Lyme Brook Mist

Anton Corvus

Description

Anton Corvus combines elements of many of the great literary classic adventures (think Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) with various dystopian classics (1984) then adds dozens of allusions to the works of classic writers (like Edgar Allan Poe, Edward Lear) to create a unique world of fantasy, mystery and mayhem in this spellbinding and frequently hilarious novel which follows the journey of an average teenage boy, Leo, through a mad world of weird characters and crazy situations.Part tribute to his own literary heroes, part guessing-game based on literature, Corvus hides his references to the classics in the names of both people and things - trying to guess what lies hidden in each page is almost as much fun as reading the story. The deducing of the story from the clues provided will also appeal to all lovers of the mystery genre - can you work out what has happened before the end?

Sujets

• Staffordshire
• Children's

Informations

• Publié par: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 28 septembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781838596132
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

Copyright © 2020 Anton Corvus

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Matador
9 Priory Business Park,
Wistow Road, Kibworth Beauchamp,
Leicestershire. LE8 0RX
Tel: [phone]
Email: [e-mail]
Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador
Twitter: @matadorbooks

ISBN 9781838596132

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

For Leo – an adventure…
…I hope you like it!
Contents
That Brought the Fog and Mist
Adversity Makes Strange Bedfellows
The Lion, the Bull and the Bear
A Curious Case of Beakery
The Library of Inoffensive Books
A Place for Everything
An Alternate Tea-Party
Kidnapped
Exceptional Relativity
A Watchful Gaze
The Wealth of Boroughs
Annabel’s Free
The Trial Part I: The Beakeries Outlined
The Trial Part II: The Case for the Prosecution
The Trial Part III: The Case for the Defence
The Trial Part IV: Crimes and Punishment
The Remarkable Adventure of The Mouse and The Moose
The Fairground
The Force of Destiny
The Magician
The Empress
The Ten of Swords
Judgement
The Jester
The Poetry Competition Part I: A Motley Crew
The Poetry Competition Part II: Equal Rights for Puppets
The Poetry Competition Part III: Something Special
The Mayor’s Mipas Magpie March
Until We Meet Again
Appendix
Chapter One
That Brought the Fog and Mist
It was a damp and chilly winter morning – the 15 th of December 2018, the penultimate Saturday before Christmas. A thick blanket of fog had descended over the Westlands, the area just to the west of the market town of Newcastle-under-Lyme where Leo Marcus lived. Leo’s father was at the desk in his office, reading one of the obscure books which so fascinated him, all the while checking the things which the book said on the internet; he was something of a sceptic, Leo’s father, and hardly, if ever, trusted any single source of information.
“Dad, can I go meet my mate, Sam, in town?” asked Leo, walking into his father’s office. His father looked out of the window.
“Hmm … it’s extremely foggy today,” he replied.
“It’ll be alright in town,” insisted Leo.
“Which route will you be taking?” asked his father.
“I’m going to meet him in Lyme Valley, between the bridge and Homebase,” answered Leo.
“Right,” said his father, “very good. Be careful, though… in this fog.” He turned to his windowsill and took the small brass pot in which he kept some loose change. “I imagine you’ll be in need of some funds… you’ll be going for lunch in Subway I suppose?” Leo’s father knew well enough that Leo liked to go to Subway whenever he went to Newcastle.
“Oh, yes, please,” replied Leo cheerfully. His father delved into the brass pot, removed three two-pound coins and held his hand out towards Leo.
“Will that be sufficient?” he asked.
“Yes, that’s fine, thanks,” replied Leo happily. His father stood up and peered out of the window again. His office window faced into the back garden of their home; it was impossible even to see the back gate leading to the garage.
“This fog really is terrible,” mumbled Leo’s father.
They both walked out into the hall and towards the coat hooks near the front door.
“You’d better put your parka on, Leo,” said his father, opening the front door to gauge the temperature. Leo pulled his parka off the peg, put it on and zipped it up halfway. “You have your phone?” he continued rhetorically. “It’s fully charged, I hope?”
“Yes, Dad,” replied Leo, moving it from his trouser pocket to his coat pocket. “I just unplugged it, so the battery’s full.”
“Very good. Be careful, then,” said his father.
“Is that Leo going out?” shouted his mother from upstairs.
“Yes, I’m going meet Sam in Castle,” Leo shouted back.
“You’re going to meet Sam…” admonished his father, who often corrected him for the omission of prepositions “…and the town is called Newcastle not Castle ,” he added. Leo had a propensity for abbreviation which his father liked to correct.
“Well, it’s dangerous going out in fog like this!” warned his mother, appearing at the top of the stairs holding some laundry.
“It’ll be fine, mum,” replied Leo. “I’ll be extra careful. I only have to cross one road; I’m going through Lyme Valley.”
“We’ve already had this conversation, dear,” said Leo’s father, dismissively.
“Well, be very careful, then!” conceded his mother with a still anxious expression.
“I will!” Leo smiled and walked out through the door towards the front garden gate. “Be extra careful on the pelican crossing!” his father called after him. “The visibility is very bad today – it’s the worst fog I’ve seen in a long time!”
“I will, Dad, see you later!” replied Leo as he disappeared through the gate and into the fog. His father shut the door and returned to his office and his obscure book.
Leo was 12 years old, almost 13 in fact, and quite an informed and knowledgeable boy. He naturally liked to play computer games, as do most boys and girls of his age, but he also enjoyed reading, which he did very frequently – albeit not frequently enough for his father’s satisfaction, but one might suppose that to be not an uncommon observation of parents towards their children. He liked to read about science and history mainly but loved funny and trivial books too. He also liked to watch videos on YouTube about all manner of different subjects.
As he walked along towards the pelican crossing on Clayton Road, the fog became even denser, and as he reached the crossing, he even briefly entertained the possibility that his parents’ warnings about the fog being dangerous might be justified. He pushed the button and waited for the green man to appear, which it soon did. Notwithstanding that under normal conditions that would have been sufficient for him to proceed, he listened very carefully for the sound of any oncoming traffic over the beeping of the crossing and only stepped out onto the road once he was satisfied that it was safe to do so.
Once safely across the busy main road, he felt considerably more at ease and started to ponder about what he and Sam might get up to once they reached the town centre. Other than going to Subway or McDonald’s – he hadn’t yet decided for definite between the two in his own mind, and being a considerate sort of young fellow, he would anyway need to take his friend’s preference into account – what else could they do?
The amusement arcade just outside the Vue Cinema was always on his itinerary for a trip to town, but he didn’t have enough money for more than about fifteen minutes in there. “The cinema itself?” he wondered. He hadn’t bothered to look what was on, so that was a decision only to be taken once in town, and with only six pounds in funds, it was not a strong contender. As he proceeded along Buckmaster Avenue and reached the top entrance to the Lyme Valley Parkway, he considered the mundanity of living in Newcastle-under-Lyme. “Never much to do in Castle,” he mused, failing to observe his father’s admonition on abbreviating place names, “same old, same old … nothing eventful or extraordinary ever happens here – always just the same old Castle!”
Leo’s view wasn’t entirely fair in actuality because Newcastle-under-Lyme did usually host an annual travelling fairground over the Easter weekend in Goose Street, and another one around mid-October in Lyme Valley, at the same time as the annual fireworks display. There was also the annual switching on of the Christmas lights, although Leo never considered that event to be too much of an excitement.
As he continued along the path which runs down into Lyme Valley proper, the fog got thicker and thicker, and by the time he reached the bend in the path at the end of the treeline, he could barely see a few yards in front. In fact, and notwithstanding that he had followed the same route hundreds of times in his short life, and thus knew his way around Lyme Valley like the back of his hand, if it were not for the path being tarmacked he would undoubtedly have lost his way.
So he continued on, looking down at the path now rather than forwards, as that was the only way to gauge that he was still going in the right direction. When he reached the bottom of the path, where the circle with the benches is, he very nearly walked into the Lyme Valley Parkway metallic sign that rises from the centre of the circular area. “Great,” he muttered in a sarcastic tone; “I can’t see a damn thing now!”
By now he could see that the fog was being created from a mist that was actually rising from the surface of the Lyme Brook itself which runs the whole length of Lyme Valley thereby giving it, and the town of Newcastle-under-Lyme, its name. The mist was rising in swirls or vortices and moving outwards from the brook – which he knew was there but couldn’t actually see.
Leo stopped walking and