In a work that blurs the boundaries between futurism and very recent history, wild imagination and straightforward reportage, this piece takes us through the phases of tumultuous transformation in our present/future shock. Reality ain’t what it used to be. Enjoy the ride.
Category: Fiction
Life Cycle of a Shadow
Properly speaking, shadows are not those places where the light is blocked. In the earliest reconstructed languages, those places have no names, though the proto-word for shadow does exist. Shadows were the beings that lived in those places of blocked light. Through the corruption of time, they have lent their name to their native homes, been subsumed by them, been forgotten.
Author Interview with Isobel Granby
“The Second” was written for a speculative fiction writing workshop and very last-minute in its original form. I did the plotting and world-building on the fly, and basically the original idea was “what if the protagonist were trying to save their friend from a duel?”
See You In Our Dreams—A worm’s-eye view from the Readers Underground of a social dreaming experiment in progress
Another intimate Readers Underground group has formed around Maia’s See You In Our Dreams, a book described as “a long, complex, slow exploration of the final paroxysms of a dystopic future before something starts to change.”
See You in Our Dreams
Intimate Reading Performance and Social Dreaming Experiment beginning June 19th The story, set in the 2050s, focuses on an underground community of poets, artists, scientists, and theater geeks (Bard-lovers) who share the weird experience of receiving …
Weekend Getaway
The game gives us a satisfaction that life denies us.—Emanuel Lasker ∞ “Tea or coffee, Sir?” “Coffee. Black. No sugar.” I’m on the phone with a market researcher. I try to picture a pretty girl at the other end of the line, but it isn’t working. All I …
Medb: A Disappearance and Reappearance (excerpt)
I looked at him through the camera. “You have a secret.” His eyes widened. I continued. “It’s not something…bad…but you think it is…. Something about a confrontation with your father. And it has to do with…a female.”
Introduction to the Editors: Geoffrey Edwards – Writing that Transgresses
As a fledgeling writer and editor, as well as an (almost-retired) scientist, I am feeling my way into the business of editing, critiquing, choosing. I have eclectic tastes. I read just about anything, and voraciously. I review everything I read—you can …
A Demon’s Escape (Based on a True Story)
Whether I chose to feel my emotions fully, or experience the depth of them — that wasn’t up to me. That was up to God, or Satan, or whatever it was that controlled me.
Daniel’s Dream
That room is gone. Or rather, the room is still there, but what’s in it now is so different from what was in it before that the room itself seems transformed. It holds a vast model of the world we live in, built to scale and rendered in exquisite detail…
See What You Think About ThisXIII — You must listen intently to the sound in your ears. It’s a carrier signal.
You must listen intently to the sound in your ears. It’s a carrier signal. The message is layered into it.
See What You Think About ThisXV — Yes. It was the Werewolf
Yes. It was the Werewolf, he said. I ask him what happened.
See What You Think About ThisXVII — How much further are we going?
How much further are we going? She isn’t really asking me. Just thinking aloud.
See What You Think About ThisXVI — There was a boy once upon a time
There was a boy once upon a time who lived in a small village with his mother, this father, and his sister.
See What You Think About ThisXIV — This man lived once in a fairly clean house
So this man lived once in a fairly clean house, up along a good road. A good neighbourhood. This was the man I told you about.
See What You Think About ThisXVIII — Where did those men go?
Where did those men go? What men? He says he didn’t notice; had his eyes closed listening to some music the barman had put on.
See What You Think About ThisXVII — The music fades out
Fade out. The music fades out. I say you’re a strange girl. She doesn’t reply immediately so I stay: switch channels.
See What You Think About ThisXVI — Three black bags lay on the table
Three black bags lay on the table and the telephone was ringing in the back. That’s where it was.
See What You Think About ThisXV — So in this photograph is a boy and a girl
So in this photograph are a boy and a girl. The boys sits on the ground to the left and the girl lies on the ground to the right.
See What You Think About ThisXIV — The point about the Werewolf is this
The point about the Werewolf is this: a popular conversation about categories of things.
See What You Think About ThisXIII — This guy works in a store
This guy works in a store. He has a bulging gut but his heart was in the right place.
See What You Think About ThisXV — And off we set with the black bag
And off we set with the black bag in the trunk of the car. The drive to the restaurant is some two hundred miles of desert, mountain passes.
See What You Think About ThisXIV — I was wrong
I was wrong. It did change. How can you hear the cries of others and not listen?
See What You Think About ThisXII — I get flashbacks of war
I get flashbacks of war. But I wasn’t there
See What You Think About ThisXI — A man up along a road
Now see what you think about this: a man up along a road stood next to a tan colored car.
See What You Think About ThisXI — Letters
Letters. The writing on the brown envelope said: photocopies as requested.
See What You Think About ThisX — This isn’t my natural line of work
As I mentioned, this isn’t my natural line of work. I just fell into it.
See What You Think About ThisXII — Every now and then
Every now and then the old man would rock back on his heels. Every now and then.
See What You Think About ThisXI — You must listen intently to the sound in your ears
You must listen intently to the sound in your ears. It’s a carrier signal.
See What You Think About ThisX — March the seventeenth
March the seventeenth. Thinking about the body guard: got shot.