Category: General Fiction

All Stories, General Fiction

Not For Sale by Guylaine Spencer

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An autumn evening, 1950

Along the Grand River, Ontario, Canada

Yes, sir, she’s a mighty fine mansion. And an unusual style for this neck of the woods. Looks a bit like a bank to me with that porch and pillars. The first owner built her back in 1845. She doesn’t get the attention she deserves these days. You can see that by the peeling paint and the boarded-up window. The brothers don’t live here full time now, but they do come down on occasion. Separately, always. That’s why they have the wife and me looking after the place as caretakers. We live in the house and keep an eye on things. The two brothers don’t speak to each other anymore. They send messages through me. They haven’t talked since the blowup they had over the repairs to the roof.

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All Stories, Editor Picks, General Fiction, Latest News, Short Fiction

Week 528: What’s in a Title; The Votes Are In and Genre Overkill

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Naming Stuff

I like interesting titles. Now, these are not items to be confused with lying “clickbait” nonsense, but titles of books, movies and songs that stray from the norm. Often, as is the case of the cheap 60’s Spaghetti Western God Forgives, I Don’t, the item fails to live up to the title (but, to be fair, it is an interesting little film regardless). And sometimes certain interesting titles almost guarantee a good picture. The two Sergio Leone “Once Upon a Time…” films are classics, as is Quinton Tarantino’s exceptional Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. There is also one called Once Upon a Time in Mexico that I’ve heard good things about (starring Johnny Depp and Penelope Cruz, both excellent performers), yet I’ve somehow yet to see it (I hope to fix that someday soon).

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All Stories, Fantasy, General Fiction

The Enormous Pacifier by Alice Kinerk

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You’ve probably heard about this already, but one day some kids dug up an enormous pacifier, and in doing so pretty much brought chaos into the world. Apparently the kids were playing in the strip of woods by Route 42, just poking sticks in the embankment there, no thoughts of upsetting nesting bees, preventing future mudslides, or their moms having to pretreat their laundry stains afterward. Because where the dirt fell away, they uncovered something that shouldn’t have been there. A large, old, manmade hoop.

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General Fiction, Short Fiction

The Margin of the River by Mitchell Toews

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I finished shaving. A $10 coffee shop gift card was in the car, and although I knew I should hit the weights and take my usual morning walk, I also felt like a lazy day was not a bad idea.

Janice nudged me aside on her way to the ensuite.

‘What’s up?’ she asked.

‘Dunno,’ I said while pawing through the underwear drawer for just the right pair—supportive but not too bossy.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Confessions 1:07 by Kendra Yvette

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This is my confessional right here. Instead of an old wooden box full of stale air, I sit on a rickety old concrete porch at a rusty metal table with a stained-glass top. I always stay in room 107. The seashell wallpaper makes me want to die, and the air stings with the putrid stench of vomit, but this room has a perfect view of Main Street. This motel is the only part of this hick town that’s worth a damn. I fill my glass ashtray, stained yellow with wear, with cigarette butts as I spill my sins and people watch.

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General Fiction, Short Fiction

Eighteen Ninety-Seven by Pauline Shen

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I run my finger along the marker at the edge of our farm. Its wood is parched from time and weather. A locomotive’s soprano voice carries across the prairie. I picture that engine puffing into a station where the platform swirls with a symphony of tongues. I think of families boarding with slumped shoulders and weary eyes. I recall how we, my parents, my brothers and I, stepped onto the colonist car with its sunlit windows and faintly sweet fragrance. Around us, men snored while mothers cooed at young ones latched to their breast. I witnessed my older brother, Wasyl, rub his teary eyes as the train pulled us westward.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Have Your Say by Scott Taylor

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There were precious few ways of getting your point across in life and so Vern liked to shout at people.  He shouted at them in restaurants, he shouted at them in supermarkets, he screamed in their faces out on the street.  He would go in to get a sandwich and the woman would apply too little mayonnaise.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Killing Time by Michael Loyd Gray

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I once shared a cell with a con from Detroit named Marty Ballantine. He had a blazing shock of red hair and was tall and looked more like an ex-basketball player than the head of accounting until his firm realized he was skimming. He had a young girlfriend on the side, an expensive marriage and mortgage, and combined with greed, he got caught. Big surprise. I couldn’t really picture him in a blue suit and red tie, slaving away at debits and credits. But his orange jumpsuit went well with his red hair.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Dirty Screen by Christopher Ananias 

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The ice cream the night before was so hard I couldn’t scoop it. Today it was a cloudy tub of sweet milk. The Budweiser, I swore off, was piss warm. Even so—with all my new promises made to Denny—that was disappointing. I clicked my dry mouth. Denny watched me like how the sparrow watches the hawk circling in the sky. She looked down at her bandaged hands. 

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All Stories, Editor Picks, General Fiction, Short Fiction

Week 526- Humourisk

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Of all things considered entertainment, comedy is the hardest to explain. Whether you spell it humor or humour (being based in the UK we will go with the latter), to my satisfaction no one has ever defined what makes something funny in one sentence.

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