Story Time

I've been asked recently to share some of the old short stories I wrote back when I was using my pen name, J. David Bell, before I turned to novel-length YA fiction.

Looking over my oeuvre, I found two readily available stories (both were published online) that feature child protagonists and fantasy or science-fiction related material.  So I guess, in retrospect, I've been moving toward speculative YA all along!

The first story is called "A Chimaera Story with Four Morals."  It appeared a couple years ago in Jersey Devil Press.  It started out as a simple experiment in writing a very short story, but it refused to remain a mere experiment.

The second story is called "Cats in the Backyard," and it appeared in the journal Niteblade three years ago.  It's one of my favorite stories of all time--a hybrid of literary fiction, horror, and something else I can't quite put my finger on.  It was first written years ago--as many as 20 years ago--then set aside and reworked when I returned to writing fiction.

I'd love to hear some reactions to these older pieces!

A Chimaera Story

Well, after yesterday's gloom-and-doom message, maybe you're not ready for this announcement, but here goes: I had a new story accepted for publication. It's called "A Chimaera Story with Four Morals," and it was picked up by Jersey Devil Press. Should be out in June, at which time I'll provide a link.

Funny story about this story: when I originally wrote it, I had in mind some bizarre, tongue-in-cheek, self-referential parody of the "sci-fi apocalypse" narrative. So I wrote it that way--or at least thought I'd written it that way--and sent it off. Turns out there's a very straightforward, mournful tale about loss and the relationship between fathers and sons lurking within the madcap prose, and the editor at JDP was sharp enough to pick it up. So I was advised to trim out the parts that worked against the inner story and let it emerge. I was reluctant to do so at first--it's easy to fall in love with one's own high concepts--but once I did it, I realized the editor was right, and it's much better in its current form.

It just goes to show, you never really know what you're doing when you sit down to write. Sometimes, maybe all the time, you're better than you think.