September 29, 2016

Win Real Coffee in the Fictional Cafe Sticker Contest!!

The Fictional Café (not a real café) is teaming up with Café Monte Alto (a real café) for a brand new contest. You may recall we recently came into some very real Fictional Café stickers. Well, you can win real coffee from Café Monte Alto by putting your very real Fictional Café sticker in the most creative place and sending us a picture of it. The person with the best sticker placement will receive an 8oz bag of any blend of coffee from Café Monte Alto and their winning photo will be featured on our website. Four more creative sticker affixers will each receive a 2oz bag of any blend of coffee from Café Monte Alto. To Enter: Simply email us and say you’d like to participate in the FC Sticker Contest and we’ll send you…

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September 16, 2016

Podcast: “It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis, Episode 2

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Book Reviews, Podcasts

Here we continue our September podcast of the Amazon/Audible audiobook, “It Can’t Happen Here,” with thanks to Amazon, Blackstone Audio, Inc. and the excellent narration by Grover Gardner. In this segment we see how Senator “Buzz” Windrip insidiously works toward becoming president from the perspective of Doremus Jessup, editor of a small-town Vermont newspaper. In case you missed last Friday’s first episode, it’s here. If you have any concerns about the sentiment of the American people or their feelings about the current presidential candidates, you owe it to yourself to listen to, or read, this novel. The Audiobooks version is available here on Amazon for a very reasonable price, or free if you take a one-month subscription.

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September 14, 2016

When Ghosts of the City’s Past Linger: A Review of “The Appearance of Annie Van Sinderen,” by Simran P. Gupta

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Book Reviews

Editor’s Note: With this book review, we take great pleasure in introducing Simran P. Gupta, a new and talented contributor to Fictional Café. Learn more about Simran at the end of her review. We hope to be seeing a lot more of her writing here at the Café! When Ghosts of the City’s Past Linger: A Review of “The Appearance of Annie Van Sinderen,” by Simran P. Gupta Katherine Howe’s YA novel, The Appearance of Annie Van Sinderen, is a perfect combination of spooky and romantic. The result is an equally enthralling and chilling story. Perhaps most impressive is the fact that Howe has written a love story in which one half of the equation is a ghost– yet she never says the word. As summer eases into autumn, this is a perfect book to…

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September 13, 2016

Jessica Edouard’s Inspirational Artwork

Posted by Mike Rochester in Fine Art

* * * Jessica Edouard is a historical romance novelist from the Pacific Northwest. She created her website, Send Sunshine to “touch as many people as possible with a vision of positivity and squelch our acceptance of negative influence.” You can find more of her writing on her website or at her Etsy shop.

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September 11, 2016

“Switzerland” by T.R. Healy

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art

Seated on a three-legged stool, Neuheisel inhaled the steam rising from the cup of Costa Rican coffee then with a soup spoon broke the thin crust that began to appear at the surface of the cup. Briefly he closed his eyes then filled the spoon with coffee, leaned over, and noisily slurped it into his mouth. Jenny, the young woman he was training to be a barista, smiled. For a moment he let the coffee sit on his tongue, making sure it touched all his taste buds, then spit it out into a large brass bowl in the center of the table. “Now it’s your turn,” he said after filling her six ounce cup with coffee. Again she smiled, sliding a little closer to the table. “First off, you should identify the aroma. Is it…

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September 9, 2016

Podcast: “It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis, First Episode

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Book Reviews, Podcasts

In 1935, a well regarded novelist named Sinclair Lewis published a book entitled It Can’t Happen Here. The story concerns a senator who is perceived as a man of, for and by the people. But when elected president, he reveals himself as a dictator and turns the United States into a totalitarian police state. This is a story which, 81 years later, still makes Americans cringe. Yet as we look toward the 2016 presidential elections, it’s hard to escape the fact that the Republican candidate frequently rings this bell. For further evidence of this view, read this op-ed from the Boston Globe by Joan Wickersham, “An eerily familiar fiction.” Once a stage play, the novel was never made into a movie. Fortunately, it was made into an Audible Audiobook, which we are excerpting here with…

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September 7, 2016

A Bevy of Poems by Paula Bonnell

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art

Waking from a Nightmare I am awash in the terrible seas of the night; dream waves lift me and drop me. Every hollow is a deep pit: water for drowning is its floor and I am sure to go under. Gold could be lead in this lack of light, and the sea so big no one could measure its changes. I am rising through blacknesses, drowned in the bleak shutting out of even the sheer blasts of the weather. And as I am rising, utterly lost, the dark water leaching my last warmth you are there soft in the bed beside me, the mercy of your flesh draped exactly on your skeleton. Your body posits axioms of warmth as you draw breath, confident as the geometer in the sand, and though the soldier strike you…

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September 5, 2016

“If Only They Could See Her Now!” by KJ Hannah Greenberg

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art

Not only had Kimmy visited star systems far beyond the ken of her race, but she had left behind, in all viable places, descendants who copulated fruitfully and who lived twice the natural life span of her species. Though she had wished for a corner of the community chambers, what she had been granted was something far more wondrous. The adventure began when Kimmy returned home between trips of campers. There were three shifts and she was on payroll for the entire summer. Though both Ross and Dad had written to her, there was nothing like her familiar hibernaculum to ease her to sleep or to bring on handsome dreams. Sadly, Dad’s handwriting was becoming increasingly illegible. Like many great omnivores before him, he suffered from a combination of Fatty Liver Disease, Lethargy, and The…

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September 2, 2016

Lost in Thought: September Submissions

Posted by Mike Rochester in News

As those sunny summer days wind to a close, we start to wonder where the time went. I like to recall those days spent with head in the clouds, those hours sitting by the pond reflecting on life, while life reflected back at me. Our submissions this month are all about such head-in-the-clouds moments. Thomas Healy starts our offerings with his short story “Switzerland,” in which we see a man who sits all day by a fountain, lost in thought. To where does his mind venture? Where would yours go? Next up we have the poetry of Paula Bonnell. She ponders the “somedays” of life alongside vivid descriptions of nightmares past. Read along to see where her eyes and mind bring you. For our art this month, we feature the inspirational images of Jessica Edouard…

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August 29, 2016

Emily Harstone says Writers Must Be Readers

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Guest Posts, News

There are essentially two schools of thought about how to become a writer. The older European school says read, read, read. The newer American school says, go to college – in particular a graduate creative writing program – and study to be a writer. Emily Harstone (a nom de plume) wrote the following article, “Why Writers Need To Read To Be Writers” for the AuthorsPublish website [if you’re a writer and you aren’t a member, you should be]. Following AuthorsPublish guidelines, here is an excerpt from Emily’s article. Go to the article link above to read it in its entirety. “When I was a child I read one book every day. And by a book, I mean a one hundred to two hundred page novel. Usually it was part of a series. Often it was nothing that would…

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