Thursday, November 26, 2015

Monday, November 9, 2015

About my book

I feel the need to tell you how wonderful I think this book will be, so I decided to write you a short book report. Usually the western reader is against most short stories, but the ones that I have written are designed in such a way to compliment each other gracefully. 

Most adult readers who pick up my book will be delightfully pleased at the original compilation and publication order. Many of the stories tie in with others that I have written but some are just zany fun. I've found that I like to write a combination of dark tragedy and thrilling humor. It's a fun mix and will keep you spellbound.

Of the twenty eight short stories, three follow a little friend of mine named Koko the Dragon. He's a lovable doofus that just wants to have fun, but he's a dragon too. If you remember Craig Atherton from By the Gates of the Garden of Eden, you may recall that the last time we heard from him, he was stuck at college. He's got a little story in the mix as well. I will write more on him in the future. Such an interesting guy.

There are several stories that deal with outlandish scenarios in strange futures. "Nibblers", "Island at the End of Time", and "Older Twins" are three such stories. I had hoped with these to eventually turn them into novellas, but have not done so yet. Three or four deal with the strange metaphysical aspects that need further exploration. Another set deals with the end of the world.

On the whole, most of my short stories are epical, but I do have one or two lyrical and artifice thrown in for good measure. Technically, I might also want to add that one or two are not short stories at all, but rather flash fiction and vignette in nature. It's a process to be sure, but for the average reader, I will tell you that it reads well.

Whether you are following Kliefel and Orcsnart on their adventures in trying to put out a burning orb workshop or hoping that Sergeant Goraw catches the bad guy, you are sure to get a kick out of it. I've included three longer pieces at the back of the book so you if you have a penchant for the longer story, these three novellas might be right up your alley.

The first of my novellas is a fictitious account of a deceased high school friend of mine. He was a misunderstood guy, a lover of science fiction, and an all-around swell fellow.

The second novella: "Ouesso to Epena" takes us on an adventure with two of our friends from my first novel. Tugg and Hezzy are up to some craziness in the middle of the Congo jungle. They have been hired to survey the land for a possible shipping route. But of course, while they are at it, they will do some independent filming as well. Hilarity and horror ensue.

The third novella is much darker and tells the story of four seemingly unconnected book owners. Each owns a very odd and rare book that is somehow telling the story of one of the other person in the story. Dark by nature and very riveting, it is on par with any "Twilight Zone" episode.

So that's it. Buy my book this coming November 27th. It should be available around midnight or so. A link will be at the top of this blog, but for now, you can go to my amazon page.

How many pages is my book?

Pages? Around 241.

Words? Around 65,000.

Imagination? Around unlimited.

Well, I could write a million more words, but here are sixty five thousand at least. 

Thursday, November 5, 2015

Going over and over

Over  and over and over and over and over
Again I go and go
Over the manuscript

Hopefully I am catching
All of the typos

Monday, November 2, 2015

super excited

This week i've been steadily working on getting all of my typos and errors corrected. I'm really ramped up for the realease this black friday. 

Sunday, October 25, 2015

How NOT to Put Together a Short Story Collection

How NOT to Put Together a Short Story Collection
By: Amber Sparks

I have this short story collection called May We Shed These Human Bodies that just came out from Curbside Splendor, and I think probably the thing people ask most often about it is “how do you put together a short story collection?” And honestly, I have no fucking clue. But I can tell you that this version of the collection, the version that Curbside Splendor picked up, is probably the tenth version of this collection. It has had other names, other stories, other orders and versions, has been longer or shorter, and at one point in its long history of rejection sat in my laptop’s trash for four months. It has been rejected or ignored by nine publishers in its various forms. So what I can tell you, judging by my own experience only, is how NOT to put together a short story collection – at least, if you want it to be published.

DO NOT say to yourself, Well, I’ve got a lot of stories now, so I guess it’s time to shove them all into a manuscript and send it around. This is not a good reason to compile a short story collection. Are your stories good? Do they complement each other in some way? Do they reflect the very best of your writing? Then by all means, go to it. But be aware: selling a short story collection is very difficult. Editors like novels. Some presses only publish novels. This doesn’t meant that you won’t be able to sell your collection but do not think that this will be an easy task. As a short story writer, you already have an uphill battle to fight. If you’re working on a novel, or have a fantastic idea for a novel, it might be better to just do that instead. If, like me, you are deep-in-your-soul a short story writer, then I am sorry for you and glad for you. Just be prepared for a long slog.

DO NOT treat your story collection like a mix tape. Please dear god no stop do not do this. I followed this advice, or tried to follow it, because I heard it over and over again. I think writers repeat it because they want their book to be as cool as an album. Look. Stories are not songs. Trying to figure out how to make your book like a mix tape will drive you crazy (long short long? Two depressing stories and an upbeat one?) and will be, in the end, completely useless to you. If you really, really like the idea of a mix tape, go and make one for your friend or lover or sibling and get it off your chest. Then go back to compiling your book.

DO NOT include every single piece of shit you’ve ever written in your collection. If your story collection is too short without it, then guess what? You don’t have enough material for a collection yet. No filler. Be selective. I even had to cut some of my favorite stories out of my book because they just didn’t fit anywhere, so they eventually had to come out. I’m sure my stubbornness about that cost me a few publishers at least.

DO NOT send a book full of only short shorts to a publisher. Unless that is all you write, of course, and then I cannot help you. I’ve written a lot more flash fiction than I have longer stories, but have you noticed? People who aren’t writers hate flash. Which is most of the people who you want to buy your book. So if you want to fill your collection up with a lot of flash fiction (and mine has a lot) you have to a) balance that shit out with some longer pieces and b) be prepared for readers to ignore all your flash and only love your longer pieces. Sorry, but that’s just the way it is. Don’t believe me? Talk to your non-writer friends and family and ask them what they think of page-long, two-page-long stories. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

DO NOT misspell the first word of your first sentence of your first story in your collection, and force the poor publisher rejecting you to inform you of this problem. Did this happen to me? Yes, yes it did. And by “happen to me,” I mean, “I was a fucking dumbass who thought I could catch all my own mistakes while writing.” Don’t let this be you. Use Spellcheck for the love of all things holy and good.

DO NOT save the best for last. Save the best for first. Put every single “best” story in the beginning. Frontload that motherfucker and then frontload it some more. Great story, great story, great story, great story – keep them hooked and don’t let them read anything less than your best until at least halfway through. In fact, let all of the stories be your best. Keep pushing the reader in, not letting up, and end on a high note, too. This is another good reason to include only the best stories in your collection. People are distracted and fidgety. Haven’t you heard? We are all A.D.D. now. We are all caught up in the speed of the tubes. Don’t give people a reason to stop reading. Don’t sell that collection until everything in it is the best goddamn thing you’ve even written. And even then, cut the weakest best. Cut more. Write better. Cut more. Write best. Then send it out. Then cross your fingers and toes. Then hope for the best and prepare for the long, slow wreck of the worst.

What about you guys? What have you all learned not to do when compiling a collection of short fiction? How about the poets out there? Non-fiction writers? What rules of the road do you guys try to follow?

cut stories

sometimes, it's sad, but not every story can make it in the book.

here's one -


The Operations

It didn’t matter how many times he let the bones grow back, they always would and he would have to dig them out again. He didn't mind digging them out... or rather would not mind digging them out if they didn't hurt so terribly.

He was just like most humans in the world of life and love and pain... He felt it and he dealt it in occasion. Like Trenna. He had loved that smarmy vixen with all his heart and look where it had gotten him. Trouble. Nothing but. Ah well. He was over her... Mostly. There were still nights where he would wake up humping the body-pillow - but those were less and less since he had started the operations.

Maybe it was the operations that she had hated. He couldn't know. Not since he had killed her.


yeah. i think one day i will publish a flash fiction book. i could put this one in there for sure.

so anyway. i think it's time to eat another bagel. i've got a new batch of "everything" bagels ready. you know, once i went to a place and they didn't put nuts in their dough. what the hey! you should always have a great selection of chopped nuts in your everything bagel. what a shame.

Saturday, October 24, 2015

ONE MONTH LEFT


November 27th is the day the book will be live and ready to order.

I am super excited and ready to release "Sometimes I Write Tiny Stories" on to the world.

This project has been a long time coming and I am grateful for everyone's help that chipped in.

It's larger than I expected.

I thought I would get it up to around 40,000 words and call it a day, but I kept finishing off long overdue projects and re-writing sloppy sophomoric attempts.

Now the beast rests heavy at 69,000 words. That's almost double what I intended.

I have already put aside two large stories for a later date.

They were begging to be written and it was hard to say no to them, but I laid them aside for their own novel.

Heck, even the three novelettes I have at the end of this book were screaming out to be expounded upon, and when you read them, you can easily see how it could happen.

Short stories are very difficult to handle.

It's like a minnow.

You know you're fishing, but you catch it and often are disappointed.

We just have to remind ourselves that it takes a lot of anchovie to cover a pizza.

This is a terrible analogy.

Anchovies are hideous.

Nonetheless this book is a quality work and you should buy it.

Buy four of them actually and give them to your friends.

This book is rated PG and should be quite affordable on this coming Black Friday.

Sunday, September 27, 2015

formatting today

I have been hard at work formatting the book.

I look at the clock and without counting the brief walk my wife and i had to go get an ice cream, I've been at it for twelve hours.

A good day.

I've moved all of my stories into a word processor in order to do this.

I lost a LOT of formatting along the way.

Paragraphs needed to be redone and all of my italics are gone.

That's alright.

I've got two months to finish.

I'm at 62,860 words and I have yet to write an introduction and an outro.

I just spent five minutes looking up the word: "outroduction" just to be sure.

This is not a word, but Intro and Introduction are.

English... You wastrel.

So.

Book.

Ah yes.

Stay tuned.

It's gonna have pizzazz.

That's more Z than a lumberjack.

Monday, September 21, 2015

Superior Respondent

Just finished a little novelette, Superior Respondent.
It's 9181 words and a little long for the short story book, but I will put it at the back, so all is well.
Feels good to bang that guy out.
It's been brewing in me for a couple of years.

Monday, September 14, 2015

New word count

Alright, my word count is up to 47,950. That's half as long as my full length novel but long enough for a short story collection.

The problem remains that I would like to keep adding to it to finish strong with at least 15,000 more words. I hope to achieve that in the next fifteen days before I must start the editing process.

Fifteen days!?! Eeek!

I hope I can pull this one off.

Wednesday, September 9, 2015

"Dipping The Green" Excerpt

Here is some text from a story called "Dipping The Green" by me coming up in the new book.


"In the deep time of of the cosmos, the eons that pass over and wash the skies clean of stars every morning, there is a longing, a thirst, a hunger for the push of anything countable. In the spaces that men know, the moments that we hold of value and the seconds that make up our minutes, there is the fallacy that we call this time indeed. Time is an uncounted thing, a large rough beast that comes in unwanted and unheeded to our lives and tramples us to dust nonresistant to our pleas and supplications. A distant and angry god, not to be forgotten."

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

Tugg and Hezzy return

Tugg and Hezzy return in their own short story in my newest book: Sometimes I Write Tiny Stories. You may remember them as two of the wonderful and heart-warming characters from my full length novel: By the Gates of the Garden of Eden. Well... Maybe they were just there as comic relief, but no matter, here they are again in their own adventure!

Don't forget to keep this blog bookmarked for new updates on the book! It is scheduled to be on sale this Christmas!

Here is a quick tease from the short story.

-----------------------------------------------

Down to the Lake

Part One


Tugg and Hezzy were almost to their 75 mile mark at the bai when things took a turn for the worse. It was July in the Congo and it was only 73°F but with the 100% humidity you would have never known it. Working their way through the forest with the camera crew had proved to be the worst thing they had ever agreed to. Slogging behind as usual, getting stuck everywhere, the whole crew was tired and grumpy.

“Jeezmani Crispers!” Hezzy called out to Moise as he almost dropped one of the equipment bags in the water. “Be careful you nimwit!”

“Ce serait bien si vous ne l'auriez pas trouvé un tel endroit stupide pour vous traverser idiot!” Moise shot back at him, glaring.

“Oh idiot am I? Let’s remember who’s the dummy in tha show why don’t we?” He jerked his thumb back at Tugg and gave a sharp laugh.

“C'est suffisant. On est tout aussi stupide que l'autre.” Moise laughed and climbed out of the river. Christian and Emmanuel were next with more equipment and then Tugg, climbing up on the bank, as smooth as a cat.

“What was that all about?” He asked Hezzy.

“Nothing.” Hezzy smiled at Moise, “Mossy called yeh a dummy, but I got yer back pardner.” Moise, Christian and Emmanuel looked around nervously.

“Sure you do.” Tugg smiled. “Allons avant le mannequin tombe.” He said to the men. They all laughed.

“Hey!” Hezzy said, “What’d you say?”

“Hurry up before the dummy falls in.” Tugg said.


It was a joke, maybe.


-----------------------------------------------

911 Challenge

Hey there faithful audience. Soon in my country people will be waving their flags and showing support for a cause. I believe the cause is larger than one flag or one country. I made this. Maybe we can spark a new revolution. Hopefully this will catch on. I'm going to do it. #911Challenge





Monday, August 31, 2015

Supply and Remand

Just finished typing up this little 2,500 word doozy-of-a-story. It's a good one and I hope that you will like it when it comes out. I am handing it over to my Beta-readers and my Editors now, and I really do hope that they enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. My wife even seemed to love it.

Don't forget that you can buy my full length novel now while you wait to read this new one.

http://www.amazon.com/Gates-Garden-Eden-Empire-Beneath/dp/1499133847

Saturday, August 29, 2015

Ten Guidelines for Structuring a Short Story Collection


While editing my finished pieces and writing new ones, I am concerned that my beta-readers and editors do not fully grasp the project as a whole, so I am very much going to have to dig into a nice way to organize the stories. These all look so tasty, I don't know which one I will go with yet.

====================

One of the best articles about organizing a story collection comes from David Jauss, in an article he wrote for Writer’s Chronicle, “Stacking Stones: Building a Unified Short Story Collection.” In it, he writes, “The placement of a story in a collection can alter both its meaning and its affect.” A bad order can ruin good stories, while a great order can actually improve them.


Ten guidelines for ordering a collection:

1. Benjamin Percy argues that you should put your best stories at the beginning (in his words, “strongest” or “most celebrated” stories), to hook the reader. He uses his own advice when he starts Refresh, Refresh, with the Paris Review published and Plimpton Prize story “Refresh, Refresh,” then follows it up with the Glimmer Train story “The Caves In Oregon.” The lead stories are my favorite ones in the book.

2. It’s always tempting to squeeze one black sheep in at the end. Don’t. I always disliked that Nathan Englander tried to shoehorn “In This Way We Are Wise,” into the end of For the Relief of Unbearable Urges. It didn’t match the other stories in tone, style, and content. Make sure all the stories really cohere.

3. Build your own structure, and then order stories according to that logic. Jauss offers five possibilities:

Hourglass:
“According to Forster, an hourglass structure is one in which the characters and/or themes gradually change until they reverse themselves in the middle and go in the opposite direction for the remainder of the work.” (Longstreet’s Night-Blooming Cereus)

Möbius Strip:
John Barth’s Lost in the Funhouse “would be strung together on a few echoed and developed themes and would circle back upon itself: not to close a simple circuit like that of Joyce’s Finnegans Wake, emblematic of Victorian eternal return, but to make a circuit with a twist to it, like a Möbius strip.”

Mosaic:
“Amy Hempel’s In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried is composed of brief, fragmentary, discontinuous sections that may seem relatively unrelated until, eventually, the reader is able to assemble them and the whole picture comes together.”

Musical Improvisation:
In Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories, Sandra Cisneros “states an idea or image in the first sentence, flies away with it and returns to the same image (the way a musician returns to a chord) to ground the story in the end.”

Instant Replay:
“Tim O’Brien’s “How to Tell a True War Story,” describes, again and again, differently each time, the death of a man who stepped on a land mine. The Things They Carried, the collection that contains this story, employs a similar structure. Several of its stories obsessively retell-and often revise-the events of earlier stories.”

4. Daniyal Mueenuddin argues that the “last [story] should open the book out.” That, and it should also leave your readers on a strong note, something that unifies the collection. Treat the last story as the last page of any of your stories. It has to make emotional sense of everything that’s come before and wrap things up.

5. Put your novella at the end. Sorry Nam Le, but the whole novella-in-the-middle technique in The Boat threw me. I thought I was getting into a short story, but boy did I have a lot more coming. Follow Rattawut Lapcharoensap (Sightseeing) and George Saunders (CivilWarLand in Bad Decline) and have it finish the book off.

6. If you have any overlapping characters, put these next to each other in the book. You’ll create connections by juxtaposition. It’s also easier to transition from one story to the next if we can stick with the same character.

7. Build what David Jauss calls Liaisons:

Liaisons are the principal cement that mortars our stories together into a unified collection. In his superb book Shakespearean Design, the scholar Mark Rose defines a liaison as a key word or image whose repetition links two seemingly divergent scenes in a play and thereby reveals their underlying connection and unity.

Ann Pancake’s Given Ground contains an excellent example. Her story “Wappatomaka” concludes with the sentence “I drop my shovel because I am tired, heavy with this dirt in our veins,” and the next story, “Dirt,” repeats, in its very title, that sentence’s key word.

8. Here’s another piece of advice from Daniyal Mueenuddin: “The first story . . . should be bright and immediately appealing.” Bright is key — you don’t want a super-depressing story to launch the collection. You also want one that appeals to the largest demographic (that is, if you want people to continue reading.)

9. If you have shorter stories, or ones that use a different point of view, or stick out in other freakish ways, consider placing these in the middle. It’ll be a nice change-up for the reader, and yet the reader will have a chance to see your solid material and style again before they leave your book. A.M. Holmes does this with the title story in “Things You Should Know,” which is even quirkier than the rest of the stories in the collection.

10. Don’t feel that the title story has to come in a particular place in the collection. I’ve seen them as the first story (Refresh, Refresh, Benjamin Percy), in the middle (Voodoo Heart, Scott Snyder), and at the end (St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves by Karen Russell). The title story isn’t the best story, just the best title. And if you lack a smash-bang story title, make up a title that doesn’t come from a story (Like You’d Understand, Anyway, by Jim Shepard).





Thursday, August 13, 2015

Finished stories vs. Unfinished stories - Word counts

Worked for a while on my short story book. Hoping to get it out by Christmas.

Almost 39,000 words and counting in the "Done" section from a total of twenty six stories.

In the "Not Done" section, there is another scenario to be seen. It is, at this time, half the stories, but many of them are getting longer and longer as I go on an on. In all thirteen stories there are already 20,200 words... But it will grow.

Thirty nine stories is nothing to sneeze at. With the total at a little over 59,000 words, it should shape up to be a pretty substantial book of stories.

Friday, July 31, 2015

rewriting a rock opera

my original intention for the piece i am working on now was to be a rock opera.

i had shown it to my buddy john conrad and had even recorded several of the key songs for the opera while i was a third shift baker.

but...

i don't think i will do that.

instead i am going to make it into another novelette for the book. i am already at 4,337 words and even the skeleton looks shaky.

it's a really powerful story though.

if done well, this will be one of the highlights of the book.

Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Halfway

It's a dusty day and the sun is low.

Pow! Pow!

Gunshots.

Somewhere, a baby screams.

The smoke stings my nose.

Before me lies twenty three stories.

In the distance... Hoofbeats.

Twenty more.

The book is halfway done.

Monday, July 6, 2015

Editing and Writing tonight

Often, I feel that I cannot go on with my writing career if I have to edit.

That's bologna. It's called perseverance and we all have it.

I just have to dig into mine and take a chunk... EAT IT... And continue on.

So I have today.

I banged out four thousand words tonight since I got home around four.

Kinda feeling tired and my fingers hurt.

Go Book Go!

Woohoo!

One of my main novelettes is almost there!

I need to fix some sentence structure, but it's looking good so far!


Friday, July 3, 2015

23? 40?

Twenty three short stories being edited all at once is a little much... Even for me. The good news is that there will be around forty in the finished book!

Monday, June 29, 2015

Editors

I recently reached out to many of my closest, most intelligent, and well-read friends and asked them to help me edit the short stories that I am compiling for the book.

Jennifer, Jess, Shelly and Nessly have just now begun the laborious task of helping me fine tune these rough rocks into precious gems and for that I am ever grateful.

It takes a team effort and I am happy to have the best team assembled. I look forward to my new editing partners as we venture forth and complete this book!

Monday, June 15, 2015

Book Cover Idea

I just spent around 100 hours making this design. Tell me what you think.


Embracing the book

WURK WURK

I have been working steady on organizing all these short stories that I have punched out over the years and it is looking like I should be ready for a publish before the end of the year. No promises on the actual date... Still a lot left to do and to rework.

But as it stands now, I have:

Eight stories that I am just getting started.
One story that needs a lot of work.
Fourteen stories that need a good ending.
Three that are almost there.
Fourteen that are done.

So after I get them all "Done", then I will edit them. And then I will edit them... And then, guess what? I am going to edit them.

Then I will:

Figure out the best order to arrange them in...

Then I will write my front matter. Introduction, dedication, copyright... Stuff like that...

Then I will design a great cover!

So...

You should have it soon.

In the meantime, you can always read my full length novel or some short poems HERE

http://www.amazon.com/Pauly-Hart/e/B00N7RUETK

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

The Faster and the Furiouser

"I don't know which one I am, or if this is the first time I've written this note", the note said. "All I know is that I think someone is following me."

"Yes." Ned said to the note. "I am."

He crumpled it in his hand. "And we've done this before."

=================

I was working hard on the book yesterday... Pounding that thing like a cage wrestler in a death match. Here is a facebook update I posted: 

i'm so excited about my book ideas that i am running around the house shouting and jumping up and down and clapping as it keeps expanding! who has time to write any of this down? i do and i must! i madly dash to the desk and scribble on the back of an insurance quote: chicken scratches serving as harbingers of plot twists, devices, and contagonists. it's a good day in writing when the heavens open and the whole thing just dumps into your mind! [have you] ever had days like this?

At any rate, It was furious work and there were hours of it. The story wasn't being written yet, for most of the plot and such was dumping into my head like a teenager bagging groceries. At one point during the outlining the power went out. Bad news. I hadn't saved in a while.

But that was alright. Power came back on and I rewound the experience and wrote it all out just like I had before, maybe with some improvements.

I've found that when I brainstorm, I do so best on paper, so I had my notes out in front of me doing my plot outline. The good news is, this is a great story. The bad news is, this is supposed to be a short story.

Maybe it will be a novelette or a novella by the time I am done with it, but at any rate, you will be able to read it soon.

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

5/19/15 waking dream writing conclusion.

Earlier this morning I began a story that I had from a waking dream. Here is the full story. Just finished and edited. Enjoy.

====================

Saph and the kitten


Long ago, Saph had become known as "The Emperor without words", and that was just how his subjects treated him. The subjects would come, always the mice first, due to their impertinence, and bow and grovel at his feet presenting their gifts one by one - in tears of sorrow. It was then that Saph would wake up screaming, as he always did. It was a farce, for his only reality was the Jade Dungeon and the Minotaur who kept him there.

The Minotaur's name was Jake, and it was funny that he lived in the Jade Dungeon. He had always wanted to go out and see the mountains, but no one had ever given him any heed, as he only spoke Kraken, and he never saw the Kraken anymore.

Saph had the same dream about the kitten every night. He was quite convinced that it really was a dream about kittens, but the mice were always there, ruining everything with their terrific demands. More piers into the sea, more bridges over the ant swamps, more this and more that. And they always left their disgusting gift in tiny pink vials. It was the tears of the ever-queen, long dead and forgotten.

How they had gotten those tears was beyond him and he probably shouldn't have asked, but in a dream, you never know how things will turn out, and invariably he would ask and they would always tell him: "She died in our loving embrace, and she let us eat her when she passed." Saph knew it was all lies, but they told him the same story over and over, and he became prone to believe it after a while.

And so, night after night, he would dream the ridiculous dream, and morning after morning the Minotaur would be there banging on his cage telling him to shut up, in his very loudest Kraken. Breakfast would come, usually in the form of Turtle Cake, but there would never be anything to drink. Once, there was no breakfast, and once there were waffles. The waffles only happened once, and so every time he ate a bird, he imagined delicious waffles with nice warm syrup, even if the waffles they had served him had not been warm or delicious, and probably shouldn't have even been called waffles to begin with.

The Minotaur would then begin reading poetry to him. It was long and drawn out, but it pleased the Minotaur very much and since there was nothing better to do, he let the Minotaur drone on and on in his unique and strange language of the sea, reading poetry to Saph from a large orange book.

He had tried to teach the Minotaur to speak like him, but often, for his reward, there would only be a sharp prick with a trident, so Saph decided that the best thing to do was to nod and act as if the Minotaur's poetry was very important and rhymed very well.

The cage hung from a large chain high into the sky. He would have called it a ceiling, but since he couldn't see the top of it, there was no use, so he might as well call it the sky. The cage was round, and approximately one half a meter in diameter. It was very tall, however, and Saph could stand whenever he wanted, and did so often. When sitting, he would dangle his four legs out from the sides of the cage and hum quietly to himself.

One day, as he was humming along, the Minotaur came round, making his daily checks. He stopped and listened to Saph. Saph, of course, lost in song, had his eyes closed. Saph had never hummed with the Minotaur near before, for he feared that the monster would not like the tune, so he was very stealthy about it. But this day, as I have said, his eyes were closed and there was nothing to do about it but do as you do when you don't know anyone else is watching. Hum hum hum.

What startled Saph more than anything was the fact that the Minotaur started humming along with him. And why not? The Minotaur was a huge fan of music and even had some an old Donna Summer record that he would play at night, up in his spire, when all the prisoners were either asleep or dead. He only had two records, the other one being a Donnie and Marie Osmond record, but he couldn't stand that one, and had since smashed it to pieces.

Saph, completely taken aback that the Minotaur had been listening, stopped, so the Minotaur poked him a little with his trident, and Saph began humming once more.

Moments turned into days, which promptly turned into weeks, and wouldn't you know it, before long, the Minotaur had learned all of the songs that Saph could teach him. This really got the Minotaur angry, who had quickly decided that all he really wanted to do (besides see the mountains) was to become a musician, which made him feel good inside and filled him with a sense of purpose, even more than poetry ever did. "Jake" would be in lights at the theater, and everyone would come out to see him hum his famous tunes. He even stopped writing new poetry. Maybe he would write more poetry, one day... Once he had created songs from his old existing poetry from his big orange book. He had big plans.

Saph, if he had known about the Minotaur's aspirations, would have perhaps hesitantly told him that he was a terrible student of music and could not carry a tune in a bucket... But thankfully Saph did not speak Kraken, and so little was done.

That's really all there is to tell. For all we know, Jake and Saph still hum away to this very day. There really wasn't any kittens in this story, sorry. Saph never really got over the fact that the dream always happened in the same way, and Jake kept waking him up earlier and earlier just to be hummed to, so Saph never got to the part in the dream where the kittens appear. He knew that they would eventually, it just never happened.

Which makes me sad. I really wanted to hear about kittens... And maybe I even wanted to hear how eventually Saph taught the Minotaur lyrics and through that, taught him Grelch (which is what Saph spoke), and by that, convinced the Minotaur that he had a terrible job and should release all the prisoners at once. The Minotaur would have agreed and they all would have danced away into the sunset... But sadly, that is not at all what happened and I am incredibly sorry that there is not a better ending to this story.

Day Faith

Upcoming in my newest short story compilation are also a couple that are under 500 words.

It's actually quite challenging making a tiny story interesting. Here is one that will be in the book.

Day Faith

At the end of the day as I was walking home, I found a man lying on the ground who had been beaten. His shirt was torn, and his face was bloody and crying. He was pleading at me with big watery eyes, but I was running a little late for my favorite show. I came to my house, and it appeared that the neighbors cat had been sick earlier, and had left a lovely present for me on my doorstep. As I walked in and threw my keys on the counter, the phone rang. It was Denise. She had been in Detroit for the last couple of days on business, and had decided to give me a ring because she felt obligated. Her call was meaningless. I half-listened to her as she rampaged against the politics of major car corporations, and hung up the phone when I couldn't take it anymore. She immediately called back, but I just sat there watching the phone as it rang, trying to imagine her frustration on the other end of the line. Eventually she must have gotten tired with the whole ordeal, because the phone quit ringing.

I decided it was time to eat. Going to the freezer, I realized that I had bought nothing in the past month that even closely resembled sustenance. I ate anyway. Frozen biscuits usually taste better cooked... I didn't mind. I plopped into my chair, just in time to catch the credits of my show. Damn Denise. Damn her to Hell.

Oh well... I stood up and kicked the TV in. Another day. Deciding whether to sleep in my suit or pajamas took up the better part of the next hour, until I determined that my suit just didn't feel good anymore, so I stripped it off in the living room and pushed it into the corner. Ahhh, better.

I studied myself in the bathroom mirror. The same tired shoulders, the same haggard face, the same graying hair. Depressed once again, I staggering to the bedroom, I coughed up blood and flem into my hand, and wiped it on the wall before I collapsed onto the bed with the grace of a corpse. I lay there, and laid there. All my life seemed to be wrapped up in today.

I had gone to the doctor again today and he told me that my condition had not improved. As a matter of fact, it had grown worse. Much worse. If I sleep, I die. I haven't slept in fifteen years. I lay in bed and do not sleep. There are approximately twenty two thousand, three hundred and thirty seven dots on my ceiling. I finished counting them last night. I'm done counting my dots. I'm done counting on my luck.

Goodnight. I'm going to sleep.

Why am I writing Short Stories?


Why am I writing Short Stories?

I don't know... But I write them all the time. Most of them are Fairy tales.


A Fairy tale is a type of short story that has a shared folklore. Fairy tales have not a moral ending, like a fable, nor a legend, which requires belief in the tale. Historical Fairy tales rarely have a happy ending.


Here are two really good quotes on fairy tales.


“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”–Albert Einstein


“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.” - G.K. Chesterton

Commander Yoq (short part)

Commander Yoq (short part)

Below is an excerpt from the new short story compilation. It was featured in my newest novel: By The Gates of the Garden of Eden. Enjoy.



Chief Security Commander of Squadron One, Inio Alephandri Yoq climbed down to the ground from Recon 5. The Securityship held up to twenty passengers or ten Security robots. Today it was her and the top nine of her Damram.

Her mission: Find out what the hell happened at the Club Elix.

So basically: Capture suspects. Kill renegades. Bring in witnesses. Control the media. Clean up.
In all suspicion, she figured that this would be nothing more than a clean-up. The media had ceased yapping about gangs, it actually scared them to pieces. No one wants to hear about a bunch of crazy kids with guns blowing each other away. Not sponsors anyway. Oh hell, she didn't want to hear about it either. But here she was, and their was work to be done. But it pissed her off all the same.

Those stupid gang members. That's all I need now. First Lo-Ami takes out the Neo-Sushi on live TV, now I have to deal with this! Commander Yoq was New Boston's top officer. She took down the entire Kidd gang by herself. Any cop had a record like that could get whatever they wanted. But all she wanted was to kick some ass... And that was fine with her authorities. However, the cops these days weren't as tough as her. The numbers of actual humans in the COPCORP was dropping with each YER.

She had some problems with that, but it meant that the competition for choosing assignments was slim to none. And that she had no problem with. "Alright boys. Search out the Elix club. I want my two with me. Sgt. Goraw, I want you and the rest of the Damram to search out the ally ways. I'm going to take a look inside."

Sgt. Goraw nodded and with a mechanical voice said. "Move out," Human cops weren't that efficient these days... With all the gangs running around they didn't have enough stamina to catch up with them. But Mobots on the other hand... They were the key to keeping this city in peace; they didn't need to eat or sleep, just repairs and some jizz-juice and they were good to go. Actually she had no idea what it took to run one of those beasts. They ran, and that was enough for her. Let the 'Docs worry about 'em. I'm just here to clean up. She looked at her nails and sighed. She hated getting her nails broken... especially when picking up stupid gangs trash. It would be no problem. She was better. None of the other could compete.

The two Damram units were like her shadows. They were programmed that way. Ernie and Bert. She had named them off of some obscure 2-Vid she had seen many, many years ago. Where she turned... they turned. Whatever (or whoever) she fired at, they would also fire. They were exact mimes of her. That is, until she released them on some preset program stored into their memory. Recon Program 4 Modification D effective now... And so forth... Her green eye blinked and surveyed the dead outside with high band impacting. Her brown eye blinked as her iris focused on the Elix club. The UV picked up no one alive inside. They're all gone. Greeeeaat. Just corpses now. She should probably go check it out. Alright. Here she goes. Hopping upon Bert, they flew into the scene.

Damram Sgt. Goraw did not have much luck either. He scanned the perimeter and nothing showed in his visuals. "Move out. Nothing confirmed." The six Damram Units with him began to move when Damram Venture spoke.

"Sir! Visual confirmed in sector 67-1! Scan concludes two DNA sigs. One seems to be Feline! Possibly a mutation or something else undetermined. The other has a carbon base, but it seems metalloid, possibly robotic."

Sgt. Goraw flexed his LM-2 Tiger Style Prototype. He might try it out sooner than parameters had anticipated. "Belay first order. Proceed to 67-1. Assault Formation 1-A." The Damram all pulled their Pulse Rifles from out of their arms. "I will stay here and resume Com with The Commander. Now go!" Six deadly figures took off silently into the night sky, eyes gleaming a dark purple, Projacks glowing a silent red.
Sgt. Goraw's Com program clicked on and spoke. "Commander Yoq. We have picked up two DNA sigs." She responded. "Good work Sgt. Goraw. I want them alive and well. Use the Slepurr packs on them. I want to see them sleeping like babies."

"Affirmative and out." Sgt. Goraw opened up her Com to Venture and the other Damram. "Venture, start Capture Program 102, Commander Yoq's orders. I am coming to you as we speak. Do not engage until I arrive." Venture responded. "Affirmative Sgt." Sgt. Goraw's torso seemed to bulge, and something like a third arm came out of his torso. But the thing was mobile, and seemed to move up his head until it covered both head and left shoulder. The Tiger Style Prototype warmed green and blinked.

"101011100110110001001011010," it beeped. Sgt. Goraw beeped back to it: "Affirmative." His Projack pulsed and he was away.

She jumped off the Damram and looked around. The faces of the Go gang looked so innocent. Like ordinary girls. Like orphans. Her demeanor changed. Like whores. Like street trash with their pretty outfits. Thinking boys will want them because of their bodies. Thinking they were the queens of the night just because of their technology. Commander Yoq laughed her head off. She used to be a member of this pathetic gang. Perhaps that's why she gave them such an easy time. She could have busted them sooooo many times, but just let them slide. Empathy? Yes, she guessed that's what it was. The Go Girls gave her a chance to break out of the ghetto.

Oh well, that was a lifetime ago. She sent Ernie and Bert to look in the club. She kicked around outside. Too many deaths. Too much pride in their little heads. They thought they were all that. They thought they could rule the world. But that's the problem... Each gang thought the exact same thing. Stupid sluts. I've seen their tags around town. Even on the Elixnode. 'Angels of New Boston.' 'The Princesses.' Yeah right. She kicked the glass away and sighed heavily. It was going to be a long day.

Burgerman

Burgerman

Burgerman lived in Chicago. He was half blind and half deaf from a grenade explosion in Vietnam. He had never enjoyed reading, and had never found anything on the radio worth listening to... but he enjoyed talking to people, and he enjoyed making people smile, and he enjoyed making hamburgers.

He ran his own vending cart in the downtown Chicago area. He sold the best damn hamburgers anyone had ever had the opportunity to bite into. He put up signs saying so too. He was the busiest vendor on the block and he always made money.

Burgerman had paid his sons college tuition with the money he made from hamburger sales. Like I said, He always made money.

His son was home for the holidays, and was helping his dad out with the business, when they began talking about the economy. "Dad, the economy is in the worst shape it's been in years. And things are only looking worse for the future."

Well, He believed his son. His son had been to college. His son knew things that He didn't know. And maybe it was his imagination, but people had looked grumpier recently.

Burgerman took down his signs. He couldn't afford them anyway; and he started using cheaper hamburger. People started to go elsewhere for their hamburgers. Soon there was almost no business at all.

"Son, you are right." Burgerman said, "The economy is in bad shape. Nobody wants to buy hamburgers anymore."


Copyright 2003 by pauly hart


==================

The above is an excerpt from my book, coming out soon. I will be posting here where you can buy the book. Please stay tuned.

5/19/15 waking dream writing

This morning I woke and wrote down my dream. It was deeper and more profound, but I am short on time and this should suffice to prompt me to remember everything later.

===============

Long ago, Saph had become known as "The Emperor without words", and that was just how his subjects treated him. The subjects would come, always the mice first, due to their impertinence, and bow and grovel at his feet presenting their gifts one by one - in tears of sorrow. It was then that Saph would wake up screaming, as he always did. It was a farce, for his only reality was the Jade Dungeon and the Minotaur who kept him there.

===============

Have a great day and remember that this entire collection will be coming out soon! In the mean time, did you know that I've written two poetry books as well as a full length supernatural thriller novel? You can buy them all here at http://www.amazon.com/Pauly-Hart/e/B00N7RUETK

Enjoy life!

-Pauly Hart

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Writing tips from C.S. Lewis



1. Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn't mean anything else.


2. Always prefer the plain direct word to the long, vague one. Don’t implement promises, but keep them.


3. Never use abstract nouns when concrete ones will do. If you mean “More people died” don’t say “Mortality rose.”


4. In writing. Don’t use adjectives which merely tell us how you want us to feel about the thing you are describing. I mean, instead of telling us a thing was “terrible,” describe it so that we’ll be terrified. Don’t say it was “delightful”; make us say “delightful” when we've read the description. You see, all those words (horrifying, wonderful, hideous, exquisite) are only like saying to your readers “Please will you do my job for me.”


5. Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don’t say “infinitely” when you mean “very”; otherwise you’ll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite.

Friday, May 1, 2015

Book for sale soon!

A Book of Tiny Stories is a collection of tiny stories, short stories, and one novelette that I have been working on for quite a number of years. Some ideas are abandoned full length novels and some are ideas that I've had floating around for years.

Here are a couple of tidbits from my book. I hope you enjoy them.

I will be updating this blog with more information as time goes on.




Day Faith

     At the end of the day as I was walking home, I found a man lying on the ground who had been beaten. His shirt was torn, and his face was bloody and crying. He was pleading at me with big watery eyes, but I was running a little late for my favorite show.  I came to my house, and it appeared that the neighbors cat had been sick earlier, and had left a lovely present for me on my doorstep. As I walked in and threw my keys on the counter, the phone rang. It was Denise. She had been in Detroit for the last couple of days on business, and had decided to give me a ring because she felt obligated. Her call was meaningless. I half-listened to her as she rampaged against the politics of major car corporations, and hung up the phone when I couldn't take it anymore. She immediately called back, but I just sat there watching the phone as it rang, trying to imagine her frustration on the other end of the line. Eventually she must have gotten tired with the whole ordeal, because the phone quit ringing.

     I decided it was time to eat. Going to the freezer, I realized that I had bought nothing in the past month that even closely resembled sustenance. I ate anyway. Frozen biscuits usually taste better cooked... I didn't mind. I plopped into my chair, just in time to catch the credits of my show. Damn Denise. Damn her to Hell.

     Oh well... I stood up and kicked the TV in. Another day. Deciding whether to sleep in my suit or pajamas took up the better part of the next hour, until I determined that my suit just didn't feel good anymore, so I stripped it off in the living room and pushed it into the corner. Ahhh, better.

     I studied myself in the bathroom mirror. The same tired shoulders, the same haggard face, the same graying hair. Depressed once again, I staggering to the bedroom, I coughed up blood and flem into my hand, and wiped it on the wall before I collapsed onto the bed with the grace of a corpse. I lay there, and laid there. All my life seemed to be wrapped up in today.

     I had gone to the doctor again today and he told me that my condition had not improved. As a matter of fact, it had grown worse. Much worse. If I sleep, I die. I haven't slept in fifteen years. I lay in bed and do not sleep. There are approximately twenty two thousand, three hundred and thirty seven dots on my ceiling. I finished counting them last night. I'm done counting my dots. I'm done counting on my luck.

Goodnight. I'm going to sleep.




Commander Yoq 
 
Chief Security Commander of Squadron One, Inio Alephandri Yoq climbed down to the ground from Recon 5. The Securityship held up to twenty passengers or ten Security robots. Today it was her and the top nine of her Damram.

Her mission: Find out what the hell happened at the Club Elix.

So basically: Capture suspects. Kill renegades. Bring in witnesses. Control the media. Clean up.
In all suspicion, she figured that this would be nothing more than a clean-up. The media had ceased yapping about gangs, it actually scared them to pieces. No one wants to hear about a bunch of crazy kids with guns blowing each other away. Not sponsors anyway. Oh hell, she didn't want to hear about it either. But here she was, and their was work to be done. But it pissed her off all the same.

Those stupid gang members. That's all I need now. First Lo-Ami takes out the Neo-Sushi on live TV, now I have to deal with this! Commander Yoq was New Boston's top officer. She took down the entire Kidd gang by herself. Any cop had a record like that could get whatever they wanted. But all she wanted was to kick some ass... And that was fine with her authorities. However, the cops these days weren't as tough as her. The numbers of actual humans in the COPCORP was dropping with each YER.

She had some problems with that, but it meant that the competition for choosing assignments was slim to none. And that she had no problem with. "Alright boys. Search out the Elix club. I want my two with me. Sgt. Goraw, I want you and the rest of the Damram to search out the ally ways. I'm going to take a look inside."

Sgt. Goraw nodded and with a mechanical voice said. "Move out," Human cops weren't that efficient these days... With all the gangs running around they didn't have enough stamina to catch up with them. But Mobots on the other hand... They were the key to keeping this city in peace; they didn't need to eat or sleep, just repairs and some jizz-juice and they were good to go. Actually she had no idea what it took to run one of those beasts. They ran, and that was enough for her. Let the 'Docs worry about 'em. I'm just here to clean up. She looked at her nails and sighed. She hated getting her nails broken... especially when picking up stupid gangs trash. It would be no problem. She was better. None of the other could compete.

The two Damram units were like her shadows. They were programmed that way. Ernie and Bert. She had named them off of some obscure 2-Vid she had seen many, many years ago. Where she turned... they turned. Whatever (or whoever) she fired at, they would also fire. They were exact mimes of her. That is, until she released them on some preset program stored into their memory. Recon Program 4 Modification D effective now... And so forth... Her green eye blinked and surveyed the dead outside with high band impacting. Her brown eye blinked as her iris focused on the Elix club. The UV picked up no one alive inside. They're all gone. Greeeeaat. Just corpses now. She should probably go check it out. Alright. Here she goes. Hopping upon Bert, they flew into the scene.

  Damram Sgt. Goraw did not have much luck either. He scanned the perimeter and nothing showed in his visuals. "Move out. Nothing confirmed." The six Damram Units with him began to move when Damram Venture spoke.

"Sir! Visual confirmed in sector 67-1! Scan concludes two DNA sigs. One seems to be Feline! Possibly a mutation or something else undetermined. The other has a carbon base, but it seems metalloid, possibly robotic."

Sgt. Goraw flexed his LM-2 Tiger Style Prototype. He might try it out sooner than parameters had anticipated. "Belay first order. Proceed to 67-1. Assault Formation 1-A." The Damram all pulled their Pulse Rifles from out of their arms.  "I will stay here and resume Com with The Commander. Now go!" Six deadly figures took off silently into the night sky, eyes gleaming a dark purple, Projacks glowing a silent red.

Sgt. Goraws Com program clicked on and spoke. "Commander Yoq. We have picked up two DNA sigs." She responded. "Good work Sgt. Goraw. I want them alive and well. Use the Slepurr packs on them. I want to see them sleeping like babies."

"Affirmative and out." Sgt. Goraw opened up her Com to Venture and the other Damram. "Venture, start Capture Program 102, Commander Yoq's orders. I am coming to you as we speak. Do not engage until I arrive." Venture responded. "Affirmative Sgt." Sgt. Goraw's torso seemed to bulge, and something like a third arm came out of his torso. But the thing was mobile, and seemed to move up his head until it covered both head and left shoulder. The Tiger Style Prototype warmed green and blinked. 

"101011100110110001001011010," it beeped. Sgt. Goraw beeped back to it: "Affirmative." His Projack pulsed and he was away.

  She jumped off the Damram and looked around. The faces of the Go gang looked so innocent. Like ordinary girls. Like orphans. Her demeanor changed. Like whores. Like street trash with their pretty outfits. Thinking boys will want them because of their bodies. Thinking they were the queens of the night just because of their technology. Commander Yoq laughed her head off. She used to be a member of this pathetic gang. Perhaps that's why she gave them such an easy time. She could have busted them sooooo many times, but just let them slide. Empathy? Yes, she guessed that's what it was. The Go Girls gave her a chance to break out of the ghetto.

Oh well, that was a lifetime ago. She sent Ernie and Bert to look in the club. She kicked around outside. Too many deaths. Too much pride in their little heads. They thought they were all that. They thought they could rule the world. But that's the problem... Each gang thought the exact same thing. Stupid sluts. I've seen their tags around town. Even on the Elixnode. 'Angels of New Boston.' 'The Princesses.' Yeah right. She kicked the glass away and sighed heavily. It was going to be a long day.