Fiction is a place where writers are invited to submit new fiction for publishing on thisisUll.com. Remember, it's not who you are, but what you do, that count's, so just do it, and send it in. contributions@thisisull.com More Home Page    Page 1    Page 2    Page 3 For the index by Author to all Fiction click here.

Fiction - Load the Cards By Sean Davey
	Loading up the cards and I start thinking. I think about casino's, and all that is. Imagine a building dear reader, where degenerate, and often eccentric behaviour is not only the norm. its positively encouraged. Heavy drinking and gambling is as much a part of the punters mind as work, or going for a meal. Its just what they do to get their kicks. Read more...

Fiction - Charity Begins in the Toilet By Shep
	Like most stories this one starts at the beginning with a middle aged man kissing a middle aged woman on the middle of the lips. I'm not sure where the middle starts or ends but I'm fairly sure its centre is an equal distance from these two extremes. The man's head jacks back and forth like a mother bird trying to vomit out some nourishment to her Read more...

Fiction - Goths in Denim (I only dress like a Goth!) By Jason Ince
	'That can't be the time!' I scream, staring at the clock-slash-radio-slash-CD player. This is the last time I try a DVD marathon within one day, I'll kill Stanny for suggesting it to me. The phone starts to vibrate before the ringtone kicks in. It's Clark's tone...again, 'damn you, Clark!' I charge across the room and leap over the chair and snatch the mobile. Read more...

Fiction - Absinthe - A Cautionary Tale By Sean Davey
	In pursuit of the perfect high, man invented absinthe, and I among others regularly enjoy its powerful effects. But on some days, store-bought brands are far too timid for the task at hand. On these days we need the homemade stuff. Created in garages and lofts, jam packed with wormwood and all those other alpha-terpenes to get the brain synapses into full gear. Read more...

Fiction - Punishment By Nick Quantrill
	Punishment by local crime-fiction writer and thisisull.com contributor, Nick Quantrill, has won a nationwide short-story competition run by HarperCollins. Entrants were invited to submit a story of no more than 1,000 words in the crime-fiction/thriller genre. Here's what the judges had to say about Punishment : 'We were impressed with the use of Read more...

Fiction - Friday Feeling By Nick Quantrill
	Friday 3pm It was building up to being another busy Friday afternoon shift. It was probably no busier than any other shift, but the extra tiredness that Detective Constable Maynard felt by this point made them feel that much longer. He had been sent to Young's general store in East Hull straight after attending a suspicious death over on the other side of the city. It was Read more...

Fiction - The Morning After By Joe Hakim
	They'll be here soon. There's nothing much to do other than wait, so I make another strong cup of coffee and light up another cigarette. Even these seemingly arbitrary actions are cast into a new focus now. This patch of time I'm occupying is a bridge - a bridge that spans the space between the way my life used to be and the way it's going to be. I look around my living room Read more...

Fiction - In A Room By Joe Hakim
	I wish there were bars so I could hold them, wrap my fingers around the cold steel and press my face in between them, but it's just a room, I'm in a dark room with no windows and no features, so I just sit and think and think and think. I am a captive, a hostage in a foreign country. I'm apart from my family and friends and I don't know if I'll ever see them again. Every so Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 2: Prologue (June 1904: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	From the outside the two-storey building looked even more forbidding now than the first time I saw it. Eighteen more years of Hull soot had turned bricks from red to dark brown. The dank smell of Grandmother's skirt returned to me. I caught my breath. So many emotions stirred inside me. Doors in my mind that I'd kept closed for so long were opening again but this time Read more...

Fiction - Buried In The Past By Joe Hakim
	Arriving back in Hull, the first thing that hits me is just how much hasn't changed. As I walk down Princes Ave, I look at all the café bars that have sprang up to replace the odd little shops and businesses that used to line it, but it still feels the same somehow. There's a kind of progress, I suppose - even if progress means it's starting to resemble everywhere else in Britain - Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 21 (1886: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	The extra twenty-four hour wait only made me more desperate than ever to discover what had become of my old friends. It didn't feel right to be back and not be with them. They were Hull to me. I needed to see them and for them to see me. Would they believe little Sammy could have grown so much? Would I be as tall as George now? My friends were all I wanted Read more...

Fiction - Red Carpet Blues By Steve Rudd
	'One more word out of you, and it'll be your last - I promise.' The ice-cold gun nudging Ellie's temple was motivation enough for her to keep her mouth shut, as she trembled with fear. She daren't even sob in case her captor construed that any form of noise was reason enough to blow her brains out without further ado. So much for being a superstar in her own right, Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 20 (1886: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	The deck rose and fell beneath my feet. My moccasins were meant for the solid earth of the Dakotas, not a slippery wooden deck in an Atlantic storm. I continued focusing on the infant pony and repeated all the psalms and hymns I could recall. Words that were drilled into me. I never thought they'd ever be of any use, other than to avoid Jolly Rodgers' Read more...

Fiction - 'I Do' By Steve Rudd
	Nobody told me marriage would be like this. I thought it would be bliss, day in and day out, but problems soon surfaced, after our hastily arranged elopement in good old Gretna - that bizarre little settlement that straddles the border between England and Scotland as though it can't quite decide where it stands; where it belongs; which side of the metaphorical fence it is Read more...

Fiction - Two Sides : A Friday Night Out In Hull By Joe Hakim
	I'm just finishing off at work, watching the clock and loading the pot-wash with plates and cups, waiting for Sarah to start her shift so I can go home. It's been a really busy day, so I'll be glad to see the back of the fuckin' place. I've been working at Sparks cafè bar on Newland Ave for over a year, but it's only been in the past couple of months it's got really busy. Fridays are Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 19 (1886: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	Was it my imagination or were dark clouds hanging over the Persian Monarch the next morning? I feared the worst. Heavy feet climbed the wooden steps to my hero's saloon. As before Red Shirt, Dog That Stands and Laughing Waters were there in support of my case. We entered the cabin and my spirits rose. Nate Salsbury wasn't there and Miss Arta was Read more...

Fiction - Complicity Part 6 By Nick Quantrill
	Complicity is the new crime-fiction novella set in Hull featuring Detective Sergeant Coleman and Detective Constable Maynard. The thisisull.com serialisation is accompanied by the stunning black and white photography of Roland Standaert, which illustrates the story and takes a unique look at the city. Complicity and other stories are available for free. Read more...

Fiction - Gloomy Sunday By Joe Hakim
	As we got closer I could see it framed against the horizon. From this distance it just looked like a huge black shape, like a giant lump of coal or something. "Jeezus, it's huge," I said. "Yeah, I'm guessing it's a male," Mike said. "Could be about fifty tonnes of whale washed up down there." Mike was a marine biologist. He'd been given the task of studying Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 18 (1886: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	My sister and I were sitting on my bunk. A funny feeling came over me: it was almost like relief. My hero knew about me and about my circumstances but he'd not decided automatically that I'd have to go back to the orphanage. 'I have always wanted a brother. I do not want to lose you.' Laughing Waters didn't share what she considered to be my unfounded confidence. Read more...

Fiction - Welcome To Hellville - Part 17 By Rich Mills
	29th November 2040 The information is coming thick and fast. The latest version of Arc-iSearch is a truly amazing piece of AI software. It sweeps across the huge net archives, sniffing out the smallest of references, eliminating the irrelevant with an intelligence that grows as it goes. I set it on its way yesterday, now it has started to Read more...

Fiction - The M1 McDonalds Girl and the Most Suitable Bloke By Andy Bilton
	So I'm heading home. Heading north. Eighty, on the M1, just south of Sheffield. Pissing it down. That horizontal stuff that totally obscures your view, your only safe option being to get in to the inside lane and follow the red cat's eyes. Not ideal weather conditions for a must-get-there-quicker sort of situation such as this. I should slow down really but Helen's already been on the mobile Read more...

Fiction - Complicity Part 5 By Nick Quantrill
	Complicity is the new crime-fiction novella set in Hull featuring Detective Sergeant Coleman and Detective Constable Maynard. The thisisull.com serialisation is accompanied by the stunning black and white photography of Roland Standaert, which illustrates the story and takes a unique look at the city. Complicity and other stories are available for free. Read more...

Fiction - The Guy Who Had All The Time In The World By Joe Hakim
	Sometimes it gets to be a bit too fuckin' much, I decide, after another day spent wandering the streets aimlessly. The sky is still bright purple - the colour of a fresh bruise - and the streets are still completely silent; not even the sound of birds chirping or distant traffic in the distance. Aside from that, everything seems to be much the same, at least on the surface. There's no visible Read more...

Fiction - Kat Out of the Bag Chapter Fourteen By Steve Rudd
	Yogesh, my abandoned guide on all things Nepalese, had said that the small yak-herding settlement of Langsisa was worth seeing if seeing meant believing, being as it is so isolated and yet further east of Kyangjin. Yogesh and I had discussed where I might like to trek on my trip before we embarked from Kathmandu, and he'd proposed the Langtang trek as being an ideal one Read more...

Fiction - The Burden - A Short Story By Joe Hakim
	I step out into the sun and close my eyes, letting the light wash over my face. It's cold, and the wind pinches my cheeks but I feel complete, for the first time ever. Today the world is different. Today is the first day of a new beginning. Everything feels real and vivid, and I bathe in it, taking it all in like a child seeing a painting for the first time, judging the angles and Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 17 (1886: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	When we got further out into the Atlantic my companions became wary of going up on deck. When they did they scanned the horizon and talked in low voices if there were dark clouds heading towards us. The ocean swell was stronger but these weren't the rough seas they expected in repetition of the previous crossing. I was pleased we weren't enjoying the great sickness Read more...

Fiction - Kat Out of the Bag Chapter Thirteen By Steve Rudd
	I remembered the ring simply because it wasn't the type of ring that a man would usually choose to include in his pro-macho jewellery box. The rare stone at its heart shone like a bewildering beacon demanding attention in the pits of hell, while its subtly alluring design was elaborately detailed yet delicate. To all intents and purposes it looked like a lady's bridal ring, and thus the plot thickened. Read more...

Fiction - Complicity Part 4 By Nick Quantrill
	Complicity is the new crime-fiction novella set in Hull featuring Detective Sergeant Coleman and Detective Constable Maynard. The thisisull.com serialisation is accompanied by the stunning black and white photography of Roland Standaert, which illustrates the story and takes a unique look at the city. Complicity and other stories are available for free. Read more...

Fiction - Welcome To Hellville - Part 16 By Rich Mills
	"What music are you into, man?" The American exchange student who had earlier introduced himself, without any regard for Alan's need to be alone, suddenly threw a curve-ball of a question like this in his direction. "Well I listen to..." What followed was a definitive list of bands from Alan's wide-ranging rare vinyl and CD collection, he even Read more...

Fiction - Complicity Part 3 By Nick Quantrill
	Complicity is the new crime-fiction novella set in Hull featuring Detective Sergeant Coleman and Detective Constable Maynard. The thisisull.com serialisation is accompanied by the stunning black and white photography of Roland Standaert, which illustrates the story and takes a unique look at the city. Complicity and other stories are available for free. Read more...

Fiction - Off To See The Wild West Show Part 16 (1886: Hull, Yorkshire) By Frank Beill
	It took only three days for timidity to turn into brutality and two little girls were directing it towards the latest addition to their family. Two small bodies were jumping on my bunk and I was still in it. If I hadn't been so exhausted I might have enjoyed the experience. 'Ger off!' I yelled. They didn't know the words but they understood the meaning. Two frightened rabbits leapt off the bunk and Read more...

Fiction - Complicity Part 2 By Nick Quantrill
	Complicity is the new crime-fiction novella set in Hull featuring Detective Sergeant Coleman and Detective Constable Maynard. The thisisull.com serialisation is accompanied by the stunning black and white photography of Roland Standaert, which illustrates the story and takes a unique look at the city. Complicity and other stories are available for free. Read more...

Fiction - Complicity Part 1 By Nick Quantrill
	Complicity is the new crime-fiction novella set in Hull featuring Detective Sergeant Coleman and Detective Constable Maynard. The thisisull.com serialisation is accompanied by the stunning black and white photography of Roland Standaert, which illustrates the story and takes a unique look at the city. Complicity and other stories are available for free. Read more...

Fiction - Welcome To Hellville - Part 15 By Rich Mills
	They always cut it close but their timing was always impeccable, arriving at the house right on schedule. Schedule was a bad choice of word as they'd never been organised enough to have a schedule, let alone keep to one. Chaos was their maxim really. Everyone else thought that their apparent external serenity was one of infinite calm. However, this was Read more...

Fiction - Kat Out of the Bag Chapter Twelve By Steve Rudd
	Dinner-time came and went, and on us four hardy men trekked. I hadn't been feeling too well for the past couple of days, so I hadn't been eating all that much. The reason I was probably feeling so down and out was no doubt due to the lack of food that I'd consumed, so it was bit of a Catch-22 situation all round. Read more...

Fiction - Kat Out of the Bag Chapter Eleven By Steve Rudd
	As the cunning midday sun burned my retinas to a blinding crisp, I slyly slipped on my designer sunglasses, hoping that my three so-called companions might not notice. I looked out of place amidst such blatant wonders of the world, with the horizon-hogging mountains looking down on my little life like the hard-hitting rock above pitied me in some inhuman way. I understood perfectly, for I Read more...

Fiction - Welcome To Hellville - Part 14 By Rich Mills
	Remember, remember the fifth of November. Alan smiled to himself, he felt she'd smile back. As with all days leading up to any Bonfire Night he could ever remember, the gods were restless. A storm in a D-cup had met her PR-effect match, and the media for mindless meat-eaters was polishing off the shit-dish, like the ginger tom who'd Read more...

Fiction - Two Extracts from The Shintae - a Novel by Brian R Hill
	The Shintae is a new fantasy novel by Yorkshire writer Brian Hill. The novel is due to be published by Publish America sometime around the Christmas period but is currently available online at www.amazon.com , www.publishamerica.com , www.barnesandnoble.com and www.whsmith.com. The ISBN number is 1-4137-8322-4. For more information Read more...