Clickbait
My new story, in Amazing Monster Tales #4
I’m excited about the latest story of mine to hit the shelves. The anthology is one close to my heart: Amazing Monster Tales #4, edited by DeAnna Knippling and Jamie Ferguson (I also have a story in Amazing Monster Tales #2). The book series has a real pulpy, sci-fi/horror vibe that I—and my 12-year-old inner child—connect with. I love the authors I’m in there with, I love the cover art, I even loved the editing process, which I felt greatly improved the story (thanks, DeAnna!).
My story is titled “Clickbait,” and it stands to me as a sort of personal crossroads, even as the narrative deals with a literal crossroads. So many paths took me in the direction of this tale, and so many departed from its writing.
I wrote it just as 2019 was turning into 2020. My Dad had just died (he was actually alive when I first started the story, and I could show you the exact sentence I was working on when he passed). Covid 19 was maybe a month away, and was rearing its head in full force as I began rewrites. The 2020 election year campaign was showing the first few glimmers of how ugly it was going to get. One of my daughters was out of the nest, not entirely successfully, and the other would be testing her adult wings within the year. Early retirement would be offered to me in a couple months, radically changing the shape of my life. I was a year away from moving in with my wife.
It was, at the time, I thought, the best story I’d ever written. Much of my life, and the larger life of the world around me, found its way into that story, It’s a story about roads, and crossroads, and decisions.
It’s a story about monsters too (there are always monsters). The monster in this story—mild spoiler alert—lies mostly off-stage, and only make its way in front of the audience at the end. I spent multiple hours with the therapist talking about what the monster in the story represents to me (as opposed to what it might represent to the reader). Fear of death? A loss of faith in institutions? The monkey’s paw allure of easy solutions? Generalized anxiety? Old age? The unknown?
I genuinely don’t know, though I have some ideas.
Maybe it’s just a monster.
If you are inclined, please give the story a read. This one’s close to me.
Peace.
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The links. Here are my last two story sales, along with two self-published short stories. If you like my writing, buy a story.
A Trick of the Light (NoSleep podcast, $1.99)
Goodneighbor.com (Dark Moon Digest, $2.99)
F*ck, Marry, Kill (self-published, Amazon, 99 cents)
Veronica Scissors (self-published, Amazon, 99 cents)
