CANNIBALS OF THE AFTERLIFE
1. The Edge of the South China Sea
2. Eggboy and the Drunk
3. Amanda Hazelton Was a Thief
4. Fall From Grace
5. Eve Ago
6. The Perfect Man
7. Burning Bridges
8. The Most Important Woman
9. Henry and Hannah
10. The Love Triangle
11. Cannibals of The Afterlife
12. How to Eat a Peach
13. Bully
14. Good Friday
15. Fish Bait
Disclaimer: The Hungry Mirror, The Corner of the Desert, West of Wawa and Cannibals of the Afterlifeare all works of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Other Work
by Lisa de Nikolits
The Corner of the Desert
The Corner of the Desert features Canadian Kate, from Quelph, who ditches her two-timing boyfriend of eight years and, on a whim, goes an overland trip from Cape Town to Namibia.
All kinds of mayhem unfolds as the ragged crew are let loose in Africa. This novel is is jam-packed with witchdoctors, the origins
of Nazi theory, African muti, urban legends, murder and intrigue.
Complete manuscript is 165 000 words.
Excerpt from The Corner of the Desert
“Yes, they certainly gave Kleine Skok the heebie jeebies.” Richard stretched his feet towards the fire. “Poor fellow, he had this godawful lump of dried up rabbit’s blood and I asked him if that was something a witchdoctor would use and he nearly shot right off the mountain. I felt quite dreadful for asking.”
Jono laughed, and drank his beer. “Yes, I can imagine that frightened him in a big way. More than six hundred people have been killed in the last ten years in Gauteng alone, because they were accused of being witches, so even the mention of such a thing is frightening for many people.”
“How can you cure a person of being a witch?” Kate asked.
“If you think you have a witch,” Jono explained, “then you must call an isanusi, a professional who can smell out witches and get rid of them. In some places, Zimbabwe for instance, people there believe that witches ride hyenas at night, and if you spot a person traveling on the back of a hyena, then that person is a witch.”
“I hate hyenas,” Marika muttered and she gave a shiver.
“They’re evil; creatures of the devil.”
“There are many kinds of witches,” Jono continued, “one of which is the night-witch who is invisible during the daytime but then at night, changes into an animal; a crocodile, a hyena, a lion, a wolf maybe. They can change innocent people into animals also. Now, if you are poisoned by a witch, then you die and your spirit becomes a slave to the witch. Night-witches devour human bodies, dead or alive during the night and they can been seen flying at night, with fire coming out of their bottoms.”
“They fart fire?” Mia found this hysterically funny and the rest of the group joined in, laughing. “Oh lord, fire-farting witches, knock my bleedin’ socks off.”
“Isn’t it true,” Helen queried when the laughter died down, “that Western doctors found a high correlation between schizophrenia and epilepsy in individuals who have been accused of being witches?”
Jono nodded. “Which would explain the hallucinations they have,” he said. “And some of them have also been found to be manic-depressives and schizophrenics. But if you ask me, this does not mean that Western medicine has any kind of increased knowledge in this area, it’s just that you call your witches by a lot of medical-sounding names and find different ways to treat them.”
“Touché.” Richard exclaimed.
Short Story Synopses
1. The Edge of The South China Sea
There’s a contra job that needs doing and I’m just the woman for it. It’s a pity the buyers think I need the help of a screwed up team of twisted specialists. I know I can do it alone. I’ve never fail to deliver and I won’t this time.
2 400 words.
2. Eggboy and The Drunk
It’s one of the best parts of town, but the neighbours are crazy. A schizophrenic with Tourette Syndrome throws eggs at cars at night and gets into fights with a one-time soccer mom, now bitter drunk.
4 600 words.
3. Amanda Hazelton Was a Thief
Amanda’s life isn’t turning out so well. She can’t keep a job and she steals, giving voice to passive anger and muted revenge. And then something happens.
5 800 words.
4. Fall From Grace
Grace is dead but she still visits me from time to time. We hang out at Starbucks and shoot the breeze. Grace’s feelings are hurt because Isabella Blow, who also died by her own hand, won’t invite her to the parties in heaven, despite Grace’s Chanel suit being all freshly laundered and sharp. While I, well, I don’t know who I am. I remember for a moment and then I remember to forget. 3 600 words.
5. Eve Ago
I’m a paparazzi photographer and I follow the world’s largest living conceptual art, an obese woman, a cause célèbre, who is fawned over and fed by people the world over. When she dies, I’m obsessed – what became of her body? Were her attendants really her family? Did they kill their parents? Did her siblings devour her after she died and was that the plan all along, to create the fatted calf, the ultimate societal revenge? 3 000 words.
6. The Perfect Man
My name is Jasper Lambert and I’m struggling. Yeah, I love my wife and my kids but work is hell. I just know they’re going to fire me any day now. The furnace is shot and the car’s a lemon. Sure, there are moments of perfection but I can’t make them stay and I’m more tired than I can tell you. So I wait for one of those moments, one of those perfect moments and then I shoot my family. It’s the only way, you see, that I can make it last forever.
4 450 words.
7. Burning Bridges
Amelia’s the kind of girl who burns her bridges in front of her. When her boyfriend kidnaps her she thinks its kind of romantic, maybe he’s just got a strange way of telling her he cares but that’s better than nothing, right? He ties her up and takes her out for a long drive and it looks like Amelia’s going to let it all go. But she makes a stand and for once she burns her bridges behind her. 4 500 words
8. The Most Important Woman
I’m the nuts, the glue, the backbone of the company. It would all fall apart with me. That’s why I get to work at 6 a.m., that why I can’t take time out to go the washroom, that’s why my stomach’s killing me and I smell like a baby’s full diaper. Yeah, I know I do, don’t think I don’t. But I’m busy, busy keeping my job and busy keeping the company afloat. If that guy had liked me who knows but he didn’t so suck it up.
1 000 words.
9. Henry and Hannah
Hannah’s got a bottle of wine, she’s ready to party. Henry says he’ll call. He says he’ll paint her portrait. It’s summer, and they’re in love. They also on meds and welfare and a few sandwiches short of a picnic. Ain’t life grand? 1 400 words.
10. The Love Triangle
She’s in love. But can she accept happiness? She likes threesomes with her guy and fellow named Destruction. 460 words.
11. Cannibals of The Afterlife
I’m a life coach. One of the best. I fill halls and stadiums with cheering crowds. Life’s a cake, yours to choose and make and bake. Everybody loves cake. And the whole bangshoot’s looking so damn good, so sure, so fine. I’m on my way to motivate and inspire when it all falls apart. I just want to sleep. I’m so tired. So tired. Too much pain everywhere. I stop. I close my eyes. 2 500 words.
12. How to Eat A Peach
Do they really mean eat a peach? Beauty is so fleeting. 500 words.
13. Bully
I live on an island in a corporate sea of cubicles. Podland. Speak when spoken to, shut up and take it on the chin. I do my best but it’s an apocalyptic kind of day. I should have followed the guy on the subway and got my own aluminum foil hat.
3 400 words.
14. Good Friday
I’m Jesus, dead a couple of hours, banished to my tomb. It’s weird and I miss my body, although it’s been through so much maybe numb is better. I try to tap into Dad to see what comes next but he’s gone. He told me it’d be tough, that I’d have to keep the faith. Which is fine but what I don’t understand is why people are so darn crappy to each other. No matter how badly they beat you up, seems like they always want more. 3 400 words.
15. Fish Bait
I want a new fortune cookie. But I’m not a Russian whore working the street to get by, so I guess it could be way worse. I just want to be a good girl. I want to wriggle nicely on my hook. I want a new fortune cookie.
500 words.
Excerpt from the short story Henry and Hannah
Someone’s talking too loudly. I turn off my music and look across the aisle, wanting to glare down the source of my irritation. I’m only half-looking though but I register that something’s slightly off kilter in
the tableaux – the dog ran off with one of the puzzle pieces.
Sure, the guy’s gorgeous. Could have been a model only he’s got that homeless look about him. His legs splay out in front of him and he’s tapping his knees together like a child. His brown loafers are worn and dirty, his socks are flashy white.
His shirt’s untucked over a big belly and I’m surprised by his fat, why,
I don’t know. He just looks as if he should have been the lean sort.
He’s wearing an old brown leather jacket, it’s slightly out of style and covered in daubs of blue paint. Maybe he’s an artistic genius. His thick hair is curly and wild, brown streaked with a lot of grey. His eyes are a startling green, with long girly eyelashes. His legs stretch in front of him and his belly faces front but he’s twisted at the shoulders, his face straining up from his slouched position. He looks for all the world like sixteen year old boy who’s just fallen in love.
His large hands rub his thighs while he looks at the woman beside him, and he isn’t talking, she’s the one making all the noise, she’s the one jabbering a million miles an hour. He’s smiling, nodding, listening.
“You’re a great artist, ya know that, you’re real good man, real good.
I seen your work, I’d love to see more, man, love to see more, do you do, like whadda ya call them, portraits?”
She’s about thirty five and solid in tight stretched leggings, with a mans oversize t-shirt that looks like it’s seen some wear. She’s clutching
a plastic bag with a bookstore label on it and checking her phone.
“Frickin’ thing’s battery’s dead, dunno why, because I need it to work, man, I really do. Hey, you’re a good artist man, real good.”
He bends down over an old canvas satchel covered in paint splats
and pulls out a dollar store wire-bound notebook.
Here's a synopsis for my latest work:
A Glittering Chaos
This manuscript is complete to first draft (70 000 words)
A Glittering Chaos is Melusine's story. The novel begins with her living a relatively boring, safe and conventional existence in which everything is superficially fine. However, suffering from a new restlessness brought on by the death of her parents and the departure of her son who has gone to university, she (uncharacteristically) asserts herself by insisting that she join her husband on an optometry conference trip to Las Vegas – and it is on that trip that she discovers that things are not as they seem – and neither is she.
Myriad relevant subplots speak to the strengths of human character, the empathy of self-acceptance, and how individuals deal with the realities of life.
The various male figures in the novel embody a gamut of masculine roles but the men have one thing in common; they are all damaged, although in singularly different ways. Some of the men rise above their difficulties while others flail into self-desctruction.
Melusine is a good mother, she enjoys good relationships with others, she has a high tolerance for human frailty and a good sense of self discovery; she embraces her erotic desires with self love – after she realises, with surprise, that she even has an erotic self.
While her husband spiral into self-destruction and loses his vitality and life-force, Melusine blooms. She also deals with his oddities with fair-minded non-judgment and takes the crises of her life in her stride, even when her heart is broken and her world turned upside down.
There are two central ghostly women figures in the story; two characters encapsulating figments of the masculine imagination of the idealised feminine but these characters are ultimately hollow and have no life of their own – they are negating and destructive. In the end, the one vanishes and the other dies.
Reader comment: I am in the middle of reading an incredible new novel, called The Corner of the Desert, by Lisa de Nikolits. It fuses African mythology (and a little bit of magic realist elements) with an incredibly smooth, and utterly absorbing writing style. Her ability to describe people and places, precisely, with just a few words, blows me away. I love her characters, and the ease with which she describes complex issues.
– Danila Botha, Author of Got No Secrets
