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Temptation

A Dickensian coming-of-age tale about poverty, sex, World War I, and the darker side of human nature as seen through the eyes of a lobby boy in a Budapest hotel. Temptation is a rediscovered masterwork of twentieth-century fiction, a Dickensian tale of a young man coming of age in Budapest between the wars. Illegitimate and unwanted, Béla is packed off to the country to be looked after by a peasant woman the moment he is born. She starves and bullies him, and keeps him out of school. He does his best to hold his own, and eventually his mother brings him back to live with her in the city. In thrall to his feckless father, Mishka, and living in a crowded tenement, she works her fingers to the bone, while Béla shares a room with a hardworking prostitute. Finally, Béla secures a job in a fancy hotel. Though exhausted by endless work, he is fascinated by the upper-crust world that his new job exposes him to; soon he is embroiled with a rich, damaged, and dangerous woman. The atmosphere of Budapest is increasingly poisoned by the appeal of fascism, while Béla grows ever more aware of how power and money keep down the working classes. In the end, with all the odds still against him, he musters the resolve to set sail for new future.

Stuffed Animals

Stuffed Animals is a collection of haunting, sparsely wrought micro fiction. Each story invites the reader in and then delights and torments them with surprises and plot twists. Whether you are in the mood for black humour, spine-tingling horror, or soul-wrenching tragedy, you will find it within these pages. While the stories explore a wide range of themes and genres, they share an interest in word play and conceptual games. With complex imagination, compelling characters, and gripping storylines, Stuffed Animals asks the reader to sit down, dig in, and not let go. It captures an unsettling balance of beauty and repulsion, the writing versing more as artistic expression than conventional storytelling.

M for Mystery 2