Past, Future, or Now

A short story: Lasting The last Sunday of the month, the last Sunday of the year, the first light of sunrise. The phone alarm wakes me on the last day. No sounds filter through the window, just light. I roll onto my side and open one eye, not too wide in case I see what’s …

The Moaning Ritual

Sorry, the Morning ritual. It's the time of day when the sun don't shine, the eyes don't open, the coffee is floating an aroma around the house. Two minutes. Then it will be coffee in hand, eyes open, bum on seat. Then I remember all the other stuff that happens without brain engagement. It's the …

Place and Time

Otherwise known as Setting. It's one of the [many] things I struggle with. The basics of an opening to a story needs to make clear the Who is Where and When, Why they're there (maybe just a hint), and What they're doing. This post is about the Where and When of a story. The place …

Looking, Looking, Looking

for a quick-bite post. Looked up all the places I usually go for a bit of a gnaw of meaty inspiration. Fandango has FOWC (but I hate the word ravish -- do people understand the full implications of that word and it's associations? It's one of those words with two meanings at polar opposites:To ravish …

Nikky’s Interview …

is here. It's a cool pic, and before the thing that happened last year (and my hair is very long now), 'cos I'm not coming out of my cave until I'm sure that unwelcome visitor is away and gone for good. Or close enough. Anyway, I did an interview. Would you like to read it? …

Summary Tell, or Interactive Show?

It's that old conundrum of show versus tell. Every story has summary, every story has immediacy, but they don't usually end up in the same paragraph. There are reasons for that. A tell is summarising something, a conclusion made, or an unmoving description (static, unattached to a character). There are several ways to tell. Summarising …