The Strange Tales of Peter James Martin

The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Book 1: A Boy and A Rat

Wednesday, 20 March 2024

#63 Not Again + Brennan and Riz: A Case Study

Happy Blog Day Everyone!

Today, I'm going to delve into the process I use to write Brennan and Riz Tales (of all sizes, with some alterations) using last week's short story as a case study. If you have read it, I implore you to go and check it out!

Before that though, we'd better catch up with the pair in comic form!

The Comic Tales of Brennan and Riz

Another entry in my wordless strips and...it could be better, definitely messed up a few things in the art department (should have made the bars thicker). Still, the idea is sound, and who doesn't love the idea of Riz being put in time out within a pet carrier?

Brennan and Riz: A Case Study

So, where to start?

Like all good stories, it starts with an idea...one that I hastily scribbled in a note book, giving the idea a single sentence to sell itself. That sentence for the story last week? Five Lamps of Thornaby. I didn't have a lot to go on, but this story behind the story actually starts earlier than you'd think. You see, I actually wrote a draft up of this very idea a few years ago now. It would have been for a proposed "3rd Anthology" book of Brennan and Riz short stories. There is still plans for that book, but obviously you won't find this one in it.

I have the basis of the idea, I just need to expand it. In this case I wanted to turn it on its head and play with another idea that was churning in my mind: belief making things real. Now, I was already planning another story to use this with, a longer one (spoiler alert: still haven't written it) but this seemed like a good place to start a narrative thread. To make it work, I changed it from a real piece of folklore, to a fake one. I kept a real explanation of the Five Lamps of Thornaby that was a basis of the fake 'five death lights' of Thornaby.

When writing shorts, I'll either plot exhaustively or go at it with just the idea of where it's starting and see where I end up, going back to edit things if needs be. Seldom, I'll do bits of both, which is what I did with this story. I had a beginning, and I had a rough ending, the middle was a work in progress. Thus I went at it.

To simplify the plot, Brennan and Riz get called to deal with a couple of unusual deaths in Thornaby, revolving around the aforementioned 'Death Lights" except Brennan had never heard of them before, despite growing up in Thornaby. What followed is the duo trying to figure out how a made up piece of folklore can kill anyone before realising the truth. Knowing this, they then have to race to save the final victim and proving that seeing isn't always believing.

Sounds like a fun story right? Nope. I knew early on their was issues as the pacing was well off, and the threat practically non-existent. I pushed on, confident that I could fix things in editing but I hit another snag, u wasn't enjoying myself. The story had quickly changed into a comment on Internet culture, the idea of how a community could give life (see Slenderman for example) but the execution was flawed leading to a climax that dragged, as despite best efforts, nothing seemed in character. I finally finished it, but reading back through it some days later (always give time before you do a read through), it just wasn't very good and like other works I've talked about on this blog, it would have needed a complete redo rather than an edit. I made the (easy) decision to shelve it.

Let's flash forward to a few weeks ago when I was thinking of what short stories I could do for the blog. I had not long wrote down a new list of possible Brennan and Riz story ideas, for a proposed 4th anthology, I'd come up with a fair few ideas but found I'd put the five lamps on the list. After digging through some notes I'd made on the legend, I didn't think there would have been enough for a short story, not a decent sized one anyway. It was then that it clicked that it would be a perfect size for the blog (it didn't turn out that way, but that's the beauty of hindsight!). Using the research I crafted a small narrative, whenever I look at folklore, I have to decide the angle I take on it. Sometimes this is easy, others, not so much. With this one, it fell into the former category. As far as plot was concerned, I didn't plan further than the reason they were looking into things, deciding to 'pants' it. Evidence of this can be seen in the ending, which went darker than I would have liked, but it did fit the tone the story ended up with.

It's funny to look back and contrast the two versions, both born from the same facts but veered off in two complete different directions. Could I have fixed the other one? Maybe, would it have been worth it? No. I think I'm happy enough to allow the Lights on the Green appear as representation of one of Thornabys greatest legends.

Well, that's that. Not exactly the deep dive into my creation process but a greater look at how my weird brain works all the same.

There's another short deviations next week, and I can confirm that Isabelle and Robyn are returning for a walk down memory lane...

Till then,

Keep on writing!

Peter James Martin

Quick Links

The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Book 1: A Boy and A Rat

Wednesday, 13 March 2024

#62 Precautions + Short Diversions: The Lights on the Green

Happy Blog Day Everyone!

This week, it's Brennan and Riz's turn to shine in Short Diversions: The Lights on the Green!

...

What's that?

....

They already get their own segment with a brand new Comic Tales of Brennan and Riz?

....

Well, Riz is a greedy rat, and he did promise to bite me if I didn't post this story...

So yeah! Double Brennan and Riz goodness this week! Please enjoy!

The Comic Tales of Brennan and Riz

For all those Valarie fans out there (you know who you are) here's her updated appearance since last October...I never meant to leave it that long between appearances, I swear. Not quite sure her hair works at that angle though. Still, hopefully Riz won't be sticking his head into any more bags for a while.

Short Diversions: The Lights on the Green

This was supposed to be a short, short, story but this ended up being one of the longest yet on this blog. I can't even explain why its this long other than it feels like a Brennan and Riz story that never made it to the books.

Please enjoy!

**********************

It was a pleasant Spring night, or what passed for it in England. I was avoiding the muddy patches of the grass while Riz sat on my head like some demented watch rat.

“Try nd keep yaself steady ya twat!” he yelled at me, as if I was doing this on purpose. If I had been, he’d found himself stuck in the mud as I would have flipped from his lofty perch.

“I’m still not seeing anything,” I said, choosing to take the high road and ignore his comment.

“Well, dat means we can jus go home now nd ferget all bout der job!”

“God, I wish you were being serious.” I didn’t want to be out here. The ‘job’ was deceptively simple. People had spotted five lights near St Peter’s church, and the council wanted me to make sure that nothing untoward was being done to the ancient building. I was a bit uneasy as there were lingering memories of a previous time I’d been called here, though that time was Riz’s fault, this one was more that we needed the money, as rent was due. However, the people we spoke to hadn’t been helpful, with very few sightings to go off. The one we were told went as follows:

Five lights in a plus formation floating through the trees, always going in random directions. That was it. That’s all we had to go on. With those scraps, we settled on ghosts, or a form of ghostly phenomena. The majority of people would be familiar with ghosts of people, I don’t think that needs an explanation, but there were, in rare cases, the times where you would have sightings of…let’s say smaller objects. I mean like only seeing people’s hands, floating through the air.

We assumed that this was the case, though there was an argument to be made that it could have been a will o’ wisp, but that was discounted due to the strange formation. With a ghost hypothesis in hand, we’d prepared appropriately. This led us to this situation we were in now, and I can tell you we’d been out here for four hours already. Four hours stumbling around, our eyes darting around, trying to spot the lights or just spot the difference from the lights and kids with their mobile phones out. You can see why Riz’s declaration that we just abandon the job had so much weight, as it was looking like we’d been sent on a fool’s errand. However, as much as I wanted to do that, the thought of returning to the council, empty handed, thus getting no pay, wasn’t appealing either.

“Dis is so annoyin!” Riz called out.

“Look, we’ll stay for one more hour.” I sighed.

“Wudn’t be so bad if sumit wud jus happen already!”

Almost as if he’d been challenging it, we did spot something moving through the trees. The lights resembled more flames than what I was expecting, and didn’t look ethereal at all, which was also worrying.

“Still think it’s a ghost?” I asked Riz.

“I’m not pickin up on nethin ova dere, so, yeh. Get us closer nitwit!”

Begrudgingly, I obliged, heading towards the tree line where the lights were also slowly moving forward. From a new vantage point, I started to see a faint outline behind the lights, but no sooner had I made this discovery, they faded from view.

“It vanished? It bloody vanished! Wat der actual bloody heck!” Riz pulled at my hair in frustration before calming down a moment later. “Wait, does dat mean we can go ‘ome now? We saw it, nd it buggered off.”

I was going to answer, but there was a glow to our right and the lights appeared again, but this time, they were going the opposite way. With a second chance to get a good look at the target, I focused on the outline. With how it was positioned, I think we stood behind it, and whatever it was, had the lights in front. It seemed humanoid in appearance. There were no discernible features, with everything resembling a swirling mist..

“Riz, what’s going on here?”

“Duh, it’s der soddin ghost! Let’s get rid of it so we can go home!”

“Aren’t you curious at all about this warping faceless ghost? Or the fact that all we can see ifs the floating flames?” I questioned.

“Do we get paid more fer knowin dose things?” Riz asked in return.

“Well, no…”

“Dere’s ya answer den! Dere’s da target, der rune ya need is in ya pocket, blast it nd we can go…Oh, it’s bloody disappeared again!”

With Riz saying that, I looked around, and sure enough, the lights had disappeared. Things were tense for a few moments as we waited to see if the spirit returned, but disappointingly, we were alone again.

“Bugga,” Riz muttered. “Ya gunna make us wait out ‘ere longa now ta see if der ghost returns aren’t ya?”

“Sadly, I think I have to.”

“Fer once, ya cud ‘ave sed, ‘nah, let’s go home fer a cuppa, or booze’. Dat’s wat ya shud ave sed.”

“If a job is worth doing, it’s worth doing right. Isn’t that what you’ve told me before?”

“Only wen der job is worth a shed load of cash. Der council added an extra zero or two ta dat reward, nd ya wud be rite.”

I left a moment of silence to fall between us, before I spoke again.

“I don’t care, we’re staying. I want to know who this is, and what is going on with them. Especially why they keep jumping around.”

“Gawdammit, fine! We catch a cold nd itz all ya fault! Ya got it?”

“Considering you always blame me, that’s nothing new, keep your eyes peeled,” I said, ignoring his rudeness again.

“Wateva.”

I think another hour passed before the ghost made its third appearance. Now, the person holding the lights was more solid looking than it had been previous. They appeared to be wearing armour, like the knights of old. His eyes were stained as if he’d seen a lifetime of hell. At first, I didn’t think that he could see us as he stared straight ahead, at a point that was beyond the trees. It was only as he walked past, did his head turn, but as abruptly as he arrived, he went to speak, but vanished before saying a word.

“Please tell me that you believe this is odd now as well?” I turned to Riz, who was trying to look away.

“Fine! Yeh, it’s smeggin odd! Ya happy now! Clearly der ghost is losin his focus nd can’t keep ‘imself ta getha. Probably y he’s poppin in all ova der place instead of stickin ta one path like all dose normal ones we deal wit.”

I waited till Riz had finished speaking before getting cocky with him.

“Did being that helpful hurt you?”

“No, but dis will hurt u!”

The little git bit my ear in revenge, which I should have seen coming as these exchanges always ended up like this. A quick plaster on my ear and I was ready to deal with the spirit.

There was a memory that was flickering in my mind, something I’d not thought of in a long time, but the sight of the ghost knight dredged it up. I looked back at the small building of St Peter’s church. I’d remembered my father telling me how old it was, that it’d been there since the 12th century , replacing an even older building. Part of the story he’d told me, was about a 13th century crusading knight called Robert De Thormodbi. Robert’s part in the tale revolved around how he was wounded in a fierce battle, and swore to create a shrine to St Mary should he survive. To honour his vow, he travelled to Thornaby and created it in St Peter’s Church, lighting five lamps to light it.

Had I just encountered Robert, some seven hundred years after his last flesh and blood visit to the area? I certainly couldn’t discount the possibility. The lamps he was carrying, was he trying to get them into the church? That part I couldn’t figure out yet. I shared my thoughts with Riz, who didn’t really find anything that he could argue with, least not because he had no idea himself, and more importantly, he was wanting this job done.

A tense half an hour wait ensured, but in the distance, the furthest away from the church the ghost had been, we saw the flickers of ethereal flames, and knew he was back.

“Hold on Riz,” I shouted as I ran over to the spirit as fast as I could. Given how quick the spirit was at making himself disappear, I didn’t want to waste any time in getting to the bottom of this. As before, the ghost was fully visible, and he turned his head to me as we got closer. He had gone to speak, but I spoke first.

“My name is Brennan, that’s Riz and we’re here to help you! You’re Sir Robert De Thormodbi aren’t you?” My words came out quickly, too quickly, as I was worried that he might not have understood what I was even on about. The ghost slowly nodded, it didn’t seem like it was intentional, instead coming off as recording that was being purposefully slowed.

“The…Lights…” he said, his voice showing that same unnatural slow pace.

“The lights? These ones?” I pointed to the ones he was carrying, wanting to try and cut any unneeded talking. Again, he nodded.

“What are you doing with them?”

“Need…to…relight…them…” With the ghost’s other hand, he pointed towards the church, the unfurling of his finger seemingly taking minutes instead of seconds.

“You need to put these in there?” I was dying to ask why, as it made no sense, there was some in there, for sure, but they were normally lit by the priests as and when needed. No ghost lights required.

“Yes…to….prevent….” those words were ominous, even Riz’s interest picked up when he heard them.

“Prevent wat? Wat ya tryin ta say ya old coot!” Riz went to grab the ghost by the collar, but of course, fell through him.

“Hmm…” he said from the ground. “I fink I mite know wat’s going on ‘ere, well, sorta.”

Taking my attention away from Sir Robert for a moment, I looked through him at Riz who was on the ground.

“Sumit is interferin wit ‘im manifestin. It’s takin all ‘is will ta get ta dis point, nd it’s probably y he keeps jumpin from place ta place, neva gettin in dere.”

“The…Lights….need….to…be…relit,” Sir Robert said, going forward again, but I saw him ripple, like someone dropping a stone into a pond, and with each ‘wave’ he grew more transparent. I knew he was going to disappear again soon.

“Ideas, quickly, Riz!”

“He keeps dis up, he won’t be able ta manifest at all…Job dun at dat point! Tho, we don’t know wat der lights are gunna prevent, jus my luck it wud be summit bad.”

“Thanks for explaining things, but I wanted an idea to help.”

“So, he wantz ta be ova dere, but he can’t as summit is stoppin ‘im. Clearly wateva that summit is, doesn’t want ‘im ova dere. Thus, we ave ta get ‘im ova dere. Ta do dat…Well, I do ave one idea, but ya ain’t gunna like it.”

“Try me.”

“Ya gotta let ‘im possess u, it’s der only way he’s gunna get in dere.”

I took another glance at Sir Robert, who was rapidly fading from view. I really didn’t have much of a choice at that point, and given the way Riz was nibbling on a rock, making a kind of a Rune I’d never seen before, yeah, it’d already been decided for me.

“Please…Help….” Sir Robert’s voice fell to a whisper.

“Rite, ‘ere we go,” Riz said putting himself between me and the ghost.

“What happens if this fails?”

“Den not payin der rent is der least of ya worries, ‘ere goes nuthin!” Riz crackled. He spoke that strange little language of his and Sir Robert flashed and was gone. At first I didn’t think anything had happened, till my body started moving on it’s own, and five ghost lights appeared in front of me, my outstretched hand holding them in place.

“Thank you,” a voice from within my own mind said. It clicked quickly that the voice belonged to Sir Robert, now talking at a normal speed.

“You’re welcome?” It sounded to me like I said it, but my lips didn’t move.

“Ever since I fulfilled my first vow, and lit the lamps inside this building, it has been my fate to return here, to make sure that they stay lit. I know the priests of today light them but that is not the same as what I will be doing,” Sir Robert started saying. With him being in control of my body, I wondered if it meant I could have seen into his memories, which would have gone a long way into explaining what was going on here.

“These are, what I have come to call them as, soul fires. Normal people won’t be able to see any difference once my work is finished.” Sir Robert was wasting no time with my body, and we were almost at the church.

“The force that had been trying to stop me must be fooled by your strange tactic, but I doubt it will work a second time. If you are truly on the side of valour, I beseech thee to do all thou can in order to defeat it. I doubt that I can do this in future.” Everything Sir Robert was saying seemed to be cryptic, vague and purposefully lacking detail. Sadly, this was the norm for cases these days.

“Is it this force that the lights are supposed to prevent?” I asked.

“The lights will prevent great calamity while they are lit, but they do not last indefinitely, and the greater the pressure on them, the faster they will be extinguished.”

Now, we were in the Church, how we got in, I don’t know as I wasn’t paying attention, instead trying to straighten everything out what I was being told. The inside of the church was small, and intimate, maybe space for fifty people at best. At the other side of the main doors was the shrine, and this was where Sir Robert, in full control of my body, strode up.

“Is there anything you can tell me about this force? This enemy? What am I supposed to be looking out for here? I’ve got quite a lot of supernatural crap going on as it is!”

Sir Robert didn’t reply at first, as he was concentrating on hanging his spectral soul fires over the physical lamps, aligning them. I did feel something as he completed his task, a subtle shift and a warm feeling. The fact that I felt them was significant as it meant that Sir Robert had begun the process of returning my body over to me, his time up.

“The enemy…is from beyond here. They have woken. I cannot see them, but I feel them, they are vast…” Sir Roberts’ words started to be stretched thin. “Thank you…again, you are…indeed a brave and…selfless knight. I pray that you…are victorious…Farewell…”

I couldn’t hear him anymore after that, and I had full control of my body once more. I blinked, my senses feeling a bit duller than before, and movements were sluggish at first.

“Ya feelin betta?” Riz asked cautiously.

“I think so? Everything seems quiet now,” I dragged my attention over to the soul fire lights that were barely visible to me. I observed the way the flames flickered and reached out to one, but felt nothing there.

“Did he say nethin?” Riz scurried up to my shoulder. “Ya know, while he waz in yer hed?”

“Well…” I took me a bit of time to get my thoughts in order, but I explained everything that Sir Robert had said,or rather what he tried to say. About this force that had been trying to stop im, that was apparently waking up, and wasn’t too happy. Normally, Riz is never surprised, he’s been around the block a few times, he knows everything, this news had him in silence, a contemplative silence, the sort where you would put your hand on your chin to try and work things out. He did have something to say about it in the end, a single word:

“Shit.”

“That’s all you’ve got to say? Do you know what this force is? How to stop it?” I asked frantically.

“Listen, der’s sum things ya can know bout, den dere’s otha things above ya pay grade…Dis is one of dose things. Dere’s a time nd a place ta learn, but fer now…” Riz looked awkwardly upwards at the night sky. The clouds had parted, granting us a view into the uncaring cosmos we drifted in. “Fer now…Ya jus gunna ave ta live wit wat ya know. Cuz, we ain’t ready at all fer dat fight….”

Riz’s words echoed around on the drive home, and for the next few days. The lady I spoke to at the council was ecstatic with the news that duly paid us. That was enough to keep Riz’s mind off the matter, and he settled back into his ways. For me though, I’d heard similar things from all sorts of places, sometimes it was from a Fae, or even other humans. I left myself go on autopilot, even ignoring Riz’s insults. Nothing was making sense, and while I was sure on some level the information would sink to the background, a comfort was taking away from me. That I knew that an ominous force was lurking around the periphery. I was left with the question of what to do now, and sadly, there was no easy answer to that…

End.

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Well what did you think?

There's a strong chance you might see this in print at some point though in a cleaned up and expanded form.

Funnily enough, there's more to say about this story but that will have to wait for now.

Till next time,

Keep on writing!

Peter James Martin

Quick Links

The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Book 1: A Boy and A Rat

Wednesday, 6 March 2024

#61 Where The Real Money Is Made

Happy Blog Day Everyone!

It's March, which means it's time for my second monthly review! Did I do well? Or did I do very little again, scroll down to see!

Before that though, its time for more misadventures from that lovable duo:

The Comic Tales of Brennan and Riz

So, the answer to last week's teaser was, of course, the legendary Mel Brooks. His movies were a great source of inspiration to me when I was growing up, with Spaceballs being the very first one I saw (was probably way too young but it just leaves fertile ground for rewatches to see what jokes flew over my eight year old brain.

With all that said and done, I knew I wanted to do a homage to it somewhere, and thus was the siren call of Riz putting his own name on things to sell them, too good to ignore. It does make it a little wordier than I would've liked, but it is what it is.

Hope you all enjoy it though!

February Report

Another month has come and gone, and I swear they feel like they're getting quicker!

What has this short month bought for my writing?

To start with the obvious, I wrote two short stories for this very blog!

Valentines Date

The Contract

These two were fun to write and are technically connected (I.e. they're set in the same universe) they both turned out longer than I expected, especially the Valentines Date one. Judging by page views that one was also more popular. Bodes well for Avalon Tales, speaking of...

I finally finished chapter 1 of this ever changing novella. I'm over half way through chapter 2 so I'm hoping that this March will be better, but watch this space.

As for any movement on things getting published however, that's looking less likely (talking mainly Brennan and Riz here) as time goes on, but I am trying.

That's about it for this week. Next time, it'll be the loveable duo's time to shine!

Till then,

Keep on writing!

Peter James Martin

Quick Links

The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Book 1: A Boy and A Rat