightforward as you may like (starting with the musical phenomenon then moving back to Melissa's illness), and it only gradually seems to focus in on the real heart of the story - but its quirkiness appealed to me. Of course it's bleak - after all it's dealing with the death of a much-loved child, and the family's disintegration afterwards, but it's told with a sense of wry humour (particularly as regards the habits and 'goings-on' of the neighbours), and the 'coda' at the end leaves the reader feeling that, no matter what, life does carry on. 

Is it a book I'd say I loved? Well, it's too dark for that, but it's a quiet, slowly revealing story one I could read again and again.

Jonathan Taylor's earlier novel Entertaining Strangers didn't quite grab me when I first read it - too many ants among other things! - but I always felt it was a book worth re-reading. Having been so impressed with Melissa, it's time I did just that!

Maryom's review - 5 stars
Publisher - Salt Publishing
Genre - Adult literary fiction

Entertaining Strangers by Jonathan Taylor

review by Maryom

 "Entertaining Strangers is a tragi-comedy about the eccentric Edwin Prince – a depressive intellectual obsessed with high culture and ants – and the mysterious, homeless narrator Jules, who gradually unravels Edwin’s impossible relationships with his landlady, neurotic mother, psychotic brother, domineering ex-wife, dead grandfather and, above all, his ant-farm. At the same time, Jules continually experiences traumatic memories full of fire and water, and gradually a terrible pre-history emerges from beneath all of the other stories, which seems somehow to shape both Jules’s fiery dreams and Edwin’s obsessions – a great fire, massacre and one girl's drowning in Smyrna, 75 years earlier."

Homeless Jules accidentally stumbles into the house and life of Edwin, an eccentric high-culture buff with a fascination for ants. Living in chaos, surrounded by broken relationships, Edwin tries to find order and a perfect world in his ant colony. His family is, at best, dysfunctional; all of them scarred by his grandfather's experiences in Smyrna, 75 years earlier. Is Jules destined to save them from themselves?

From its double-edged title to the equally ambiguous narrator, Jules, Entertaining Strangers is a difficult novel to pin down and describe. If you could imagine a mash-up of  It's A Wonderful Life and Withnail and I with copious amounts of vermouth you'd perhaps be coming close. I probably wasn't the best person to read this, having a 'deaf ear', therefore no understanding of music, and a deep seated repugnance for ants - so I'm sure many subtleties either drifted past me or I shied away from. At times I was pulled in and fascinated; others not so much; but it's definitely a book I would return to. 

Maryom's review - 3.5 stars
Publisher - Salt Publishing
Genre - Adult fiction

Buy Entertaining Strangers (Salt Modern Fiction) from Amazon