Novels

The Manse Cats; an extract from The Dowager’s Dream.

Father turned scarlet and I steeled myself for the explosion but to my astonishment, instead of roaring in rage, he burst out laughing, “Get away with the both of you, you wayward limmers,” he said, but in quite good humour, “How can a poor man have any peace among all you females when even the cat persecutes him? Get away now and let me be!” He scooped Griselda up in his arms where she purred and butted his chin with her head.
I was deeply relieved and so, I imagine, was Griselda; she cannot abide shouting or argument. If anyone raises their voice, she will always get up and pat them upon the arm or on the hand; or if she thinks a stronger remonstrance is necessary, she jumps upon their lap and pats their lips until they control their temper and speak softly
I named Patient Griselda after a story by Chaucer but there is nothing patient or submissive about her. To tell the truth, she bosses the other cats in the manse and the humans as well - even Father puts aside his pipe when she jumps on his knee and wrinkles her nose in disgust at the smell. In spite of this, Griselda is Father’s favourite cat and she is often to be found in the study, curled upon his lap.
We have three cats at the manse; the other two are Elijah Mark and Leah Elizabeth. Father named them and he gave them two names each, because, he said, they should have a name from both the Old and New Testaments, just as we always have a reading from both Old and New in the kirk every Sabbath.
Kirsty will insist upon calling Elijah Mark, ‘Eli’, Patient Griselda, ‘Patty-cat’ and Leah Elizabeth, ‘Lizzie’ or ‘Lizzie-Lee’, much to Father’s annoyance. He says they have good Biblical names and it is sacrilegious to shorten them, but Kirsty only retorts that no-one could call a cat ‘Elijah’ or ‘Leah Elizabeth’, and besides, she says, the cats prefer the names she gives them. I think she is right for they always come to her without fail when she calls them - even Leah who is a law unto herself and rarely does anything she is bid.
I fear Kirsty, too, is a law unto herself and she blithely ignores Father’s edict and goes on calling the cats whatever she chooses, as if I were not her mistress and she were not a servant at the manse.
Leah Elizabeth is mostly white in colour, with some brown and grey markings upon her back and the top of her head, while Elijah Mark looks like a manse cat, being glossy black with a white stripe around his neck like a clerical collar, and a smart white front. He has white socks, too, and a white tip to his tail. He and Leah have produced many kittens between them but he leaves Patient Griselda alone - I think he would get a face full of claws if he did anything different. Father claims he is a good mouser but I have never seen him with a mouse; it is Griselda who is our chief mouser. Kirsty says female cats always are the best mousers for it is their nature to hunt to provide food for their kittens, but Father won’t acknowledge any such thing. I think he finds it hard to believe a mere female can excel in any field over and above one of the lords of creation, even when they are only cats.

Miriam Hastings’ latest novel, The Dowager’s Dream, is available now in paperback from FeedARead Publishing. Also as an e-book on Kindle: The Dowager’s Dream.

In a crumbling mansion on the north coast of Scotland, the Dowager grows old; exiled there by her son, the Laird, she dreams of her girlhood and waits for death, but when the tenants keep talking of a monster in the sea, she becomes obsessed with the strange creature living in the bay beyond her windows.

The people claim the sea monster portends disaster and they are right for the Laird has grand plans to improve the estate. He intends to evict all the tenants from their crofts in order to turn the land over to an army of sheep.

Can the Dowager stand up to her unscrupulous son? If she does, she may have to pay a terrible price.

Walking Shadow, Miriam Hasting’s first historical novel, was published in November 2019 under the name of M W Hastings, and is available direct from FeedaRead Books as well as through Amazon. It is also available as an e-book on Kindle. This is a historical novel with profoundly modern themes: the fear of terrorism, political manipulation of information, and issues of religious fundamentalism and intolerance.

Edmund (aka Rosamund) Shakespeare, younger sibling of William and lead player of female roles with the King’s Men, is the narrator and central protagonist. When the novel opens, it is January 1606 and London is a dangerous place; the gunpowder plot has just been foiled, spies and informers are everywhere, and Edmund is a prisoner in the Tower, charged with treason. 

The Minotaur Hunt.

Miriam’s first novel, winner of the MIND Book of the Year Award, is a present-day story with a legendary model. To the people of Crete, the Minotaur was traditionally a creature of darkness and horror. Locked in a labyrinth where no-one could see him, he became the scapegoat for everyone’s worst imaginable nightmares and terrors.

Chrissie and Rachel are Minotaurs. They meet in Bradley, a rambling Victorian institution for the mentally ill. As the novel unfolds and their respective stories are gradually revealed, their growing relationship becomes a rich source of shared experience and a focus for their deepening knowledge of themselves.

Some reviews of Miriam Hastings’ The Minotaur Hunt:

[An author] “of great talent and wit, the courage to lead us through purgatory and the tenderness to love and understand its inhabitants.” Monica Dickens.

“There are echoes of romantic fiction, but there is also a whiff of grim realism . . . Underlying the narrative is an impressive refusal to attempt glib explanations.” Bernard Ineichen.

“Miriam Hastings’ The Minotaur Hunt is an engrossing novel set in a mental health institution and in the minds of some of its patients. . .The positive portrayal is very well done, yet it does not pull any punches about the difficulties faced by those with serious mental illness”, Mercia McMahon.

“No matter how dark the labyrinthe of emotions, there is always redemption for the human condition, and this sensitivity to lightness, back-to-back with the darkness, is where Hastings’ writing is at its finest. It has the voice of authenticity.” Vine Voice.

“The Minotaur Hunt is beautifully written with an immediacy and urgency that has you turning the pages”, The Bub.

 New Work

Miriam Hastings has recently completed a new novel, The Dowager’s Dream, a surreal fantasy set on the north coast of Scotland at the time of the brutal clearances in the Scottish Highlands.  The novel was inspired by the (largely imagined) lives of Miriam’s great great-grandmothers, Margaret MacKenzie and Christine Patterson, and also by an account written in 1809 by a minister’s daughter, describing a mermaid she had seen in Sandside Bay, Caithness. Although The Dowager’s Dream is set in the early years of the 19th Century, the themes of dispossession and ethnic cleansing will resonate with the contemporary reader.