Careful With That Axe

By David Schembri

Dive into the cold earth, dig through the damp leaves and burrow deep to uncover true darkness...

In your hands is the 2026 expanded edition of the award nominated collection, Beneath the Ferny Tree, with 10 new original tales and additional artwork exclusive to this edition.

Live the horror of war-torn Germany, discover true monsters aboard a slaver's ship, hide in the shadows as children are stolen into the night, and face overwhelming dread as a prisoner is haunted by his past while desperately searching for a chance at redemption.

Uncover true terror along the way, and always be careful with that axe.

Praise for Beneath the Ferny Tree, 2018:

A Horror Collection by David Schembri was my first read for 2019 and an excellent start to the year with its dark selection of short stories, flash fiction, and poetry. The opening story, The Unforgiving Court, is a showstopper, a supernatural holocaust tale, at once a metaphor and also absurdly real. Highly relevant even today, the story is brutal, its desolation rendered even more poignant by a moment of connection between enemy characters. Other favourites include cautionary tale, Severed, and Atlantica, a historical creature feature so vivid that it leaps off the page-proof that Schembri has done his research well. Of the poems, the eponymous, Beneath the Ferny Trees resonated for me with its ominous twist on the Riding Hood fable. Interior art, also by Schembri, is spectacular and deserves a gallery exhibition in its own right. This is definitely a collection to savour.

- Lee Murray

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1764491904
• ISBN13: 9781764491907
• Release Date: January 2026
• Publisher: North Forest Books
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.58 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.7" x 5.0"