Something Timeless This Way Comes A Year of Wonders
Something Wonderful This Way
Comes
12 Blogs to Help You Start
Something Wonderful with Hollyhock Books
Blog 12: Something Timeless
This Way Comes A Year of Wonders
By Sophia Salazar,
Editor-in-Chief
Well, dear readers, here we are.
Twelve blogs. Twelve journeys
into the Hocksbox universe. Twelve invitations to read, to listen, to create,
to gather, to wonder.
We've come a long way together.
We started with book
clubs—simple gatherings of people who wanted to share stories. We learned how
to listen with all our ears, how to catch stories of our own, how to explore
big feelings through the adventures of Oliver and Crumpet and Percival. We hosted
mystery nights for Sherlock Lockwood and ghost investigations for Holloway
& Graves. We built story tents under the stars and challenged young writers
to create their own episodes.
And through it all, we've been
guided by the words that open every tale in the Hocksbox collection:
Look, Listen, Linger, Laugh,
and Love.
Four simple verbs. A lifetime of
practice.
What We've Discovered
Looking back across these twelve
blogs, certain truths have emerged.
Stories are for sharing. A story read alone is wonderful. A story
shared—with family, with friends, with a circle of listeners around a
fire—becomes something else entirely. It becomes a bridge. A memory. A thread
connecting people who might otherwise have remained strangers.
Stories live in places. In blanket forts and campfires, in moonlit gardens
and on rooftops under the stars. In the corridors of Saint Edwards and the
villages of Trinidad, on sun-drenched islands with goats and in cemeteries
where ghosts get married. Place matters. The where of a story shapes the how of
it.
Stories are made of feelings. Underneath the whimsy, underneath the mysteries and
the mayhem and the flying watches, there are real emotions. Courage in Oliver's
mittened hands. Hope in Crumpet's twenty-five-year wait. Longing in Percival's
letters to Emily. Kindness in Sherlock's noticing. Love in a ghost wedding that
should never have been possible.
Stories belong to everyone. The competitions we launched are proof of that.
Writers aged 5 to 16, from anywhere in the world, sending us their visions of
Holloway & Graves, their adventures for Percival, their mysteries for
Sherlock Lockwood. The Hocksbox universe isn't just something you read. It's
something you join.
Stories never end. They linger. They echo. They get passed from person
to person, growing and changing with each telling. The stories you've read in
these blogs will stay with you. The stories you've written—or will write—will
stay with someone else.
A Look Back at Each Stop on
Our Journey
Blog 11: Something Final This Way Comes Write Your Own Sherlock Lockwood
We've asked you to write for
Holloway & Graves. We've asked you to write for Percival. Now we're asking
you to step into the hallowed halls of Saint Edwards Boarding School.
What Comes Next
The blogs may be ending, but the
Hocksbox universe keeps growing.
The competitions continue. The deadlines are 31st October 2026. There's still
time to write your episodes for Holloway & Graves, for Percival, for
Sherlock Lockwood. Send them to competitions@hocksbox.co.uk. We're waiting
to read them.
New stories keep arriving. Head to hocksbox.co.uk to explore the full collection—Tales
from the Story Catcher, the adventures of Percival, the cases of Holloway &
Graves, the mysteries of Sherlock Lockwood. More are added all the time.
The community keeps
gathering. Start your own book
club. Host your own mystery night. Build your own story tent. The blogs have
given you the tools. Now it's your turn to use them.
The wonder keeps going. Because wonder isn't something you find once and
lose. It's something you practice. Something you choose. Something you pass on.
A Final Word on Wonder
There's a moment in every
childhood—maybe many moments—when the world cracks open just a little, and
something extraordinary slips through.
It might be a story that stays
with you forever. A night around a campfire when the darkness pressed close and
the tales felt real. A feather floating down from a window. A goat with
opinions. A cat who knows more than he's letting on. A wish tree that answers
in twisted ways. A ghost wedding where love outlasted death.
These moments don't last. That's
what makes them precious. But they leave traces. They echo. They shape who we
become.
The Hocksbox universe is made of
those moments. Of wonder, practiced and shared. Of stories that crack the world
open and let the light in.
You've been part of that.
Reading these blogs, trying these activities, imagining your own
episodes—you've kept the wonder alive.
Don't stop now.
Keep reading. Keep listening.
Keep gathering. Keep writing. Keep noticing the small things—the displaced
object, the faint footprint, the person who doesn't quite fit. Keep helping
when you notice someone in need.
Keep looking, listening,
lingering, laughing, and loving.
That's the whole of it. That's
everything.
An Invitation
Before we close, one more
invitation.
Take everything you've learned
from these twelve blogs and do something with it. Start that book club you've
been thinking about. Plan that mystery night. Build that story tent. Write that
episode.
And then tell us about it.
Write to us at storymailliterarypost@gmail.com
and share your stories—the ones you've read, the ones you've told, the ones
you've written. Send us pictures of your story tents and your mystery nights
and your blanket forts. Let us know how the wonder is growing in your corner of
the world.
Because that's what this has
always been about. Not just reading stories. Living them.
The Box Is Still Open
When we began this journey, we
told you about the hocksbox—a chest passed down through generations, a drawer
in a kitchen table filled with precious things, a box you open when you need to
remember who you are and where you came from.
That box is still open.
It's open every time you read a
story aloud. Every time you gather people around a fire. Every time you write a
letter to someone you miss. Every time you notice something small and wonderful
and let yourself be changed by it.
The box is open. The stories are
waiting. The wonder is yours.
Thank you for walking this path
with us. Thank you for reading, for trying, for creating, for sharing. Thank
you for being part of something wonderful.
Until we meet again—in stories,
in dreams, in the spaces where wonder lives—
Look, Listen, Linger, Laugh,
and Love.
— Sophia Salazar,
Editor-in-Chief
P.S. The competitions are
still open! Send your Holloway & Graves, Percival, and Sherlock Lockwood
episodes to storymailliterarypost@gmail.com
by 31st October 2026. We can't wait to read them.
P.P.S. The stories keep
coming. Visit hocksbox.co.uk to
explore the full collection. There's always more to discover.
P.P.P.S. Toby is still
chasing that chicken. Some things never change.
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