This science fiction premise has become a cliché. So how do you give this plotting device a twist? Being the last person on earth may be more common than thought when the subject is comatose and unable to cry to the outside world for help. The ultimate question then may be, “Can anybody hear me?”
A few readers called “Last Man on Earth” terrifying. It’s posted at Every day Fiction (http://www.everydayfiction.com/the-last-person-on-earth-by-walter-giersbach/). You tell me. Maybe it’s my odd sense of the ridiculous, but I wrote the story in an ironic vein. It’s less about death than about nurses who knock on the doors of comatose patients, doctors who flout mortality with their vices, and the hubris of scientific dogma. But my thanks go to some scientist who used the metaphor of Christmas tree lights blinking off in the brain. Now that’s ironic!
This is my third short story EDF has published, so I feel a great deal of appreciation for editors Jordan Lapp and Camille Gooderham Campbell and Webmaster Steven Smethurst.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Ghost of a Valentine
I was fascinated by the first successful face transplant, on Nov. 31, 2005, when a 38-year-old French woman received—literally—a new outlook on life. As reported by Time magazine’s Jeffrey Kluger, “No surgery quite crosses the existential line the way transplant surgery does. Create a single chimeric human with the tissues of another and the very sense of self goes wobbly.” My interest was more in the poetry of undying love than in Gray’s Anatomy, asking if the face is a reflection of the person within. That’s the thesis behind “Ghost of a Valentine,” at http://www.everydayfiction.com/ghost-of-a-valentine-by-walter-giersbach/
News items like this make me run to the PC. William Gibson (Spook Country) grabbed me last week when he wrote, “She remembered [him] describing Stockholm syndrome, the fondness and loyalty one could supposedly come to feel for even the most brutal captor.... America had developed Stockholm syndrome toward its own government, post 9/11.”
Great concept! This has taken me into writing a mystery about a wealthy, educated career woman apparently disappears. Going missing, however, isn’t murder. It turns out that with all the achievement and wealth, she escapes from her “kidnappers” of parents, boyfriend, career, and education.
Other idea-generators have included a feature in the China Post surmising that most cubicle rats have “office spouses”" (every editor was outraged at this one), a blog from numerologists worrying about the number 11 (below, sold to Bewildering Stories), a news item about Chinese studying how magnets make it possible to “read” a hidden newspaper (“Magnetic Resonance,” waiting for an acceptance), and a psychologist describing Capgras syndrome, in which a family member becomes unrecognizable (sold to Mouth Full of Bullets).
Amazing how ideas can be transformed into fiction. Grab them, jot them down, shaken them up, let them ferment--and then see what comes out of the bottle.
News items like this make me run to the PC. William Gibson (Spook Country) grabbed me last week when he wrote, “She remembered [him] describing Stockholm syndrome, the fondness and loyalty one could supposedly come to feel for even the most brutal captor.... America had developed Stockholm syndrome toward its own government, post 9/11.”
Great concept! This has taken me into writing a mystery about a wealthy, educated career woman apparently disappears. Going missing, however, isn’t murder. It turns out that with all the achievement and wealth, she escapes from her “kidnappers” of parents, boyfriend, career, and education.
Other idea-generators have included a feature in the China Post surmising that most cubicle rats have “office spouses”" (every editor was outraged at this one), a blog from numerologists worrying about the number 11 (below, sold to Bewildering Stories), a news item about Chinese studying how magnets make it possible to “read” a hidden newspaper (“Magnetic Resonance,” waiting for an acceptance), and a psychologist describing Capgras syndrome, in which a family member becomes unrecognizable (sold to Mouth Full of Bullets).
Amazing how ideas can be transformed into fiction. Grab them, jot them down, shaken them up, let them ferment--and then see what comes out of the bottle.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Food Fantasies
There seems to be a natural affinity between fiction and food. Comestibles and condiments mix well with horror and homelife. “Face in the Tree” trades on one such affection gone wrong over a love of barbecue. You can read it at http://www.southernfriedweirdness.blogspot.com/. Hope you enjoy this bit of foolishness—and remember that the recipe for vengeance calls for different kinds of ingredients.
Someone mentioned that I could double the submissions potential of food fantasy by submitting the stories to Food TV. If they ever start featuring fiction along with the fajitas, maybe Bobby Flay will review it.
Someone mentioned that I could double the submissions potential of food fantasy by submitting the stories to Food TV. If they ever start featuring fiction along with the fajitas, maybe Bobby Flay will review it.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Art Imitating Reality—or Vice Versa?
A feature in today’s New York Times reported overweight people are resisting entreaties to become rail-thin. “Blogs written by fat people—and it’s fine to use the word, they say—have multiplied in recent months, filling a virtual soapbox known as the fatosphere.” The bloggers (Kate Harding’s Shapely Prose at www.kateharding.net has 3,710 hits per day) resist the notion that a St. Bernard has to become a greyhound.
Hurray! “Laura Lard Takes No Prisoners,” one of my stories in Cruising the Green of Second Avenue, has our eponymous heroine telling a waitress, “[Salad] is not the food of my people. Where I come from, a decent meal should be heavy enough to hold down a circus tent in a hurricane.” She has enough confidence in her image to make the cosmetics sales ladies at Bloomingdales wet their panties.
I’m a skinny guy, so maybe my opinions don’t count. Laura’s story line, however, is that her being fat is an attribute, and she defends it by doing an Elliott Ness against the Prejudice Mafia. Writing this story, a part of me expressed a strong belief that public sentiment wants to remake the obese, corpulent, oleaginous, turgid, stout and plump minority into the size, shape and silhouette of the chosen. Health and science demands it, the evangelists say.
That scares me. It’s just a matter of time until I become a target because I’m a casual smoker, whiskey drinker, fiscal conservative and social liberal. Oh—wait a minute! I already am a target! Beware the Prejudice Mafia. They’re watching you.
Hurray! “Laura Lard Takes No Prisoners,” one of my stories in Cruising the Green of Second Avenue, has our eponymous heroine telling a waitress, “[Salad] is not the food of my people. Where I come from, a decent meal should be heavy enough to hold down a circus tent in a hurricane.” She has enough confidence in her image to make the cosmetics sales ladies at Bloomingdales wet their panties.
I’m a skinny guy, so maybe my opinions don’t count. Laura’s story line, however, is that her being fat is an attribute, and she defends it by doing an Elliott Ness against the Prejudice Mafia. Writing this story, a part of me expressed a strong belief that public sentiment wants to remake the obese, corpulent, oleaginous, turgid, stout and plump minority into the size, shape and silhouette of the chosen. Health and science demands it, the evangelists say.
That scares me. It’s just a matter of time until I become a target because I’m a casual smoker, whiskey drinker, fiscal conservative and social liberal. Oh—wait a minute! I already am a target! Beware the Prejudice Mafia. They’re watching you.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
If Editors Only Realized
The holidays can be so filled with Himalayas of joy and Marianna Trenches of despair that I’m happy to report my family—all of them—and I came through them with great experiences, sensations and memories. One added Christmas present came on Dec. 26 when I opened my mail to find an acceptance from Every Day Fiction (www.EveryDayFiction.com) for the flash piece “The Last Person on Earth.” [Publication date to come shortly.] Camille said of it, “A fascinating concept and well-crafted prose. The last line is particularly well done.” Co-editor Jordan remarked, “Wow. This asks so many questions beyond the actual story. It’s so deep and yet so short. Another beauty from you.”
This is my second piece to have been accepted and published by this new [2007] online magazine. As with a few other editors, it’s a pleasure to deal with these thoughtful people. Every writer has received snarky rejections from don’t-bother-me editors. A friend of mine actually got an-mail back saying, “This story is crap!”
How nice then for BJ Bourg, publisher and editor of Mouth Full of Bullets (www.MouthFullofBullets.com) to tell me in September that he was truly and personally sorry he had to reject a story. A few months later, he wrote about another submission, “Thanks for submitting such wonderful work! I really enjoyed ‘Epitaph with Flowers’ and will publish it in December 2008. I hope all is going great for you and that you have a Happy Thanksgiving.”
Wow! Those are the kinds of responses—for acceptances and rejections—that keep writers coming back. I’ve struck a number of magazines off my list of markets because there didn’t seem to be a human being at the helm. Queries weren't answered, delays were interminable, approvals were later cancelled. Others, however, have gotten my checks for subscriptions.
As a side note, this encouragement means I've spent more time—successfully—writing to specific genres. The good editors are making me examine their markets more closely—and making me a better writer. Makes me wonder if editors know the effect they have on writers.
This is my second piece to have been accepted and published by this new [2007] online magazine. As with a few other editors, it’s a pleasure to deal with these thoughtful people. Every writer has received snarky rejections from don’t-bother-me editors. A friend of mine actually got an-mail back saying, “This story is crap!”
How nice then for BJ Bourg, publisher and editor of Mouth Full of Bullets (www.MouthFullofBullets.com) to tell me in September that he was truly and personally sorry he had to reject a story. A few months later, he wrote about another submission, “Thanks for submitting such wonderful work! I really enjoyed ‘Epitaph with Flowers’ and will publish it in December 2008. I hope all is going great for you and that you have a Happy Thanksgiving.”
Wow! Those are the kinds of responses—for acceptances and rejections—that keep writers coming back. I’ve struck a number of magazines off my list of markets because there didn’t seem to be a human being at the helm. Queries weren't answered, delays were interminable, approvals were later cancelled. Others, however, have gotten my checks for subscriptions.
As a side note, this encouragement means I've spent more time—successfully—writing to specific genres. The good editors are making me examine their markets more closely—and making me a better writer. Makes me wonder if editors know the effect they have on writers.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
What’s to Be Afraid of in a Number?
A letter crossed my desk years ago from a fellow who’d written a book exposing odd cyclical correlations. The price of pig iron in China, he believed, ran in cycles comparable to sow bellies in Iowa. I didn’t buy his book, but the coincidences kept coming to my attention. For example, Jack Kennedy had a secretary named Nixon and Richard Nixon had a secretary named—you guessed it. I often wondered whether there might be cycles that would uncover mysteries. Numerology, astrology and “sympathetic magic” fall into this class of happenstance. So does a great deal of Old Testament religion, which gave rise to a gaggle of writers describing 666 as the sign of the devil. I wish life were that easy and such shortcuts to interpretations were available.
All this leads to my short story titled “Number Eleven,” which editor Don Webb has published at Bewildering Stories. You can read it at http://www.bewilderingstories.com/issue272/number_eleven.html. But, please, don’t write or call to tell me that numerology really does explain the innermost secrets of our existence!
All this leads to my short story titled “Number Eleven,” which editor Don Webb has published at Bewildering Stories. You can read it at http://www.bewilderingstories.com/issue272/number_eleven.html. But, please, don’t write or call to tell me that numerology really does explain the innermost secrets of our existence!
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Opening the Cable Window
Editor Don Webb has just posted my short story, “Cable Window,” at Bewildering Stories (http://www.bewilderingstories.com/issue271/cable_window.html). This bit of gee-whiz is less an exercise in sci-fi than a way to unveil our heroine’s loneliness over the loss of her husband. Missing a TV signal does not compare to the death of a loved one, but some metaphorical comparison could be made.*
The time-out-of-synch plot isn’t original. It’s been the core story plot a number of times over the decades. Philip K. Dick was a master of the sub-genre. The fact that there’s a “February 29th” in “Cable Window” is my predilection for things that are sometimes overlooked. Perhaps it’s a stranger’s earring found in your bed, or finding a strange cigarette end in the car ashtray. Who knows where that could lead?
The story grew out of a prompt years ago that made me ask, “What the heck is a cable window?” Well, I now know it’s that period when time stops because Macy’s is going to deliver that whatchamacallit, or the repairman will visit—and you better be home to receive the delivery or service call. Haven’t we all taken a day off work to wait for the person who doesn’t come? The window closes, we’re often dissatisfied, then we have to muddle through as best we can.
Give “Cable Window” a read and let me know about the windows of waiting in your life.
* I can’t leave this without digressing into humorous absurdity. Someone has asked, “How can you tell if your husband is dead?” (Answer: The sex is the same but you get the remote.)
The time-out-of-synch plot isn’t original. It’s been the core story plot a number of times over the decades. Philip K. Dick was a master of the sub-genre. The fact that there’s a “February 29th” in “Cable Window” is my predilection for things that are sometimes overlooked. Perhaps it’s a stranger’s earring found in your bed, or finding a strange cigarette end in the car ashtray. Who knows where that could lead?
The story grew out of a prompt years ago that made me ask, “What the heck is a cable window?” Well, I now know it’s that period when time stops because Macy’s is going to deliver that whatchamacallit, or the repairman will visit—and you better be home to receive the delivery or service call. Haven’t we all taken a day off work to wait for the person who doesn’t come? The window closes, we’re often dissatisfied, then we have to muddle through as best we can.
Give “Cable Window” a read and let me know about the windows of waiting in your life.
* I can’t leave this without digressing into humorous absurdity. Someone has asked, “How can you tell if your husband is dead?” (Answer: The sex is the same but you get the remote.)
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