From the Inside FlapIn Vienna, schizophrenic, Sam Baldock, is haunted by Beethoven in -A Musical Calling. Nurse Amanda is drawn into the wiles of a Harley Street hypnotistin - Voices of A Hypnotist.The roots of a yew tree deliver more than sap in -Family Tree. Emily is determined to 'reach out' to her dead husband in the haunted - The Parchment Recipes.Stories blending eeriness, suspense, tenderness and the poignancy of lives which could be yours when driven to extremity.About the AuthorRaymond Nickford says that, to him, people are stranger than fiction and in many ways more fascinating. Perhaps this is what first led him to his degree in Philosophy and Psychology from the University College of North Wales, leading to searching character studies.Souls, particularly troubled ones; the outsider, the lonely and any driven to extremity, have been indispensable for his paperback novels, now easily available in .co.uk KINDLE E-books including: Aristo's Family, Mister Kreasey's Demon and Twists in the Tale. Of his novel based in Cyprus, Aristo's Family, BARBARA ERSKINE, best selling author of Lady of Hay, affirms the beautifully observed characters, intriguing and atmospheric scenes and, above all, the suspense which made her want to read on. His favourite producer is ALFRED HITCHCOCK, and he admires the authors Patricia Highsmith, Ian McEwan, Ruth Rendell and Henry James. Raymond is a member of The Society of Authors. He believes his teaching of English in colleges and as a private tutor has informed his new literary thriller, A Child from the Wishing Well. This new title will also be published in Kindle in August and, as with all the above book titles, is already available to buy as an Epub-book from smashwords.com. It features an eerie music tutor, her young pupil Rosie and Rosie's paranoid, inept father, Gerard, who nevertheless yearns to mean more to his daughter. The book was selected for the Harper Collins Gold Star Award, May 2010. Candace Bowen, author of A Knight of Silence, writes of A Child from the Wishing Well : Growing up in a suburb of Chicago, the first scary movie I remember seeing was the 1965 Bette Davis movie, The Nanny. To this day, that movie has always stuck with me as one of the great psychological thrillers of all time. For me, A Child from the Wishing Well, by Raymond Nickford, is reminiscent of that movie. Ruth, the eerie music tutor, and Gerard strap you in, and take you on a psychological thrill-ride to the very end. how do i make a design portfolio Twists in the Tale: Collected Stories of Psychological Suspense, the Supernatural and Ghosts
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful. Mischievous plotsBy DaydreamerThe two octogenarian piano tuners, 'Hubbald and Bros' give a mischievous slant on the belief that most generous old men are endearing. The trick seems to be that they 'appear' every bit endearing but may have a sinister ulterior motive in offering the free gift of a Steinway to the rather nice customer who, so constantly assured, is their 'favourite' customer. There is a lingering sense that the brothers just might not be using their converted Methodist chapel workshop for repairing/tuning customers' pianos and that the long decommissioned crematorium at the back could still be made to operate.Other stories move from the vulnerable to the predatory, the spider-phobic to the agoraphobic, the obese barber who is mortified more by his loss of self image than by the hoodlums who torment him for his inability with women. Then there's the story where wife, Emily,clings to the idea that she can 'reach out' to her dead husband, Berny, if she chants some of the unusual recipes in a centuries old handwritten parchment recipe book she found in her attic after his death and whose pages have a feel that reminds her of her husband's touch.It's a good job you can read this as a cheap 'ebook', else you might wonder what the pages were made of, if you bought the paperback.6 of 7 people found the following review helpful. A great findBy George ThompsonThe stuttering teenage Eddy in the second story, Family Tree, was for me enough confirmation that the descriptive tags given for the book were about right: "Psychological suspense, mystery, romance, atmosphere, travel, literary, character, music, ghosts".The clear and condensed style gives the book pace and kept it tense - though in places too tense, perhaps I should just say disturbing. But then the stories are as described in the notes, powerful without being gratuitous, even though some have their macabre moments.My only other point is that to appreciate the story about A Musical Calling where the poor schizo, Sam Baldock, thinks he's called to Vienna by the spirit of Beethoven, I felt you need to know something about Beethoven to fully appreciate the storyline. This said, the book is painstaking in its research and, for me, the colorful description chilled because it made Beethoven come alive.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Lives to share, dreams and escapesBy SevilleOrangeAmongst the stories one of the best is about the two truly weird old boys who form their little firm of piano repairers, Hubbald Bros, the plus 80 year old brothers with their damp old Methodist chapel they've converted to their workshop. If two outwardly likeable octogenarians ever seem to like me so much they want to offer me a Steinway piano for free and invite me to a damp old Methodist chapel full of piano's opened up like butchers cattle, I don't care how chummy and quaint they seem over their tea and cakes, I'm not putting a foot in their workshop - specially if the streets around are dead silent and poorly lit.For an observation of apparent kindness and superficial politeness subtly masking inner perversity this, as much as the tension of the story, is well written and deserves to be called literary fiction but occasionally I had to stop where there were layers of meaning beneath the surface which perhaps I hadn't fully appreciated first time around.The other stories were also populated with flawed and troubled characters, whose lives were interesting because I felt that sometimes I had shared their own nightmares and wanted to follow their escape routes from them. Nickford often has a very individual angle of perception so that occasionally the minor characters were more memorable than the main protagonists but I can say I'm glad that the best still live with me.