Writing News
- At November 16, 2009
- By Bob Howe
- In Fiction, News
12
I’m very happy to post that my novella, “The Natural History of Calamity,” will appear in issue 14 of Black Gate.
Here’s a sample…
I took the Will Charbonneau case on the same day an exceedingly creepy ex-boyfriend reentered my life. The way the case played out, and the reason the pinhead smashed back into my life, were intimately related. It would have saved me no end of trouble if I’d known that from the start.
I’m on the phone with my mother. “So are you seeing anybody?” she asks.
Coming from my mother that’s not a question, it’s a deep pit full of scorpions and irritable cobras. From her second generation, Italian-American perspective, the way my 34-year-old uterus was going unused was a disaster on a par with Frank Sinatra’s death.
“Ma,” I say, in the Universal Warning Tone, “Don’t start.”
“I was just asking,” she says, in the Universal Wounded Tone. “I wanted to know if you were bringing someone to Brenda’s wedding.”
That would be my cousin Brenda, who at the advanced age of twenty-three is marrying a Port Authority cop she met while getting a ticket for drinking Stoli on the PATH train. I’m saved from the pit by Gerald, my secretary, who sticks his head around the corner of my door.
“Someone to see you,” he mouths.
I nod and held up one finger.
“Gotta go, Ma, business,” I say.
markbourne
Yay, Bob! Congrats. Like that excerpt.
karen_w_newton
Wow, that’s fantastic! Congrats!
kijjohnson
Nice! Congratulations, Bob.
saladinahmed
Very cool — the excerpt is enticing…
davekirtley
Stupendous!
mckitterick
Awesome, congrats! And what a lively start.
admin
Hey Mark! Thanks!
admin
I’m pretty pleased. Thank you, Karen.
admin
I owe it all to fleas.
admin
Thanks, Saladin. I think it passed through the workshop just before your time.
admin
Hey Dave, thanks!
admin
Thanks, Chrisglad you liked the tease.