7 Minutes

Watch a short video – also from this author. A short film written for the Tropicana Film Festival of 1998.

Coming soon. I’m currently working on the sequel to The Road Behind.

Mark and Fiona's son, Nelson, continues the Kidman saga in It Grows on Trees. It's eleven years on and Mark's estranged father, Nelson's grandfather, is dying. Nelson's happy childhood starts to unravel as he becomes entwined in the tangled roots of his family tree. … [Read More...]

The human heart is like a water pump.

It looks fine; it sounds fine. But if you don’t look after it, if you’re always running hot, or your system’s full of shit, your impeller blades wear down, your bushes go, your gaskets start to leak. But it still looks and sounds fine, till suddenly one day you find yourself stopped at the roadside, boiling over. You open your bonnet and you say, shit, my water pump’s fucked. Look after your heart. … [Read More...]

Something to Look Forward to

I fear that I'll grow old one day Lose contact with my youth I'll have to be responsible And even tell the truth My kids will think I'm senile And women think I'm spent My memory shot to buggery My body worn and bent My sense of purpose wilted My libido like a slug I'll be plugged into machinery Too weak to pull the plug … [Read More...]

Synopsis: Eden

Set in the immediate future, and told from multiple points of view, Eden is an escapist fantasy, a commentary on planet Earth’s woes and a crime thriller. Doug Winchcombe, a brilliant but chronically introverted, physicist discovers a gateway to another planet. A perfect world he names Eden. He returns to Eden daily, amazed by its wonders and content in its tranquillity. But a perfect world needs more than one inhabitant. He recruits his nephew, Matthew, and together they encourage others to … [Read More...]

Dad

My father was born in 1924, when electronics were in their infancy and electricity wasn’t widely available – certainly not in Bootle, a working class suburb of Liverpool. As a child, the only electricity in his house came from a hand-wound dynamo, which he attached to a treadle sewing machine to increase the output. He laid a bare wire along the top of his fence and when he saw a cat jump up he’d peddle like crazy and the cat would leap off yowling. He started an electrical apprentice just … [Read More...]

Mandy

MANDY I had a little mandarin I bought it at the shop The Safeway store in Williamstown A place I often stop A gorgeous, juicy, mandarin With a lucsious orange glow It came from California A place they often grow I took it to the airport To eat it on the way But somewhere round the Ring Road Mandy got away When I got to Jetstar Terminal I searched and searched in vain I looked for four full minutes But I had to catch a plane Then sometime five days later In a room in … [Read More...]

My Four Fathers

a collaboration with my daughter when she was very young My Four Fathers My name is Mia and I have four dads. My best dad is called Jonno Mofo. He lives with me in Newport. He’s a rock star. He says I have a good imagination but mum says we talk shit. My worst dad lives in America, his name is Mike Hall. He’s a con man. He sold my Bratz dolls and my Littlest Pet Shop figures on ebay. And he didn’t give me a cent. He lives in a maximum security jail in Nevada. I have a dad in … [Read More...]