Reclaiming a Misunderstood Word Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons Say the word “occult” and most people picture candlelit basements, whispered incantations, and something vaguely dangerous lurking at the edge of reason. The image has been shaped less by history than by horror cinema, sensational headlines, and the cultural aftershocks of moral panic. The occult has become shorthand for menace. Yet the word itself tells…

History, Belief, and the Human Need to Know In a dimly lit parlour in late Victorian London, a woman sits at a small round table, her gloved hand resting lightly on a spread of cards. Across from her, a client leans forward, searching the symbols for reassurance about love, money, or a son posted abroad. Outside, factories roar and empires shift. Inside, the future…

The Hand That Writes A pen rests on paper. The room is quiet. The writer claims not to know what will come next. Words begin to form, slowly at first, then in a rushing stream. When the page is filled, the writer looks down and reads what “someone else” has written. For some, this is a parlour curiosity from the age of séances. For…

Mirrors, Water, and the Discipline of Looking Long before crystal balls became theatrical props, people leaned over bowls of dark water and waited. In the ancient Mediterranean world, divination was woven into civic and religious life. Oracles, omens, dreams, and private consultation Scrying is an ancient divination practice that involves gazing into a reflective or translucent medium to receive visions, symbols, or insights from…

Why People Think Things Remember A historical and cultural study of token-object reading, from Victorian science to Cold War files. There is a particular weight to certain objects. A ring that has outlived its owner. A watch that stopped at a certain hour and never started again. Most people, at least once, feel that quiet pressure of meaning when they touch something that clearly…

How Modern Policing Was Rebuilt New Scotland Yard sign. In March 1967, lorries moved through Westminster carrying more than desks and filing cabinets. They carried the paper memory of London. Criminal registers, fingerprint cards, surveillance reports, and intelligence bundles left the old Norman Shaw buildings on the Embankment and crossed to a new headquarters at 10 Broadway. It was not simply a change of…

Following on from The Corpse Door, and Finding Mabel, this case file returns to an earlier chapter in Mabel Shirley’s life—before the war, before the government’s attention, before her name was whispered in certain circles. It is 1904. Mabel is seventeen and still learning to live with the gift she never asked for. In the quiet village of Easterwich, she runs the family shop and…

The Corpse Door is the first Novel in the Mabel Shirley Case Files. In a world divided by life and afterlife, only one voice can restore the balance. A devastating attack on an isolated home leaves a family slaughtered and a newborn orphaned. The quiet English village of Easterwich reels from the tragedy—but the truth lies far deeper than anyone suspects. Behind the horror,…

Finding Mabel is a slow-burn narrative told through discoveries, case notes, and lived recollection. When a senior police sergeant uncovers something that should not exist, she begins a search that leads her to Mabel Shirley, a woman whose life has unfolded at the edges of official record and quiet history. What begins as investigation becomes recognition, as fragments of a hidden world surface through memory,…

Why I Bother (And Why I’ll Keep Bothering): The Curious Case of Mabel Shirley’s New Look No one’s really visiting the blog, let’s be honest. Most days, I’m probably talking to myself. But that’s all right. Because something odd has happened — and it’s worth saying out loud, even if the echo is all that answers back. I’ve been working hard — with quiet…