Folklore and Me Part III

Folklore and Me Part III

Welcome everyone, got a couple of special announcements before I continue with the stories behind the stories!

Harvey Duckman Presents... 

So my publisher, 6e Publishing, is launching a new anthology in April, the aforementioned Harvey Duckman Presents... And included in its number is a completely new Brennan and Riz story!

The story is called 'A Walk Through the Pleasure Gardens' and has the pair investigating strange trees seen in a Thornaby park...

As usual I'll share the story behind the story once the anthology is in readers hands.

Check out the preorder below!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Harvey-Duckman-Presents-Collection-Steampunk-ebook/dp/B07PHTV7WJ

Creator Chaos

Out of the orderly Writing Community of twitter comes chaos, Creator Chaos that is! 

Me and some well known writers from the famous #WritersCommunity on twitter have banded together to create a new podcast! The questions are taken (with permission) from the #characterchaos hashtag game.

Find us on the link below and give us a listen! 

https://www.soundcloud.com/creator-chaos0/entering-chaos

Now all that is out of the way, let's get down to business!

Once Upon a Halloween at Preston Park:

Preston Park is located on a land that has been lived on continuously since the early medieval times. The land has changed hands countless times since then, starting in 1673 when George Witham bought it after the land was taken back following the defeat of the Royalists in the English Civil War, whom the land’s original owner, Lawrence Sayer pledged his allegiance to. The old manor house became known as Witham Hall, and thus began a series of changeovers. In 1820 though, it was bought by David Burton Fowler and in 1825, it was he who built the building that we know today as Preston Park Museum. The old manor house became a barn and was eventually demolished in 1974. The last private owner of the park was it’s most famous, Robert Ropner, who at the time he purchased the land was the High Sheriff of Durham. He purchased the park in 1882 and his family resided here till 1937. Stockon on Tees council bought it in 1947, and it officially became a museum in 1954. The park itself covers one hundred acres and has a number of alterations through out the years, and at one point, the world’s first passenger railway ran through the park, parallel to the main road. Through all this though, there has been a surprising lack of folklore associated with the land, and there is only a few sightings of ghosts within the museum. The most common of these is the lady in black that has been seen in the main hall, and within the basement. This is the source of the lady in black that taunts Brennan and Riz in the story. However, the ghost of Samuel, is based on a sighting that has been reported in the upper level of the museum. I uncovered this sighting early on when I was writing the story, and as I read it, I knew I had to incorporate it within the story somehow. The decision about the true identity of the lady in black was an early idea that I was able to expand on here.

The Deal at the Crossroads:

From learning that there was a haunted crossroads in Middlesbrough, I knew I wanted to include a story set there. I wasn’t able to pinpoint the exact crossroads I’d read about, despite the hints (on the outskirts of town, every one knows it yet won’t talk about it). Going for the next best option, I found another one that was just as suitable, one that happened to be near an old church for good measure. The church used to be a Methodist Church till it was sold off, to become a nightclub, and then sold again to become flats. The storyline itself was based on the idea of people going to a crossroads to do deals with the underworld. This is probably seen in best in the hit US show Supernatural. I took this and then added in some of the old folklore regarding crossroads, that of being a place to bury victims of suicide. The idea that the soul would get to choose where it ended up is a funny one, as what soul would purposely choose to go to the hell? Though it should be pointed out that it wasn’t just suicide victims that were buried here but suspected vampires as well, which are stories for another time.

The Barguest Lurking in the Town:

This originally started off as a completely different story. It was changed as I realised that I wanted to tell a tale regarding these black dogs on their own first. I also didn’t just want a story about these omen’s of death to just be about how they were completely antagonistic, hence the way the story develops. Whitby is a place that I have many story ideas around, so Brennan and Riz shall find themselves exploring that ancient town soon enough. The idea of supernatural beings being unable to cross running water appears here, during Jordan’s recollection of his night out. This is a very curious idea that you could find in many folktales. The black dogs go under different names across the country, with Black Shuck being one of the first recorded (and probably being the first to be immortalised through a rock song thanks to British rock band The Darkness), the Barguest though is Yorkshire through and through, and while there was tales of it hunting through the narrow streets of York, it is Whitby who has more tales linking it to the region. There is a different variation on spelling the name, being Barghest, in the story I went with the more familiar to me, Barguest. The origin of the name isn’t fully decided on, with several explanations offered. These range from Burh-Ghest (Town Ghost) to Barg-Geist (Mountain Demon when translated from German). One of the first recorded mentions of the Barguest is in William Hone’s book, Everyday Book (published in 1830). It takes the form of a ballad and tells the tale of a young man who goes out, unafraid, to vanquish the Barguest. The story does not end well for him, seemingly leaving the moral of not biting off more then you can chew. I diverge heavily from the folklore here by having the Barguest be the spirit of a dog that was turned into the monster by it’s owner. This allowed the hound to have a reason to haunt Jordan (the desecration of it’s masters grave). In the next story, you’ll see the Barguest again, but this time connected to a different piece of folklore, one that has ties to the Norse Mythology.

The Wild Hunt on the Road:

This one started off as a completely different story, it’s based off a ghost sighting that’s seen on the road from Guisbrough to Whitby, and there’s conflicting reports of her origins. One of the front runners is that she was a governess for a wealthy family but lived elsewhere, and so walked down that stretch of road every night to go home. Her spirit haunts the road as she was killed. Thus she turns up as the hitchhiker host stereotype. The original story was based on an alternative take on the origin, which was that she was obsessed with the supernatural, and wanted to go to Whitby, because of it’s connotations with Vampire’s, thanks to Bram Stoker’s work Dracula, which has the titular count wash up on Whitby beach. The idea would have had a race against time as Brennan and Riz tried to get to Whitby Abbey before she could. Then before it came to time to write the story, I heard the legend of the Barguest and they were often seen at along side the Wild Hunt. The Wild Hunt stories detail times when people have found themselves in the midst of a spectral hunt, with horses been ridden by riders who seem out of touch. The hounds they use, are of course, no other then the Barguests, giving them the same job as hounds in the hunts that we still do today. Now the person who leads the hunt is most interesting part of this. One of them say it is an old English king who now presides over the hunt, and his name is Helea King. An old ruler from a time before the Saxons came to these isle. It was said that he was invited to a wedding by a Dwarven King, so the King and his entourage went and stayed three days but by the time the walked out of the cave entrance and back into the forest. On the way to the castle, he spotted a farmer, but couldn’t understand what the farmer was saying. It transpired that while they thought only three days had passed, in the world of men, three centuries had passed. In shock, one of the king’s men jumped form his saddle, but on touching the floor, was nothing more then dust. Thus the king was forever more, doomed to lead the wild hunt. The man got a new identity though as time drove on, as stories started linking him to Wolden , who in turn was just a different name for Odin, leader of the Norse gods. Once I knew these details I knew how I wanted the story to go. I created a new monster here as well, the Ashen, how effective they will be remains to be seen.

Before I leave for another week, a quick reminder:

You can check out my newest work over at Royal Road, with new chapters weekly (I'll talk about this at some point as well)

https://www.royalroad.com/profile/113939/fictions

I'm also on goodreads if anyone wishes to connect on there

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18934209.Peter_James_Martin

And of course, I'm on twitter, my home away from home:

@Brennan_and_Riz

Till then my friends, keep crafting and telling stories, it's the most human thing to do.