The Written Word Group

  In an exclusive Dwarf staffed bar called the Khuzdul. An unmarked, down some dark stairs, into a deep secret basement, type of place. A wink wink, nudge nudge, entrance by text invitation only. Guarded by the hairiest, scariest bouncer, this side of Sasquatch.  Khuzdul was now firmly on the Twitterati celebrity circuit. Here they entertained Clooney and Leonardo, plus other flavour of the month reality stars of the stage and screen. Who came to hide from the paparazzi and stare at the freak show, provided by happy Dwarves and pissed off Hobbits. After a few heavy drinking sessions, and to kill the ever-present pain of betrayal. Gimli, Hurin, Narvi and Nali, feeling red faced and rat-arsed. Would start channelling their ultimate all American mumbling hero, ‘Rocky Angry Inch Rambo.’ “Taught us to operate million-dollar equipment. Can’t even get a job, as a busboy. Adrian, Adrian …. Never gave us a parade.” It always raised a laugh from the insider Hollywood patro...

  “Hello, can I help?” The assistant looked straight at me. “Oh, don't mind me, I'm just his wife, he makes all the decisions” Derek proceeded to puff up his chest. Here we go, I thought to myself. He took the folded paper from his pocket. “Right young man, I have a few questions about this tv here” I walked off and left them to it. Looking back, I saw they were in deep conversation. A ceiling light shone on to the back of Derek's sweaty head.  Christ, what a complete nob that man is, I thought to myself.  Walking back towards the store entrance, I spotted a cafe. Derek would be a good hour and I wasn't going to stand around like the little woman while he preened his way through the purchase of a new tv. A few minutes later, drinking the hot sweet coffee, I lost myself in thoughts about where my life was going.  I took out my notebook and started writing.  “Excuse me. I couldn't help but notice your beautiful pen. Is it a Montblanc?” I looked up at the handsome ...

He'd always been small and had grown up slow and angry. Rejected by girls, bullied at school. He learned how to blow the fuse, very quickly. Joining the army seemed like a great idea. Until he was fucked over by them as well. Pleaded with the recruiter. But got the usual, not up to standard, spiel. “Rules and regulations, sonny. We’ll keep you on file.” That all changed with Tora Bora. And the extensive Kareez tunnels the T-Men used, to hide from the wrath of the Great Satan. The Army came back for him. They insisted on giving him the stupid Dwarf name, Gimli. The anger just boiled under his skin. “I’m no Dwarf, I’m a man, I’m a fucking man.” After pounding the area with massive air strikes with no results, the US Army decided to go sneaky beaky. So, the U.S. Special Operations Command, determined that a new team needed to be outfitted and trained. To work down the extensive Kareez warren of rabbit holes. Chasing the elusive T-Men. Or whatever else High Command was hunt...

          Mike did something in the city, a high powered big wig on a six figure salary who wore a suit which cost two thousand pounds. He drove his top of the range Mercedes. Jeanie owned her own chain of high class boutiques up and down the country and dressed in the finest of dresses with high heeled shoes.   She drove her top of the class Range Rover.   They drove their cars to their home in the country on a Friday, and Saturday morning they would drive out of their gate in a nineteen sixty four Volkswagen camper van painted all over with multi coloured flowers.   He, wearing a long wig with a leather band round his head, a white and red kaftan and cut off shorts with sandals which he’d made out of an old car tyre and bailing twine.   She let her hair down and also had a leather band round her head, but with feathers sticking out of it.   A full length blue and green flowery kaftan and sandals Mike had made from...

I’m just his partner….. They walked into the hotel foyer together, he reaching Reception first and handing over his ID card. “Mr and Mrs ……Sawyer?”  the receptionist looked at them  both inquiringly. “Oh no,” she said hastily, conscious of the colour rising in her cheeks. “No, we’re not married, I’m just his partner - business partner “. She could feel his eyes on her, mocking her, enjoying her discomfort.  A flash of fury shot through her.  She had had enough of his condescending attitude. “But,” she turned determinedly towards the receptionist, smiling her sweetest smile “for this weekend we are indeed Mr and Mrs Sawyer and we will share a room.” She had the heady satisfaction of seeing his annoying self confidence take a massive hit. “Well,  Mrs…err…  Madame, that’s fortunate.  There is a exhibition in town this week and we have only one room still available and that’s the Penthouse Suite, will that be fine for you?” “That will be perfect” ,  B...

Bewitched It was a cold January morning, with a biting wind and heavy clouds that promised snow.  Thomas was never enthusiastic about school, but this particular morning with only the prospect of an exam ahead, an exam for which he had not revised, he was positively reluctant. Life had been hard recently - well, ever since his father left, really.  He shied away from the painful memories of his father’s departure, of having to witness his mother’s desolation.  It wasn’t talked about now, locked away in a box marked forbidden, leaving him with this aching feeling of having failed, of impotency if only he had had the vocabulary to describe it. He was in sight of the school gates when he noticed something stirring under a shrub at the side of the road.  It was a small bundle of black fur which moved as he approached it.  Suddenly he was staring into the sad brown eyes of a very young dog. “Hello, little friend”, he said “What are you doing here?”.  He offered ...

Ripper, Sultan and  Duke eyed me with exquisite feline contempt from their vantage point stretched  along the back of the sofa. “Foolish human” I imagined them saying.  “We know you’ve had cat enemy number one secreted in the study for over a week now.  We don’t need to see him, we can smell, hear and sense him.”. I’ll try reasoning with them, I thought and sat down on the chair in front to ensure I had their undivided attention. “Look, guys,” three pairs of yellow eyes stared back at me without blinking.  “Remember how you came to be here, in this very comfortable home? Remember how cold and hungry and afraid you were?” There was an almost imperceptible widening of the eyes at the word afraid.  Not an emotion any one of them would readily  admit to. “When you had to prowl and hunt and sleep in those dangerous streets?”  Ripper stretched a little further and Sultan and Duke humoured me with a slow blink.  “Well, we welcomed you into our home,...

By no stretch of the imagination could I be called a travel writer, but this island’s beauty is moving me to prose.  This island, this Madeira, to paraphrase a famous line, is quite breathtaking.  It’s July, and we are here to escape the stifling temperatures of Almeria, and to date the mercury hasn’t climbed above 27 degrees.  I know my fellow Almerenses will understand the joy of a strong, cooling breeze.   The second pleasant discovery is we are on British Summertime, as should be the entire Iberian peninsula.  Only Franco’s desire to stay in tune with Hitler caused Spain to abandon Greenwich Meantime and move forward an hour.  The temptation to think that Spain and Portugal are some kind of sibling act should be avoided.  The language looks similar on paper, but sounds radically different.  Also, the day here in Portugal is structured differently.  No long 2 pm lunches followed by a siesta.  Here many restaurants and bars  don’t...

  Old Jack looked at his reflection in the shop window.   How much longer can I go on, he thought, I’m seventy years old and have lived on the streets for the last forty years, how much longer before they find me dead in the gutter ?   He looked at his lined, weather beaten face, the once bright, alert, eyes now dull, tired and half closed in the cold wind which blew down the street from the north.   The deep worry lines carved across his forehead, the black woollen cap pulled down to hide his receding hair line and keep his head warm.   The wind plucking at the upturned collar of the old army greatcoat, which someone had given him years before, almost hiding his bearded chin, the once bright and polished brass buttons now green with grime and dirt? He turned his back on the wind and looked down the length of the street, at the light from the street lamps shimmering on the wet road surface as the wind blew across the surface of the water filled potholes pluck...