The northern English city of Manchester is most often associated with soccer and perhaps its vibrant indie music scene. Yet this thriving metropolis also has much to offer the more darkly inclined.

Spring is just around the corner and what better way to celebrate it than with a sweet Romanian tradition?

The 1st of March is a special day in Romania. It’s called ‘Mărțișor’ and on this day all men offer women small gifts accompanied by a red and white ribbon. I usually wear the ‘Mărțișor’ as a brooch and the red and white ribbon as a bracelet around my wrist. When I come across the first tree in bloom, I tie the ribbon to one of its blooming branch and make a wish. They say that those kind of wishes always come true.

Tired of fluffy hearts and saccharine sentiments drowning you in sickening sweetness on the 14^th February? Perhaps we should hark back to some of the origins and recapture a little of the original meaning of Valentine’s Day.

Giacomo Casanova, just the name says it all does it not? He’s one of the most famous womanisers who made history just by conquering as many women as possible.

The Secret Past of TV’s Hottest New Devil

From the bloodsucking pin-ups in Buffy and True Blood, to the prime time serial killers Dexter and Hannibal, the heroes of TV’s best shows just seem to get darker and darker. But can you get any darker than the Devil himself, titular anti-hero of the hot new series Lucifer?… Not everybody’s happy, with conservative Christian groups calling for the show to be banned, the right-wing pressure group One Million Moms, raging that it ‘will glorify Satan as a caring, likeable person in human flesh.’

I’m a zombie. Well, not entirely correct, I think I am a zombie but I am not sure. You see, six months ago I was working in a dull office building minding my own pathetic life and complaining of how I am not really living my life the way I wanted to. That was six months ago. Now I wish I had that life again.

Most people start their New Year with hope-giving resolutions, promises they eventually end up breaking, bad habits they can’t quit and goals they won’t reach. Well, so do I. Though for me, in respecting my New Year’s resolutions I’d be saving my own life.

Ghost stories have long been traditionally associated with Christmas, and a good spinechiller can prove a welcome spooky antidote to the saccharine sentimentality of the season. Anyone likely to be in the Liverpool area over the next few weeks, who fancies an evening of ghosts and goosebumps, should check out The Haunting of Hill House, the new production at the city’s Playhouse Theatre. It comes with an impressive pedigree, adapted from a 1959 novel by America’s queen of psychological horror Shirley Jackson, staged in association with the legendary Gothic film studio Hammer.

Everyone likes fairy tales, don’t they? We all know that everyone here loves darkness even more. So we thought, why not combine those two?

This frosty December we share with you a gothic story.

I hereby continue the story of how I met the child…I can’t tell you how I met the man just yet. Although, that”s another story worth telling.