We’ve been fortunate to have published both a previous work of fiction and some original fine art by Dory Fiamingo in the past. The woman is a creative maelstrom, and has finished another novel, Requiem for a Caged Bird. It’s a great read, it really is. We hope you get to read it in its entirety in the very near future (as we have), but for now we’re presenting a special Three Days of Dory excerpt, yes, you guessed right, for the next three days! Here is the first of three short tastes from this wonderful work of a contemporary fantasy fiction. Sebastian (“Bastian”) is an almost-immortal private eye able to leap from one world to another. Maggie, the love of his life, had walked out on him thirty years earlier. She shows up at his cosmic bookstore,…
Announcing Our First Annual Short Story Contest
To celebrate entering our fifth year bringing excellent short fiction to the world, we are opening a new venue for writers: the Fictional Cafe Short Fiction Contest. Here’s how it works: Step One: Over the course of the summer, writers enter their works in one of ten categories for fiction. Entry will cost a nominal fee, to prevent us from getting spammed. FC subscribers get a discount. Step One-and-a-Half: The most-viewed story for each month from January to June, 2017, is automatically entered into the contest for free. Step Two: This fall, our readers vote on the entered stories in head-to-head, double-elimination tournament action. Step Three: We put the first and second place winners for each category into an actual print anthology made out of actual dead trees. And a Kindle edition, too. Step Four: That anthology…
“Fractured” by Lorie Adair
FRACTURED The snow maids among us are idle angels too terrified to plumb the icy depths of murderous woe. Their eyes are thick with wax, smiles startled artifice, words unintelligible skeletons. Lovers cannot repair the distance; they are but shadows on the lawn, roosters who savage along. I shall be well again a hollow phrase they repeat in therapy where they dream someday it will ring sapphire true. Until then they lie in bleached valleys of waste and shame, fractured mirrors, aborted stars. * * * Lorie Adair is the recipient of several Norman Mailer Scholarships and Arizona Commission on the Arts Creative Writing fellowships. Spider Woman’s Loom was a finalist for the Southwest Writers Award and a semi-finalist for the Dana Award. She has written for NPR affiliate, KJZZ, and her fiction and…
“In Love With a Ghost” by Jenny Cokeley
In Love with a Ghost It was a silent slipping away. They hadn’t just grown apart. That would make it seem like they could grow together if they had the motivation, but they had no compelling incentive to move together, or move on for that matter. They would rather be unhappy together than alone. It had been 15 years, after all. They became roommates who shared the same bed, mailing address, and monthly Sunday romp. She didn’t talk to her friends about her loveless marriage over coffee or her profound loneliness over lunch. Jesus, just finish already. I faked it ten minutes ago. I even finished my shopping list. Maybe you should lay off the pork rinds for a while. You shouldn’t have to work this hard. Do you have to pant and groan in…
New and Old Friends – April Submissions
My mom recently shared this quote with me about the importance of maintaining friendships. Here at the Fictional Café, we like to pass these lessons learned on to our readers. Whether you’re a literary community like ours or an individual in the creative arts, connecting with others opens so many doors and opportunities. Life is all about relationships, and we hope you will enjoy yours with us and encourage others to join us! This month, a good friend introduced us to a new community. We’d like to welcome our readers and members from GrubStreet, a Boston-based non-profit that provides resources to writers of all levels, including workshops, seminars and networking events. Please check them out. In the spirit of the quotation above, we will be featuring work from both new members and long-time members this month. Before…
Faux Fiction Audio: The Cast
Writing, reading, recording and sharing our creative work Our featured podcasts for March were the first four episodes from “Mickie McKinney, Boy Detective.” The show was written, directed and produced by Ruby Fink, who heads up her own audio studio and staff of talented, hard-working performers of Faux Fiction Audio out there on the Left Coast [where else?]. What began for Ruby as something simply fun to do has turned into her passion. What next? She hopes a business, specializing in producing podcasts and audiobooks for authors. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, you can continue listening to Mickie here [we’re up to Episode 5, “Brawn and Brain”], while you wait for Ruby and her cast to get Season Two up. You can also listen to the Mickie podcasts on iTunes [podcasts, store, search “mickie mckinney”]….
Podcast: Mickie McKinney, Boy Detective, Part IV
From left to right: Violet Faux as Samantha, Lucas Faux as Mickie, Leann Faux as Burner and Writer-Director Ruby Faux. Here’s the news, Fictional Cafe habitués: Although this is the last episode in the story of the chemistry lab explosion, it’s not the last in the Mickie McKinney story. If you like what you’ve listened to here, please head over to Faux Fiction Audio to listen to more. The next episode is “Brain and Brawn.” This is such a unique theme in today’s podcasting, featuring a teenager in middle school who solves mysteries and problems for his classmates. A tip of the barista hats to Ruby Fink, the series creator, and to all the folks who listened to weekly episodes on her site. They have inspired her to keep going. She and her talented team…
Podcast: Mickie McKinney, Boy Detective, Part III
Mickie’s back in this third, continuing story of the boy detective who solves mysteries at Maple Ridge Middle School in exchange for anything made of sugar. In this episode, Mickie and his sidekick Samantha Hayes (pictured) begin a new investigation: there’s been an explosion in the chemistry lab. Was it a simple accident or something more? The principal thinks it’s the former, but Mickie, of course, thinks it’s the latter. Enjoy this two-part, skillfully plotted, often humorous and always entertaining story. The second episode comes your way in two days, and more all week. Please click on the arrow below to listen to Mickie McKinney, Part III.
Guest Blogger Clark Zlotchew – “Havana, 1959”
Editor’s Note: You may recall Clark Zlotchew’s poetry in our December Submissions. I had a chance to talk with Clark about his experience in Cuba and his writing. Did this trip inspire the poem and photo you shared with us? Yes, my several trips to Cuba did inspire the poem “Dancing in the Tropics” but with a little help from what I witnessed in Haiti as well. These events took place in the last years of Fulgencio Batista’s regime, while Castro was in the mountains at the other end of the Island. I was there in 1957 and 1958. Those guns and pup tents on the roof of the Presidential Palace were protecting Batista. The occasional bomb blast in Havana was set by Castro’s agents. Castro took over the whole Island in 1959. Was it scary seeing…
“Journaling Abroad” by Rachael Allen
I’ve been studying in Italy for over two months, and have become a journaler. I’ve become a dedicated one too, sitting down to write for almost an hour each day in these flexible canvas-covered, orange-detailed notebooks I purchase from a bookstore off Bologna’s main street. In these journals, I recap my day. I write about the food I ate. I spiral into analyzing my emotions, then pick myself up with a second-person pep talk, occasionally feeling strongly enough to address myself by name. I am glad my Italian roommates don’t understand English well nor know the spot in the second drawer of my bedside table where I stack the journals, beside a jar of Skippy peanut butter from home and my monthly food allowance. What are these journals worth, really? Are they worth all the…