The Hook:
In the summer of 1887, my grandfather stole a clock. He trundled it out in a wheelbarrow and loaded it into a pony and trap, and off he went with a click-ity clop. A big smile stretched across his face like a chalk line drawn by a child on a blackboard, wonky and unsure.
Click-ity clop
The clock was six feet high
Click-ity clop
and the shape of a coffin.
Ishbelle Bee says:
The beginning of my book neatly sums up its entire premise – an object of great power: a sinister clock which is obsessively pursued by a variety of individuals because of what it contains. As the grandfather clock is the shape of a coffin, it is suggestive of acting as a vessel in which to place a dead body. In this case, the object inside the clock is a little girl called Mirror, locked inside by her insane grandfather. She is rescued by a policeman who becomes her supernatural guardian but they are pursued by the Lord of the Underworld assassin, John Loveheart, because he wants to eat her and absorb her powers.
The Singular and Extraordinary Tale of Mirror and Goliath is a Victorian horror fairytale set during the Jack the Ripper killings in London, Egypt and the Underworld and reveals a variety of unusual and colourful characters, including fraudulent psychics, secret cults, a photographer of the dead, a death mask collector, Jack the Ripper and bewildered Scotland Yard detectives.
It is a book about a magic, sinister clock. It is a book about the nature of time and the possibilities of manipulating and consuming it.
Buy The Singular and Extraordinary Tale of Mirror and Goliath on Amazon.
About the author:
Ishbelle Bee writes horror and loves fairy-tales, the Victorian period (especially top hats!) and cake tents at village fêtes (she believes serial killers usually opt for the Victoria Sponge). She currently lives in Edinburgh. She doesn’t own a rescue cat, but if she did his name would be Mr Pickles.
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Alex Shvartsman's Speculative Fiction 