International Mermaid Day

We all need a bit of cheering up. I should be doing cash flows, so instead I’m posting about mermaids.

Just a short post, mind.

If you are in to Mermaid-kind you might like The Real McCoy

Cherry Potts’ story in We/She

I’ll tell you what though; you weren’t really expecting me, a genuine mermaid, were you? You thought I’d be some girlie in a clamshell bikini and yardage of slinky blue skirt with
unconvincing fins. So why are you disappointed that you got the real thing? That makes no sense at all! You should be in awe, really…
Very few of us survive without the sea. Take us away from it and we pine, dead in a fortnight mostly. Fortunately I’m tough, and I can see the positive side of a career.

And if you’ll stretch to a Selkie, then Jackie Taylor’s Pelt in Strange Waters might be just the thing.

Her scalp itched; her thick, grey-black hair fought against the tyranny of the new perm. She was uncomfortably hot and clammy in her new outer skin of trench coat (belted, beige), silk scarf, beret, tan leather gloves. Samuel had said when he met her at the station, ‘You scrub up well!’ And she’d winced at the thought of the skinning knives used to clean down pelts.
She wanted to take the trench coat off and carry it, but there was drizzle, and it was the wetting kind, and if her skin got wet, she would smell of the sea. She was never sure if anyone else could smell it, but the thought of it made her burn with shame.

Strange Waters is also available as an audiobook read by Sophie Aldred

Happy Mermaid Day!

Video from Other Worlds – the Real McCoy

The final video from our Brockley Max event, (which became a celebration as we won an award!) at Misty Moon – a mermaid runs away (or should that be swims away?) to the circus, and finds it’s not all she hoped.

The wonderful Carrie Cohen (currently appearing at the Tabard in Misalliance by Bernard Shaw) reads from The Real McCoy, by Cherry Potts

If you would like to see the whole thing read live you can catch Louise Gummer reading at The Literary Kitchen Festival TOMORROW, Tuesday 17th June, 6.30 as fellow Sabotage2014 Award winners, Liars’ League, head south for the evening and take up residence at the Peckham Pelican.

You will also soon be able to see video of Lin Sagovsky reading The Real McCoy at Liars’ League last week. Keep an eye on their website.