A game of Scrabble has serious consequences.

A semi-barbaric king devises a semi-barabaric (but entirely fair) method of criminal trial involving two doors, a beautiful lady and a very hungry tiger.

Looking round he saw an old woman dragging a bucket across the floor and holding a mop. When she realised that his eyes were upon her, she said in a throaty voice, ‘Oh, don’t mind me, dear. You carry on.’

ulissa Ye relished all the comfortable little routines and quietude defining her part-time job at The Bookery, downtown’s last small, locally-owned bookstore.

‘Bloody hell!’ said Detective Constable Bright. ‘It’s a minefield!’ ‘There’s more …’ replied Detective Sergeant Dawes with a grimace.

Henry pours more coal onto the hearth as a gust of wind rattles through the cracked window frame. She’s almost an hour late. He’s half tempted to leave a one-star review on her website, but he knows it won’t make a difference, not after tonight.

The forest looked ethereal in the light from the moon overhead. Ghostly, eldritch, like Dave had stepped into another world. The branches swayed with a slight breeze, and the leaves rustled out a mellifluous harmony.

‘Sofia, let me in, I didn’t mean nothing,’ shouted Charlie as he banged his fists on the door. ’It won’t happen again, I promise. You can come out now, darling.’

Corporal Earnest Goodheart is crouched in a ditch on the edge of an orchard between Dunkirk and De Panne. It’s 28th May 1940, just a day into the evacuations.

The rain fell on him as he died and kept on well after he was dead.

There was a long conversation then, and many qualifications and a great deal of sympathy; but the long and short of it was that I had aggressive macular degeneration, which is a fancy way of saying: I was going blind.

I hate Interstates. They’re boring, dangerous, and packed with people who pay little attention to what they’re doing. I love two-lane roads: the ones that meander through the countryside.

Mrs. Henshaw, grey-haired and ancient before her time, resting her rheumatic twig fingers in her pinny lap, sat facing a large wall mirror and rocked the gloom away.

The ground shuttered. The earth split. And foul gases, detritus, and splintered rock erupted into the jungle like spew from a volcano. And the worm inched closer to the world above, the open air and the scorching humidity of the Brazilian rainforest.

Deacon Park is where they bury the bodies. For a cold-blooded killer, a huge tract of wild land in the middle of the city can be an indispensable resource.

Through clouds of smoke, his blue eyes examined the ladies and gentlemen in front of him. They all looked hard at work, and he smiled at their naiveness, then chuckled, which turned into a coughing fit.

Most of our problems involve Grandma Grace, or rather her ashes. “It’s a public health violation,” Mom loves to snap at Dad. “We can’t have your dead mother on a shelf next to the food.

It’s not every day you get an offer like that. In fact, most days, you don’t get an offer at all.

“This is it,” he said. “This is the big one. After years of carrying crap, we’ve finally got us a job that’s going to change our bank accounts and bloat our pensions.

“I got a call this morning. My dad…” And Martin had explained the situation, as best he could. He wanted to see his father one last time. He wanted Joel to see his grandfather.