Wisdom and Madness

By Brian Craddock

Dante Halloran and his friend Roshan are in Pakistan for a puppetry festival when they are taken to visit the Sufis of Shah Jamal, a hypnotising dance beneath the great fig trees growing from the tombs of a revered saint. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when Dante decides to partake of the festivities in the only way he knows how, and Roshan finds himself facing off against an angry mob.

This story follows years later in the footsteps of the novel Eucalyptus Goth, exploring the further adventures of its characters.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brian Craddock
• Release date: Jan 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463212646

Brian Craddock

Brian Craddock is the author of Eucalyptus Goth (Oscillate Wildly Press, 2017). The Dalziel Files (Broken Puppet Books, 2018) is his first collection of short stories, many of which were originally published in Steve Dillon's Things in the Well anthologies (Between the Tracks, Below the Stairs, Behind the Mask, Beneath the Waves).He is also published in Midian Unmade: Tales of Clive Barker’s Nightbreed (Tor Books, 2015), and Book of the Tribes: a Tribute to Clive Barker's Nightbreed (OzHorrorCon, 2013). His essay on Clive Barker appears in The Body Horror Book (Oscillate Wildly Press, 2017).Brian has also written for the puppet webseries The Hobble & Snitch Show (2015/2016), wherein he directed and performed.In the late 1990s, under the pseudonym Dakanavar, Brian Craddock wrote and illustrated eleven underground comics centred on the Goth subculture in Australia (respectively titled "Crimson: Riot Goth" at 7 issues, "Grave Company", "Caduceus", "Dead/Dead", and "Alida: The Reluctant Goth"), and contributed to several zines and small-press publications.

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© 2019 Brian Craddock

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Cover by Brian Craddock.

Ebook ISBN: 359-2-85933-609-1

‘Do not make eye-contact,’ was the last thing the puppeteers told him before they’d opened the doors, but Dante Halloran had always been something of a rebel. If he’d been warned not to jump from a cliff, he’d have been belting toward the edge before anyone could stop him.

So naturally, when he stepped out into the clouds of dust from the traffic on the street-with-no-name, a thousand treetop lightbulbs glinting in his eyes, the first thing he did was make eye-contact.

The Sufi stopped in his tracks, stooped over and regarding Dante with amusement.

From the corner of his eye, Dante could see the other puppeteers – the people who had thought it’d be a laugh to bring him here – panicking and imploring Roshan to drag him away before something terrible happened. For his part, Roshan had been filming the street, and hadn’t noticed