From a well-established short story author, let’s turn to a young, exciting, twenty-first century writer. Since 2022, Robyn Jefferson’s work has been being published in journals and highly placed in competitions.

‘The Danger is Still Present in Your Time’ is Lauren’s coming-of-age story, but she lives in a village where everything is overshadowed by the disappearance of a sixteen-year-old girl ten years before.

“Maybe Meggie’s expression in the picture on the wall in the Queens Head will become a cipher she can solve, as if the commonality of their newly shared age will shift them sideways onto the same transcendental plane.”

Jefferson captures the universality of being a teen girl, as well as Lauren’s unique experiences. She also describes well the current which runs under communities where a major crime remains unsolved (in York, we have Claudia Lawrence). When Lauren and her friends experiment with Ouija, it is Meggie they try to contact.

But then, the action moves on and beyond in a direction I was not expecting, but felt I should have been, given the extent to which Meggie’s mystery has been woven into Lauren’s upbringing.

Published by MIR Online, 18 April 2022, and available to read here