Mantel Pieces | Book Review

Mantel Pieces

Hilary Mantel

335 pages

Paperback

4th Estate

2021

£9.99

ISBN: 9780008430009

Review

Hilary Mantel is known to many for her peerless ‘Wolf Hall’ trilogy, the last book of which I reviewed here. She was a true national treasure in an era when such terms are used cheaply. Her short stories, some of which are found in ‘The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher’, are also lean and gripping. Although I have listened to her lecture on YouTube many times, I had not read much of her non-fiction.

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Drip, Drip, Drip | Short Story

Rusted water tower against a desert background

The water tower looms, as all water towers do. It does all of the things that water towers are supposed to do; it winks in the setting sun, it slowly rusts. It groans in ponderous, metallic agony.

You like that? Made that up myself, so I did.

Buy some of the more suggestable townsfolk a beer and they will tell you all sorts of things about the tower. They’ll wax about how the creatures first crawled into the shadowy cylinder on a dry, moonless, desert night back in the sixties. They’ll talk, if you let them, about an unsatiable appetite for moisture, for dankness in the arid northern winds, of an incomprehensible idyll of beaded moisture on oxidising iron. You’ll see, if you’ve time enough in the bar, the locals side-eyeing you, even more than might be expected for an out-of-town businessman. You’ll notice lips twitching and elbows dug into friends’ sides.

An outsider would notice these things, an imbecile even. I think you’re more than that, friend.

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Place, Parallax, and a Sense of Community | Article

The liver birds, Liverpool

In June 2022 the fountains in Nottingham’s Old Market Square were turned off after water was discovered leaking into an electrical control area below the mechanism. The water features were a draw for children and their families during hot weather, with youngsters playing in the pools and beneath the jets as shoppers trundled past. In December 2023, and with Nottingham City Council having effectively declared bankruptcy, the local authority confirmed that the features would be switched off permanently in an effort to save £30,000 per year. When I went to the city last year this was indeed the case; Nottingham Council House looked on sternly as the attractive stonework stayed bone-dry. The early morning square was desolate save for pigeons and shop workers walking to their places of employment.

Financial issues affecting town and city centre aesthetics is not unique to Nottingham. In July 2024 the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce said that the city centre was in need of ‘fresh life’, whilst Birmingham City Council’s bankruptcy has resulted in dirtier streets and threats to cultural heritage in England’s second city. In straightened financial times it is easy to understand why local authorities choose to cut seemingly frivolous spending first; after all, shouldn’t we prioritise services like social care and education over the maintenance of water features or ensuring that the facades of historic buildings are scrubbed clean?

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Listen | Short Story

A rusted trampoline in a shadowed, overgrown garden.

I’m delighted to say that my flash fiction piece ‘Listen’ has been published in ‘Down in the Dirt’ magazine.

Read it here.

Other recent short stories include ‘Bellahouston‘ and ‘Echoes‘.

Matthew Richardson is a writer of short stories. His work has featured in Gold Dust magazine, Literally Stories, Close to the Bone, McStorytellers, Penny Shorts, Soft Cartel, Whatever Keeps the Lights On, Flashback Fiction, Cafelit, Best MicroFiction 2021, Writer’s Egg, Idle Ink, The Wild Word, Down in the Dirt, and Shooter magazine. He has a Professional Doctorate in Education. Matthew blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com.

Spate and Salt | Haiku

Waves crashing against a sea wall

From fresh to saltwater today in a couple of haiku…

A river rushing over boulders and pebbles.

Spate

Through spate and death-drought,

Boulders rounded, pebbles smoothed –

Cold river-crafted.

Waves crashing against a sea wall.

Salt

Salt murmurations.

Tops and troughs, feeling, pressing,

Weaving sea walls, slow.

Thanks for reading, folks. Second image courtesy of Greg Hartmann. My recent short stories include ‘Bellahouston‘ and ‘Echoes‘.

Matthew Richardson is a writer of short stories. His work has featured in Gold Dust magazine, Literally Stories, Close to the Bone, McStorytellers, Penny Shorts, Soft Cartel, Whatever Keeps the Lights On, Flashback Fiction, Cafelit, Best MicroFiction 2021, Writer’s Egg, Idle Ink, The Wild Word, and Shooter magazine. He has a Professional Doctorate in Education. Matthew blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com.

Bellahouston | Short Story

Bellahouston Park at dusk

Brace

Ice-stiffened grass and dogs wearing hi-vis in the gloom. Here roam the early risers, the antisocial, the lost-in-thought, the lost. There are few words, fewer greetings. Instead, breath plumes over shoulders, shoulders hunched up around ears, eyes fixed to the paths. People pretend not to see dogshit, each other.

Birth

Once the twilight wanderers have disappeared – work, breakfast, despair – come the first real actors, for whom the park provides the clumsily-painted scenery for their fantasies, their crumbling dreams. The wind-chapped cheeks of parents and toddlers bob by, trudging from park entrance to jungle gym, joined by the cold and the conviction that this is what they should be doing. Professional dog walkers, encumbered by tangled leads and tangled dog-eared business plans, wonder how short a distance qualifies as a ‘good walk’. Quasi-gurus set up for fitness classes, their open minds trammelled by quasi-ideas – wellness, holistic, wholeness.

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