Dear Hunter Steen McFaull, Happy Birthday, son. 9 years old. Pfft. Where does the time go? Perhaps you’ll read your old man’s ramblings some day. Some distant day, far from now, when you’ve fulfilled your childhood dreams and become a Ninja…with your younger brother nipping at your heels, desperate for…

Glastonbury, 2002. The scent of floral marijuana smoke contends with stale beer and rancid sweat, as my friend Ben and I squeeze ourselves in among the masses on this sun-kissed late afternoon. “Do you want a go, mate?”, asks the man to my right. He is clutching a comically tiny…

Three years ago today, Buddy Yorke McFaull — a cherubic-faced terror, forever on the hunt for adventure, perennially in motion, thundering and charging round the gaff like a barrel-chested tiny Godzilla — said what would be deemed, on the grounds of technicality*, his first word. *(let the record show, he…

I make my way onto the drive. The soft crunch of gravel — speckled whites, elephant greys — alerts her to my presence. She sees me from the kitchen window and even though she darts off sharply towards the front door, I know from the side of her face that…

Yesterday, as lockdown restrictions began to ease on the Isle of Man, my Dad and I spent a nondescript, mostly uneventful day together. We took my sons on a walk and we fed overfed, disinterested ducks. We sat in my garden reading, as the scorching sun lay her hands upon…

He shuffles awkwardly. The echoing hall is silent but for the gulp of throat, the twitching, nervous rustles and tremulous chair-leg screeches that fill the vacuum before somebody speaks… Hey, everyone. My name is Stuart Steen McFaull and I’m writing a novel. Well, I’ve kind of, sort of, in a…

There’s a moment in the latest episode of Channel 4’s ‘Gogglebox’ that for me, sums up its enduring appeal. Clone-faced siblings Pete and Sophie Sandiford are engrossed, staring at the telly, mugs of tea perched on the table opposite. They are watching a preposterous looking American drama about the blonde…

The ‘a few bad apples’ metaphor has, over time, been used to defend the actions of supposedly rogue police officers. Those under the arm of the law who, perhaps, enjoyed the uniform, the baton, the shiny badge and the power a little too much. The…

In Emily Bronte’s seminal literary work — Wuthering Heights — the author not only explores the vagaries of the ever-complex human spirit, musing on the ties that bind between the most troubled of souls; she also uses symbolism and stuff to show that the moors are wild, extremely shaggable things…