M F ALFREY

M F Alfrey has always been fascinated by creatures – especially the strange and the overlooked, from peculiar dinosaurs to bizarre insects. A lifelong love of wildlife and monsters had him dreaming of a career in special creature FX, but with no clear path at the time, he turned to art. Eventually, that passion evolved into writing, where he now brings his own monsters to life on the page. From the horrific to the inexplicable, his creatures are more than just threats – they’re the wildlife of his worlds, serving as antagonists, protagonists, or mirrors of humanity in all its beauty and brutality.

Inflicted Reading

Marek Alfrey was not a natural reader. As a child, reading was kind of inflicted on him and it wasn’t until he was in secondary school that he actually picked up a title he wanted to read (and actually read) of his own volition.

His first memorable experience of books as child was around the age of nine or ten on those summer-holiday mornings at his Polish grandparents’ house. An early riser and of the “don’t be a nuisance to people” generation, Marek often found himself in want of entertainment in that little boxy bedroom while his grandparents slept. There was not much in that room except for a corner shelf packed full of books. Notably, books his aunts probably read as kids themselves. Some of those titles were Garfield, the Black Hand Gang, and the Famous Five. The first two being the most frequently revisited by Marek as they had pictures in them.

Something clicked though and, whether the interest was acknowledged by his parents or was simply a result of an assumed duty to supply reading material to a child, he was given more mystery from Enid Blyton to read, predominantly the Secret Seven and S.E.C.R.E.T. series. He stepped into fantasy when an aunt bought him a copy of the Witches (but the cover scared him so much it took him a while to get round to reading it), but it was the Chronicles of Narnia that sealed fantasy fiction for him.

“There was one time he nearly broke his neck sliding down a rope into a crevasse, giving himself a nasty rope burn, and landing in a dead (and very mushy) sheep”

So, one fateful day when the mobile bookshop came to his primary school and Marek saw his first picture of a dragon on a book, he bought it. It was a cool picture and a pretty golden cover. The dragon was Smaug, the book the Hobbit. He was maybe ten. He never read it. The same happened again with Conan – it had a pretty cool cover too.

As a very visually influenced teenager, Marek naturally shifted to movies and comic books particularly drawn to Dark Horse Comics, shunning the shiny world of Marvel heroes for the grittier and lesser-known worlds of Aliens and the Mask. Though it was the movie Jurassic Park that made the dinosaur-loving teen pick up his first adult fiction, by Michael Chrichton. He loved it and went on to devour Congo, the Lost World, Rising Sun (but didn’t like that one), and eventually Prey.

It was the bookshop in Aberystwyth, during summer holidays, where he would camp out agonising over which book to spend his pocket money on that inevitably got him hooked on their supply of Alien, and later, Predator novels, leading him to love writing science fiction, fantasy, and horror. He’d spend hours in his tiny caravan bedroom reading and worrying over his books when they inevitably got damp and the pages went all wobbly, or if – heaven forbid – the spine got cracked (he got over that, now he’s a merciless book bender).

Childhood Misadventures, Outdoor Pursuits, and Seeking Solitude

Adventure, although Marek failed to notice it consciously as a child, was always top of the list. There was a not-so-brief stage where he donned his father’s Aussie-bought hat (stolen from him), slung on a satchel, and took himself off on Indiana Jones style adventures in the valley not far from the family holiday caravan. This usually ended up with him hurling himself down forest slopes and swinging into the river to float back to the van. There was one time he nearly broke his neck sliding down a rope into a crevasse, giving himself a nasty rope burn, and landing in a dead (and very mushy) sheep to be chased away by a swarm of angry blue-bottle flies (they got in his mouth – he is still traumatised by this).

“Marek busied himself being a teenager, developed a love for thrash and groove metal, and eventually achieved a Bachelor’s in Fine Art”

The adventures continued through camping and hiking with his folks, and later in Scouts where he picked up shooting and archery and became a pretty good shot. He also developed a love for rock climbing, mountaineering, and backwoods skills which would later come in useful when he became a professional outdoor instructor attaining an SPA climbing certification (yet still wary of canoes and kayaks as they seem to conspiratorially have it in for him).

One thing the outdoors and his father taught him was the beauty and value of solitude, especially in nature. Even as a kid, Marek would disappear from the caravan in Wales, leaving his parents in peace to seek adventure in the nearby valley where he would practice his climbing, river fording, and backwoods skills. This transformed in adulthood into long solo treks and runs along the South West Coast Path, where he would live on trail mix, sleep under the stars, and generally devolve into crustiness.

#writerslife

The earliest instance of writing Marek can recall was inspired by an attic treasure in his family home around the age of twelve or thereabouts. It was an old portable typewriter in a black box with red lining, possibly an Adler Gabrielle. There were such things as computers back in the ‘90s of course, but they were deemed too expensive for the likes of him. But here was his chance at literary freedom (though that’s not how he saw it back then, it was just a cool typewriter in a box).

On that trusty portable, Marek typed his first serial about a time-travelling adventurer who reliably got stuck in the time of the dinosaurs. The series never saw professional publication but was dutifully, and kindly consumed by his grandma. That typewriter was later to be placed aside, but not forgotten, for an Amstrad PC when his parents replaced their business’s computers. With the aid of a printer, Marek now had the means for mass printing. At fourteen, he wrote a sequel to Jurassic Park with high hopes only to have those hopes dashed when the Lost World was released in 1995. That killed his early writing career, so he turned all his efforts to art.

“His world changed when he met his future wife, who also had ants in her pants. They both sold and gave away everything they owned“

After that, up until his twenties, writing fell by the wayside but in that extra space Marek busied himself being a teenager, developed a love for thrash and groove metal, and eventually achieved a Bachelor’s in Fine Art. Early adult life loomed thereafter. He ended up working as a warehouseman, a printer, on a motorbike assembly line, as a framer, a pub chef, a cleaner, an odd-job guy, in hospital hotel services, an outdoor instructor, and finally a thirteen-year career teaching English as a second language.

In 2016, midway through his English teaching career, Marek got serious about writing. A reading renaissance commenced, this time the sci-fi and fantasy classics and revisiting some of the titles of his childhood. Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams became good references for developing his own humour. He concentrated his efforts on the Writers of the Future competition and has been the recipient of Honourable and Silver Honourable Mentions for several of his short stories. He started blogging and building his social media presence after receiving advice that this was the thing to do for writers nowadays. He submitted manuscripts to agents and publishers, occasionally received a polite decline but mostly a collection of rejection emails until one day he had his flash fiction, the Plant, accepted by online magazine Every Day Fiction.

“After his father died from cancer, caused by asbestos, Marek took himself to Thailand to teach English, but instead ended up on a silent retreat in a Buddhist monastery”

By this time, he had accumulated numerous short stories and drafted around five novels. With the encouragement of strangers behind him (and partially due to impatience), he decided that indie was the way forward and thus committed. He published Symbionts, a sci-fi collection in 2019, selling mostly to friends, family, and his scant social media network. While he was confident his work wasn’t terrible, he still felt the need to improve his craft and to gain confidence that he knew what he was doing.

After toying with taking on a Master of Arts in Creative Writing, he worked hard, saved up, and finally completed his MA through the Open University in 2023. Midway through that, in 2021, he published his second shorts collection The Sixth Dawn, fantasy this time. After completing his Master’s, he joined the CIEP to pick up a better editing skillset (Obsidian Prose Editing is born) and finally chose to revive one of those five novels he had drafted years ago. Applying what he had learned through personal and Master’s reading to a serial he had previously published on his blog simply titled 58, the book May Contain Space Pirates Vol 1 was published in February of 2024.

A Serious Case of Ants-in-the-pants

Baby Marek was baptised into nature by his father in an icy waterfall up by Edale in the Peak District. Twice, actually, because the photo didn’t turn out the first time. His parents toted him into the mountains, carrying the pushchair where necessary. Later, the family took to cycling everywhere, especially around Mid Wales. Holidays and weekends were usually camping or caravaning and often mountaineering with the Scouts in Wales. This was probably where he developed the need to be on the move.

At the age of nineteen, Marek struck out to Tunisa with a college mate and they took themselves to Matamata to visit Luke Skywalker’s house. Adventure and excitement were things he craved. After an epic motorcycle journey 11,000 kilometres around Australia with his father, he well and truly had the bug, with a special soft spot for jungle and desert climates.

In 2004, his world changed when he met his future wife, who also had ants in her pants. They both sold and gave away everything they owned and headed for Cornwall where they lived in a frame tent, which later became a dying Sprite caravan, and then a static caravan on a dairy farm that stunk of rancid milk in the summer and was home to a horde of creepy farm cats.

“Marek is convinced the pair of them will never truly settle in the common understanding of the word”

After his father died from cancer, caused by asbestos, Marek took himself to Thailand to teach English, but instead ended up on a silent retreat in a Buddhist monastery for three months. The solitude thing again. After that, he got married and a few months later said a temporary goodbye to his wife and flew to a teaching job in China while she finished her PhD in Social Psychology. After joining him in China, the pair of them found their way across Northern India where Marek saw the Dali Lama (although the Dali Lama didn’t see him), then travelled to teach in Poland, then back to China, then Spain, then back to the UK, then Covid happened.

Like most people, it took a while for Marek and his wife to get back into the swing of things after Covid, especially travel. The writing continued, a Master’s was done and the ants started tickling in them pants … so, they sold everything, and gave everything away (sound familiar?) and bought a ticket to Thailand because they didn’t know where else to go. That led them to Vietnam, Japan, Taiwan, back to Vietnam and Thailand, only to swing round to Turkey and finally Greece. All the time, those sights, the people they met, the challenges they faced, influencing his writing.

Because of all that, Marek is convinced the pair of them will never truly settle in the common understanding of the word, simply because he hasn’t figured out how to (nor does he want to) get rid of those ants in his pants.