Tag: Mark Norman

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, Contemporary Romantic Fiction, crime, Fantasy, Fiction, ghost story /gothic, Historical fiction, Jenny Kane, News, Opening Lines Blog

This week’s Opening Lines blog features a brand new anthology of stories – put together by the Exeter Author’s Association – of which I am a tiny part.

The anthology, Tales from Deepest, Darkest Devon, features 19 different stories from 13 authors, all living in and around the county; from Brixham, to Tiverton, Ottery St Mary to Bampton, and many places in between. The stories cover a wide range of genres, and offers a story for every literary taste.

Part of the sales from this book will go to the Devon Air Ambulance Trust

Blurb

Devon; a land of beauty, of moors, villages and coasts. A place of stories, told by the people who live there.

Take a look beneath the surface of Devon with the Exeter Authors, nineteen tales from thirteen of the county’s finest writers.

Contains some adult (18+) material.

Bobbing. Discover why revenge is a dish best served with cider,

Make a wish. Devon is the place to spend the rest of your life.

The Dartmoor Dragon. Discover the magic on the moor.

Cutty Dyer. Quiet villages can hold deadly secrets

Winter Snow. The old ways are the best

The Padding Horror. On the moors, an ancient evil is stalking its latest prey.

Under the Hunters Moon. You’re never truly alone on the moor

The Fairmile Green Man. Has Swampy and his protest been forgotten? A green man carving brings a much older story back to life.

Guardians. A peaceful little village hides a dark secret.

And many more.

Contributors: Jenifer Braund, Richard Dee, Maura Beckett, Chip Tolson, Brian Willis, Janet Few, John Hall, K. Y. Eden, Richard Lappas, Tracey Norman, Mark Norman, P.J. Reed and Jenny Kane.

Part of the sale price goes to the Devon Air Ambulance Trust.

Here are the opening lines from my own story, Bobbing.

Feeling like a malevolent Eve slithering through the Garden of Eden, Libby did a slow twirl in the centre of the old cider barn.

The gauze dress was thin. It caressed her skin with a teasing arousal.

She was fertility herself.

If Robert hadn’t wanted her before, he’d definitely want her now. But then, if she was honest, that had never been a problem. Robert always wanted her. He always wanted everyone. And her boss usually got what he wanted.

The scrumpy’s pungent presence accosted Libby’s nostrils as she ascended the ladder propped against the eight foot high cider barrel. Empting two boxes worth of apples into the liquid, she watched as the fruit bobbed across the foamy alcoholic surface.

Smiling into the vat depths, Libby counted the apples, making sure there were enough for all the guests to have a go at capturing one with their teeth. Then, balancing carefully, she reached up to the ceiling. A stick was hanging horizontally from ropes above the barrel. Tying a beeswax candle to one end and an apple on string to the other, Libby gave the stick a gentle push. She watched with satisfaction as it swung back and forth over the barrel of bobbing cider.

Returning to the ground, Libby checked the collection of silk ties next to the steps. Each one waited patiently to fasten hands behind their backs of potential bobbers; thus eliminating their temptation to cheat.

Libby experienced an unexpected flash of power as she heard Robert’s distinctive footsteps approaching. It was difficult not to grin too widely when she remembered how pleased he’d been when she’d suggested he had the honour of being the first to attempt the ancient apple catching ritual.

Fingering her pentagram shaped pendent, Libby’s mind filled with images of ancient Pagan fertility rites she’d seen in history books.

‘You wanted a traditional Pagan celebration boss, and this is it. There’s alcohol soaked bread to be offered to the trees in the orchard, cider ready to be poured onto the roots to toast the crops health, apple bobbing, and of course, the apple stick.’

Allowing Robert to slip his arms around her waist, Libby wasn’t surprised when he shuffled close enough for her to feel his crotch against her butt. Rather than examine the beauty of the Celtic scene she’d created, Libby knew Robert would be checking to make sure no one else was in the barn.

He glided his hands from her waist to her tits. She let him. As the moment to execute her plan grew ever closer, Libby’s body had been on the cusp of an increasing impatient sexual high.

As Robert pushed her back against the barrel, he peered up at the hanging stick. ‘It looks impossible! And dangerous.’

Easing away from his grasp, Libby climbed the ladder and lit the end of the swinging candle. Her eyes flared with the fizz of the wick as it caught…

***

You can buy Tales from Deepest Darkest Devon in paperback or as an eBook from Amazon via…

Happy reading everyone,

Jenny x

Mark Norman: Folklore Thinking

By Jenny Kane

On December 12, 2017

In Audio, Blog, Non fiction

Today I’m joined by one of my fellow members of the Exeter Author Association; folklore expert, Mark Norman. So go and grab a cuppa, then come back and have a read…

Hello. My name is Mark Norman. I am a folklore researcher and author based on the edge of Dartmoor, in the South West of the UK. Although I sometimes stray into the world of fiction, most of my writing is non-fiction, being based around my research. So today, I would like to introduce you to the world of folklore, and my writing within that area.

Folklore essentially boils down to being an examination of the traditions and beliefs of individuals and communities: literally, folk-lore or the beliefs (lore) or the people (folk). It can be seen to span various broader disciplines such as psychology or anthropology, but I prefer to think of it as a part of social history and it is therefore as a history discipline that I tend to work most.

Although I am a committee member of the Folklore Society, the UK’s oldest academic organisation for the study of the subject, I am not affiliated to any institution, being an independent researcher. I am therefore free to focus on whatever aspects of the subject I choose to explore.

My interests within the field of folklore are quite broad, but the areas that I mostly focus on are the more regional aspects of folklore within the area that I live and most particularly, the phenomenon of ghostly apparitions of phantom Black Dogs. This is the aspect of folklore upon which Sir Arthur Conan Doyle drew when he wrote what is arguably one of his most famous Sherlock Holmes stories, The Hound of the Baskervilles.

My most involved publication to date is my book, Black Dog Folklore, which was published in 2015 by Troy Books. To date, this book is the only academic investigation of the subject by a single author. I hold what is thought to be the UKs largest archive of Black Dog sightings, traditions and eyewitness accounts (probably over 1,000 now) and around 700 of these are included in a gazetteer in the appendix of the book.

Publication of Black Dog Folklore was the culmination of around ten years of research, on and off; an undertaking which could have continued for longer had I not taken the decision to draw a line under the research at the time and decide that the book should come out at that stage. One of the difficulties of working in an area of cultural history such as this is that one story will inevitably lead to many more. New information comes to light all the time and stories change and develop. So, although the book is out on the shelves, the work on the subject most definitely continues.

Aside for this full-length study, I publish a lot of short-form articles for magazines, websites and in other places where I am invited (or sometimes cajoled) to contribute. Amongst these, for example, are pieces for Mythology magazine on Christmas traditions, an article on dog bones discovered at an archaeological dig and related to my research for Folklore Thursday website, an article for a personal site on the folkloric links of The Hound of the Baskervilles and a piece on the links between Sirius (the dog star) and dogs in folklore. I was also asked by the producers of one of Sir Tony Robinson’s documentary series’ to advise on some Black Dog lore in the area being discussed.

I have been asked to contribute to, or contribute myself to, various books and anthologies. Most recently I co-authored a chapter on fairies in Devon for a new book called Magical Folk published by Gibson Square and a chapter proposal I was asked to make for a new academic book published by Palsgrave Macmillan is being looked at currently. My fiction short story The Padding Horror which sets some of my research against a fictional backdrop of Victorian Dartmoor in Lovecraftian style was published in the UK as part of a charity anthology called Secret Invasion, to raise money for the mental health charity MIND and is published this month in America in another anthology called Fairy Tales and Folklore Reimagined.

Another large chunk of my writing time is taken up in script writing. I am the creator and host of The Folklore Podcast which is quite widely listened to around the world. In fact, just a couple of hours ago as I write this, I learned that it is currently ranked at #141 in the US iTunes charts for History. The podcast is released twice a month, with one episode being a guest interview and the other a presentation written by myself. It is admittedly a lot of work to script this frequently alongside other projects and so sometimes I share my research across other projects that I do to help with this. For example, as I speak relatively frequently at conferences or public events, I will sometimes adapt talks for podcast episodes or vice versa.

As far as future book publications go, I am currently planning to release a volume of extended essays on a range of folklore subjects. The backbone of these will be from past scripts I have written for the podcast episodes, which will then be expanded and researched more tangentially to form longer studies suitable for book chapters. I am also looking to work on another longer study of an area of folklore in the same style as Black Dog Folklore. There is another well-known piece of widespread folklore which has not been seriously studied or collected together since the 1930s to which I am hoping to turn my attention.

It is certainly the case that books and writing form a large part of my life. At home I live with my wife Tracey who is also a writer (see her recent blog on this site about her play WITCH for example) and, with a colleague, we also produce and narrate audiobooks. I am also on the judging panel for a national book awards for non-fiction titles and with what remaining time I have left in the week, I work for Libraries Unlimited, the umbrella organisation for Devon Libraries.

I hope that you have found this short insight into my research and writing interesting. I am always happy to talk about my research and you can contact me easily via my social media pages below. If you are interested in the subject, please do get in touch.