Incesticide

By Natasha Sinclair

Did you ever hear about the clowns snatching kids from the school gates?

What about the infamous threat of Maggie Murphy?

Or the Gorbals' Vampire hysteria?

From urban and folk horror born in the belly of Scotland to outright splatter. Showcasing myth blended with horror realism and the sexually bizarre.

From one of the most vivaciously audacious and macabre minds of the modern speculative fiction scene, Sinclair's tales are guaranteed to thrill.

What readers are saying:

'Natasha Sinclair is a modern Mistress of the Macabre. Inside these pages you will find nine short tales that will shock and scare. Written in an enchanting style that Sinclair's fans have come to love. I highly recommend this one.'
—Kevin J. Kennedy, author of Halloween Land

'If you think extreme horror is just a lot of blood and gore splayed out on a page for all to see, it absolutely can be that, but it can also be beautifully poetic where the gore and pain is hidden between gorgeous sentences. You have to move the curtain a bit to peek behind it and see the extreme. I love both styles, and this was very refreshing for me as I read it at a time where I'd been reading a lot of the former style, so this was a nice change of pace.'
—Rachel Schommer, Reviewer (Gym_and_Genres)

'Sinclair steers from the derivative drivel available on the market and pulls you into the nightmare fuelled world of horror at its finest.'
—Tim Eagle, Author

'If you're into dark horror stories filled with sordid sex and soaked with gore then you're going to want to read this collection—'
—Michael, Reviewer (The Neverending TBR)

'Natasha Sinclair seduces her reader with words. Her collection of tales will pull you in, then cut you to the core.
"Incesticide" will leave you reeling and clamoring for a merciful release!
Sinclair describes unsavory characters and deviant acts in settings so rich with visceral imagery you may well imagine yourself in the bowels of her unique story "Hell," and you may want to linger for the pleasures offered in "Time for Tea."
Her writing is malicious like Clive Barker's and as erotic as Anais Nin's.
Sinclair holds no detail back, and her fluid prose floods your senses with the darkest fiction smoothly blended with an audacity that will satisfy the most discerning readers of the genre.Natasha will haunt your dreams and nightmares, and you'll be glad she does!'
—Ruthann Jagge, author of The New Girls' Patient

• Language: English
• Publisher: Clan Witch
• Release date: Dec 14, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201449421

Natasha Sinclair

From the heart of Scotland, Natasha finds inspiration to write in just about everything -- from the maddeningly mundane to the utterly horrific. With stories that provoke deep emotional reactions in readers or a twist of a viewpoint that stirs fresh thought.Natasha doesn't subscribe to boxing art off into a single genre or indeed anything in life -- art should be unapologetic in its freedom. Her own writing spans genres including - speculative, horror, psychological and erotica.She has independently published work, compiled and edited collections, and has contributed to several anthologies. Natasha supports other creatives by way of proofreading, editing, and creating promotional material via her Word Refinery services, linked on her site, ClanWitch.comOut-with writing and editing, she's an avid gig-goer, reader, vegan, home educating, nature-loving, adopter of wonky animals.

Book preview

INCESTICIDE COLLECTED HORROR

––––––––

NATASHA SINCLAIR

FOREWORD BY G G FLAVELL

Copyright © 2022 Natasha Sinclair.

Action Man and the Gypsy’s Curse © Natasha Sinclair and David Owain Hughes.

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof including all images, may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author and publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Any unauthorised use will constitute as an infringement of copyright.

https://clanwitch.com

[e-mail]

Contents are works of fiction. Names, characters, and events are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Foreword by G G Flavell.

Cover art by Natasha Sinclair.

First published 2022.

Other formats available.

ISBN: 9-798-2014-4942-1

ISBN: 9-798-4326-8122-5

ISBN: 9-798-4341-9170-8

ISBN: 9-798-2150-4146-8

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Dedication

For literary fans who appreciate language diversity and understand the importance of fictional characters speaking and acting authentically. Even when it’s crass, un-PC, ‘offensive’ and shows the ugly (or simply imperfect) side of humanity. We are all but human, even the fictitious humans. The picture isn’t always preened, filtered and pretty. This is where fiction and realism blends.

Contents

Dedication

Foreword

Preface

Acknowledgments

City of the Dead

Always Time for Tea

Fuckin’ Maggots

Collector’s Edition

Boys will be Boys

Lust and Rage

Hell (Revised)

Action Man and the Gypsy’s Curse

Grandma, take me home

What Did You Think?

What early readers said

About G G Flavell

About David Owain Hughes

About Natasha Sinclair

Discover other titles

Trigger Warning:

This book contains dark themes that some readers may find upsetting/triggering. These include (but are not limited to) explicit sexual content, offensive and blue characters, abuse and graphic violence. These are integral components to the plot and characterisation within the relevant stories of this horror collection.

Foreword

I remember exactly where I was when I first saw Natasha. I remember because she had an aura around her that drew me in. An aura that had so much mystery, I made it my mission, which I declared to the girl sitting next to me, to immerse myself within. I didn’t know anything about her, but I wanted to know everything. I guess that’s what fangirling is. Perhaps I was her first fan, but I doubt it.

Natasha, as I would discover, has an essence that somehow manages to be both deathly fragile and unbreakable at the same time. She pours this essence beautifully into her writing style. The graceful detail of a scene will have you there, almost holding your breath in fear that the blood-soaked predator doesn’t hear you. It allows her to create the most vivid detail that we often shy away from but forces you to look, not against your will but because you’ve never looked at it in this light before. That’s her gift to this world. And we are all the better for it.

Whenever I get the chance to read one of Natasha’s stories, I have learned to prepare for the unexpected. I don’t assume anything. She, as a writer, can transport the reader fluidly, from one thought process to an entirely different one in a sentence. This is a trait of hers as a person, so it is only natural that this can come through in her writing. Whenever she flexes this muscle, and it’s a big flex, I can confidently say my jaw drops, and I gasp with intrigue as I turn the page. That is a style Natasha has and uses so well. You have been warned.

When she asked me to write the foreword, I wanted to just brag about how amazing, complex, complicated and deep she is as a person. Then I realised her writing expresses that on its own. You almost feel naughty, like a peeping tom, peering into her window, seeing and feeling things you weren’t supposed to. So, go forward, turn the pages and peer into her soul. Digest her words and embrace their effect on your mind, as they are supposed to. Let her take you to her world, where everything isn’t alright, but she’ll be there holding your hand, reassuring you that it never was.

––––––––

—G G Flavell

2022.

Author, friend

Preface

I’m not sure of the popularity of short story collections, at the time of the compilation of Incesticide: Collected Horror. I personally enjoy a sprinkling of anthologies now and then, as a way of discovering new-to-me writers. The single author collections are perhaps a trickier sell as one may desire already to be familiar with the author’s work to be enticed into the pages? I know that is generally the case for me, having a little familiarity with the writer’s prose before buying into a collection.

It may seem unprofessional, unbusiness-like to not be intimate with the numbers in the market and chase numbers and trends. Then I’ve never been a trendy type or held such desires to conform with any such in crowds. I’m more concerned with the writing and creation than numbers and feeding trends. They are just temporary; art always outlasts those notions.

This compilation is the bringing together of a collection of shorts that were printed by other publishers previously, with a couple where this is their first venture out to meet readers. On the off chance someone picks this up who have met my shorts elsewhere, it felt essential to bring something new for your fingers to thumb and eyes to consume.

The title of my previous collection, Murmur: Collected Horror was selected in homage to a favourite band of mine, so it felt only right to continue that nod my art to other artists that I love in the title of Incesticide: Collected Horror. The cover art was created to continue that hat-tip. Can you see it? It is coincidental that my collection of shorts is releasing in the 30th anniversary of its namesake’s release.

I’ve compiled nine short pieces here, each one created with a different submission in mind and a couple for especially for this release. As with Murmur: Collected Horror, each story is followed with a little about how it came to be.

As hinted to in my dedication, and if you’ve been exposed to a few pieces of my written work, some stories contain dialogue depicting the Scots dialect of the character. Often West Central Scots. No, these are not errors or ‘bad English’, these creative decisions depict true speech for specific characters. If you’d like more information on languages and dialects of Scotland, https://www.scotslanguage.com is a wonderful starting point.

I hope you enjoy this collection of short fiction.

—Natasha )O(

2022

Acknowledgments

As always, I thank my partner, Paul. Living with a solitary creative type isn’t easy! He manages it pretty well. My children too. Though they’re young, they know when I’m in that space, and naturally excel at making me work harder to get through those rushes. My little precious monsters. And my furry and feathered family who go long agonising evenings without lap time when I’m writing or editing surrounded by longing eyes and competitive purring and stamping.

Thanks to the publishers who invited, read and considered (whether the result was an accept or decline) my work into their books. Some stories contained here were first published with, Crimson Pinnacle Press, KJK Publishing and The Evil Cookie Publishing.

For their friendship and support I also thank, Lisa Marie McKenna, Katey McKenna, Ruthann Jagge, Kevin J. Kennedy, RJ Roles, Elizabeth Sinclair (Restrick), Kimberley Hamilton, Fiona Angus, David Owain Hughes, Dawn Keate, Grant Flavell, Andrew Taylor and the invaluable eyes and minds of early readers and reviewers.

I also want to give a shout out to Mar Garcia of TBM Horror and Mother’s of Mayhem (MoM). Both fiercely female ran outfits who give so much to the horror community (particularly) those in independent business. If you’re looking for a new underground read, art, entertaining horror chat, check TMB and MoM out.

The duty of youth is to challenge corruption.

—Kurt Cobain

Singer, songwriter, artist

City of the Dead

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Behind the 7-foot blackened sandstone dyke, the Southern Necropolis teemed with weans, brandishing an array of knives, crucifixes, garlic, the odd crudely fashioned stake. Excited dogs bayed and barked by scruffy ankles. A rally of child executioners from four through twelve swarmed for their fallen brethren as an army. Wee Tam, Billy, Ian, Izzy, Fiona – it could be any one of them between Jenni’s ravenous ir’n teeth next. 

In the City of the Dead, they gathered; their fierce display and arsenal would make the Razor Gangs proud. Goading each other on, even when they shivered with fright, it added to the electricity in the air. They were on the hunt.

Why did no one believe them? The grown-ups told them to ‘hawd their wheesht’ and ‘stop spreading tall tales’. But they weren’t tall tales at all. It was true; it had to be, several eyewitnesses had verified, every wean knew someone who could add a slither of weight to the story.

Messages pervaded through playground whispers and scrunched desk hopping notes, the news rippled amongst the youth, the believers in an unwavering tidal wave of truth and terror. A child killer on the loose! It was her. Jenni wi’ the Ir’n Teeth, none of them were safe until the monster was dead. They were going in to track her down and decapitate the terror of Glasgow.

Sandy! Sit. Sean pulled his wire-coated ginger mongrel to his heel. Sean was one of the boys that helped round everybody up. He’d had enough. He was going to the big school next year and was in the know about things, had information not everyone else had. Sean Friel was the oracle of St Francis primary. Wee Terry Lynne said tae me that his big cousin, Betty, knew wan o’ the boys. He and the other wan went tae her school. They used tae go tae Blackfriars.

Aye? said Ian, two years his junior at nine years old, he looked up to Sean, so he went along with whatever was going on. If it was good enough for Sean, it was good enough for Ian.

Yup, she said tae Terry it was a blatant conspiracy – wan day they wur there and the next they wurnae. Off-registered, teachers acted mega shifty when asked aboot the boys. Some claiming never tae huv heard o’ them! It’s mental.

Ma maw hinks it’s aw jist hype.

Look aroon’ ye, Ian, would this huv aw come aboot if it wisnae true? At least two schools huv emptied into The Gravy the night.

Naw, a suppose yer right, got tae be somethin’ in it.

Aye, n’ if she can take oot two boys withoot any clap back, she’ll be back fir mair o’ us.

Well, that’s why we’re here, innit. Tae take her doon, kill the vampire.

And that we will, Sean wiped his button nose on his scraggy knitted jumper sleeve then bent down to pat his dog on his big head as he slobbered enthusiastically, tongue dangling like a loose slingshot. The vampire might’ve been out for blood, but they all wanted hers.

The low chatter of 150 or so bodies was far outnumbered by the dead. Sean’s deep-set hazel eyes scanned The Gravy; he thought of the ghost stories his big cousin Max told him about this old place. Tales of voodoo men controlling the dead. Stories of restless bones under the dirt, ones that didn’t want to be dead, picking them off like party nibbles. Maybe they were to be feared as much as the bloodthirsty vampire that roamed their town. It was hard to imagine 250,000 corpses under their soles. He imagined them stretching down there, opening their jaws to mouthfuls of dirt, roots and beasties, trying to see with eyeless sockets through the condensed, opaque dark. He prayed they all stayed there, dead and buried. Those numbers did not go in favour of the living teeming around their graves. The idea of them being outnumbered more than 1000 times over made his heart punch hard against his ribs. He thought about the movie White