Creepy Christmas cracker

GHOSTLY goings-on in his home inspired a former college principal’s latest novel.

Former principal of Oldham Sixth Form College, Nick Brown, has published Christmas ghost story “Skendleby” — and has already won a rave review in America.

The 62-year-old’s supernatural thriller features a tape of an unexplained scream recorded at his home in Cheadle Hulme, Stockport.

Even before its release date the book caused a stir in the publication world with a publisher’s monthly web magazine in America and Britain describing it as one of the best six Hallowe’en reads, putting it alongside the works of Roal Dahl and Susan Hill.

“Gripping and genuinely creepy, it’s an autumnal must read,” said the website, New Edition.

Nick’s interest in the paranormal was aroused about 30 years ago when a series of guests staying in the front room of his house were woken up by a woman who had her face close up to theirs. These strange phenomena occurred six times.

The author said: “When the house next door is empty we hear people running up and down their landing and they hear the same when we are away.

“The house and the five to the right of it are built on old medieval strips and our hedge boundary is the original one from the end of the middle ages.

“The group of houses has always had a reputation for strange things.

“There was a period when things moved about and we heard people crashing about upstairs when there were only us here. It’s calmed down recently.”
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