By Ken Preston in Books — 13 May 2026

Ink & Shadows, and a Free Short Story

Ink & Shadows

I have recently started making Zines. I love the physicality of the cutting/tearing, folding, and gluing. There is something about the process that is, oh I don’t know, mindful I suppose. When I have been working on a zine I find myself lost in the act; the world and all its worries and drama just disappears for a while.

I have just recently been chatting about this with Emma Darwin in relation to writing, and she said something very interesting:

‘… that if our beloved art of writing has a drawback, it's that it's not very material, in the physical sense. It has huge satisfactions, but you don't get your actual, physical hands on Stuff, and when you’ve finished something you can't so easily put it in the middle of the table for your nearest and dearest to admire.’

This is so true. I showed my wife the first zine I made, and she exclaimed, "Oh, I LOVE it!', a reaction she has never had about any of my books!

It’s called Ink & Shadows, and will be officially launching for paid subscribers very soon as a downloadable PDF with instructions on folding and cutting to make your very own zine.

Chapter Five of Le Grande Mystérieux — The Pall Mall Gazette

We took the stairs, careful once more on the steep steps, to the archive room. The ceiling here was low and the walls were lined with pigeonholed shelving, many of them crammed with bound volumes of back issues. A long, ink-stained table stood in the centre of the room.

‘I’m afraid we could be here for a rather considerable time, and the hour is late,’ I said. ‘Would you not rather return tomorrow?’

‘My uncle may not have many tomorrows left,’ Miss Fenwick said. ‘And I feel you underestimate my patience in matters such as this.’

The title of the story, Le Grande Mysterieux, in a swirl of magic

Le Grande Mystérieux is a serialised story for paying members.

You can read a preview of Chapter One here:

The Lonely of the Scharnhorst

Grab yourself a free story here

Barry went first. Barry always went first. No reason, that was just the way it always was, always had been.

Barry went first in everything. First girlfriend, first pint, first time having sex, first in a job, first to get married.

First to have an affair.

Greg was a follower, not a leader.

So Barry was always, always the first one in the water.

Using his fins he propelled himself down. The cold of the English Channel bit him even through the wetsuit. He was used to it.

A shadow cutting briefly through the rays of sunlight streaming through the water signalled Greg’s entry into the sea.

Barry was always first, but Greg was never far behind.

In this short story, two divers go exploring the wreck of the Scharnhorst, jammed upside down in a ravine at the bottom of the English Channel. But Barry and Greg both carry their own secrets, and what waits for them at the bottom of the ocean may be something worse than the truth.

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