What would you do if you discovered a new path in a forest you know well? Would you ignore the warning signs or embark on a new adventure?

Jacqueline Gabbitas lives on a canal boat in the UK. She has published three short collections of poetry, Mid Lands (Hearing Eye), Earthworks and Small Grass (Stonewood Press) and her work has been featured in various magazines, including Poetry Review, anthologies such as the Forward Prize Anthology, and broadcast on BBC radio. She has won two Arts Council England awards, and is a Hawthornden Fellow. As a child, Jacqueline cut her teeth on ghost stories and fairytales (greedily reading the Armada Book of Ghost Stories, Poe, King, Koontz, Herbert and whoever she could get her hands on). During the first lockdown she returned to reading and writing ghost stories (especially focusing on stories written by women). She found it a way to try to understand the isolation and loss of contact many of us were feeling. Her stories can be found in New Ghost Stories IV (The Fiction Desk) and Unfeared: a podcast of ghost stories written by women, which she hosts. The ruins in ‘Forest House’ exist. So does the nail.


You can read "Forest House" at https://www.kaidankaistories.com.

Website: kaidankaistories.com

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