This entry will, I hope, be more comment than posting. First, just to set the mood, here’s an excerpt from my story “Uther.” This “Fred” character isn’t me: he just happens to have the same name. Fred checked his jeans … Continue reading
Here’s a story for you. Last night, as I was winding things up at my desk and getting ready for bed, I heard the unsettling sound of footsteps outside my window. This wasn’t the window facing the parking lot; it … Continue reading
“It was getting very late when we came to a certain house that was not at all like the others on its block.” –from “Boo,” by Richard Laymon October is in the chair, as Neil Gaiman might say — … Continue reading
One of my two favorite professors in my college days was a wiry little old Texan named Professor Charles Froehlich. With him I studied three years of Koine Greek (the language of the New Testament), a year of Latin, a … Continue reading
Today I collaborated on a poem with my mom. How is that possible, you ask, since she died several years ago? No, I didn’t hold a seance. As I was putting together the content for this posting, I came across … Continue reading
Poe’s Law of the Short Story is this: “Every word in a piece of fiction pays its way.” Have you ever read Mark Twain’s enthusiastic description of the wonderful new invention called the “typewriter”? If you read it today, you’d swear … Continue reading
There’s an enormous yellow moon hanging outside my place tonight. The crickets are shrilling in the bushes, and the lone streetlamp in my dark little street is flickering insanely, about to give up the ghost. An inside source tells me … Continue reading
The short story was once famously defined as fiction that could be read in a single sitting. When we look back today at the stories that definition was meant to describe — the “short story” of a century or two … Continue reading
We hear it all the time from writers, writing teachers, and the trade magazines: if you’re going to submit your stories or book manuscript for publication, learn to handle rejection. Develop a thick skin. Learn to discriminate among rejection letters, because … Continue reading
During this week falls the Japanese festival of Obon. (It’s hard to pin down precisely what day it is — different towns seem to celebrate it at slightly different times, but it’s right around now, anyway.) It’s similar in some … Continue reading