Dear Reader…
First, some housekeeping!
Our summer season of fiction is just around the corner! Over the next few weeks I’ll be poking and prodding at a few things around the Talebones site to make sure everything is ready for regular posting in June, so please excuse my dust if you see little changes here and there.
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About a week ago, I shared a piece of flash fiction here called Cliffsong. It was my first piece of fiction shared exclusively to Substack, and I really, really appreciated everyone’s kind reactions!
Thank you for giving this new adventure of mine such a warm welcome!
Something I’m planning to do when the Archive launches this fall is include a Seasonal Summary post with each batch of archived content where I answer questions and give a little behind-the-scenes for each story I’ve posted.
But since Cliffsong is homepage-based flash fiction and won’t be archived, I have been pondering how to answer some of the questions expressed in the comments of that story.
Cliffsong was a wholly original idea cooked up for the Fictionistas prompt and not based on any of my previous characters or works, but after writing it I’ve since figured out a pretty detailed background for our unusual narrator friend, the posthumous paramour, and the island of exile! Enough for a longer piece of short fiction, anyway.
Some people like mystery and for the questions to remain unanswered, and some people probably want to know more.
So I’ll ask you in the following poll: would you rather I leave Cliffsong as-is, or would you like to see a longer piece of short fiction based on it?
I’m happy either way, so let me know!
Thanks in advance for your thoughts, I appreciate your feedback!
Finally, just for fun, here’s a Drabble (100-word story) I posted on Erica Drayton ‘s site this week. The prompt was “How ‘bout them 1940s?”
“Best Picture”
Early morning diner. Quiet.
“Hey, Mort,” Vinnie said, “what won Best Picture in 1940?”
Mort took a bite of pie. “Rebecca.”
Tammy shook her head over the glass she was polishing. “Nah. It was You Can’t Take It With You. Frank Capra.”
“I thought it was Boys Town,” said Clarabelle, plates stacked sky-high on her forearm.
“Goodbye, Mr. Chips!” said someone in the corner booth.
“Idiot, it was Grapes of Wrath,” said another voice from the bar.
But Mort and Vinnie were gone; empty plates, no cash. Dine and dash.
“Gone With The Wind,” Tammy said. And that ended that.
I refuse to vote! I see value in both options, but I don't want to commit you to expanding on a story if you don't have the inspiration to.
I've mentioned a couple times, I'm perfectly comfortable not reading a series if I think it will ruin the books for me (the rest of the Enders Game or Dune series, for example). So I'm comfortable with Mystery. But if you have an idea for how to expand it and you are itching to write it, then don't hold yourself back! Tell the stories that you feel need to be told!
What you have with Cliffsong is a compelling world with lots of unanswered questions. If I were doing my own take on this idea, I might write other stories which broaden the world but which leave key mysteries unanswered. Sometimes people just love the world a story is written in and want to continue to live there; the questions don't necessarily need to be answered.
I hope this comment has been perfectly unhelpful! And thank you for writing compelling and interesting stories for us!
I had to go read Cliffsong for more voting. First of all, absolutely wonderful. I'm with Scoot in that I am perfectly fine with mystery if you choose to leave it be. BUT.... I will vote for more out of purely selfish reasons. The narrator is just too intriguing to me. As is the captain. What's the deal with his golden dragonfly pin? There's so much going on!
Also, pecan pie is my hands down favorite.