'Tis the Season to be ... Creepy

·         Are you the kind of person who takes delight when people slip on ice?

·         Do you often wonder what dark plans that angel must be forging while stuck at the top of the tree?

·         Have you ever noticed that your snowman is in a slightly different position from before?

If you have, then you sound like someone who enjoys a bit of a scare at Christmas time and will surely love the brand new ebook from Chris Priestley – Christmas Tales of Terror.

In this specially written ebook you will find malevolent snowmen, carol-loving corpses and a toy with an evil mind of its own.  Chris Priestley is on top form in these atmospheric, clever and thoroughly chilling stories. Add a new kind of chill to the fluffiest of seasons with seven brilliantly conceived examples of why you'd better be good at Christmas time.

The book can be bought on Amazon for the very festive price of £2.48. 

To celebrate publication of this new collection, Chris Priestley has written a very special 247tale on the subject of A Creepy Christmas for Bloomsbury’s short story writing competition. The competition is then open to budding writers aged between 10 and 16 to create their own frighteningly festive story. For full details go to www.247tales.com, but you should know that the closing date is next week, so get scribbling quickly (or get your classes scribbling, as the case may well be - thank you, Bloomsbury, for giving me such great lesson material!)

And here is that story, for those of you brave enough to read on:

A Creepy Christmas

That end of the park was empty and Lilian’s footsteps were the only ones to trouble the pristine blanket of pure white snow. It was so beautiful, so magical. She was breathless with excitement and, looking back only once at her now distant friends, walked on.

Lillian’s neat and charmless park was utterly transformed. The grim old archway that stood as a lone reminder of the workhouse that had once stood here was smothered in snow and feathery snowflakes fell and tickled her face. Lilian stepped through the arch as though stepping into another world.

The park was unrecognisable here. Lilian felt she was walking through a deserted wood as she reached an area thick with trees where the snow was especially deep and her whispered footfalls were the only sound. She had never thought of the children who lived and died in the workhouse but now they came unbidden into her thoughts. She even thought she could hear them whispering.

Then looking up she saw children sitting in the branches above her head. They looked like roosting owls. They were ragged children, poorly dressed and pale, eerily lit from below by bright snow. Their thin, wan faces looked down at her with large eyes twinkling in the snow light. They bore an expression she thought at first was one of tragic longing, but which she realised too late was in reality some kind of terrible and cruel hunger.

And, before she could even scream, they jumped.

Chris Priestley (247 words)