The Grim Reaper Series

A Grim Introduction

The inspiration behind the Grim Reaper series of stories came, inexplicably, from watching the X Factor/American Idol programmes. No, it was not depression setting in or circulating thoughts of murdering Simon Cowell that started the idea. What crossed my mind one night was this; what if Death wanted to retire and used a talent show format to find his replacement.

As you will soon notice, that particular story is not featured here but it is partially completed and just waiting its turn in the queuing system, which is has to be said is very much like any city centre road in rush hour. The story is complete in notation form, but part way through its writing I had wanted to write something short and for reasons unknown I started a story featuring the same Death character with the notion that I could keep it to around 5,000 words. It was never going to happen at that time. Everything I tried to keep short around that time ended up becoming something bigger than anything I had planned to be novel length.

So, it was that story which began to form much of the character and also changed a lot of him from the version of him in the "Grim Idol" novel. As the story progressed, and it has to be said got more and more out of control, Grim Fandango Reaper found the voice I had tried to gove him originally but had possibly tried too hard. In "Grim Reaping", it seemed to just flow. As always, best things come when you just let them flow.

Despite the movement of the novel, there has always been space for a short story - now that I can seem to make them stay short - and there also turned out to be space for a definite beginning to the Grim saga. "A Grim Business" was written with no real aim other than to have a bit of fun with the character in a location that would later appear in the novel and accompanied by some well known faces. When an offer to provide a story dealing with the end of the world through climate change came about Grim seemed the perfectly situated to pass comment. Without the intention, it turned out that "Grim To The End" would become the inarguable start of Grim's adventures. I'm sure it will become clear why when you read it.

So, here are the aforementioned short stories along with the opening chapters of "Grim Reaping." There will be further Grim Shorts featured here in the future so watch out for those. Sign up to the Back Side's Facebook page to be notified of new updates to the site.

Grim Shorts

Grim Novels