‘Department of Great Lies : Annual Report:   January 2016’. There can be no doubt that the fairy community is in need of another Great Lie to ensure its invisibility for the 21st century. The successful strategy employed in the early 20th century, now part of our legend, in which we made...

The brown package dropped on the doormat with a satisfying thud. He’d been waiting for some time and had become irritable and testy with his beautiful wife. This didn’t bother her. It was a price she was willing to pay. And in turn, she had exactly what he wanted in a woman: high cheekbones...

  It’s lovely to see you too. Ages, I know. Oh yes, I’m fine thanks. No really, it’s nothing. A little tired, maybe. Nothing more.   My life is splintering. I’m slipping through the gaps. The interstitial places, the spaces where meaning vanishes. I’m cracking up.   Work’s fine...

  Sonnet, with tangled web I’m looking for somewhere to lay my head before the dark. Your hand blocking out the white noise until all I hear is beats of blood charging around my body against the slow boom of your heart. It’s not easy, this lies’ thing, but it’s not hard either, and at...

  Writer: Charlotte Brookes Artist/Filmmaker: Mark Noad

Refuge Sand flecks at my heels, Salt spray I can taste, Wind storms batter my being, I stand alone.                Out of place. Left with lies to warm my face. Books: of platitudes to soothe troubled waters, Of loss. Toddlers, drifted and tossed. Laugh and the world laughs with you; Cry and...

Writer: Louise Steggals Artist: Dana...

  I Love You There it was, engraved for all to see. The wording would weather in time, eroding like her feelings for him had. Who knew the truth? He didn’t, nor did family or friends, obvious in the way they were here rallying round, supporting her through her grief. Her lips...

A living room: Vain Guy (sweeps into the room with a flourish): I just squeezed into my new waistcoat and tie. Which matches my socks and your dress. Fabulous, yes? Cautious Girlfriend (glances up from her magazine warily): I can see…it’s very co-ordinated, my darling. VG: Ah, it’s not...

Julia chewed her nails as if truth hid under the keratin. The confidence with which he stepped through the front door; no guide dog, no stick. It was a polished act but she would expose him. Julia understood the price of lies. She folded her clothes, placed them on the kitchen counter and...

  A better future, together   We are the party you can trust. We have built a fairer society. A better society. For hard working families. People who want to get on, can get on. Austerity is working. Britain is working. For hard working families. For families, who work hard....

Writer: Martin Lee Artist: Iain...

Mulloy Dynasty There is a small windswept island off the west coast. It is a strange land. It’s been compared to a miniature Scotland with rugged hills, sheer cliffs, inland lochs and beaches of all sorts – sandy, stony and slatey. Some days there is a yellow hue as far as the eye can see....

“If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.” (Hitler. Lenin apparently said something similar.)   There is a formula for bigger, better lying. How often have you heard a friend proclaim the power of the gospel truth, only to uncover the...

   I tried I tried. God knows I tried. Twenty years we’d been together, and not a moment when I hadn’t been looking out for her. But she’d never recognised how much she needed me; never appreciated what I did for her. Yes, I strayed a few times. The way she is, anyone would. But I’d...

The Last Flight – by Samm Short I give you my blue stone that I found – in a desert – – in a river – I give you river stone on a ribbon that I ask you to wear   at the base of your throat, where the fifth chakra sits in that neat little hollow none of us can...

Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics   (*All characters in this poem are fictional and any similarity to any persons living or undead is entirely coincidental).   A trademark smirk upon his lips playing, buoyed by his pack behind all braying, Something of the night about him, to be sure,...

Writer: Gillian Colhoun Artist/Singer-Songwriter: Sharon...

 “The journey of one’s life path depicted by a continuous line that never really begins or ends, never ending, everywhere and nowhere.” A little more action   He delivers my mail on a rainy Wednesday afternoon he leaves notes in old-fashioned cursive   He’s touring...

The Testament of Eve In the beginning, I was alive.           Breath. Hunger. Warmth. Pulsations of colour and movement. My senses, all new. Grassy greens, blistering sunshine and multi-coloured blooms drenched my eyes. Deep blue oceans...

Try Me   go on, try me daily, no really, you’ll see I’m the real deal and soon you’ll be feeling great – don’t wait, nothing can reduce you like I do, no low-fat plan can sculpt you like I can; I’m sweet, a treat, inedible but oh so very spreadable and I’ll take inches here and...

  It wasn’t me Brace yourself – it’s dangerously catchy. Just when you think that earworm’s gone for good, it strikes again.   It wasn’t me.   Mind blocked by a catchy refrain. Let’s just go with it. Let’s Youtube this out my system. Death by replay – that’s the plan.   It...

  Half a grain a day It’s not The Lie that destroys The Liar. When The Lie is done, it’s done. Out into the world like a paper dart. A deed, given flight. It’s what’s left behind that’s the problem. And what’s left is nibbling, gnawing Guilt. It erodes The Liar, long after The Lie is...

“Yeah, we should definitely meet again” (If by ‘again’ you mean ‘never’)   Why lie? Is it because we’re all the sharkiest bunch of truth-dodging weasel snakes? Or because bullshitting like you’re on Fox News is sometimes for the best? The stories you’re about to read are all fake.* So...

“Our lies reveal as much about us as our truths.”  (J.M. Coetzee) “But which is which?”  (J.L. Lennon)   The white flame lies, lures the moth’s moon dance, wings tracing soft grey truths in air   Our lies reveal as much about us as our truths. Know me...

Writer: Sue Evans Artist: Zoltan...