Wight Christmas: Halloween Countdown

[CREDIT: Fantastic Foray] Wight Christmas will be tweeted throughout the month of October as part of our Halloween Countdown.

Celebrating spooky season, with a Halloween Countdown, I’m serially tweeting an abbreviated version of “Wight Christmas” throughout October. In the story, Louis’s Christmas decorations have only recently been stored away for the year, but Edward has been stewing on the unseasonal longevity of  his roommate’s display all summer, and Louis is in for a surprise where his yuletide treasures are concerned. Unfortunately, Edward is also in for a surprise. Wight Christmas is one of five stories in “Weird Rhody,” which collects five haunting tales from the imaginations of talented Rhode Island writers. The cover of the book depicts an aptly...

Weird Rhody Horror Stories Reviews Build

Horror story collection Weird Rhody is available in ebook form on Amazon.com for $2.99.

Positive reviews for our Weird Rhody horror stories continue build on Good Reads and Amazon, the first from Laura Matthews giving Wight Christmas high marks for sex-positivity and holiday cheer! Laura is the owner and creative talent behind ThinkStory.biz, whose services include expert story analysis and editing, specifically for self-publishing authors. Having worked with Laura in the past, including during the heady days of my membership within the former Nobscot Niblets writer’s group at the now-defunct Annie’s Book Stop, once tucked away in a cozy shopping plaza in Framingham, MA. That link goes to Niblets co-founder Robyn Bradley, whose book...

Meating of the Mind: Printed Steak, Terry Bisson

Terry Bisson's short story, "They're Made Out of Meat," tests conventional thinking. And it's a fun ride. It's available in a collection of six tales from the author, primarily known for his short stories.

My friend and fellow horror writer G.A. Miller happened to post about this recent Business Insider piece about printed steak as an off the cuff Facebook post. I read it and Terry Bisson‘s short story, They’re Made Out of Meat came instantly to mind. The two things don’t have much in common besides a challenge to our way of thinking about meat – actually, our way of thinking about things in general, I would say. They’re Made Out of Meat won the Nebula Nomination for Best Short Story 1991. Deservedly so! So the Business Insider piece got me thinking about...

Jon Land Praises Weird Rhody RI Horror Stories

Horror story collection Weird Rhody is available in ebook form on Amazon.com for $2.99.

Weird Rhody has been in the wild for a handful of days and is already collecting rave reviews, namely, Rhode Island techno-thriller novelist Jon Land! “Weird Rhody draws its heart from the classic tales of “The Twilight Zone” and its soul from the best of Stephen King’s shorter fiction in Four Past Midnight and Night Shift. This splendid collection of Rhode Island-centric stories from authors who call the Ocean State home contains enough thrills and chills to keep readers turning the pages with quivery fingers long into any night. From haunting children, to the price of fame, to a morbidly-themed Christmas tome, here are...

Weird Rhody: Pre-order for Sept. 2

Weird Rhody - five tales by Rhode Island authors, is coming out this month.

Attention, Fantastic Foray fans! Weird Rhody’s release date has been pushed back into the first week of September, but you can still PRE-ORDER Weird Rhody TODAY! If you haven’t signed up for our newsletter already, you can still do that when the sign-up pop-up pops up, and you’ll still get a free flash-fiction preview of Wight Christmas! Tell your friends: free stuff awaits, and all I ask is your email so I can tell you the whole thing is for sale before anyone else knows.

Perseid Post Peak Peeks, Viewing Tips

[CREDIT: NASA] A diagram of the Earth's path through the debris from the Comet Swift-Tuttle. The yearly journey along this path is the reason for the Perseid Meteor Shower.

The Perseid Meteor Shower, nature’s regular summer spectacle, is past its peak (Aug. 11 – 12), but an eye on clear skies and a waning moon mean there’s still a good shot at shooting stars Tuesday and Wednesday, depending on locale as Earth hurtles through dusty trail of comet Switft-Tuttle. “Midnight to dawn any morning the week before or after (the Perseid peak) should produce a few meteors,”: NASA reports. The Perseids generally appear to radiate from a point high in the north, called the “radiant,” the NASA folks say, but you only have to point yourself North and look up. Not only is...

Weird Rhody’s August Release

Weird Rhody - five tales by Rhode Island authors, is coming out this month.

The Fantastic Forum was conceived with ambitious goals, but never realized its potential as my focus on other projects sapped the site and my fiction writing of the energy that a whole hearted effort required, until recently. Last year, I asked Rhode Island authors to submit stories for an anthology I aimed to use as a free giveaway for yearly subscribers to WarwickPost.com, my now six-year mission to add a home for quality journalism to the Ocean State’s roster of news websites. I received some great submissions, but a theme of haunting tales began to make itself apparent as I...

The Fantastic Forum is now Fantastic Foray

The Fantastic Forum is now Fantastic Foray. The domain and name change sets the site a bit apart from a pretty crowded field. If you tried to visit thefantasticforum.com and wound up here, it's all according to plan.

Hi, regular visitors! Welcome to FantasticForay.com, once The Fantastic Forum. It turns out The Fantastic Forum has been used numerous times throughout the internet and on various shows. Fantastic Foray, not so much. So, I made a change. It turns out Fantastic Foray communicates the same general ideas I’d intended with the original FF domain: Fantastic topics and stories, and adventures. I do hope to make it something of a forum with guest interviews and, hopefully, thoughtful comments. We’ll see how that works out. Fantastic Foray is now a little more modern than before. If you’re one of our many...

Podcastle Flash Fiction Waiting: Suspense Edition

Podcastle Flash Fiction Waiting: Suspense Edition

So, I entered the Podcastle Flash Fiction contest recently. Turned my submission in a day early, under the word limit, and began an anxious wait for the stories to be posted, and commented on, and voted on. Then some more waiting. Then another day. I hear tell there’s a record number of  submissions, so I ought to expect it to take a while. But I’m having trouble waiting without thinking about the contest and the next steps. Maybe if I’d done this before, I could take my mind off the contest, but the prospect of critiques positive and negative has...

Limbering up with the Podcastle Flash Fiction Contest

Limbering up with the Podcastle Flash Fiction Contest

Just submitted to the Podcastle Flash Fiction Contest. Two days early, and either six or two words under the 500 word limit, depending on whether Google Docs or Word is more accurate. I listen to Escape Pod’s sci fi narrations somewhat regularly, and there was a promo for the contest there that tickled the part of my brain that keeps trying to marshal the rest of it to put aside my business and journalism ambitions and finally get back in the regular writing saddle. It seems to have done me some good, anyway. I’m excited about the characters in my...