To date Paul Magrs has written nine novels featuring the dynamic duo of Brenda, a Whitby B&B owner with a past as unconventional as her present, and Effie, her junk shop owning, witch neighbour, six of which have been featured and praised here on Wyrd Britain.
This three part radio play version, starring Joanna Tope as Brenda and Monica Gibb as Effie, was aired on BBC Radio in 2009 and features the stories of, 'The Night Owl', 'The Vintage Costume Hero Ball' and 'Our Frank', which will be mostly familiar to readers of the novels but, for those who aren't, what you'll get is - if you'll excuse the horribly reductive analogy - Alan Bennett does Hammer Horror. Magrs has an often gloriously silly imagination that is steeped in the classics of British sci fi and horror and his stories are joyous, celebratory, and occasionally vicious, mash-ups of said classics interlaced with that very British, bawdy 'Carry On...' sensibility - "I know what I'm talking about when it comes to people putting the willies up ya!" - and they are fantastic fun.
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Know your frenemy. ‘I’ve had adventures too. My whole life doesn’t revolve around you, you know.’ When
she's not busy amassing armies of Cybermen, or manipulating the Doctor
and his companions, Missy has plenty of time to kill (literally). In
this all new collection of stories about the renegade Time Lord we all
love to hate, you'll discover just some of the mad and malevolent activities Missy gets up to while she isn't distracted by the Doctor. So please try to keep up.
After many, many years and having filled several bookcases I think I've finally...mostly...almost - there still a few Targets and a couple of annuals I'd like to find - broken my Doctor Who book addiction but I couldn't resist one last bit of fun with this anthology of stories featuring the fabulous Missy and it was worth it.
The book contains six stories by various Who alumni including James Goss, Paul Magrs and Jacqueline Rayner and is pretty much all excellent fun particularly when it's flying it's own flag in a story not beholden to the parent series.
James Goss writes about a post regeneration Missy taking gleeful revenge on a club full of misogynist scoundrels, Cavan Scott takes her off on a mission for the Time Lords, Magrs has her playing the long game with the aid of a TARDIS and a magic teddy bear, Peter Anghelides doesn't quite nail it with a time hopping romp around Venice, Rayner gives us a fun series of email exchanges between Nardole, The Doctor and, eventually, the captive Missy and finally Richard Dinnick does an OK job with the two incarnations of the Master on the giant Cyberman riddled spaceship but it feels out of place here amongst the snappier less canonical pieces.
Like I said earlier I'm very glad I broke my embargo for one last Who book as this proved to be a fine and fun way to spend an afternoon.
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For '3 Wyrd Things' I asked various creative types whose work I admire to tell us about three oddly, wonderfully, weirdly British things that have been an influence on them and their work - a book or author,
a film or TV show
and a song, album or musician.
First up, Paul Magrs.
Paul Magrs lives and writes in Manchester. In a twenty-five year writing career he has published novels in every genre from Literary to Gothic Mystery to Science Fiction for adults and young adults. His most recent books include the concluding volume in a science fiction trilogy for kids - ‘The Heart of Mars’ (Firefly Press), and ‘Fellowship of Ink’ (Snow Books) which continues the multi-volumed saga of Brenda, the long lost Bride of Frankenstein. He has taught Creative Writing at both the University of East Anglia and Manchester Metropolitan University, and now writes full time
Paul's writing is always an absolute joy to read; it's 'War of the Worlds' as written by Alan Bennett and it's 'Hammer House of Are You Being Served'. His work is gloriously individual and utterly rooted in everything that makes British science fiction and horror so much fun and we are honoured to have him write the first in this new series.
More info on Paul's writing can be found on his website - Life on Magrs.
Books
Armada was the most amazing and – I think – undervalued of children’s publishers in Britain of the Seventies. Never as classy as Puffin or Piccolo, their books were readily found in the paperback carousels of newsagents and motorway service station shops. A little cheaper, a little tackier and often a lot more fun. My favourite thing they did was their anthologies: umpteen volumes of ghost tales, mostly edited by the remarkable Mary Danby, and six books of Monster stories curated by the semi-legendary R. Chetwynd-Hayes. Best of all, to my mind, were the Armada Sci-Fi Books one through to four. Every story is a gem – juxtaposing shops and tower blocks with alien visitors and space fleets from afar. Richard Davis was the editor and these books are vanishing from Ebay, from endangered bookshops and from the face of the earth itself. They must be collected and preserved.
TV
‘Three Salons at the Seaside’ is the most wonderful piece of telly I know. It’s a forty minute fly-on-the-wall documentary from 1994, produced for the BBC and directed by Philippa Lowthorpe. All it asks is that we sit quietly in the corner of three different hair salons in Blackpool during a rainy Monday (it feels like) as the sky blows and glooms outside and the elderly ladies come trogging in, in twos and threes, to have their rinses and blow-waves done. We eavesdrop on alarming conversations about death and disaster and all manner of frailties and scandal. We discover the secret of the communal funeral handbag and we marvel, basically, at these wonderful, watchful, eloquent faces as they mull over the meaning of everything, sitting under the driers. Outside a young girl flies back and forth on roller skates and the music is just exquisite; jaunty, hopeful and achingly nostalgic. It’s the best bit of telly there’s ever been, in my humble opinion.
Record
For a record I’d like to pick out Geoff Love’s ‘Space Themes’ – a picture of the cover appeared recently on this page. That marvellously copyright-infringement-dodging painting drew my eye back in 1978, when Fine Fare opened a late-opening megastore in our town precinct and offered all kinds of fantastic records and stuff to lavish your pocket money on. This album – joined by many other Geoff Love classics – has lived in my treasured collection ever since. The rendition of the Doctor Who theme is like the pulsating, thrilling, technicolour cinematic version that the Seventies failed to bring us.
Many years later, in 2011, when I was writing Doctor Who stories for AudioGo I played this version of the theme to myself, to get me in the mood for a day’s recording near Charlotte Street in Soho. I sat outside a Greek café at eight in the morning, anticipating a day in studio creating a story I’d cheekily called ‘Tsar Wars’ – a kind of retelling of ‘Nicholas and Alexandra’ set in 1970s outer space.
We had a rather large cast arriving at about nine o’clock. I was there early, eating a bacon sandwich, sipping frothy coffee, enjoying the sun sliding over the canyons of Fitzrovia. The Geoff Love Dr Who theme was playing loudly and… at that very moment Tom Baker came galumphing round the corner. He was swinging a bag of cakes and sweets he was bringing to share with everyone at the recording.
It was a completely magical moment. There was no one else there on the street. He noticed me and gave a jaunty wave. And that moment became one of my favourites of all time: set to the tune of that disco-era Doctor Who.
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Throughout
his adventures in time and space, the Doctor meets so many people and
each one is affected in some way: the waiter who keeps a special table
for the Time Lord's granddaughter, Susan; the American student who
befriends lost Lucie Miller; the teenage girl who discovers that she may
be something more than human. What is it like when that strange blue
box appears in your life? What is it like when your eyes are opened to
so much more? What is it like when everything changes?
I've eyed up a couple of these BF anthologies a few times over the years but even 2nd hand the price tag has been too high for me so spotting this in a junk shop recently was a real treat.
As was usually the case with BF (it's changed lately) the stories feature Doctors 1 to 8 and in this case in pretty tiny little escapades...escapadettes perhaps...or not.
James Goss
The book is crammed and the highlights are many. James Goss' 'Indian Summer' featuring the First Doctor, Susan and a lifetime of strange events for a restaurant waiter / maitre d / manager / owner / manager again Suresh Parekh is a particular favourite and being second in the contents means the bar is set high and early. Fortunately there are a few that are up to it; Simon Guerrier provides an intriguing serial Doctor adventure featuring a young girl with a big problem, Brian Dooley gives us a delightfully bickery tale between the Fourth Doctor and Romana and the Eighth repays a favour in Joseph Lidster's 'Salva Mea'.
There are plenty of others both fun and funny and some that just drift past and the book ends oddly with Paul Magrs' 'Fanboys' which feels like it's been printed in the wrong book but I'm pleased to have finally tracked one of these collections down, it certainly didn't disappoint.
Paul Magrs Snowbooks 'Brenda and Effie
Forever!’ is an outrageous Gothic adventure involving ancient vampires,
miniature mermaids, the Phantom of the Opera and his hunchbacked
boyfriend, a fiendish ghost who drives a limousine, Mr and Mrs Claus and
all three Bronte sisters discovered alive and well in a secret base
under the parsonage at Haworth with a sentient, stuffed Art Critic
called Panda. Brenda and Effie are living it up on the
continent. Holidaying in Paris, they are menaced by a mysterious Peeping
Tom with a limp and a hump, who warns them that they must never return
home to Whitby again. Untold disaster will take over the world if they
go anywhere near the North Yorkshire coast… But Brenda and Effie know that they simply have to return to Whitby, even if it means the end of everything they hold dear. Brenda
owns a Guest House by the sea and her best friend Effie runs the junk
shop next door. But together they have another role as the guardians of
Whitby against the vampires, daemons and creatures of the night that
continually plague the quaint but terrifying town. Together Brenda and
Effie must face the most startling dangers ever as they are engulfed by
hideous secrets from their long-hidden pasts. Can our heroines survive all these fiendish shenanigans and live to fight the powers of darkness another day?
And so we come to the last in the adventures of those most cantankerous and geriatric protectors of Whitby, Brenda the Bride of Frankenstein and her witchy neighbour Effie.
Making their way home from an enjoyable and relaxing European jaunt - well that last bit with the kidnapping and the vampires wasn't so enjoyable or relaxing but on the whole... - the pair find themselves warned off returning to Whitby so as to avert a prophesied calamity. The vampires in particular seem most perturbed and insistent hence the rather rude kidnapping attempt.
Ignoring the warnings the pair make their way home and immediately find themselves embroiled in various palavers involving the grotesque Mrs Claus, miniature mermaids, the return of Mr. Danby and most crucial of all the Limbosine and it's regular abductions of Effie in order to stimulate some deeply buried memories. As they return we find out Effie's past and Brenda's pre-ordained future.
As it's Paul Magrs you know it's going to be a fun and lightly written jaunt filled with mischievous appropriation and re-invention and this is indeed the case but aw a conclusion to the series it's just not up to snuff. Too many threads are left hanging, characters behave in uncharacteristic ways that aren't addressed and the finale is both vague and rushed, not to mention deeply unsatisfying. Truthfully it was almost on a par with '...and I woke up and it was all a dream.'
I have pretty much loved this series from a chance find of the first volume in a seaside charity shop and it's been a ride filled with fun and adventure that has touched on so many of my pulp, sci-fi, horror loves and woven them into Brenda's world. The character's were a joy to spend time with and the warmth and (sometimes fractious) camaraderie was infectious fun. As such I really hope this isn't truly the end as to leave it (and them) as he does would be a real shame.
Something is
biting people on the streets of Whitby. In an ordinary town, this would
be worrying. Here, it's disastrous, and only Brenda has guessed why.
She's also trying to prepare for a packed festive break at her B and B.
But when unexpected help from the shadows of the past arrives to
illuminate the dangers awaiting them all, Brenda realises that unless
she can find a way to save Effie, the consequences may be eternal.
So
back to Whitby we go where we drop ourselves straight into the
aftermath of the return of Alucard and the nibble he took out of Effie's
neck at the end of the previous books shenanigans.
Things
have not been going well for our favourite crotchety old witch and it's
not long before the arrival of Brenda's monster hunting ex beau takes
her misery to a whole new level with his stake happy ways. Mixed in
with this you have a cult based around the pulp fantasy novels of
Beatrice Mapp based in the matriarchal world of Qab to which Brenda
inevitably has long forgotten links.
It was a
rollicking good read that didn't let up it's breakneck (or should that
be biteneck) speed for a second. It left things open and full of
questions but as there's still another one of these to go in the series so
I'm a happy man whose breath is bated.
Penny is running away from a
life of domestic strife and into mysterious Whitby - where she hopes to
find herself. But in her quest for self-discovery, Penny may have
stumbled on something far more sinister: the gateway to hell. For Whitby
is no ordinary seaside resort, and all that keeps the evil at bay are
Brenda and Effie - two very unusual old ladies. When a film crew comes
to town to remake the sixties schlock horror movie Get Thee Inside Me,
Satan, Brenda and Effie suspect something strange is afoot. Female lead
Karla Sorenson is reprising her role and she doesn't look like she's
aged a day. Surely that's not possible? Then there are the disturbing
rumours surrounding the original movie - a cult classic that is, quite
literally, spell-binding. As events spool out of control, Penny's new
boss Robert draws her deeper into the movie's peculiar mystery. But can
it be stopped before all hell breaks loose?
And so
for the fourth time we venture into the hellish environs of Whitby
where Brenda and Effie continue their mission to protect the town from
evil.
This time a remake of an old Hammer style horror film comes
to town along with its vampish star, Karla Sorenson. Brenda has history
with her, and with the original movie, but the old memory is not what it
was. Soon Sorenson is bewitching the local men whilst the film, at the
behest of dark forces, begins to bring both secrets and old
acquaintances or into the open.
I wasn't as absorbed by this one
as I was with the others but truthfully I don't think it was the book's
fault I was just a little preoccupied. It was fun, silly and very much
in the spirit of the others in series. Another gem in a series that has
been nothing but gems although maybe this time out it's perhaps more of
a midget gem from one of Brenda's bags of pick 'n' mix.
No matter what she tries to do,
trouble has a way of finding Brenda. It's hardly surprising with secrets
like hers. When her old adversary Mr Danby starts filling the airwaves
with his late night phone in show it can only mean one thing - and sure
enough best friend Effie soon finds herself up to her neck in it. But
that is only the beginning; fate has an even bigger surprise in store.
Romance is in the air for Brenda and, do what she will, she cannot deny
that she and her man were made for each other - literally. But as usual,
Brenda and Effie will face up to whatever dangers come their way with
fortitude and grace: even if that means journeying to places beyond
their wildest dreams.
This is the third Brenda and
Effie and it all kicks off mightily as, thanks to the really rather
unpleasant Mrs Claus, Frank's in town and he wants his wife. Brenda's,
strong, objections to Frank's insistence on what he sees as his long
overdue nuptials sends the two of them quite literally to Hell via a
long drop over a large cliff. Effie and Robert are having none of it
and soon, with Sheila Manchu in tow, follow her via the Bitches Maw
into a Hell that bears an uncanny similarity to the Whitby they'd just
left and so, on familiarish ground they soon manage to get back together
with Brenda. Things don't necessarily go exactly too well but thanks
to Brenda's selflessness the friends, along with Frank and Alucard, escape
Hell in a fabulously unorthodox way.
Magrs is a writer with a
gloriously silly imagination and the chops to back it up with a series
of referential and (ir)reverential stories.
Brenda must face her
demons, but first she needs to get to the bottom of the sinister
goings-on that threaten to overcome an all-too-quiet seaside town. When
poison pen letters start flying around the quiet lanes of Whitby,
trouble is in store for Brenda and Effie. And with Jessie the Zombie
Womanzee, trips down memory lane and amorous ghoul hunting, literary
minded and strangely youthful professors of Icelandic history, as well
as a terrifying encounter with bamboo wickerwork gods from the dawn of
time, even Brenda’s ample cup is running over. But her most challenging
battle is the one she must fight with herself – or, at least, parts of
herself…
This is the second in the continuing adventures of Brenda and Effie as they guard Whitby against nefarious goings on.
As
with the previous book in the series there are several short tales
embedded within the longer story. In this instance though they serve to
provide more insight into Brenda's past and present. We are introduced
to one of her ex beaus - a monster hunting Cambridge don and Sheila
Manchu - wife of a certain aged (and now deceased) oriental criminal
mastermind. These two play central roles in the unfolding menace of an
ancient alien bamboo god called Goomba who so desperately wants to go
home he's putting everyone under a spell.
As with the first it was a good fun read although it was considerably less gung-ho than it's predecessor.
Brenda
has had a long and eventful life and she has come to Whitby to run a
B&B in search of some peace and quiet. She and her best friend Effie
like nothing better than going out for tea at the Walrus and the
Carpenter or dinner at Cod Almighty and keeping their eyes open for any
of the mysterious goings on in town. And what with satanic beauty
salons, more than illegal aliens, roving psychic investigators and the
frankly terrifying owner of the Christmas Hotel there are no shortage of
nefarious shenanigans to keep them interested. But the oddest thing in
Whitby may well be Brenda herself. With her terrible scars, her strange
lack of a surname or the fact that she takes two different shoe sizes,
Brenda should have known that people as, well, unique as she is, just
aren't destined for a quiet life.
Magrs
(pronounced Mars) is a Doctor Who writer (amongst other things) and it
really shows as this whole book has a lightness and playfulness about it
that made it compulsive reading with ideas straight out of the ‘Who’
grab-bag.
The (not a) Bride of the title is named
Brenda and is the owner of a B&B in Whitby who, along with her
neighbour, junk shop proprietor Effie, investigates strange goings
on in her strange little town. Brenda’s true identity becomes evident
very early on in the proceedings and she is slowly revealed to have been
‘guided’ to Whitby to become the guardian of the place against the
portal to Hell opened there.
Magrs makes use of War of
the Worlds, Most Haunted (one of the most shameful programmes ever to appear on UK
television) and Whitby’s most famous visitor and weaves them into the tapestry of Brenda’s world to produce a joyful, rollicking read full of good, old fashioned, unadulterated fun.
