If you are reading this congratulations! I mean welcome! You‘ve found your way to my first ever blog post published on my first ever home on the web. My very own domain! Subscribe!
I have it on good authority that as a newly-fledged novelist, I need a better online presence. I need followers, dammit! Lots and lots of them! Thousands! Clearly, what I need is a miracle. Subscribe!
Thus far I’ve tried posting these little 280 character (or fewer) microfictions just about every weekday. I’m utterly ignored on Twitter. I have a half-dozen devoted readers on Instagram. A few “pity-likes“ on Facebook. You could say I’m on a roll.
A few of those Pithyfics have been published in Microfiction Monday Magazine. They accept stories of one hundred words or fewer. My Twitter-friendly stories are always the shortest. I’ve included the published ones below. You know… content.
But… if you visit my freshly-minted blog you will see that, for the next while at least, its focus is on my upcoming bicycling tour from Montréal to Victoria. What?! Is he out of his mind?!
Tidewater Press, who published my debut novel - The Little Brudders of Miséricorde - have encouraged me to combine my long-planned adventure with a… hem, hem… promotional book tour. Trust me. Only celebrity authors and crazy cyclists can afford a promotional tour. The celebrities stay in four-star hotels. I’ll be wild camping near some cemetery or in a farmer’s field. Maybe a ditch by the side of the road.
So read the published Pithyfics below if you want ’content’ (Or if you’re wondering if I can actually write.) But better yet… go to my blog and SUBSCRIBE! Also buy my book.
If you really hate reading just give it to a friend. If you’re one of my former students - you owe me one. In your miserable heart of flint, you know that!
If you’ve actually read the book - why aren’t you talking it up? I’m cycling 6000K. I’m really not asking much - you know - by comparison. Your suffering will be brief. Mine will last months.
Also… subscribe! I promise I won’t bury you everyday with boring content. I have to do this on my iPhone. My hand is cramping up as I write this. You will get just the pearls. Promise. So subscribe. Tell a friend to subscribe. Do it, dammit! Right there near the top of the blog. You’ll see it.
Also - I don’t want to hear about my typos. If you recognize that it’s a typo then you know what I meant so-what-the-hell-is-the-problem?! Did I mention I’m typing on my iPhone?
Peace and love.
The Content
Feathers
Little Amy picked up the head from where it lay in the dust near the axe. It was as soft and weightless as a marigold.
“Come back! I’ll fix you!” she cried, running in frantic circles.
Feathers flew everywhere.
Blossom
In August were buttercups, lady slippers, snapdragons. Bluebells, cockleshells, eevy, ivy, over. Hopscotch and skipping rope. All around the mulberry bush and the ice cream truck. Then September and polka dots and am I pretty? All those tears and scattered leaves.
Eastern Approach
Lena’s teacup performed a little jig in its saucer as the vibrations grew closer. The tiny cry of porcelain chiming over the rumble of tanks grinding in the street below her window. Soldiers trudged behind, clad in khakis and impunity.
Winged
Every day at lunch Brenda sat alone in the playground sharing her sandwiches with a score of hungry pigeons surging around her. Patiently, she weaved their stray feathers into a dappled carpet.
“Where is Brenda?” asked Ms. Chen one afternoon.
A blur soared past the windows.
Cradle and All
There was an official investigation, of course. No one blamed her. These things happen. It’s nobody’s fault. But next morning a little flurry of hail fell. She stood at the window watching it gather against the porch steps and dreamed of fairies and baby teeth.
Follow, Follow
Follow the path of crushed stone, the curled leaf riding the creek. Pass under the bridge with moss hanging from its struts. Climb the bank toward the strains of the calliope, where trinkets dangle, whirligigs spin, and clowns lean from a carousel waving white Jesus on a stick.