(When the Caged Canary Sings Chapter 1) - Novella Sneak Peek

Isolated in the bleak mid-winter snow, Jackary Murphle, conceals himself from the harsh image of the world at Toad House, a country manor inherited after the tragic deaths of his parents. He believes that he has no place in the world, and his confidence in his creative abilities stunts his ambitions. He is the image of stagnancy, a formerly ambitious newspaper contributor, has become transformed into 'some grotesque hermit-like creature,' a man diminished to little self-worth, his appearance repulses even himself as he obsesses 'over the endless creases, and grooves that had appeared within his skin, his skin of a tissue paper thinness.'

With the family business of burying the dead, dead and buried along with the passing of his parents, he becomes reliant upon the income of his brother who has taken a labouring job in the nearby village buried in the nook of the valley, at the foot of the moors. With various 'stomachs hungry for animation' the house becomes a fruitless anchor for the two brothers as they struggle to keep the house going for the sake of their parent's memory.

The 'penniless poet' thirsts for some form of literary recognition as to contribute to the running of the house, yet his agoraphobic state, and his desire to isolate himself from the rest of the world leaves him obsessive and the image of procrastination.

Alone and vulnerable, among the disorganisation of the home and the chaotic order of objects which clearly identify with the main protagonist's loneliness and lack of direction as he desperately clings to items and objects that anchor him to some form of previous existence. It is in the depths of an isolated night that the strange visitor, Douglas Black, who claims to have arranged a viewing of one of the rooms to let, that throws him beyond the realms of comfortability.