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The SE++ Short Story Thread
Raijin Quickfoot
I'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPA regular
I'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPA regular
Hey everyone! I don't know about you but I love reading. However, as @Rorshach Kringle likes to remind me I am swimming in kids and I don't have a lot of spare time. Therefore, I've been reading a lot more short stories recently. Quick satisfaction! So let's talk about our favorites here and link to them if it's kosher.
A list!
To Build A Fire by Jack London
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien
Anything by Edgar Allen Poe
Shattered Like A Glass Goblin by Harlan Ellison
Basically anything by Ellison...
I could sit here all day and make a list of great shirt stories but I'm at work and nobody wants to just read through a list.
Let's discuss some of these! Let's talk about new short stories or obscure ones that maybe you don't think anyone has read. Or some of the all time classics.
Lets get some material up in this hizzy
A list!
To Build A Fire by Jack London
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien
Anything by Edgar Allen Poe
Shattered Like A Glass Goblin by Harlan Ellison
Basically anything by Ellison...
I could sit here all day and make a list of great shirt stories but I'm at work and nobody wants to just read through a list.
Let's discuss some of these! Let's talk about new short stories or obscure ones that maybe you don't think anyone has read. Or some of the all time classics.
Lets get some material up in this hizzy
Raijin Quickfoot on
+2
Posts
damn this might be the new baby shoes never worn, bagel
No need, I've got stopping me covered.
I was pretty upset. Then I read the short story and was pretty upset AND pretty horrified.
They're basically the same thing.
I've never understood how it happened but whatever!
I got Yukon Ho! for christmas later that year anyway
~the end~
I've also recommended the Hugo-nominated Selkie Stories are for Losers by Sofia Samatar to a lot of people and not one has been disappointed. It's a quick read and well worth your time to check out.
Ugh, yet another perfect work of fiction cheapened with a needless follow up in a blatant cash grab
it's not for nothin' people compare him to Chekhov
also "Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman is super great
man I wish Harlan Ellison hadn't spent the last fifteen years yelling at the internet instead of writing
You probably should have stopped me.
One day, I logged to my instant messenger software and Randall was not there. This was not entirely unprecedented, but it was certainly unusual, as Randall was up earlier than I and, like myself, was almost never without a connection. But the day went by and never did the small light next to Randall's username, StalwartDefender, alight. The next day came and passed with no change, as did the following. By now I feared the worst--something had happened to my friend, and with no connection beyond this single digital courier, there was no way for me to know. I reached out to several of our other mutual online acquaintances, but none had heard from him either. In spite of our intimate knowledge of one another as human beings, we knew almost nothing of each other as people. I knew he lived, or claimed to live, somewhere on the east coast, but that's the most he'd ever shared. We had always treated our offline lives as a sort of afterthought, some other thing that was not truly important. It was only then that I realized the folly in this.
I continued to sign on every day, for I had other friendships to maintain, and in time, I forged new bonds, none as strong or as deep as the one I had known, but fulfilling in their own ways. Still, always a small part of me held out hope that one day I would log on to a greeting from StalwartDefender, welcoming me as if we'd just spoken hours before. That day never came.
Some years later I was in Maryland on business and stopped at a local coffee shop for breakfast. The man in front of me in line reminded me a bit of Randall, who had shared with me many funny pictures of himself (a true mark of our friendship as this was before the era of social media). I dismissed this as a flight of fancy, until the server called out an order for a "Rambo", surely meaning Randall. So I approached the man, mentally rehearsing the rather awkward introduction I had to present, but only got as far as "Excuse me," before he smiled and said, "I was wondering if you were going to say something."
"So it is you," I replied. "Where have you been? What happened?"
Randall explained to me that his life had been in a rut, that he wasn't happy, and that, after a lot of soul searching, he realized he'd been using technology as a crutch, as a way of avoiding the problems in his real life. And he decided that the only way he could fix it would be to take away the crutch, so he got rid of all the technology in his life. And the results were incredible--he'd never been happier or healthier. The only thing he missed, he said, looking a bit guilty, was the long-distance friendships he had given up.
"We told each other everything," I said, still trying to process what I learned. "Why didn't you just tell me what was going on? I would have understood, we could have stayed in touch some other way. Why did you just disappear."
"I didn't know HOW to tell you," he replied softly. "It had to be a clean break--I couldn't have reminders of that part of my life distracting me, tempting me back. But I didn't know how to end it, so I just stopped
"Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor
My new novel: Maledictions: The Offering. Now in Paperback!
You're Chuck Tingle?