Hi everybody!
My short story collection, Nine Tales, is now available on Amazon. The e-book version will be up and available in a couple days.
Check it out! 🙂
Category Archives: short story
Ten Spoons of Spinach
Hey weberverse. How have you been? I haven’t been doing well lately. I haven’t been managing well. It has been a hard fall-now-into-winter. My heart longs for spring.
I do have some cool news about writing. I have a new plan on getting published. I am going to self-publish (yes, like every other Joe Schmo) The Novel That Will Get Me Published and I have several ideas on how to market it/myself. I am hoping a pub. company will get wind of it and then I’ll get offered a contract from that point. Hey, it could happen.
I also have a new sci-fi short story I am working on. The idea came from a co-worker, so I’ll be sure to credit her, but her idea is too good not to write down. I’m going to work on that and add it to my sci-fi collection. I’ll probably self-publish that, too. That way, I’ll have a couple different things for people (soon to be fans, I hope) to read.
I have several new ideas for novels, too. I think I mentioned one of them already, but now I’ve come up with another one. So I hope to be starting work on those, too…
M and my psych have been encouraging me to write more. I haven’t actually sat down and written anything in many, many moons. I suppose I can say half of it is because you never want to do anything when you have depression, but then I guess the other half, is I don’t feel I’m good enough so why bother. I think I talked about that before, too. But right now I just want to finish some stories to read them and make myself feel better. That’s the whole idea, right there.
So that’s where I am right now. I hope I can start to manage my illnesses better this year and I hope to write and read a lot more. I guess those are my “resolutions.”
Stay classy, San Diego.
Better, Faster, Stronger
*except it’s “way” not “wat”
But it’s still true.
I started this short story about six years ago and ever since, I have revised and redone it at least ten different times.
…and I’m about to do it again.
It’s one I want to include in my short story collection, and one I’d like to get published beforehand, so I want to make sure it’s totally rad. As I was going back through, it I realized I’m not happy with it. Maybe it’s because I’ve been reading a lot in general lately, or maybe I’ve just grown as a writer since I first started it, but I really think the story is crap as it stands now. Needs work.
Just an update for you…and a motivational quote from Stephen King.
Harvesting My Brain Juices
Fall the Red Door-Manning Street, Philadelphia by moocatmoocat
We’re well into it, but Happy Fall, everyone! Huzzuh! It’s my second favorite month: October. (It’s also my birth month. ^_^)
Last year fall (and winter) was a hard time for me because I hit rock bottom as far as my depression and anxiety goes. This year, I am staying positive and looking forward to the new adventures and opportunities it will bring. Plus, it’s freaking gorgeous outside.
My new job is going well. I love the place and the people, and the work is great. I’m doing lots of editing and writing. Thumbs way up. I’m so thankful.
I’m very excited for next month. It’s National Novel Writing Month!
I don’t know if I’m gonna follow the rules and write a novel, but I’m definitely going to sit down and WRITE. The other day I had a great plan to rework a couple novelettes into short stories for my sci-fi collection. I’m still three stories away. I don’t want to rush it or anything, but I’d like to finish the collection by end of the year. (My old goal was by end of summer, but, well, yeah…) I haven’t been working on these novelettes because I’ve been concentrating on the short stories, but I’ve hit a wall with them (no ideas). Then I realized, “Wait, these novelettes are sci-fi and I really, really want to write them. I know, I’ll turn them into short stories! I can always go back and make them longer later if I decide.”
So that’s my plan right now. You’re excited for me, I can tell. Shucks, thanks, dolls.
I’m also working on coming up with more tips and tutorials, too. (Don’t worry, that hasn’t totally faded away.)
What about you? Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? What are you going to be working on?
W.I.P.-Great Aunt Margaret
I thought I’d share one of the short stories I’m working on. It’s a mystery/thriller. Spooky.
Let me know what you think!
Great Aunt Margaret
J.C.D. Kerwin
“It’s watching me,” Eliza declared. She scrunched up her nose and tilted her head.
“She is not,” her father said. He straightened the frame and descended the ladder. “There, that looks good.”
They each took a step back and gazed at the portrait now hanging above the fireplace. The lady pictured sat in a chair, arms folded gently across her lap. She looked directly at the painter—at the viewer—with a distinctive expression, as if she was trying to convey a thought with her eyes alone. A rusted metal placard sat at the bottom of the frame. Its faded type read “Great Aunt Margaret” but the artist and date were indistinguishable.
“It gives me the creeps, Roger.”
He pushed her shoulder. “It’s a woman, you know…and the name is Dad.”
“Well she gives me the creeps.”
He gave her a disapproving look. “You had better get used to it. It’s going to be here for a while.”
Eliza moved left and right, testing to see if the eyes in the painting would follow her movements. “Is this creepy picture really all you got?”
Her father nodded at the painting. “Yeeeep.”
“Well I, for one, am not going to be alone in the same room with that thing.”
She spun on her heel and hurried out of the room.
He stared at the painting for another few seconds before turning away. He paused at the light switch. He could’ve sworn he caught movement out of the corner of his eye.
“Now she’s got me doing it,” he mumbled. He shut off the light.
* * *
I got the idea for this story from a prompt. Now I’m going to offer it up to you! Here it is:
- The person in a painting you recently acquired suddenly disappears from view.
J.C.D. KERWIN 