My essay will be just one of dozens and dozens. Every journey is unique. Some were gut-wrenching. Others merely sucked. This promises to be a fascinating look under the hood. Due out approximately November 1st.
Woke to an email — when do these people sleep anyway? — that I had an essay selected for inclusion in a book of essays on the writing muse. You know. Cool. Meanwhile, #amwriting some interesting stuff. My decision to return short #fiction to my menu items is paying off with more energy and inspiration. These are good things as I slog through longer projects.
My story “Sound Retreat” will be one of twenty-odd short stories featured in an anthology to be titled “The Wordsmith Chronicles” sponsored by Sweetycat Press. It is due out in January 2021.
Very little that I write is not torn out of my heart, and this story is in that tradition. There is stuff on the surface, and then there is stuff lurking below the surface.
It’s weird, you see, because I’d been talking to my therapist about barriers, and then this story appeared, and those barriers had to be breached. Had it not been for therapy, this story would look different, or not have made it.
The strange happenstance of existence.
Not sure when you’ll be able to read it, but got word my short story “Coffee Break” will at some point see the light of day in Djinn World at http://paperdjinnpress.com.
I enjoyed writing it. Not my usual genre, but I added my own unique absurd viewpoint.
I will certainly provide links at the appropriate time.
In the meantime, keep writing.
Learned a few days ago that my submission has been accepted for the anthology “I, The Writer” which is due to publish in November. My approximately 500 word essay will be one of 100 with writers of every sort describing their amazing and sometimes tortured journeys. How and why they came to be writers. What stood in their way? Who helped them along the path? Kinda neat to be included in an indie project like this. I will certainly share links when it’s available via Amazon. Once again, how cool to have your stuff included in a neat project like this.
So, my novel “Winter Solstice” was included in the Sweetycat Press Book of Books. I start on page 41. Kinda cool. https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B08GFSYFR8/ref=smi_www_rco2_go_smi_4368549507?_encoding=UTF8&fbclid=IwAR0A8xy0m8GSuiJ58v1A_ibTK5eRZzjVROWXbWp1oZvTxccHdNrzjn_3aZA&ie=UTF8
Who’s going to turn that down, eh?
It’s a catalog of books across genres, authors, ideas.
So take a look. Maybe you’ll see something that triggers something.
oh. you know. i think i don't believe the world is full of nonsense Sadness. Sadsense. And I'm not sure if there's anywhere for me anymore
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Bugs!
Book 4 of Vogel’s Horizon Series tells us what happened to the passengers and crew of the Horizon Beta, the second of four colony ships sent away to escape the imminent destruction of Earth.
Whereas the Horizon Alpha encountered creatures remarkably like dinosaurs (nom nom nom), the Beta arrives at a planet inhabited by some fairly clever bugs that enslave the humans instead of eating them.
The premise is clever. The writing is crisp. The story moves with logic. You’ll be engaged in the story and rooting for Noah every step of the way as unexpected stuff happens that threatens disaster. But Noah has some skills and some smarts, and an overarching love for his Queen.
I thoroughly enjoyed Horizon Beta. Although I highly encourage you to read the three Horizon Alpha stories, Beta stands on its own two feet. Or six feet really I guess. Bugs, you know.
Long live the Queen!
P.S. I received a free advanced reader copy in exchange for an unbiased review, which I hope I have provided. I also purchased an electronic copy of my own. So there!
What is it when we feel things? What do they mean? What do they tell us? What can we learn that might help us not die?
Recently I lost one of the most significant male role models in my life. But really I lost him seven years ago when I became divorced and I was expelled from the family of my ex. Shunned.
And in an instant this man who had become over the years the father that my own father had never been was ripped from me. Gone. Just gone.
There were a few brief moments of connection. I reached out to him here and there, but they were all temporary and ethereal. Those connections were based on a past that didn’t exist.
A few days ago it was shared with me, as we remembered his passing, that he missed me. That he had expressed this. And fortunately I was inebriated, for otherwise I might have cast myself into a fire in my grief. And I imagined that perhaps had I been there I might have saved him from his insanity. I might have saved the family from the consummation of the fire. Silly me.
But his absence these seven years? Sorely noted. It was not my desire. Far from it. And I share this now because it gnaws at me.
He was far from perfect. Just as my birth father. Far from it. But over a span of nearly thirty years i came to look to him for so much.
His departure is a reminder.
I remember a simpler time. Simpler at so many levels. It is a warning to any that would heed it. Our time is fleeting.
I’m not suggesting a different end. Rather I suggest that had I known… had I known I would have seized him and grabbed him and squeezed him with all of my might…
I will never seize you and grab you and squeeze you with all of my might again
And it is an unbearable sadness that envelops me knowing that you are gone from me, and I never told you….
Soon. Soon it will be my departure. And my departure perhaps will summon feelings such as these in another. I cannot say.
I will say only this. I love you all. I have felt so much. I have felt the cold. I have drawn in the scents. I have tingled. I have reveled. I have sweltered in the heat and humid. I have roughly caressed.
I apologize for the hubris that marked my days.
My failures are my own. And to the extent that he missed me, well, I own that too. I should have been there these past several years.
So what is my point?
Think carefully. What is most important? Are you sure? Are you really sure?
And is the individual experience the most critical one?
Scott Macmann