May 5, 2020

“Window Shopping,” A Short Story by Brian Wryter

The sun was not bright like the day before. It was a gentle and calm sun. Clouds covered it and made it calm and gentle, but still the light from it gave the time the meaning of morning. The man woke up and brushed his teeth. He looked at himself in the mirror and felt deep shame. A kind of shame that made him not want to look in the mirror anymore. He put on his jeans and a white t-shirt that had a stain on the left shoulder from the pasta he ate the night before. The man didn’t look at the time and went outside his mother’s house. He didn’t say where he was going to his mother and two sisters. His sisters were in the lounge watching something that had a lot…

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May 3, 2020

Mario Loprete — Urban Paintings on Concrete

Posted by Mike Rochester in Fine Art

Mario Loprete Artist’s Statement: I live in a world that i shape at my liking, throughout a virtual pictorial and sculptural movement, transferring my experiences, photographing reality throughout my filters, refined from years research and experimentation. Painting for me is the first love. An important, pure love. Creating a painting, starting from the spasmodic research of a concept with which I want to send a message to transmit my message, it’s the base of my painting. The sculpture is my lover, my artistic betrayal to the painting. That voluptuous and sensual lover that gives me different emotions, that touches prohibited cords… The new series of works on concrete it’s the one that is giving me more personal and professional satisfactions. How was it born? It was the result of an important investigation of my work, the research of that “quid” that i felt was missing….

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April 29, 2020

“A Very Vulnerable Place,” by Alexander Kemp

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Writing

“You’re neither in Heaven nor Hell.” “Is this Purgatory?” The Old Man sighed. “Some call it that.” I looked around the modest cottage. The only furniture present was a wooden cross on the wall. Heat arose from the fireplace. The windows had thick black bars. “Have I been here before?” I asked. The Old Man pointed to the brown door. “Put your ear to it and listen.” Rushing over to the door, the knob vanished as I reached for it. I put my ear to the wood. No sound. “Close your eyes,” The Old Man instructed. * My elderly father pounded the table. “His eyes twitched. They opened. I’m serious, doctor.” “This has to be God bringing him back,” my frantic mother explained. Dr. North held his hands up. He said, “Eyes twitch. This happens…

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April 28, 2020

The Jack & Phil Show Returns! A Book Marketing Strategy That Really Works

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in News

UPDATE April 28: Our apologies for the snafu last week! Technical difficulties, which have now been addressed and corrected. We hope you’ll come back tomorrow, April 29, to enjoy our presentation. Please make sure to register at the link below if you have not re-registered since the presentation’s postponement. If you aren’t sure whether you are registered or not, you can click on the link below to make sure. Are you the author of a book, self- or indie-published, fiction or non-fiction? If you’ve tried any of the latest (usually costly and relatively unsuccessful) schemes and strategies to publicize and market your book, you may have given up hope. Here’s a free webinar that will help you do just that, and have fun doing it! Take heart. Fictional Café founder and author Jack B. Rochester and…

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April 26, 2020

“Carson McCullers,” Poetry by Abigail George

Posted by Mike Rochester in Writing

Carson McCullers I will always love music, she said to me. Turned her face away and became a sad ghost like all the people that I have loved in my life. The sad ghost, dead snakes, the religious, the ordered hide mischief in plain sight. The geranium has a tongue and the sky appears to be falling. The moon walks wider now. It curls up. The red-haired sun does not know how to travel lightly in summer. She swoons. She will fall at your feet if you remove articles of your clothing. I travel light in these heavy years. Waving earlier to the good women who pass me by. With their white teeth and their sweet breath. Bread to the soul. And the wind is sunburnt from the form and shape of the river, to the…

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April 23, 2020

“Of Dark Energy,” A Short Story by G. D. McFetridge

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Writing

Something about the old man seemed unpredictable—motives hidden behind the vacuous glimmer in his eyes, the way he stroked his long gray beard, his thunderous laugh—and he had told the same story for years. His only son, Lukas, when he was a senior in high school had survived a car accident that killed three people. The other driver was drunk, and he and his wife died instantly. Her nephew died two days later. But young Luke walked away with cuts and a few fractured ribs. The old man always said, “My boy was born just plain lucky.” Many years later after his father died of lymphoma, Luke thought it prudent to get a thorough medical examination, and everything seemed fine until the doctor telephoned to discuss the lab reports. He didn’t go into specifics but…

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April 17, 2020

“Cosmic Deletions,” An Audio Drama by David Copper

Posted by Ruby Fink in Audio Arts

Cosmic Deletions by David Copper is an audio drama about Kassidy, a broke, young woman who is recently unemployed, who gets a strange offer from a man, Max, who works for The Company who created everything. And that means everything. And because of what she did to her boss at her last job, she is the perfect candidate to do something that Max cannot. Delete those who The Company deems unfit for the world they created. The only problem, Kassidy has her own agenda. She has her own deletions she wants to make. To listen and find more fun audio adventures, like Cosmic Deletions by David Copper, go to: https://www.fictionalcafe.com If you want to check out the website or meet the cast, go to: https://cosmicdeletions.com

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April 16, 2020

“Mythomane’s Truth,” Poetry by Sanjeev Sethi

Posted by Mike Rochester in Writing

Mythomane’s Truth If we could retrofit ourselves? I would not be me nor you, you. Imagine me without infirmities. I would no longer be po-faced, pudgy and potbellied. My eyes wouldn’t swim sans Adam’s ale. If any of this gladdens your gut: I reckon, you aren’t for me. ** Flux From entanglements of existence I’m in firmament of my own. In roll-call of needs anamnesis mitigates. Past is polished with coats of one’s inner complexion. Peeps are like diaries different page different piece: same smell. ** Vision When you unself from a situation or skein: you deliver lavish dividends for yourself. Opportune distancing mends the ache: of the eventualities of our exploits. Propinquity bedims the perspective: leaving us to lust after our parakeet or pelt. *** Sanjeev Sethi is published in over 25 countries. He has more than 1200 poems printed or posted…

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April 14, 2020

“Vogel,” A Novel Excerpt by David Lincoln

Posted by Mike Rochester in Writing

TUESDAY, JUNE 13, 1944 AMIENS, FRANCE STANDARTENFUHRER HANS VOGEL entered cell 51. His black uniform was spotless and sat on his shoulders the way it would a man comfortable with physical exertion. The SS insignia on his collar faintly reflected the light from the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. It was the only illumination in the cell, which reeked of urine and the familiar coppery scent of blood. The naked prisoner sat in a steel chair, straddling the drain in the middle of the room. His wrists were bound to the arms of the chair, his ankles held fast to its legs. Leather straps held his chest rigid. One eye was swollen and purple. His lips were shredded, and his body was peppered with bruises. A sergeant wearing a Wehrmacht uniform was standing behind…

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April 12, 2020

Arya F. Jenkins — An Author Interview

Posted by Mike Rochester in Interviews

Editor’s Note: We asked author and FC member/contributor, Arya F. Jenkins, a few questions about her book of short stories. Interview with Arya F. Jenkins Author of Blue Songs in an Open Key Short stories published by Fomite, 2018 When did you first get the idea to write this book? I was in the midst of a long love affair with jazz when I first started writing fiction with the idea of having it published. I decided to do something a little different and interweaved my love for that music into a story. My short story, “So What,” was inspired by the first cut in the seminal album by Miles Davis, Kinda Blue, and won first prize in a fiction contest in Jerry Jazz Musician, a jazz-based zine run by Joe Maita. That was in 2012, and subsequently I was asked to write more stories for Jerry Jazz Musician, which I did, at…

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