“Those Browns!” said Mom, after Billy’s first visit. “They’re not smart. Short-lived, too.”
Both were true. But when my leg was in a cast, Billy carried me into the school. He blanketed everyone with kindness—warmth personified.
When the cancer got him, age 50, our children and I cried buckets.
Rita Stevens has been a teacher and newspaper writer in west Michigan. She writes every day—three novels and a stack of short stories so far.
Being a newsreader is hard. Not only do you have to look great, you must have the most current stories in order to keep ratings up.
This is where I have the jump on my competition. My inventor friend helps me make little trips.
“And now for TOMORROW’S news today!”
Susan Cornford is a retired public servant living in Perth, Western Australia. She has pieces published or forthcoming in 50-Word Stories, Akashic Books, Antipodean Science Fiction, CarpeArte Journal, Ghost Parachute, Medusa’s Laugh, Speculative 66, Subtle Fiction, Switchblade, The Fable Online, The Gambler, The Vignette Review, and The Were-Traveler. She considers herself an emerging flash writer.
The story of the week for April 30 to May 4 is…
Home Security by Mark Farley
Our ballista slams out another volley. My loader slaps my shoulder. I open up through the wire with the big Browning.
Through the fog I see burning tracks littering the wheat fields. Our main gun cycles as actinic light sears the horizon.
My melted eyes weep. Gods, please not again.
David Arnold is a former Army officer and retired academic administrator. He has recent published work in Narrative, Raven’s Perch, Microfiction Monday, and This Old Boat. He lives in the Bluegrass Region of Kentucky with his wife Rose, Bonnie the Dog, and Mosel the Cat.
After her mother’s untimely cremation, the witch pulled down their gingerbread house. In its place she built a new home, using slices of turnip for the roof tiles, runner beans for floorboards, and stems of cauliflower for the walls. No child, she was sure, would ever again bother their family.
Mark Farley writes novels, flash fiction and the occasional poem.
The Story of the Month is chosen from the Story of the Week winners announced from the past month.
The finalists for April were:
Everything you need to know about my wife’s Gaelic-Green/Irish-blue eyes. by Bob Thurber
Bad Seed by Melanie Cranenburgh
The Night the News Came by Bob Thurber
Animal Control by Uzair Shahed Islam
The winner of the April 2018 Story of the Month, and the $10 prize, is…
The Night the News Came
Understatement can have such power, especially when presented with a low word count, and that’s exactly what Bob achieved in this story, paired with a metaphor that truly lingers.
“Again with the sacrificial cults?” the editor shouted, tossing her draft in the trash. “We’re not a tabloid.”
“But people need to know-”
“That you have an axe to grind?” he interrupted. “Bring me a real story, or you’re fired!”
And that’s when she noticed the blood on his shoe.
No animals were harmed in the making of this story. Get the inside scoop on Pontius Paiva and the latest stories at pontiuspaiva.com.
I pondered bony in a shroud,
And gloat and glide o’er graves on hills,
Then all at once, I saw a cloud,
The ghost of Obadiah Mills.
In centuries or maybe more,
I ne’er saw such a spirit soar.
What horrors or internal strife
Saw this man exiled after life?
Jo Withers is a cheery soul who loves writing about death, doom, and dinosaurs. She managed to combine all three topics in her middle-grade novel 5 Simple Steps to Saving Planet Earth.
“Show, don’t tell,” you told me. “Use action to illustrate your point.”
Of course, you were right. I’d failed to get what I wanted to say across.
“I really do love you,” I said. Then I picked up my socks from the floor and put them in the wash basket.
David Rae wrote this story. See more at davidrae-stories.com.
Clare sits in her car, heater at full blast. She knows she should keep driving but the lights of the house, her home, have her mesmerized.
She looks longingly at her past. The deep snow makes it look as if nothing has changed, the SOLD sign buried beneath a drift.
Candace Kubinec posts her stories at storydribbles.wordpress.com and her poetry at rhymeswithbug.com.