Snippets of Story: Spring 2025

A glimpse at what I've been working on

Writing, over the first few months of the year, has been simple, if not easy. (Definitely not easy. But this is a cheerful post and we shall not dwell upon it.) I spent a little while after the holidays finishing up a chapter of Hard Times Come Again No More, the 1930s novel I’ve been writing a bit here and a bit there in between other projects; and after that most of my energies went into two short stories: one destined for a contest entry and one for an anthology. Both drafts are complete now, and I face the task of having to cut large amounts of words from both to meet word count limits (help!)

I’m not going to post any snippets from the contest story, since it is a contest for unpublished work and I don’t want to trip over any technicalities; but I think it entirely appropriate to share a few teasers from a story going into a collaborative indie-author anthology later this year!

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“The Princess of Flat Rock”

{short story, Western}

“Come along, kids,” said Steady Shaffler a little heavily, but still cheerfully. “Want I should carry that bag for you, or carry the little feller?”

“No thank you, I can manage it,” said Margot politely; and ‘the little feller’ gave Mr. Shaffler such a lofty stare that Steady was unaccountably reminded of a bighorn ram he had met on a mountainside once, and did not repeat his offer.