Talebones Weekly
CONTEST WINNER & What's Next??
Dear Reader…
Welcome to another exciting edition of Talebones Weekly!
We’ve got some important stuff to talk about, so let’s get started!
New Tale Next Week!
Be aware that there will be NO TALEBONES WEEKLY next Tuesday!
Instead, I’ll be posting our July Short Tale: The Revelation of Scott Candle!
In this suspenseful tale, a megachurch pastor meets his match on an ill-fated book tour. This story is the first half of a duology with our August story, so you won’t want to miss it!
Make sure you’re subscribed to Talebones to receive the new story at 7am PST next Tuesday morning in your inbox!
NOTE: Ivy & Ixos will continue on Fridays as usual!
Stay tuned for an excerpt from our Short Tale at the end of this missive!
Flash Fiction Contest Winner!!
Thank you to EVERYONE who took part in our first-ever flash fiction contest! It was SO incredible reading everyone’s creative takes on the prompt while also reading and voting for their favorites.
I am pleased to announce that the votes are in, and our winner is:
- with his tale Get Well, Man!
Now, funny enough, Scoot already has a year-long comp to Talebones thanks to his help auditing the site before its release, so I asked him whom he would like me to forfeit the prize to in his honor. He was adamant that it should go to the next story in line, and so…
- has won the year-long Talebones Archive membership with his story Screen Time!
Additionally, our runners-up,
(The Eyewitnesses) and (Through The Back Door), will both receive three-month comps in honor of their highly-voted entries!
NOTE: All comps will start when the Archive opens in September.
Check out ALL of the stories here to see all the incredible talent on display in this community. And THANK YOU AGAIN for sharing your creativity with us!
And now, before you go on about your day, please enjoy this excerpt from our July Short Tale…
Excerpt - “The Revelation of Scott Candle”
In the dawn hours of a late September Sunday a black Escalade pulled into the empty parking lot of Lake Damascus Community Church.
“We’re here,” said Andy from the driver’s seat, shutting off the engine. He peered into the rearview mirror and said again, “Pastor Candle? We’re here.”
In the backseat, Pastor Scott Candle stirred and stretched. He had slept most of the early morning ferry ride to Ferris Island and the subsequent drive up the small island’s length. He checked his phone: 7am.
Scott looked out the window and rubbed his eyes to clear the fog, then realized it was foggy outside, too. In the dim light the little church sat crouched on the edge of a gray lake studded with mallards that slipped out and away, around wooded corners, its borders vanishing into the darkness and the low mist. All was country-quiet with no other buildings, cars, or people in sight.
Andy peered at his phone. “We’re early,” he said.
Scott grunted and unlocked his screen. He knew his wife would have been awake for hours already, and he considered sending her a text letting her know he had made it safely. As it was unlikely she would have time to check her own phone in between all of the Sunday morning tasks on her usual list, he decided against it, reasoning he would call her in the evening from the next leg of the trip.
“Should we…” Andy let the question fade on his lips.
“I’m sure someone will show up soon,” Scott said, without looking up. Even here, in the middle of nowhere, his email notifications were overflowing. His congregation was now firmly in the upper thousands—almost ten thousand—between three services, and the elder board was in the midst of considering adding a fourth in the evening to serve the college student population, precipitating plenty of emailed missives back and forth.
But more importantly, his new book—Wild Wonder—had just reached #2 on the New York Times bestseller list and everyone wanted a piece of him: journalists, podcasters, bloggers, other writers. Quinn, his publicist, fielded most of his communications, but plenty still got through, enough to give him a hearty dopamine hit every time he checked his phone.
This regional western Washington speaking tour to promote the book had been Quinn’s brainchild, but adding tiny Ferris Island to the list of locations had been Scott’s idea. And even when Quinn fought him on it, he was adamant. So she squeezed it into the schedule between Sequim and Whidbey—assuring him it was completely under protest—and allowed him a precious twenty-four hours to indulge whatever nostalgia he was trying to indulge.
“Gonna stretch my legs,” Scott muttered, opening the car door and stepping out. It was colder than it had initially seemed from inside the car, and Scott grabbed the designer parka he had been using as a blanket and slipped it on, zipping it with trembling fingers. All was eerily quiet in the dim morning, every sound muffled by the fog.
Scott strode up to the church and cupped his hands around his eyes so he could peer in through the window. The building was small enough that the front door looked straight through into the sanctuary.
Someone was sitting in the front row facing the altar. Scott startled, then knocked on the door.
Hi! I’m not sure if this qualifies for a feature in Talebones Weekly but I recently launched a project on substack call The Books That Made Us. Each week we’ll host a different guest writer to write an essay about a ‘foundational book’ - I.e. a book (often fiction) that they feel helped make them who they are today.
Would love to feature posts from the fiction writers of substack (we’ve already garnered hundreds of subscribers so will hopefully drive them new eyes to their respective substacks) if possible!
Also would love to feature a post from you too at some point, S. E.!
More info here:
https://booksthatmadeus.substack.com/p/introducing-the-books-that-made-us
👌👌👌