Having spent a year hunting for affordable accommodation, a struggling writer chances on cheap rooms in a quiet central London cul de sac. Quickly signing a year long lease without questioning why the cost is so low, they soon discover the real price is far higher than they expected …

Told using diary entries over a three month period, the lodger describes how their initial elation at finally finding somewhere to live slowly turns to unease and eventually fear.

Are they really alone in their cold isolated ramshackle dwelling?

Drawing on the author’s own experiences of loneliness and poverty, The Listener taps into a myriad of contemporary themes, from isolation and wellbeing, to the wider challenges of homeworking and the housing crisis.

Algernon Blackwood (born 1869) was one of the most influential and popular supernatural fiction writers of the 20th century. A writer, storyteller, playwright, paranormal investigator and broadcaster, his work featured in numerous early BBC radio and TV programmes, and unlike many of his peers he was no sceptic, claiming all his ghostly stories were "more or less autobiographical".

Read by NeuNoir regular Richard Usher, The Listener is the Midlands-based company’s sixth Halloween production.

Description supplied by the event organiser.