Walking Horatio

by Mark Patrick Lynch

One morning towards the end of September, my cousin Leo appeared at my door and handed over a brown heap of fur that had a tail at one end, a wet nose at the other, and a tongue that stuck out and quivered like a rubber carpet in an earthquake.“Here,” Leo said. “Take care of him for a couple of weeks, and then I’ll like . . . you know . . . come back and get him.” “Why am I looking after your dog, Leo? You don’t think I’ve got anything better to do?”“Aw. You know, man. Come on. Just, you know, walk and feed him. He’ll be okay with you.”“So what’s he called, your dog?”“Horatio. You know, like after Napoleon.”“Right.”“He cool with you?”I thought about it a second.“He’s cool with me.”Thus begin my life with Horatio the dog, and nothing was ever going to be the same again. Walking Horatio is an amusing trip into the surreal world of one waster and his dog. Loveable, fun, and with an awful lot of heart, this is fiction to chase away the clouds on even the gloomiest of days.Available as an e-book and a paperback original now.

298 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 18, 2021

About the author

Mark Patrick Lynch is the prize-lacking author of a couple of traditionally published books (HOUR OF THE BLACK WOLF and NO FIRE WITHOUT SMOKE) and a number of indie titles, such as his most recent, A CLASH OF ICHOR AND BLOOD. His short stories, mainstream and genre, have appeared in an A-Z of anthologies, magazines, and journals around the world: from Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine to Zahir. He would like you to read his books but is too shy to ask.

Check out his blog here:

markpatricklynch.blogspot.com

Reviews

[Ian Duff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely delightful

Man acquires three-legged dog. Man and dog wander around their village interacting with a variety of quirky characters. And that's about it. But, it's more than enough, given how utterly delightful these interactions are. Told with a gentle humour, this is a book to cherish.