Black Cat Stories: hard to home and just as likely to honk in your shoe as purr in your faceLeave a comment

Precision

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

Jody ran into the house, all pink and breathless, ‘There’s a thing in our garden!’ he announced, coughing slightly on ‘garden’ and having to inhale half way through. ‘Oh, really?’ his mother said, not looking up from the hoover that had just died. Jody recognised this as an adult’s empty communication, although he called it being ignored. ‘A thing, a metallic thing with gadgety arms, flashy lights, and a lid thingy that’s like, going whaawha whoomph!’ ‘Whawha woomph …’ Jody’s mother had begun eviscerating the hoover, so the chances of getting her attention had just dropped below zero. Jody ducked into the … Continue reading Precision

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Black Cat Stories: hard to home and just as likely to honk in your shoe as purr in your faceLeave a comment

Stardust, Sunshine, Leeds and LA

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

Stardust Silverwobbit cast a critical eye over her outfit – head to this side, head to that – pink suspenders? No, not tonight. She ditched the pink suspenders. A giggle ruffled the back of her nose as she ferreted about in various boxes, coming up with a latex corset (matching knickers), some black fishnet gloves and a contraption that emitted an eerie light from somewhere around her navel. She made another inspection – head to that side, head to this – ok, good to go, let’s hit the clubs. ‘You alright there, Dad?’ she called up the stairs. There was … Continue reading Stardust, Sunshine, Leeds and LA

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Black Cat Stories: hard to home and just as likely to honk in your shoe as purr in your face, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Lovely Girls

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

21/09/2013 Lovely Girls Suzanne Conboy-Hill Amy watches the door, that grimy finger-stained gobbed-on portal to fleeting respite from the ward’s stink. The stink that makes her eyes water and saturates her soul. She tries to shift her bottom, to hold her limbs still for just long enough to hover briefly above the puddle of cold pee that has settled in a trough of rucked-up rubber sheeting. No luck, she sinks back. Flails back, in truth: arms threshing, mouth grimacing and spit flying, right onto the wet sandpaper of the twill draw sheet. Edie, inches away in the next cot, lets … Continue reading Lovely Girls

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Black Cat Stories: hard to home and just as likely to honk in your shoe as purr in your faceLeave a comment

If it ain’t broke …

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

If it ain’t broke … Robert cast a functional eye over the stranger in the art room. ‘You got my lunch?’ he asked, not bothering with formalities. ‘No,’ said the stranger, ‘But I’ve got an offer.’ He was tall-ish, broad-ish and, Robert thought, social worker-ish. He was also artificial-ish but that passed Robert by for now. ‘My name is Artem and I’m from …’ ‘An offer?’ Robert recognised the word but its meaning escaped him; and anyway he was hungry. You could starve here, he thought, and social workers would just fill in another buggersome form. Robert rolled buggersome around in his … Continue reading If it ain’t broke …

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All change!

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

Call this a diversionary activity, [yes do, because it is – I should be faffing with my first drawing assignment but after days of wrestling with a sculpture of Alien made from scrap metal, a hatchling dragon in an egg, and a pot cat, I’m only slightly nearer submitting something.] I’m taking a pop at the layout and design of my blogs. Remarkably, after blogging with WordPress for years, three days into the art course and I found I knew nothing about anything. I’ve been bumbling. Now though, with an enforced induction into menus and the magic of categories under … Continue reading All change!

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ghost story, halloween2 Comments

The Breathing of Souls: Halloween audio flash

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

The Breathing of Souls In the walls of buildings, between the splinters of wood and the specks of brick dust, souls trapped by the circumstance of material change, huddle and stretch by turns; making space to breathe, wearing down the solid things that keep them there, and waiting for their time to come. When it does and when, in the physical world liquids harden and become unyielding; in the metaphysical, the warp and weft of buildings begins to soften, loosening its grip and making room for the imminent exchange. Then, breath becomes an instrument of penetration, and the souls sigh … Continue reading The Breathing of Souls: Halloween audio flash

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Truth to power2 Comments

Fat Mo and the men who make stories like this necessary

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

I had been writing Fat Mo for a while. Quite a lot of it went through the Lancaster MA critique system and became part of my portfolio. But I was never ready to publish it either as a standalone short story or as part of a collection of similar pieces. The time was not right; the collection was too hotch-potch; there was no obvious market. Then Weinstein happened. #MeToo happened. Women were suddenly saying out loud what so very many of us knew to be true – that getting on in the world meant getting on with men and doing … Continue reading Fat Mo and the men who make stories like this necessary

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‘Fat Mo’

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

“In smoggy 1960s Yorkshire, a world away from the psychedelics of London, Mo arrives at the dingy building in Dewsbury where she is going to be a temp. She is not welcomed, instead she is ridiculed – a fat stupid girl running about like a frightened mouse. Merv though, the charismatic co-Director of the company, sees something in her he wants and takes her aside to be his PA. He uses his power and smooth transatlantic charm to shape her to his needs, letting her into his high flying world where there is glamour she has only seen in black … Continue reading ‘Fat Mo’

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ASMR videos and Amazon’s Alexa – the My Pod solution

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

You may not have heard of ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response ). It’s described as a response among some people to particular frequencies and repetitive sounds that causes a deep sense of relaxation. Some use it to help concentrate on work such as writing or art work (and there are claims that it promotes creativity), others use it for sleep where intrusive anxieties disturb and disrupt this. A number of disparate findings, speculations, and under-investigated techniques related to ideas of boredom, relaxation, sleep, and creativity seem to me to be coming together with this phenomenon. All of them appear to impinge … Continue reading ASMR videos and Amazon’s Alexa – the My Pod solution

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