Flash Fiction Friday (late, as usual)

Not really a raft, no, but--come on. Use your imagination.

There was only water, and then, a small raft.

It began as a speck in the persimmon fanfare of sunset, barely distinguishable from the dips of waves. She watches without watching, without realizing she's watching, until the speck no longer fades. Becomes more than play of shadow in a world too golden to be real. More than a figment of starvation, dehydration. She blinks. It's still there.

It's March 1st! Which can mean only one thing...

2014 March Vol. 3
A Pure Slush Project

My March story in the 2014 A Year In Stories project is happening. What is Luis Villalobos up to today? On January 1st it was his "walk of shame (well, drive of shame)" (from fellow project writer Stephen V. Ramey's review of The Miracle of Small Things) the morning after sleeping with his boss. February 1 threw the reader into the obscure (and not so clean) world of international finance (read Stephen's review of The Chablis & Sushi Miracle).

And March 1? Back to forbidden-sex grief? More hidden-financial-assets trouble (and lingo)?

Nope.

You can keep guessing, or you can take a hop over to the Amazon preview and read the story.

If you like it, think about this: the other stories in the series are each better than the next. And the other writers... I'm in overwhelmingly outstanding company.

After reading you might want to drop in on Stephen's review--yes, it's already up!--and vote on what you think is going to happen next month.

If you like short stories, please consider buying the book (available in print & .epub via Lulu.com, too) -- you're in for a year-long treat.

Either way, do take that hop over to Amazon to read the preview and my story. Would love to hear what you think, either here or in Stephen's blog.

Happy March 1st!

I'm an author! (On Goodreads)

Thanks to Pure Slush and GORGE: A Novel in Stories, I now have an author page on Goodreads.

How cool is that? :D Can't wait for my first fan, haha.

Copycat

The awesome editor at Pure Slush invited me to be their featured author this January. What does that mean, exactly? Well, I needed to provide four shorts (500 max) to be published in the Pure Slush e-mag, one per week, for their copycat theme.

Whoa. Copycat? Copycat?

My three copies of GORGE arrived!

I'm in bliss :) Writer heaven. Literary nirvana. 

You can get a copy through Lulu.com: 

"a novel in stories, 33 writers weave stories about a beachside restaurant, its customers and the people who work there, all in one action-packed, hunger-filled, testosterone-fuelled, hormonally crazy afternoon and evening."

54 stories, 33 writers--and one of them is ME!

Faithless: Short Story Published Today!

Yay! Fiction365 published another story of mine, Faithless. It's their feature today, Monday 21. If you have a moment to take a stroll over and read it--it's short, something like 500 words--I'd be super curious to hear your thoughts.

Bluebell Books Short Story Slam -- Week 15

And because there is no time--that's why I'm here, he said.

I don't understand, I said.

You don't have to.  It's just about the here and now.

What here?  What now?

He laughed, and my eyes pricked at the sound.  Twenty years since I'd last heard it.  More than half my life.  And it had taken me at least half of that to stop yearning for it.

The Handwritten Challenge #2

The second prompt of the Handwritten-Letter Adventure challenge I received from Michelle at Writer In Transit was thus:

"Write a piece of prose based on the prompt: 'Life is like an hourglass.  Eventually, everything hits the bottom.  And all you have to do is wait it out until someone comes along and turns it around."

This story was not what I originally had in mind.  It simply refused to bend to my will, and here's the result:

~*~*~

How had it happened, this falling apart?  Life had been good.  Why was she curled on the sofa staring out at the patio, gnawing her lip?

The Handwritten Challenge #1

The letter I received from my friend Writer In Transit contained two challenges.  I'm pretty sure she meant to offer me a choice, but since I'm an overachiever (and I'm procrastinating on the editing I have to do for the WIP) I decided to do both.  


The first one:

"Write a short dialogue based on these words: 'When you want something you've never had, you have to do something you've never done.'  It should be dramatic, filled with mystery and suspense."

I'm pretty sure this was not the result Writer In Transit was looking for, and I apologize--my romantic and darkish side got away with me.

~ * ~ * ~

"Why?"  

Dave looks so confused.  My heart twitches, but I raise my chin.

"I don’t want to hurt you," I say.  It sounds ridiculous, here among my packed suitcases.  "I need to be on my own.  For a while."

"Where will you go?  What will you do?"  

It’s not concern that makes him ask.  He’s questioning my ability to grasp life without him, and he’s right.  I can’t.  But I have to try.

Bluebell Books Short Story Slam -- Week 12

I'm back to the Bluebell Books Short Story Slam for this week--finally!  This is a blogger share-fair that I really missed, because the other participants are wonderful people that I love connecting with, and because the talent on this "slam" is breathtaking.  Please take a stroll over to the Bluebell Books site and check out the other participating blogs.  I promise you'll love them!

The prompt for this week is the photo on the right.

As heartwarming as it is, my dark side refused to take it at face value.  Here's the result; your comments and feedback are most genuinely appreciated.

You scare the hell out of me.  The innocence of your skin, the curl of your tiny fingers.  The abandon with which your back heaves in breath.  The texture of your hair—no, I haven’t touched it, and I won’t.  But it looks so soft, so—fragile.  Everything about you is fragile, and that’s what scares me.  Because it demands that I be everything, things I’m not sure I want.  Things I’m not sure I can.

Bluebell Books Short Story Slam -- Week 8

The Bluebell Books Short Story Slam!  Visit the home post here, and join in the fun!

This week the prompt was a photograph...  Darkish, perhaps, or perhaps that's just me projecting my darkish mind.  I was surprised how easy this story came, especially because I almost passed on participating this week -- I had no clue what to write.  Stream of consciousness may not be a bad thing after all ;)  I hope you enjoy!


Turning Back

The road back is the longest of them all.  It’s not a line; not even a circle.  It’s a meandering footpath, rocky and uphill most of the way, only downhill, mostly, when the slippery slope leads further away.  You don’t realize it, at first, when you begin slipping.  Perhaps you’re glad it’s not uphill, perhaps you feel you’re close.  But then you slide faster, you scrape your hands on muddy rocks, and you realize the darkness enveloping is — yes, it’s familiar, but it’s what you’re trying to get away from.  Your fingernails dig for purchase, dirt painfully gathering under them, but there’s no purchase, no stopping.  You just slide.


Why did you walk away?  Why did you need more, more than the sun, the clear sky?  More than the planes of fields that enclosed our world in their openness?  Why did you not feel the freedom of the wind, of the rippling prairie grass?  Did you look back, as you walked away?  I didn’t see you turn, but perhaps you did.

Bluebell Thursday Short Story Slam -- Week 7

My first participating entry in the Bluebell Thursday Short Story Slam...  Not really sure what the rules are, if there are any (except for the inclusion of four of the words in the Wordle above, of course), so your feedback is much appreciated.  Hope you enjoy this tale at least as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Howler Monkey

“Did you see that?”  Her voice was shrill.  “That monkey threw a coconut at me!”

“He didn’t.  Or she.  Can’t really tell from here,” I squinted up at the jungle canopy.  The light barely filtered through in patterns that made me think of the dappled surface of the summerhouse pond.  

“He did, Chris!  I saw him look at me right before he threw it, like he was taking aim.”

“Monkeys don’t do that, Sheila.  The coconut probably just slipped from his, or her, hands.”  I chanced a glance in her direction.  She was staring at me, arms crossed over her chest.  I was glad, for the first time since she’d bought them at the duty-free minutes before we boarded, she’d found these ridiculously huge sunglasses.  Their lenses shielded me from the sting of her glare, but still I looked away.

Clarity of Night

I just realized I completely forgot to link the Clarity of Night contest to this blog...  I cannot believe I did that.  I was overwhelmed, true; first by the sheer raw talent of the 102 entries -- seriously, these people can write!  And second, by the fact that my own entry received an honorable mention (an HONORABLE mention... MY entry!  Un-freakin-believable), and I was apparently inducted into the Forties club (for high punctuation in the readers' choice voting).  So, yes, I was flabbergasted and in shock for a whole five days, until today I suddenly thought, "wait a minute...".

Please forgive this incredibly careless oversight, and take a jump-click over to Jason's Clarity of Night blog.  If you want to read my very humble and undeserving entry, click here (or find entry #97 in the index of the Elemental contest post), and please check out some of the other entries.  For those ADD'ers out there, know that the word limit on this contest was 250 words.  That's, like... not even a page.  You can read a page, right?  Believe me, these are worth it:

Here are some of my favorites:

No One Would Catch Fire, by D. Biswas
The True Story of How Casey Tillson Became A Vegan, by Wendy Russ
Your Mother, by Francis Tan
The Answer, by Kilian Conor (this one has a line that I love... "I am bone and meat interlaced for breath to speak your name..."  How unearthily beautifl is that!)
Bait, by Richard Levangie (an awesome awesome awesome story!)
The Wall, by Peter Davidson (3rd-place winner!)
Golem, by Loren Eaton (2nd-place winner AND Readers' Choice!)
RIF, by Darby Krenshaw (1st-place winner - wonderful story!)

Hope you enjoy them as much as I did!

Death's Not Lonely

The phone wakes me up.  Again.  I’ve been dozing on and off - it’s a quiet night at Live Oaks Assisted Living.  My nursing shift doesn’t end until 5:00 am, but night duties are normally scant.   Since 11:00 pm when Mr. Robbins at 304 finally surrendered to the triazepam and fell asleep, silence has reigned.  Except for the phone in 315, ringing insistently every half hour or so.

Can You Keep A Secret?

Anna crouches at the top of the staircase; afraid of the darkness of the bedroom, she seeks solace in the light filtering in from below, where her parents sit in the dining room’s dim light.  Their soft murmurs waft up to her, soothing, making her drowsy.  Most nights she almost sleepwalks back into bed.  But tonight she hears something that rouses her.

-“When should we tell them?”  Her mother is asking.

-“I’m not sure we should tell them at all,” her father replies, his voice low.

-“Anshel, we must.  Soon they’ll know something is happening, they’ll start asking questions.  They might tell someone,” her mother ends in a whisper.

A surprise for us!  Anna is wide awake now, little hands grasping the wooden banister.  She loves surprises.

-“You’re right,” he sounds tired.  “But, Dara, let’s wait until we’re ready.  Once we have confirmation on the ship, at least.  We can tell them the night we leave; there won’t be time for them to tell anyone.”

Red & Black

The boy and the dog hunker under the shrubbery.  Dim green light dapples the boy’s reddish hair, the matching coat of the setter panting next to him.  The boy’s arm is around the dog; the dog doesn’t need the restraint, but the boy needs the warmth, the sense of complicity.

-“Sshh, Shandy.”

The green light catches a welt on the side of the boy’s face.  His grandfather’s hands are big, heavy.  The boy doesn’t mind pain, but the hurt in Ma’s eyes as she watches bothers him.  He knows she can’t stop it; it’s for his own good.  He doesn’t blame Granddad either; the big man loves him, he knows that too.  It’s Aunt Gerda he blames.  The wily bitch.

Come Back To Me, Elsie

Her eyelids flickered open; something had woken her, but she didn’t know what.  It was dark, quiet; as her eyes gradually adjusted to the faint light filtering through sheer curtains, she saw the unfamiliar shadows of a large bedroom.  The bedsheets felt thick, expensive; unlike anything people in her circle, fresh out of college and struggling with new careers, would have.  The pillow where her head rested teased her memory with tendrils of… something, and for some reason that scared her wide awake.  Something was lurking at the edges of her consciousness; had she been dreaming?  She didn’t know why she should be so afraid, but her heart pounded.  There was something about the entire setting that was giving her a macabre sense of deja-vu.