The Heart in Winter | Book Review

Front cover of 'The Heart in Winter' featuring a man and a woman on horseback

The Heart in Winter

Kevin Barry

214 pages

Hardback

Canongate Books Ltd

2024

£16.99

ISBN: 9781805302117

Review

‘They rode on. They rode double. The day was sharp and bright. They were mellow of mood if not entirely at a distance to the sadnesses natural to both of them, and these they knew were sadnesses unanswerable.’

‘The Heart in Winter’ by Kevin Barry feels like an oft-told tale. A western in which two young lovers elope and are chased by low-down, no good varmints – haven’t we heard this story before? If this novel risks covering old ground (or being as worn as a pair of old leather chaps?) it is brought to life by the fact that it is not a western, or at least not primarily a western.

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Echoes | Short Story

The clock struck and I woke, echo of an echo of a chime sounding in my ears. I remember it as the knell bringing in my second life. The Time After.

My wife was not in the bed beside me – no trace of warmth remained in the tangled sheets. The next discovery – the hardest to bear – was my children’s beds laying empty, their blinds down just so, the books we had read to them scattered across their bedside tables.

It was two, probably nearer three days, before it started to sink in. No neighbours, no newspaper boy, no Mr. Shaheed at the local convenience store, no traffic, no-one to answer phones or respond to emails or hear my shouts echoing around redbrick rooftiles and blank monoblock driveways.

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The Right Kind of Haunting | Short Story

‘Would you mind waiting in  the back sitting room? Graham, was it? I’m afraid we’re running rather behind.’

               ‘That’s no problem,’ I replied.

And it wasn’t, not really. I had nothing apart from that house viewing to occupy my time on that cold, bleak Saturday afternoon. Slightly more irritating was the houseowner Madeleine’s demeanour. Upon answering the door, she had seemed surprised, irritated even, as though not expecting me. She struck me as an ethereal presence as she led me inside, gauzy material fluttering underneath her arms, her dress bustling against door frames and chair legs.

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Cling and Kick | Haiku

The first chill fingers of winter have crept round the door in Scotland this week. Two haiku to match…

Frost on the inside of a windowpane.

Cling

Intruder frost has crept

Inside, clinging latticed to

Frigid windowpanes.

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Empty wire birdfeeder

Kick

Windless swaying of

Just-left feeders, kicked into

Shy parabolas.

Thanks for reading, folks. My recent short stories include ‘Sunset Hours‘ and ‘November Cold‘.

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.

November Cold | Short Story

My father disappears on the train between Neilston and Kilmarnock. He does this without leaving my side, without his elbows ever lifting from the plastic tabletop where they prop up his phone. Dad vanishes in a carriage busy with beery, jostling men talking to him about Killie’s injury crisis and whether I am his wee lassie.

In the pub Dad stands pint in hand, watching the horseracing. I’m given a packet of Quavers and the barmaid asks what time my mum is getting back from her Girls Night Out. Then, the weary walk through the terraced houses as the gloom gathers and the November cold creeps. Dad holds my hand loosely as the pavements become crowded.

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There’s No-one Here | Poetry

There’s no-one here at the moment.

Just sterilised, shadowed corners and

Rows of steel doors, all closed.

Those stories, pushed along drawer runners,

Running no more

In this halfway house, this budget hostel.

A first chance to rest

Brought to bear by flame and earth.

Thanks for reading, folks. My recent short stories include ‘Sunset Hours‘ and ‘Crib Stuck‘.

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 is a doctoral student at the University of Dundee, a lucky husband, and a proud father. He blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com.

Writing with Grace Notes | Creative Non-Fiction

From the conceptual to the mechanical and back again. Merciless chrome and black, mercifully free of cabling, of Wi-Fi range, of needy battery icons.

It is writing with sound and fury, each key an inked thwack on a page stretched taut by paper fingers, writing with echoes of thunderous roars of keystrokes within typing pools, of industry caught halfway between manual and digital.

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