Unspeakably Eerie Reads for Halloween

Are you ready for Halloween? Once you've prepared a ghastly costume, decorated your lair, and cooked up finger food in the shape of... fingers, why not settle down with a book that'll scare you into next Tuesday?

I was delighted to see ALL THE LITTLE CHILDREN on a Woman's World list of mystery novels to get you in the Halloween spirit. Check out all their suggestions - if you dare!

11 Unspeakably Eerie Mystery Novels to Put You in the Halloween Spirit

These thrillers, mysteries, and horror novels will get you into the Halloween spirit. See the best mystery books to read as Oct. 31 gets near.

Book Launch: All the Little Children

It's a dream moment for every author - the book launch of their debut novel. Mine was hosted by the mighty Kinokuniya at their flagship store on Singapore's Orchard Road - the equivalent of Oxford Street or Fifth Avenue - so an exciting place to introduce my book to the world.

From my spot behind the podium, it felt a bit like a wedding as I spotted friends old and new in the crowd. I was particularly delighted to see so many fellow authors from the Singapore Writers Group, as this inspiring bunch have been staunch companions on the journey to publication.

Likewise, my "Brownies" - a critique group that emerged from a short Curtis Brown course at the Singapore Writers Festival in 2013 - were out in force. Another writer friend, the Bridport-prize winner Elaine Chiew, brilliantly compered the event.

Maybe I'm not very good at this book marketing business, but the event for me was more of a personal milestone than an opportunity to sell units - though I'm grateful to everyone who went home with a green and orange cover inside a linen tote! Several people bought a whole stack for Christmas presents, which I think is excellent planning.

People often ask what is the hardest part of writing a novel and I say "not stopping". There are so many logical reasons to stop, especially that first novel. It feels like you're running down a dark tunnel with no idea if there's a light at the end. It's an act of blind faith. I've been to so many book launches and readings and signings over the years, wondering how you get to be the one behind the table. Turns out that the hardest part is also the simplest - you don't stop writing.

On the shelf

With Elaine Chiew

My first reading

The Kinokuniya crowd

My little children

With author Lisa Beazley

Our books

Writer friend, Magali Finet

Milestone moment

With author Stephanie Chen

Organiser, Richelle Gan

Ta-dah!

In good company

Curtis Brownies

With Mark "Ace" Furniss

A Love Letter to Switzerland

This is one of the most intimate pieces of writing I have ever shared: a love letter to Switzerland, the country that welcomed me for seven years, where my children and my novel were born. Thanks to my colleagues at The Woolf Quarterly over in Zurich for prompting me to write it: digging into the emotions that inspired a whole novel was a challenge, but cathartic!

Click...

to read my Love Letter to Switzerland on The Woolf.

BBC Interview

They say 'write what you know', and when I came to write my debut novel, All the Little Children, I wrote a location I know exceptionally well - the British West Midlands. The city of Birmingham was my home for several years, while I worked for the BBC. As a reporter, I pounded its streets and backwaters. It was there I met my husband, who comes from neighbouring Shropshire. The majority of the action in All the Little Children moves between these two contrasting landscapes - the remote forest and the urban jungle of England's second city.

When I was back in Birmingham recently, I popped in to the BBC to record this interview with my former colleague, Drivetime presenter extraordinaire, Paul Franks. Oddly enough - considering I worked in radio for such a long time - I felt nervous before the interview. But as soon as I stepped into the studio and heard Franksey's dulcet tones, I was back in the saddle!

The interview starts around 19 minutes into this playback - but why not settle down and enjoy Franksey's A-Z selection of holiday tracks?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05c3k5c

Why a dog plays a central role in my debut novel

Meet Horatio! He’s a character in my novel, All the Little Children. The girl is my daughter and she’s not in the novel, although her wit and wisdom provided some of the best lines spoken by my fictional children.

We met the dog five years ago at a riding stables in Switzerland and hit it off. He’s a sweetheart. And HUGE. This photo doesn’t quite do him justice. He's massive.

Some writers cast famous actors into lead roles, but I only ever cast Horatio. Looking back, I wonder why I gave such an important narrative role to a dog?

Here’s what I think was going on. The main character in All the Little Children is not an easy woman. Marlene Greene is brilliant in many ways – a success story who seems to “have it all” – but we see behind the scenes and behind the eyes. She doesn’t feel like a success.

Loving doesn’t come easily to Marlene. She wants to, but it gets stuck inside – as she says at one point, “like one of those sneezes that just won’t come”. The daily chaos that comes with running a business and a household of three children doesn’t make matters easier – it’s difficult to access soft feelings when life is hard.

When disaster strikes and Horatio picks Marlene to be his guardian angel, we see what she’s capable of, emotionally speaking. So Horatio is there to be loved. Although, pretty soon, Horatio has to prove that he’s a guardian angel too.

On the Edge

On a perfectly normal family holiday to the south coast of England, I wandered to the edge of this cliff. It was the silence that drew me there - not until you get right to the lip of the land does the sound of the surf warn you of the danger ahead. After a few seconds - enough to film this video - my vertigo kicked in and I scurried back to the path. The sheep who sleep on the edge watched me retreat with disdain.

Later that day, I wrote a short story about a woman who stands on this spot, looking for her family, scared she may fall. Little does she know that she's already fallen.

The story, called The Lily Stains White, is available for free by clicking the orange banner at the top of this page. 

Cliff top near the Smugglers Inn, Weymouth UK

Knock Knock - short stories with Mr O

Despite winning Singapore's most lucrative literary award with his first novel, Now That It's Over, the author O Thiam Chin insisted that he's most comfortable writing short stories. Ahead of the deadline for the 2017 Golden Point Award, he gave an afternoon workshop focused on short fiction at Singapore's beautiful Arts House.

This was my first workshop dedicated to short stories. In the past, I've started writing many short stories but found them too lean and slippery to pursue: the ideas whip away from me, snakelike. Novels, somehow, are more substantial and less mysterious. Like animals, the bigger the form, the simpler the creature.

Amid an unusually informal and interactive atmosphere, Thiam Chin shared writing tips, while weaving in exercises to focus the mind on craft.

Using a story by Mary Gaitskill, Thiam Chin concentrated on first lines; universally, we agreed, the trickiest point. The tone should be there from the off and a good start creates a mixed reaction in the reader. Gaitskill's story, The Other Place, starts at a pivotal moment, forcing us to wonder which way the story will turn. And there's evidence of the three Cs required in a strong Voice - it's consistent, compelling and has authorial control.  

Her writing is deceptively simple - but Thiam Chin warned us about simplicity: achieving it is a lifetime process. At first, he said, build a lavish life on the page and cut it down to size.

Finally, we looked at how to get characters unstuck. Of his many suggestions to keep up the momentum within scenes - such as the Murakami trick of getting an unexpected phone call or a 'knock, knock' on the door - I liked the idea of introducing a stranger. "A stranger is a universe in himself," said Thiam Chin, which I found rather lovely.

Whether the new material that transpires makes the final cut or gets edited back in the pursuit of simplicity, the stranger is a two-way mirror through which to see our character afresh.

As I sit here now, on a hiatus from trying to edit a short story of my own, I'm grateful for one further example shared by Thiam Chin. The great Alice Munro, whose story The Bear Came Over the Mountain was subtly but meaningfully re-edited even after its first publication in the New Yorker. The impact was huge - not just to the story, but also to the audience in the Arts House. If Alice Munro feels the need to work and re-work her stories across the decades, then surely so must we.

O Thiam Chin, author of Now That It's Over and five collections of short stories.

What to read... in Singapore

People very often ask for recommendations of books to read while in Singapore. Here are my top ten titles to prepare you for life in the Garden City.

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The Fall of Singapore

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Snapshots of colonial life

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The lives of Raffles' wives

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Expats amid imperial ruins

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The Rise of Singapore

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A glimpse of Asia's jet-set

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Characters of modern SG

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The 2004 Asian tsunami

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Emma, set in Singapore

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A rising literary talent

And if I've left you wanting more, check out Singapore's vibrant poetry scene, especially my personal favourite, Cyril Wong.

Debut novel cover reveal: All the Little Children

It's been a long time coming. Back in 2013, while studying for an MA in Professional Writing, I wrote a short story. I wasn't planning to focus on fiction (non-fiction seemed like a better development of my previous career in journalism) but I caught the bug.

That story became my final MA project - that 20,000 words became a novel - and that manuscript caught the eye of an agent in Chicago who took it to Lake Union Publishing.

Seeing a book cover feels like a milestone, a point on the road where I should pause a while and catch my breath. The view is great - a cover that captures the story as though plucked from my mind.

Radio Daze: how a career in broadcasting influences my fiction

“Let the listener invent their own dragon.” I can’t remember who uttered this line, but it has stayed in my mind since last century, when I took a BBC News Skills training course in London.

The nervy young broadcast journalists renamed it News Kills. Until a man in tweed came to our stuffy classroom to impart his code for living: “It’s only radio, but it’s what we do.”

I learned to create sound pictures that let the listener see “their own dragon”. Why state you’re on a beach when you can immerse the audience in surf and seagulls? Why say an interviewee is nervous when you can hear his shallowness of breath between carefully-chosen words? A broadcaster, like a novelist, is a magpie for the glimmering detail that sparks life into a story.

To read more of my guest post about how a career in broadcasting influences my fiction, visit Women Writers.

How a short course helped my publishing career

A strange thing occurred while I was taking the Professional Writing Academy’s Introduction to Writing Crime Fiction course. 

I was working on an exercise for the first class—we had to write about a detective—when a woman walked into my office and sat on the pull-out sofa bed. She was slight and reserved, but commanded my attention. She crossed her legs and bounced one child-sized foot on the parquet, allowing me time to jot down a backstory that followed her like perfume.

At the time, I was also writing a novel, a domestic thriller that didn’t feature a detective, but as I settled down each week to tackle another exercise for the course, this woman came back. She wanted in on my novel.

For the rest of my guest post about how a crime-writing course helped secure my publishing deal, visit The Professional Writing Academy.

Blogito ergo sum?

What I love about reading blogs, is the moment when a complete stranger hits my nail right on the head. This is what life would be like if I had social contact more than twice a week.

Following the links this morning lead me to Slugs on the Refrigerator, and entrepreneurial Kat Goldin's comment, "what I love about a blog is that it gives you something at the end of the day that shows you existed". Oh my goodness - what she said.

Honestly, there are some days with the kids - love them, bless them, treasure them (especially when they're asleep) - when I can't remember in the afternoon what I did in the morning. The Husband comes home that night and diligently enquires, "how was your day?". "Erm, I don't remember". I'm not being facetious. I really don't remember. Some things happened and then some other things. It was fine, but I don't remember any of it.

Like Descartes searching his senses for irrefutable evidence of his existence, I look for signs of life: a trail of squashed grapes means there was eating, from the sodden jackets by the back door I deduce there was sledging, and the way that my slipper sticks to the floor in the kitchen suggests there was playdough. Ah-ha, all is revealed...

We're just pack animals at heart, of course. My pack is spread far and wide, which is normal these days, but inconvenient when you want to pop round for a play date, a cup of tea and a reminder that you still exist. And for that, we have blogging.

Open wide and say, er..?

Is it bad that in my third week of a Masters degree in Professional Writing I’m fantasizing about becoming a dental hygienist? I went to visit a dental hygienist today, which may have something to do with it.

I took both kids along, but that’s a whole other blog entry. Needless to say, you can’t show toddlers a small plastic cup of pink drink and not expect them to shin their way up the equipment to reach it. Or grab an over-sized model of a human mouth and run up to the receptionist screaming “I’m a teeth, I’m a teeth”.

But as I lay there, jaws and eyes wide, I thought how I could enjoy life as a dental hygienist. Scraping away plaque must be deeply satisfying. All those little tools and nozzles and attachments look so neat and shiny in their special little drawer. Not to mention the pink drink. And, of course, it’s important - people need hygienic teeth.

Or am I just attracted to the clearly navigable career path? Step One: take dental hygiene course, Step Two: get job as dental hygienist, Step Three: go to work for a defined number of hours, on contractually-specified days, for a pre-determined amount of money. Job done.

As this guy, Phillip Lopate, says "You can't just get a certificate saying you're a writer now". Or as Stephen King says in his book On Writing, "what do you want, a name tag with Writer on it?". Well, Stevie, if I could just borrow yours for a bit...

Still, I hear that watch-makers are also in high demand. Now, taking a clock apart with tiny tools and putting the pieces all back together - that sounds deeply satisfying. And people always need time...

In lieu of an off-switch

This has been noted before - and by minds more advanced than my own - but the problem with children is that you can’t switch them off.

Now I don’t want to wish my time with the kids away - I know very well that, this time next decade, the Curly Girlie will only acknowledge my existence when she wants money or a lift and Alpha Blondie will have developed his “mental man cave” where males go when they want to block out the world around them in order to concentrate more fully on watching rugby, reading the Economist or playing poker on their Blackberry. But still, sometimes I wish they would just stop. Only for a short time, but... stop.

Long enough to, say, do something administrative in the Post Office without Blondie savaging the Kinder Eggs. Or long enough to get the one who is bleeding fixed without the one who is not bleeding running out of the waiting room and straight into the main road. Or long enough for me to clear up after the explosively-bowelled dog. That kind of thing.

Happily, in lieu of an off switch, the modern Mother has at her disposal the iPhone and its child-friendly apps. All hail the iPhone.

PeekabooForSS2-275x191

Long ago, before Alpha Blondie was even invented, I downloaded a great little app called Peekaboo Barn. The Curly Girlie liked it so much that I also downloaded its two sister apps, Peekaboo Wild and Peekaboo Forest. Curly liked the absorbing little games and Mummy loved getting five minutes respite to do whatever: everyone was happy.

Fast forward two years and imagine my surprise and unrestrained delight when Night & Day Studios, who make Peekaboo, offered me the chance to review an updated version of Peekaboo Barn and some other new games for this here blog. I tell you, a free copy of a game I’ve already got and two new ones... as The Husband so rightly pointed out “That’s nearly four quid you’ve made from blogging, right there”. Never one to hoard my riches, I also have a couple of apps to give away to lucky winners, so ‘stay tuned for that’.

So... it’s fairly clear from the above that we already like Peekaboo Barn. It’s a simple little game, whereby a very appealing red barn jumps about to get your attention, while making an animal noise: tap the screen once, and the doors open to reveal the animal; its name comes up on the screen and a cute little kid voice says “CHI-cken!” (or whatever) with a great deal of enthusiasm; tap the screen again and it moves on to the next animal. And that’s it.

But, sometimes, simple things are the best. Two things make PB a hit in our house: first, it’s easy enough for the kids to do by themselves and, second, it’s educational enough for me to feel ok about parking them in front of it for a short while.

So what about the update that Night & Day is so keen to promote?

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One major difference is a much-extended list of available languages. Previously only offered in English and Spanish, it now has another five European and three Asian languages to download (albeit for an extra $0.99 on top of the app price of $1.99). The latest version is also iPad-friendly, whereas previously it was iPhone and iPod only.

The update also has a new feature that should extend the game’s longevity in our household. Whereas the just-turned two-year-old Alpha Blondie is bang on target age for the game, the Curly one was getting a bit old for it. And one downside to the iPhone, is its inability to split down the middle... But a function that allows you to record your own voices saying the animal names has given it a new lease of life for us. For people who speak a different language to those offered in the packs, this feature will enable them to customise it to their linguistic heart’s content.

It does take a while to record all the words, which demanded a bit too much concentration from Blondie, but both kids are now deeply thrilled to hear their own voices in the game. Apparently, there really is nothing more hilarious that hearing yourself say “rabbit” at a volume only previously reached by aircraft and thrash metal bands.

All in all: Peekaboo Barn is engaging for kids and reassuringly didactic for parents. It looks nice. They can use it alone without downloading a load of other stuff you don’t want. When they like it, they’re quiet. What more do you want for £1.49?

monster

The next Night & Day app up for review is Go Away, Big Green Monster. This little animation is based on a book of the same name by Ed Emberley. Basically, there’s a big green monster, whose big green face, big yellow eyes and sharp white teeth certainly made Curly and Blondie cling a bit tightly to Mummy on the sofa... but then we pick him apart: “go away big red mouth” we cry, and “go away squiggly hair” and “you don’t scare me blueish, greenish nose” until the monster really doesn’t look very scary any more.

The different modes of play are rather pleasing: you can read the book yourself, listen to it being read by a precocious child or Mr Emberley himself, or hear a song version. The song makes me smile as it’s performed by a feisty girl singer in a bluesy / folksy style, which is rather cool and not at all patronising. The kids clearly find it rather funky.

Three-year-old Curly has a bit of a monster-phobia at the moment: it seems ‘shadow monsters’ are especially persistent at this time of year. The other night, one even snuck past the “no monsters” sign that we painted and put on her door, which only goes to show that they’re getting wily too. So I was interested to see if she would get a confidence boost from taking control of this Big Green Monster.

Certainly, the tension that was built up along with the description of the monster, was released again as we brought him back down to size. At the end, we all did a rousing “don’t come back!” and she seemed to enjoy it. Anything that backs up my line on monsters – a) they’re just silly things that come from our imagination, b) they can’t really hurt you, and c) any further monster-related concerns should be reported at once to Mummy – is good with me.

Go Away, Big Green Monster is rather short but very sweet: $2.99 for your iPhone or iPad from an iTunes Store near you.

vhcappfinal

And finally, it’s another cover version – an app based on the classic board book The Very Hungry Caterpillar. To misquote the popular saying, this one is a matter of “last but least”. It’s all a bit weak: a basic counting game that seems to rely on the charm of the Eric Carle illustrations, without any innovative ideas on how to turn a static text into an interactive game.

At the most basic level, you tap on a plum and a voice says “one plum”, tap on two pears and a voice says “two pears”, repeat until you reach five apples and then it just starts again. No climax, no fanfare, no feedback for the child. Target-audience Blondie wandered off and non-plussed Curly said “why is it just starting again?” Well, quite.

The higher level, which is designed to engage older children with more counting ability, is a bit better as they have to listen to instructions and race against the clock to select the desired items from a choice of caterpillar-based foodstuffs. But still: the clock ticks down, they get excited, they tap three pickles, four pears, five cherry pies and then... nothing. Not even a “yay, you did it!” Nothing at all – it just starts again. It’s no way to treat a child...

In return for the relatively small outlay of a couple of quid ($2.99) it’s fine, I suppose. But it’s not up to the usual standard of Night & Day Studios. Unlike their other games, Hungry Caterpillar isn’t at all well thought out from the child’s point of view. Simple is good; simplistic isn’t.

So there you go, my first blog review. For those who stayed with me through all that, I did tempt you with an offer of freebies: Night & Day Studios kindly offered a giveaway so, in a double-whammy, this is also my first blog competition. If you’d like a copy of the all-new Peekaboo Barn, Go Away Big Green Monster or The Very Hungry Caterpillar for your iPhone, then please leave a comment on this page. If there’s, er, more than one comment, then I’ll draw a winning name from a hat – that seems fair, plus it takes me back to my salad days in BBC Local Radio, which will be delightfully nostalgic.

Cheers and bon app-etit.

Sorry.

Imperfect Tense

I’m not perfect. There, I’ve said it. The thing is, even as I write that, a tiny voice in the back of my brain mutters “well, you should work harder at it then”. Oh, the voices, the voices.

50s_mom_with_2_kids[1]

If I’m honest, I do feel, deep down in the boots of my psyche, in the bit I try to keep locked and sealed but which manages to break out in the pesty minutes before I fall asleep, that not being entirely perfect is some kind of affliction. It may even be catching. I feel pity for those troubled by Not-Entirely-Perfectism. If I were rich, I would start a fund to research cures or treatment or at least palliative care for the condition. Like Dr House walking through a waiting room, I diagnose its flawed symptoms all around me – this darn malady is everywhere, it’s like a plague.

Of course, the sane(ish) part of my mind can acknowledge that I am also a Not Entirely Perfect Person. I am a NEPP. There, I’ve said it again.

I’m not going to start to list the ways in which girls, then women, then mothers in our society are made to feel that being a NEPP is an unforgiveable character flaw, because it’s been done before and better. In fact, I will link to another blogger in a moment who admitted her own NEPPness (NEPPtitude?) last week and inspired my outpouring here. But first to my epiphany...

This week, I’ve been thinking a lot about two things. First, that I’m not perfect (that bit isn’t an epiphany) BUT I can accept it (that bit is). Second, other people – close friends, complete strangers and everyone in between - who appear to judge me can all bugger off. En masse: a mass buggering off of unhelpful, judgemental, supercilious, schadenfreude-motivated people who make me feel all discombobulated in public.

My latest blog-crush, MammyWoo, put it perfectly when she said (talking specifically about body issues, but also perfectionism more generally):

“I would prefer the body of (not Jessica rabbit) Jennifer Anniston but hey, she doesn’t have kids, a poodle with the runs or a hectic schedule that involves more poop than scoop does she? (Scoop being cocktails and botox.) So why do I compare myself to these people who mostly are airbrushed?”

And that was my epiphany: people who appear to be perfect have just airbrushed their life.

Reading MammyWoo’s hilarious, harrowing and award-winning (oh yes) blog, led me, via The Mads Awards, to another inspirational site - Imagination Tree.

“Zillions of ideas for creative preschool play” it promises, and delivers so brilliantly that I was initially thrilled by all the new games and projects that we can enjoy... and then, only a couple of beats later, thrown into a state of dejection. How so?

Because I immediately started to worry about why it is that I don’t fill my kids’ days with resourceful, educational, stimulating games that engage their interest, develop new skills and cost nothing because I’ve found ingenious uses for a load of old junk that I’d otherwise throw away? Bah!

But then I read this, written by the Imagination Tree’s author Anna Ranson, who shall henceforth be known as “the blessed Anna”, (on my blog at least):

“We don't rise at dawn to play and craft and bake and sing. In fact we are pretty lazy in the morning altogether. We don't even do activities and crafts for a large percentage of the day, maybe an hour or so squeezed in between play groups, mums meet ups, outings to the park, watching Peppa Pig on repeat and of course the obligatory Sainsbury's shop. We have our fair sure of drawing on the walls, tantrums and pyjama days.”

Forgive me for gushing, but I read this and had a bit of a wobble. A lip wobble, in fact. “Peppa Pig on repeat”? I do that. “Pyjama days”? Check. “Drawing on the walls”? Check. “Tantrums”? If she means by the mum, then – check.

I read the blessed Anna’s incredibly perceptive passage about her non-perfect life with the kids (or is it actually perfect in its own unique way? Discuss...) and felt a weight lift from my shoulders. I actually feel lighter, less encumbered by the weight of my own expectation.

The straw that finally broke the camel’s back came from my neighbour, a child development expert, who was having a coffee and watching my three-year-old Curly Girlie drawing.

Curly Girlie: *whining, huffing, flinging self forward all over table* It’s wrong! I need another paper! Ooooooooo-eeeeeeerrrrrrrrr-HUH!

Neighbour: Wow! She’s giving herself a hard time - she’s really a perfectionist, huh?

And there you go. I thought I was going mad, but turns out it’s genetic. *

* The author would like to point out that this statement in no way implicates any blood relative as a NEPP. Also, no animals were harmed during the production of this blog.

Toddler conversation

Mummy?Yes, love? Can I take my sock off? OK. Mummy? Yes? Can I take my sock off? Yes, OK. Mummay? Yes. Can I take my sock off? Yes, if you want to, take your sock off. Mummaay? Yeees? Can I take my sock off? Darling! Yes! Take it off. Mummaaay? *sigh* Can I take my sock off? Yes. Mummaaay? Yes? Mummaaaay? YES? Mummaaaaay? ... Mummaaaaaay? Yes! Can I take my sock off? Look, it’s your sock, I really don’t care, take it off, leave it on, it’s your decision. Mummy? *deep breath* Yes, Darling? Can I take my sock off? Is this some form of psychological torture? Mummay? What? Can I take my sock off? Are you working for the CIA? Mummaay? With a profound sense of dread and trepidation - yes? I took my sock off. Excellent. Mummy? Yes, love? Can I take my other sock off?

Kaleidoscope Curly Girlie

A verse to Christmas?

‘Twas a few nights before Christmasand all through the house, Creatures were stirring – was it a mouse?

The clock showed 04.30 as I woke up, yawning, dragged from my slumber by a furious gnawing.

The stockings were slung half prepared on the floor, awaiting their filling with nuts, toys and more,

but a tiny gourmand had a fine dinnertime, feasting on peanuts, gold coins and clementine.

While I sat in bed finding mice all too scarey, the man of the house got up nude and hairy.

He dashed ‘cross the room and snatched up that sock and with mouse trapped inside turned to take stock:

“I have it, I have it!” he cried out of breath, “What should I do? Should I beat it to death?”

“Oh no!” I called out “That’s much too agrarian. You’ll wake up the kids, and besides I’m vegetarian!”

So we opened a window to the dark, snowy air and I thought with a pang “No food for mice out there!

“Show some compassion, Don’t be such a miser”. And I threw down some treats: a mouse appetiser.

So if you’re inclined to slay mice for their daring, please do remember: t’is the season for sharing.

When that mouse called out it made up for the fuss: “Good Night to All and to All, Merry Christmas!”