Insanity & Squirrels: A Horror-Comedy Collection

By Christopher Joyce

A trilogy of terrifying tales. Sort of.

Jonathan is heading home down a narrow country lane.

It doesn't end well.

Mark and Liz buy an antique grandfather clock from an online marketplace.

It doesn't end well.

Johnny and Nessa take a well-earned break at a traditional seaside hotel.

It doesn't end well.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christopher Joyce
• Release date: Jul 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223603542

Christopher Joyce

Christopher is a Middlesbrough-born Horror/Fantasy author, and freelance content creator. When not busy crafting tales of weirdness and wonder, Christopher's main passions are retro video gaming, superhero comics, and tabletop strategy games.

Book preview

Lifeblood

B e careful, she said ; she always said it as he left.

He was 40 years old, 6’2, covered in tattoos, and sported a razor-bald head; the thought of exactly what she expected was going to happen to him was a source of constant amusement. As he had remarked to her on more than one occasion, the percentage of adult men - white men at that - murdered by complete strangers for absolutely no discernible reason was shockingly - laughably - low. Even serial killers like Dahmer or Nilsen usually had a personal or sexual motive for slaying other men.

Yes, the Crime Channel was their go-to for dark nights in front of the TV.

Upon this dark night, however, Jonathan was on his way back from the gym. He had finished work at bang-on five thirty; his finger quite literally hovered over the mouse button as his unblinking eyes watched the clock tick down.

Five-twenty-nine and 57 seconds.

58.

59.

Click! Log off, fuck off, outta here.

With a shout of bye! he left the house (oh, the unbridled joy of working from home) and set off to the gym. 35 to 40 minute walk there - his warm up, as he liked to rationalise it - a decent session in the place with his earphones in to drown out the incessant thud, thud, thud of shitty commercial dance music, and another 35 to 40 minute walk back.

It was coming toward the end of winter; the days were cold, but no longer tinged with that razor edge of chill which seemed to nip and pinch at every inch of exposed skin. It was now cold, but tolerably cold. But it was the darkness which drew in as early as five in the evening which had been the source of Becky’s warnings.

Be careful, she would say, it’ll be dark on your way back.

And it was dark - very fucking dark. Still, Jonathan did not feel the same fear others undoubtedly would at walking down the long, seemingly endless country lane. It was winter-wet; not boggy, as such, just that annoying muddiness which serves no other purpose than to cake your shoes and ruin your carpets. That smiling, vindictive muddiness. Smiling mud? Anyway, we’ll just move on.

The trees on either side of the narrow country lane were imposing and thick, with virtually no breaks. A lazy mist shrouded the foliage beyond the trees, and had started to creep inexorably over the narrow lane. It looked for all intents and purposes like something out of a seventies or eighties horror movie, but still Jonathan was unfazed.

He kept on walking, his legs aching from his gym session, but in that weird feelgood way. On and on he walked - the lane was fucking long, that’s why it took nearly 40 minutes to walk to the gym.

His head nodded up and down in time to the Gym Mix he was listening to; all Slipknot and System of a Down (obviously). His thoughts, such as they were, floated in and out of vague musings about