Burn – the opening

A week tomorrow and Burn is published. Feels like this one has a been a long time coming which I suppose is true in a way. I’m really proud of this book and hope others like it as much as I do. Links to come as soon as I have them. In the meantime, here’s a sneak peek of what to expect.

BURN

CHAPTER ONE

Approaching his boss’s office, Steve Crossley halted and wiped his damp palms on his trousers. Striding through the open-plan office down on the first floor and barely aware of anything a few of his colleagues might have said as he passed, he’d taken the stairs instead of the lift as a distraction against the metallic fear in his mouth. Up on the fourth floor, seconds from Fred’s door with the low murmur of voices and the occasional ringing phone emanating from nearby, that fear could not be ignored.

And all because of how Fred had sounded when Steve answered the phone. To be in this state of what he might try to pretend was apprehension at being called up to his manager’s office was ridiculous and he knew it. Apprehension did not work here. Nor did a simple case of the nerves. This was fear and the only thing he had as a root cause was the hesitancy and the low murmur of Fred’s voice on the phone.

“…Steve…it’s Fred. Can you…can you come up…for a minute?”

It was like a rope around his neck: a tightness slowly constricting the blood-flow. Steve cleared his throat. A welcome rationality interceded. He didn’t have anything to fear here. He knew the Council offices inside out; he knew his boss was more of a mate than a manager, and this was just another day at work while the weekend approached and the days of doing his job and going home to his family ticked by in their sweet regularity.

At the other end of the long corridor, doors parted and good-natured conversation was audible. Steve wiped his hands on his trousers again and knocked on Fred’s door. Out of habit, he entered before his boss could tell him to do so. Fred’s voice, not quite covered by the whisper of the opening door or the soft rush of blood in Steve’s ears, made him sound like a man recovering from the flu.

Fred sat at his desk, fiercely bright sunlight falling on him, bleaching his skin. Opposite, a man perhaps in his late-forties and a woman ten years younger. Although they wore no uniform, carried no handcuffs or batons, Steve knew they were police. It was in their eyes, in the smell clinging to his nostrils and the back of his throat. Police in his boss’s office. Police who wanted to talk to him.

Steve shuffled forward and found his voice.

“Afternoon.”

“Steve.” Fred kept a hand on his desk as he rounded it. He walked like a guy who’d taken a smack to the groin, Steve thought. The man who could only be a police officer rose and offered a hand. Operating on autopilot, Steve took it. The officer’s fingers were long and cool.

“I’ll be right outside,” Fred muttered.

“Fred?” Steve pushed the name out of his mouth, again.

“Right outside,” Fred whispered. He held Steve’s shoulder for a moment, grip weak. He shivered as if Steve was made of ice.

The door closed and Fred was gone.

“Mr Crossley. I am DCI Ali Hannan. This is DS Laura Atkinson. We need to talk.”

Fred’s name had made it as far as his mouth; other names were buried deep in his chest. He knew those names, loved the taste of them. He couldn’t break them free from his heart.

Atkinson guided him to a spare chair with a gentle hand. “Have a seat.”

He thought he might start screaming soon. Thought it in a faint way he would remember a dream from weeks before. Where his spine met his neck, deep in the muscles and the nerves, sleeping until now, an animalistic alert rang out bright and sharp like the peal of church bell.

“Please, Mr Crossley.” Hannan indicated the chair.

Steve sat.

“Mr Crossley. Earlier this afternoon, we were called to an incident a few miles away.” Hannan remained standing and his shadow fell over Fred’s desk. It being late October didn’t matter; the room was a cramped sauna. Dribbling sweat trickled from Steve’s armpits and down his back. He was fairly sure he’d never been as hot before in his life.

“The details are still vague. There’s a lot more to uncover there. We found several people in a public area along with credit cards, phones, and personal possessions.” Hannan took a tiny breath. “I am so sorry to tell you. We found bodies.”

“No.” Steve had nothing more than that because he knew the truth of what was coming in the next few seconds. That understanding was born from Hannan’s words and his tone. And his eyes. And the flames racing through Fred’s office, come to scorch the flesh from Steve’s bones and drop his ashes straight into hell.

“No. Please.”

“I am so, so sorry, Mr Crossley. The bodies we found. They appear to be your wife and children.”

Chapter Two

“You’re wrong.”

Steve wanted to bellow it; he wanted to rage his argument with enough force to smash the window and blast the furniture into the wall. He could only draw enough breath to stay conscious, not shout at the police.

“Mr Crossley,” Hannan said. “I’m afraid we aren’t.”

You’re wrong. You made a mistake. You’re talking to the wrong man. You. Are. Wrong.

Steve tipped to the side and Hannan was there, faster than it seemed possible, catching his arm and keeping him upright.

“Here we go.” Hannan eased Steve to an upright position while Atkinson poured ice-cold water from Fred’s dispenser. She offered Steve the cup who stared at it.

“It will help,” she said.

“Help?” The word meant something. He didn’t know what.

Hannan took the water and placed it on the little table beside Steve. “Mr Crossley, we know this is horrendous. We really do, but we’d like you to come with us. Mr Peterson has agreed to come, as well. Can you stand?”

“Her dad,” Steve muttered.

Hannan leaned closer. “What was that?”

All at once, the names Steve kept under his heart broke free. It was as if they’d been jettisoned by an explosion.

Jenny. Tim. Rob. Debs.

More than names. More than his family. His soul.

“Jenny. My wife. She’s with the kids. At her dad’s.”

His fingers stretched like glue as he reached for the water. The trembling worked its way into his wrist, up to his elbow and into his shoulder. Water spilled and Atkinson steadied his grip. He managed to sip a little. The rest ran down his chin to his shirt.

“Jenny is with the kids. Her dad.” He coughed hard and sipped more water. “He’s in a care home. With dementia. They’re staying in his house for a few days before school starts again. They’re due back tomorrow.”

Atkinson had been right. The water did help. There was a white noise of unreality humming at the edges of his hearing, but he could think.

“I spoke to her this morning.”

“What time, Mr Crossley?” Hannan asked.

“Just after I got here. About eight thirty, I think.”

Steve fumbled with his trouser pocket, only then realising that his hands, neck, and back were damp with sweat. His shirt clung to him as if it was part of his body.

His fingers too moist for the fingerprint to work. He miskeyed on the phone, swore and tried again. Another miskey.

Steve clenched his jaw at the last second to keep his frustrated shout inside and thumbed the code in. Zero seven one seven. Debs’s birthday. A change from the previous code being the twins’ birthday. The boys seventeen now and how could that be possible when they were ten about a week ago? How could any of this be?

He scrolled, then showed the screen to the two officers. “Twenty to nine. We spoke for a minute. They’re fifty odd miles away. Jack, her dad, his place is in a piddly little village outside Winchester. The care home is in the city. She goes to see him there at least once a month and look after the house. They are fine.”

“Mr Crossley,” Hannan said.

“Listen to me, will you?” Steve closed his eyes for a count of five. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout. I am telling you whatever the hell is going on here, my family are fine. You’ve got the wrong man.”

He heard his last few words and cackled wild, jagged laughter. He was in every bad cop thriller ever made.

“I’ll call her right now.”

“Please. Take a moment. We’re with you. Mr Peterson is with you. We just need you to come with us.”

“I’ll call Jenny.” Steve tapped his wife’s name. “She answers and I’ll put her on speaker. Then we end this, right?”

“Please don’t do that.”

In his ear, the line rang.

“Give me a minute.”

The line continued to ring.

“It takes her a few seconds. Always does. With the kids.”

Ring.

“Please,” Hannan said. Atkinson reached for Steve’s hand, and he knocked it away.

“Just hold on,” Steve said.

“Mr Crossley. We have your wife’s mobile,” Hannan said.

Jenny’s voicemail answered Steve.

He dropped his phone.

Burn – comp titles and inspiration

Just under a month to go before Burn is published and I’ve been thinking lately about inspiration. Not the inspiration of ‘oh, I need the Muse to speak before I can write a single word’. No, the basic inspiration of where the hell an idea comes from.

Whenever a writer sends their tale to a publisher or an agent, they need comp titles. I’m sure you can work it out but just in case – comp titles are relatively recent books (not always books to be fair) in the same genre that sold well enough to be noticed and give the publisher or agent a clear indication that the writer is paying attention to what else is out there, knows where their book would sit on a shelf in a bookshop or a library and tells said publisher or agent in an instant what kind of book they’re looking at. The writer can do that with their synopsis and pitch, but the comp title thing does it immediately. And here’s the fun thing.

Most writers hate this. Writers aren’t automatically great at marketing or selling. I’m not. But we have to be. We have to come up with a clear synopsis, a one or two line pitch, a more detailed summary and comp titles. We can piss and moan all we like, but this is the business so it has to be done.

When I was first pitching Burn (back in my repped by an agent days sigh), we went through a few comp titles before hitting on the one I still use now even though both books were published a little longer ago than suits the comp title issue. Those books are The Outsider by Stephen King and Recursion by Blake Crouch. Using a book by one of the most famous writers on the planet isn’t really a great idea and maybe using a book that’s a fair bit more SF than my work is also a dubious move, but I stand by it. The Outsider is about an impossible crime, and Recursion goes into some into some pretty bonkers other reality/existences places. Both books are absolutely incredible, of course.

I went for those two and still do in my comp to Burn simply because they fit my story (told you I wasn’t great at marketing). If you’ve read both, it should tell you straightaway what to expect from me and I obviously hope you won’t be disappointed. If you haven’t read them, then get you to a bookshop or library.

This is all a rambling way of saying my inspiration came from wanting to write a story about a seemingly impossible crime and put it alongside the idea of other lives that we have not lived, but someone out there in the big black has. At that point, I didn’t really know what my crime was or where those other lives were going. I worked it all as I went after sticking to my inspiration and remembering that it most often comes when you’re already telling your tale. Not when you’re waiting for it to whisper in your ear.

Burn will be happy to meet you on 10th August.

Newsflash – new novel to be published

Cry your pardon for the second post in all of three days but I got word last night that to go with Burn and Chaos, Baynam Books will be publishing a third one from me. The Fall is coming September 2026. Consider me extremely happy. And now over to the story…

Ten years after total economic collapse, Britain is divided into Provinces and ruled by the governors – criminal gangsters dressed up as benevolent leaders – while a puppet Prime Minister sits in Number Ten. As long as they are free to forget the nightmare of starvation and chaos that almost pushed the country into the abyss, people will eagerly accept their leaders for the monsters they are.

One man cannot forget. Or forgive.

Ex police officer Craig Parsons dug too deeply into the business of the Governor-General Harry Lawrence and now all Parsons knows is a father’s grief. Lawrence took his heart and soul and Parsons plots to return the favour. Except someone has beaten him to it. They’ve kidnapped Lawrence’s teenage daughter and framed Parsons, alongside the other governors, for the crime. Lawrence, a ruthless predator with an army at his disposal, will stop at nothing to find those responsible for his daughter’s abduction – even if means war with the Provinces.

Parsons’s sole ally is the fixer Trent: a living weapon with no memory of his past and the owner of secrets which stretch from Parsons’s world into the void between life and death. Parsons and Trent have a matter of hours to track the kidnappers across the country and find a missing child before the threat of nationwide violence becomes a bloody reality.

Today, all secrets will be brought out of the dark and into the light. Today, bullets will break the world wide open.

Welcome to the Fall.

Burn – what’s it all about then?

Very occasionally, someone will ask me what one of my books is about – same as we do with a film we don’t know much about or any fiction someone might recommend. Because I’m one of those guys, I often want to ask if they mean ‘what happens in the story’ because ‘what’s it all about’ isn’t really the question they’re asking. But because I’m not a total arsehole, I don’t reply with that question.

I just think it.

Anyway, if you were to ask me what Burn is about, I’d say a husband and father is told by the police that they’ve found the bodies of his wife and kids dumped in a field and they know for a stone cold fact that these bodies are definitely the guy’s family. But then, he gets a phone call from his wife who is obviously alive. Which leaves the question – who are these bodies if not his family? From there, things get really weird. And extremely dangerous.

But that’s not what Burn is about. That’s what happens in the opening chapters. What happens isn’t what it’s about. What it’s about is family and the stark terror of being told something has happened to your loved ones. The lengths someone will go to in order to keep their family safe and to destroy a threat to their family. How we think we can’t accept something that can’t possibly be real invading the good sense of our reality. How we must if we are to keep sane and keep those closest to us safe from harm.

That last one has always been interesting to me. We all think we know the stuff that makes sense and is normal. Our jobs. Paying the bills. Socalising with friends. Cutting the grass. All that day to day stuff that fills our lives in small ways. And the bigger things – our partners and their health. Kids. The utterly fucked up state of the world and wondering how we got to the point of having the worst possible people in charge of everything. All that kind of fun. But what happens when something that cannot be real in any way not only is real but is in your home. With your partner. Your kids. Your entire world. What do you do? Lose your mind and therefore your family? Or realise that there’s no limit to what you’ll do and definitely no limit to what you can believe is true?

I think most people would realise there are no limits to both those points because if the alternative is losing everything that matters in your world. . .well, it’s no contest. At all.

So if you ask me what Burn is all about, I’ll happily tell you a guy dropped into a surreal nightmare of knowing his family is dead while they’re alive at the same time. But what it’s actually about. . .

Believing in the impossible. Because the impossible has come to you with open arms.

BURN – 10th August

Burn – behind the scenes

Well, not exactly behind the scenes but close enough, I guess. Three months to go until publication and I’m very excited to see what people think of my new tale. This is especially true because it isn’t my usual kind of horror. Don’t get me wrong – it gets dark. But this one has more of a thriller edge to it. This wasn’t a deliberate choice or even really a conscious one. It’s just how things worked out so I guess you can say the result was a happy accident.

Like most writers, I start work with a combination of ideas. Sort of a what if this situation met this one and then both hit this character. I knew who the main character of Burn would be. Steve Crossley: husband, father, friend. Kind of Mr Average and happy with it. Three kids; happily married. Getting through life with his focus on his family until. . .

Shit goes down.

I also wanted a kind of locked room mystery. An unexplained situation without an obvious answer to what’s going on or how it’s possible. I thought that could be fun as well as interesting. So what would happen to Mr Average when his family are murdered but then his family turn up safe and sound? How can someone deal with the sight of his wife and children dead on a slab when his wife is calling him on the phone at the same time?

At that point, I had zero clue but I wanted to find out so I wrote the first draft which, as all first drafts are, was not impressive. I worked out the issues and plotlines that went nowhere, fixed it all and came up with a second version that was much improved. A few more ideas came to me which ended up resulting in a third draft I was very happy with. Plus answering my initial question of what this would do to Steve was a bonus.

I had a literary agent around then. She liked the book but was clearly moving away from the kind of stuff I write. Things didn’t work out which was a hell of a setback. I still liked my book but didn’t know what to do with it seeing as it’s somewhere between horror and thriller. Baynam Books liked it as well – the timescale between my initial submission and their acceptance was damn quick so you can imagine how pleased I was with that. Finding it a home after getting canned by my agent was a massive boost.

Side note: a while ago, I wrote a book called Winter Graves which featured a supporting character named Ali Hannan. At the time, he was a one-off. Or so I thought. There was something about him that stuck with me so when he reappeared in Burn, I probably shouldn’t have been surprised. Some characters stay with the writer. It’s happened to me before as much as I like to explore new worlds and new people with each tale. In any case, Burn isn’t a sequel to Winter Graves in any way at all. At most, they’re set in the same universe but there’s no need to read one to follow the other. I hope you like Ali as much as I do.

Other news: I’m back on Threads (@lukewalker_writer) so feel free to join me there. Or stick with BlueSky if you prefer. I did create another Facebook page but for some reason, they deleted it within half an hour. I have no idea why and can’t get a direct answer so I figure that’s not happening. Also other news: the book I’ve been writing for what feels like the last thousand years has another 30k ish to go before draft 3 is done. And then because I’ve massively overwritten it, it will need the same amount cutting from it before I can submit it. The quality is there and I think I’ve got something special. Problem is I’ve got way too much of it. Once that’s done, it’ll be prep work for the book after Burn. Chaos is published early next year. I’m also hoping to hear about a third one soon. Ditto a few short stories which have been out there for a while. As any writer can tell you, publishing time exists outside of the rest of reality.

That’s about all for now. Talk soon.

Be well.

Newsflash – new novel to be published

Good news – I’ve sold another novel to Baynam Books Press who will be releasing Burn this August. The new one is called Chaos (I really need to come up with more than single word titles at some point). Very early days, of course, but consider me extremely happy. And to let you know what to expect, read on…

It is the worst outbreak of mass murder in British history: a suburban neighbourhood exploding in an orgy of violence which leaves one man alive. Questioned by the police for hours, Neil Lauther cannot explain why he was unharmed as his street turned into a bloody battleground between friends and families. And he has no idea who the armed men are who abduct him later that same night.

Held prisoner by rogue elements of the government, Neil uncovers the truth. His captors believe the man responsible for the slaughter has influenced countless others across the world and across time to commit similar atrocities. They’re seeking this butcher with the plan of harnessing his ability to spread madness by a simple touch, then unleash him on their enemies. To do that, they need the sole survivor of the most recent bloodshed.

But Neil is nobody’s victim. His childhood shaped by violence and suffering, Neil knows how to endure weeks of torture. And when the connection is made and he discovers how much his captors have underestimated a murderer who is more devil than man, he knows he will have to force a confrontation between the living and the dead. Between men who kill for their country and a creature who kills only for pleasure.

It’s time for evil to meet its match. It’s time to unleash Chaos.

March 2025

I had plans to post last weekend but you know what they say about plans and God. I spent all of last Sunday prepping a submission package to send that day as the market was open for a very short time. I got it done and then received the rejection a couple of hours later. Kind of a downer, really, but that’s publishing for you. On top of that, my wife has been ill with the flu for over a week so plans have had to change. Such is life. You either roll with it or it rolls over you.

Been thinking lately about how much time I spend writing because it isn’t just the act of writing that takes up the time. There’s time spent researching new markets, agents and publishers. Time spent ensuring whatever you send adheres to the precise guidelines. Time spent chasing those subs as and when it’s required. Time on social media either pimping your stuff in the hope it leads to sales (hahahaha) or just socialising which is a type of marketing in of itself. Then, of course, there’s life outside of the blank page. A 9-5. Family. Friends. The need to just switch off from the page and relax because all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, doesn’t it?

I think this came from a comment an online friend made recently after I mentioned working on a new book. He said he was in awe of my determination. A throwaway comment neither of us needed to turn into a big deal, but one that stuck with me. I’ve been writing what I consider seriously for pushing thirty years. It should go without saying that the early stuff (and a fair bit of the later stuff) was absolute crap. There’s no other way of learning to write and it’s something a lot of writers need to understand. I’ve been doing this for so long that I honestly don’t know what I’d do with my time if I stopped. Read more? Watch more films? Take up gardening? Who knows? All I’ve ever wanted to do since I was a little kid is tell stories. That’s literally it. Occasionally, the question of why do you write pops up online. My joke answer is it’s the only thing I’m any good at. My serious answer is it’s the only thing I’m any good at. I have zero other talents or abilities so I figure I might as well use the one talent I do have. Of course, that doesn’t mean the publishing world or the wider world is going to give the first shit. Neither owes me anything. All I owe is to tell my tales to the best of my ability.

With that in mind, draft 3 of a new book is underway after draft 1 was way too long and boring, and 2 was too short and boring. This version is, so far, much improved but I won’t know how improved until it’s finished – probably another five or six weeks. I’m currently subbing three other books and considering what’s next. A few ideas are brewing and I like all of them. Plus there will soon be promotion work for Burn which is published in August. Looking forward to seeing what people think of it especially as it’s a little different to my usual angle – this one is a horror/thriller cross with family right at its heart.

Anyway, coffee to drink and a new draft to work on.

Be well.

December 2024

In previous years, I’ve done a look back/summary kind of thing as we approach the end of the year and the start of the next. 2024 hasn’t really been a resounding success on the publishing front so there isn’t a hell of a lot to talk about there. I had high hopes for The Ninth Circle and my efforts with writing different stuff under a new name and while I’m still proud of both books, it’s probably best to focus on new fiction now.

With that in mind, I’m pleased with the second draft of a new book (working title The Torment) and am in the process of putting together the submission package for publishers, so I’m ready to send it off hopefully by the start of February. I’m also going back to the book I wrote before The Torment (working title Blood Roots) which ended up bigger than I planned and a lot messier. The hope is with a bit of distance from it, I can come up with a new version that tightens the story up and results in a better book. At the moment, I think it still has a chance so we’ll see how it goes. After that, I’m looking at a couple of other ideas so it’s a case of which one seems like the best one to write first.

Also ending this year on a small high – I had word on Christmas Eve that I’ve sold a short story. The turnaround from submission to that email was just a couple of days (in comparison, I recently hit a year to the day on a different submission for another short – I’m currently around 250 in their submission queue) which was pretty sweet. I haven’t signed a contract on it yet so won’t be saying anything more until I do. A small victory in a quiet year, but one I will happily take. I’ve got a handful of other shorts out there and while I still enjoy writing them, I’m not sure how much of my time in 2025 will be spent writing new ones. I’ve mentioned before that the market for short fiction feels like it’s shrinking unless you write to the publisher’s theme. That along with a couple of other points makes it harder to find homes for short stories. I won’t call it a day on them particularly if I have a really solid idea for one, but I think the focus for at least a while will be on longer works and keeping up on the agent hunt. I hoped to find another one after my first agent and I parted ways – no joy so far, but then publishing isn’t a game for the impatient.

I think that’s it for this year unless anything amazing happens in the next forty-eight hours. On a side note, I expect we’re in for a dark time (again unless something amazing happens) globally very soon. All I can say is do what you can to keep your light on.

Be well.