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    At Death's Door
    At Death's Door
    At Death's Door
    Ebook26 pages22 minutes

    At Death's Door

    By Mark Cantrell

    ()

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    About this ebook

    A macabre stream of consciousness tale with a heavy dose of creeping horror, At Death's Door is the latest in a series of standalone digital shorts culled from the author's collection, ISOLATION SPACE.

    Male pride and ageing flesh is never a good combination; a lesson Jeremy McMahn learns the hard way when his car comes off the road at a bend taken too fast. The thrill of speed and recollected youth ends in mangled metal...

    Crawling from the wreckage of his car, delirious, surely hallucinating, Jeremy finds himself haunted by the spectral figure of a woman calling him to follow. She's the very image of his wife, rejuvenated; how can that be possible?

    Lured onwards, he finds himself stumbling over the edge of reason. Out of body, out of mind, out of his depth: Jeremy's journey into the heart of the macabre is only just beginning...

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMark Cantrell
    Release dateApr 26, 2015
    ISBN9781310809279
    At Death's Door
    Author

    Mark Cantrell

    A coffee-guzzling journalist turned author, Mark Cantrell has chased the literary dream for years. Somehow, it's always managed to stay one step ahead, but Mark perseveres in his pursuit all the same. There are worse ways to kill time, after all. Mark is the author of two novels (so far), both released in paperback and digital editions by the indie press, Inspired Quill. Both his novels haunt dystopian ground, but aside from their dark tone they remain very different beasts. While CITIZEN ZERO (2017) runs towards political science fiction thriller, SILAS MORLOCK (2013) ventures into the shadows of dark, urban fantasy in homage of literary culture. For want of comparison, in CITIZEN ZERO The Matrix meets V for Vendetta with a touch of I, Daniel Blake. SILAS MORLOCK, though, is more a macabre melding of Fahrenheit 451 and Nosferatu. Away from novel-length works, Mark has written plenty of short stories and novelettes in his time. He's even been known to dabble in poetry. Over the years, his stories have appeared in a variety of small press journals both in print and online. Way back in 1998, two of his stories were featured in the Clover Books horror anthology, Spirit of Darkness. In 2001 there was Love, Sex, Death & Carrots. More recently, his work appeared in Bards and Sages Publishing's The Society of Misfit Stories Presents, Vol 1, Issue 1 (February 2019). Between times, his fiction has appeared in publications such as Sci-Fright, Alternaties, Asphalt Jungle, Writers' Muse, the Writers' Compass, and more. He's even self-published some of these works, individually as 'digital shorts', and in his collection of short fiction, ISOLATION SPACE (2009/2011). Available through Smashwords, you can find more details of these works below. Broadly speaking, Mark's work fits into the science-fiction-fantasy-horror spectrum, but he tends to write to the story and worry about the genre later. It seems to work, more or less. Certainly, he's happy (flattered) to be called a science fiction author even if he frequently feels unworthy of the accolade. By trade, Mark is a journalist. This is reflected on his author blog, where he writes articles about politics, society and current affairs, along with regular excursions into science, culture and literary life. Well, it keeps the 'blog-beast' fed. As a jobbing B2B hack, Mark has mostly written for trade mags. He worked in Manche...

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      Book preview

      At Death's Door - Mark Cantrell

      BLURB

      Male pride and ageing flesh is never a good combination; a lesson Jeremy McMahn learns the hard way when his car comes off the road at a bend taken too fast. The thrill of speed and recollected youth ends in mangled metal…

      Crawling from the wreckage of his car, delirious, surely hallucinating, Jeremy finds himself haunted by the spectral figure of a woman calling him to follow. She's the very image of his wife, rejuvenated; how can that be possible?

      Lured onwards, he finds himself stumbling over the edge of reason. Out of body, out of mind, out of his depth: Jeremy's journey into the heart of the macabre is only just beginning…

      At Death's Door is another [story] that creeped me. It's a surreal (I hope) journey into what Poe called the hypnagogic state of mind when you're unsure of reality and fantasy and the boundaries between become distorted and (as in this piece) break down!

      Jim Palmer, Writers' Muse magazine, August 2009 #50, from his review of the author's collection, ISOLATION SPACE.

      At Death's Door

      Published By The Author On Smashwords 2015

      Copyright (c) 1990/2007/2015 Mark Cantrell

      All Rights Reserved

      ISBN: 978-1310-8092-7-9

      Mark Cantrell has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes: This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this ebook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank

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