It’s 1979 and Sammy Rafferty is on the run. From the past. From the police. And, perhaps more importantly, from some rather unfriendly criminal types. He thinks his football dreams are over, but that might not be the case. He’s run to Burntbridge Lye. A place where dreams don’t always die. Burntbridge Boys is a horror story, a dark tale of football and the diabolical.

A subtle yet enthralling horror.
Love John F Leonard, I’ve bought nearly all his horror stories and they all deliver. This one is a slower, more subtle horror that creeps up on you as you as go along. No need to be a footy fan to be quickly absorbed by the atmosphere created.

Burntbridge Boys · A Tale of Fouls and Fouler Things

Much as he might yearn to stay in the game, there isn’t any choice. The cards have been dealt and you have to play the hand you’re given. Sammy grits his teeth and gets on with it. Life settles into monotony and offers only boredom and frustration …until he comes across an old football ground nestled in the back of beyond.

He can almost hear the roar of the crowd as he parks at the gates of the deserted Burntbridge Palmers, a decaying stadium on the outskirts of Bledbrooke Town. The club that won’t die could be just the place for a man who still has a gleam in his eye. After all, they’re both ghosts that won’t go away.

Burntbridge Boys is about a lot of things. Horror, for sure. No doubt there. Old school, quiet horror, with a twist. A ghost story where the ghosts aren’t really dead. A fond reminiscence of football, back before football became completely commercialised. Yes, soccer definitely plays its part. Although, it has to be said, the beautiful game is sometimes less than beautiful in Burntbridge Boys. It can be somewhat ugly and disturbing. And often more than a game. There’s also a fair-sized chunk of deceit and double-dealing in this story.

Football Horror?

On a more prosaic level, is there such a thing as a football horror story? Let alone one set in the past which wallows in a darkly imagined history of the game. Who knows? When the Dead Boxes are involved, anything is possible. Such items have always been scary things. Even in the swinging Sixties and glam-shock punk revolution of the Seventies, they contained a terrifying mix of horror and salvation. Throw the Scaeth Mythos into the mix and stuff gets decidedly multi-dimensional.

There are different realities and the walls which separate them can be paper thin. The tiniest tear can allow horror and madness to bleed through…

Writing Burntbridge Boys

Football has been a source of pleasure since I was a kid. Whilst I was never any good at it, the game is by far the most enjoyable spectator sport. So, it seemed a perfectly natural step to incorporate it into a horror story.

That said, in many ways, the football component of this horror story is simply a vehicle for other topics. It draws on my past and touches on many other subjects. For one thing, the almost religious reverence with which supporters treat their home ground. Entering those buildings is somewhat akin to entering a church or sanctified place. They are vast and partially open to the skies. The areas beneath the seats and terraces are riddled with rooms and passageways, those corridors to who knows where.

When full, they become vibrant, overwhelming concentrations of passion and despair. Empty, they’re spooky and slightly unnerving. Echoing and somehow desolate, as if the world has come and gone.

Beyond that, each club has a unique history which is intimately entwined with the local area and community. No two clubs are ever the same. They have their own glories and failures. Their own secrets and horrors.