Who is Feather? The wandering girl - the running girl. Fragmentary, oblique, a damaged product of innocence lost, on the run from a deprived childhood and eccentric domineering father. Passing from remote beaches and salt marshes covered with samphire and grey sky to more human wildernesses in London and Ljubljana - always on the move and always making encounters. Always touching people with her own magic. Always unable to engage emotionally with all the lives she passes through - hurt, maybe, but always just moving on. In these nine stories and novellas, David Rix weaves an enigmatic web of fictions at the shifting intersections of Slipstream, Horror and Science Fiction. Feather lurks at the edges of some of these tales and erupts from the centre of others, but her presence and personality haunt them all, like an eerie melody played on an underwater violin. Perhaps Feather is a symbol of something fundamentally human, an avatar for the collision of our common humanity with the insanely alien environment of the modern world. But ultimately, Feather is also the muse of David Rix himself, and in sharing her with him, you will come to savour the very act of questioning, and discover that strange world where mystery and innocence meet what we see as normal.

London after the breakdown ...For Jess and Jay, a former clothes designer and her partner, life has become a matter of scavenging round trying to keep going in a world of hunters and hunted. A world where the city streets have become a battleground with threats from both sides - where the 'survivors' of this disaster have reset themselves several levels downward on the scale of humanity, while the victims have become something else entirely. Based loosely on the paintings of surrealist artist Paul Delvaux, this novella dissects the trope of the zombie plague with the help of clothes design - clothes design inspired by insect camouflage. A portrait of a city filled with naked wanderers, dead railway lines, mouldering bones and almost beautiful silence.

London after the breakdown ...For Jess and Jay, a former clothes designer and her partner, life has become a matter of scavenging round trying to keep going in a world of hunters and hunted. A world where the city streets have become a battleground with threats from both sides - where the 'survivors' of this disaster have reset themselves several levels downward on the scale of humanity, while the victims have become something else entirely. Based loosely on the paintings of surrealist artist Paul Delvaux, this novella dissects the trope of the zombie plague with the help of clothes design - clothes design inspired by insect camouflage. A portrait of a city filled with naked wanderers, dead railway lines, mouldering bones and almost beautiful silence.

"If every tale told in a tavern is a tall story, then what happens when the entire universe becomes a tavern? It means that every story ever told is tall and therefore untrue, and this includes the true tales. They are all lies. But a lie is a concept only possible because it can be contrasted with truth: without its opposite concept it makes no sense at all. This implies one of two unlikely things, (a) the universe is not really a tavern, (b) there are other universes beyond this one where true stories exist. If you ever learn which is the correct answer to this riddle please let me know." 60 linked stories, 60 illustrations, 18 years in the making - this is probably Rhys Hughes' most important book to date.

Trains occupy a special place in the human psyche. The twin threads of the rails forge ahead from place to place, the ultimate symbol of travel and connection and all the hopes, fantasies, fears, reasons, romance and excitement that come with that. The links between points, the bridges and tunnels, are always so much more profound than borders or walls. And yet you travel these links through a world that is isolated from normal life and unique to itself. The railways are so mundane and taken for granted, passing through the backs of your cities and towns, yet they are worlds that cannot be visited, cannot be known. Worlds that can only be glimpsed from blurred windows or from the far end of the platform. Hidden places. Private places. Places where the ordinary and the secret meet. This was the mood in which Rustblind and Silverbright came into being - a book of railway stories that aimed to look far beyond what you might expect from classic horror or sci-fi. Like any good journey, the scenery of this book is ever-changing. You will ride the rails of language and imagination through many and varied places - some almost unendurably disturbing, some bleak and miserable, some surreal and strange, some touching and moving, some absurd and comical, some exquisitely beautiful. This is a collection that ranges widely from the almost-familiar double-track line of slipstream fiction to the grungy metro of sci-fi and the dark and sparsely served branch line of pure horror, while the squawking locomotives of absurdism jostle with still stranger trains that ride to - other places.

Trains occupy a special place in the human psyche. The twin threads of the rails forge ahead from place to place, the ultimate symbol of travel and connection and all the hopes, fantasies, fears, reasons, romance and excitement that come with that. The links between points, the bridges and tunnels, are always so much more profound than borders or walls. And yet you travel these links through a world that is isolated from normal life and unique to itself. The railways are so mundane and taken for granted, passing through the backs of your cities and towns, yet they are worlds that cannot be visited, cannot be known. Worlds that can only be glimpsed from blurred windows or from the far end of the platform. Hidden places. Private places. Places where the ordinary and the secret meet. This was the mood in which Rustblind and Silverbright came into being - a book of railway stories that aimed to look far beyond what you might expect from classic horror or sci-fi. Like any good journey, the scenery of this book is ever-changing. You will ride the rails of language and imagination through many and varied places - some almost unendurably disturbing, some bleak and miserable, some surreal and strange, some touching and moving, some absurd and comical, some exquisitely beautiful. This is a collection that ranges widely from the almost-familiar double-track line of slipstream fiction to the grungy metro of sci-fi and the dark and sparsely served branch line of pure horror, while the squawking locomotives of absurdism jostle with still stranger trains that ride to - other places.

"If every tale told in a tavern is a tall story, then what happens when the entire universe becomes a tavern? It means that every story ever told is tall and therefore untrue, and this includes the true tales. They are all lies. But a lie is a concept only possible because it can be contrasted with truth: without its opposite concept it makes no sense at all. This implies one of two unlikely things, (a) the universe is not really a tavern, (b) there are other universes beyond this one where true stories exist. If you ever learn which is the correct answer to this riddle please let me know." 60 linked stories, 60 illustrations, 18 years in the making - this is probably Rhys Hughes' most important book to date.

Eibonvale Press came into being in the winter of 2005 in a tiny Slovenian mountain town at the hands of David Rix, who sat down one day and decided "Today I am going to make a book." The fact that he knew a lot about books but nothing at all about the book world somehow failed to make that dream flicker away like most dreams and the slow crescendo of Eibonvale Press continued from there and is still continuing. That quiet and lonely winter in the Slovenian mountains still doesn't seem so far away as the press continues its search for the bizarre, the unclassifiable and the strange in new writing, in the process working with some of the best writers in the UK and elsewhere. Now, this new book provides a chance to look back a bit and define Eibonvale Press as an entity. Blind Swimmer collects together 11 stories, most never before published, by all the writers who have made up or will soon make up the Eibonvale Press family. The result is a book that is as varied as the press itself. Creativity in Isolation was the theme we set, and the results are as varied as the writers themselves. Different takes on what creativity is, what isolation is and whom we are talking to as we tell our tales in the wilderness. The stories stretch from classically tinged horror to urban strangeness to experimental fiction and surrealism. From short stories to full length novellas. From the wilderness of Britain and Sweden to the equal wilderness of the American urban landscape. Blind Swimmer is a unique and spectacular journey through the flip-side of contemporary writing. The book has a forward by Joel Lane and an introductory essay by David Rix.

Who is Feather? The wandering girl - the running girl. Fragmentary, oblique, a damaged product of innocence lost, on the run from a deprived childhood and eccentric domineering father. Passing from remote beaches and salt marshes covered with samphire and grey sky to more human wildernesses in London and Ljubljana - always on the move and always making encounters. Always touching people with her own magic. Always unable to engage emotionally with all the lives she passes through - hurt, maybe, but always just moving on. In these nine stories and novellas, David Rix weaves an enigmatic web of fictions at the shifting intersections of Slipstream, Horror and Science Fiction. Feather lurks at the edges of some of these tales and erupts from the centre of others, but her presence and personality haunt them all, like an eerie melody played on an underwater violin. Perhaps Feather is a symbol of something fundamentally human, an avatar for the collision of our common humanity with the insanely alien environment of the modern world. But ultimately, Feather is also the muse of David Rix himself, and in sharing her with him, you will come to savour the very act of questioning, and discover that strange world where mystery and innocence meet what we see as normal.

These beautiful and heartfelt stories range widely in their themes, stretching from horror and almost classic ghost stories to lyrical flights of fantasy, gritty and painful realism and dark twisted imaginings - from subtle slipstream writing with only the faintest sense of the otherworldly to haunting and vivid space fiction and even light-hearted homages to the colourful and gleeful world of the pulps. Always unexpected, these stories remain completely bound together by their own universal aesthetic and a style filled with sadness and gentleness. And filled also by a sense of wonder, both at the places where Zelenyj's imagination can take you and at the familiar world that these stories frame so touchingly. This massive collection of 40 stories will remain as a companion for a long time to come.

Eibonvale Press came into being in the winter of 2005 in a tiny Slovenian mountain town at the hands of David Rix, who sat down one day and decided "Today I am going to make a book." The fact that he knew a lot about books but nothing at all about the book world somehow failed to make that dream flicker away like most dreams and the slow crescendo of Eibonvale Press continued from there and is still continuing. That quiet and lonely winter in the Slovenian mountains still doesn't seem so far away as the press continues its search for the bizarre, the unclassifiable and the strange in new writing, in the process working with some of the best writers in the UK and elsewhere. Now, this new book provides a chance to look back a bit and define Eibonvale Press as an entity. Blind Swimmer collects together 11 stories, most never before published, by all the writers who have made up or will soon make up the Eibonvale Press family. The result is a book that is as varied as the press itself. Creativity in Isolation was the theme we set, and the results are as varied as the writers themselves. Different takes on what creativity is, what isolation is and whom we are talking to as we tell our tales in the wilderness. The stories stretch from classically tinged horror to urban strangeness to experimental fiction and surrealism. From short stories to full length novellas. From the wilderness of Britain and Sweden to the equal wilderness of the American urban landscape. Blind Swimmer is a unique and spectacular journey through the flip-side of contemporary writing. The book has a forward by Joel Lane and an introductory essay by David Rix.

These beautiful and heartfelt stories range widely in their themes, stretching from horror and almost classic ghost stories to lyrical flights of fantasy, gritty and painful realism and dark twisted imaginings - from subtle slipstream writing with only the faintest sense of the otherworldly to haunting and vivid space fiction and even light-hearted homages to the colourful and gleeful world of the pulps. Always unexpected, these stories remain completely bound together by their own universal aesthetic and a style filled with sadness and gentleness. And filled also by a sense of wonder, both at the places where Zelenyj's imagination can take you and at the familiar world that these stories frame so touchingly. This massive collection of 40 stories will remain as a companion for a long time to come.

Welsh writer Rhys Hughes regards this as his favourite book, and with good reason. It is one of the funniest and most intelligent books from the lighter side of macabre writing I have ever seen. It clamours with a cast of pirates, floppy-wristed welsh bards, explorers and inventors, imps, squonks, moving public houses, M R Jamesian revenants, M R Jamesian punctuation, blueberry pies, trousers, noses, clocks, carrots . . . I cant list them all here, there isn't room. Like all the best books, this quirky and surreal collection is hard to classify, but it lies in that region where the macabre and eerie worlds of classic horror and fantasy become a basis for something else - for a dark and original sense of humour filled with unexpected cross-references, homages, satires and black comedy. What makes this collection remarkable is not just the delightfully murky and skewed tales themselves, but the complex and ingenious way they all lock together and interrelate. I was going to say 'tessellate' but if this is a tessellation then it is filled with impossible-sided polygons, non-Euclidean three-dimensional geometry, unexpurgated curves and cracks from which blueberry-scented steam emerges with a screaming hiss. But what is without doubt is that 'The Smell of Telescopes' is a magnificent book and a cornerstone of the rather oddly shaped corner of literature that it occupies. Since the first edition went out of print, the unavailability of this book has been a great crime of literature. And Eibonvale Press is, as always, dedicated to the righting of the world's more substantial wrongs.