Tuesday, February 11, 2025

First Lines: Unravelling

Very pleased to say my flash fiction, "Unravelling," has been published in the latest issue of PULP Lit Magazine. It's only 600 words, so take a second to read it over a sip of coffee:

The cover of PULP Lit 007, showing a naturescape above a checkerboard pattern.

As I like to do when I'm lucky enough to get one of these crazy works in print, here's a compare and contrast of what the first line of the story looked like in the initial draft versus the published version (I believe I have a written draft somewhere that predates the one below, but it's probably close enough that I'm not going to bother digging through mountains of old notebooks).

Monday, January 27, 2025

Book Bites (Expanded Edition): Never Lie

Never Lie
by Freida McFadden

✩✩✩✩
1 star out of 5

The line separating good books from bad, generally speaking, is that in a good book, plot serves characters, and in a bad book, characters serve plot. Not to crap on bad books; I've certainly written my share. There's nothing wrong with scarfing French fries now and again (Ready Player One, anyone?). As long as people are picking up books and visiting their local library, who cares?

Well, me, apparently.

Never Lie by mega-selling literary sensation Freida McFadden is a bad book. The plot follows homebuyers Ethan and Tricia as they tour the house of missing pop-psychologist Dr. Adrienne Hale, only to get snowed in. Creepiness abounds. Not the most original setup, but it works. Chapters are short and the language feels grade-schoolish, but at least it's accessible.

Wednesday, January 22, 2025

O-H!


If Ohio State is going to win a college football National Championship every time the NCAA changes its tournament format (2014/5 and now 2024/5), then I say add more teams next year.

Monday, January 20, 2025

Book Bites: Playing with Power!

Playing With Power!: Nintendo NES ClassicsPlaying With Power!: Nintendo NES Classics by Garitt Rocha
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Playing with Power! is a coffee-table retrospective of the Nintendo Entertainment System. Much (Most? All?) of the text seems to be copy/pasted from existing game descriptions and old Nintendo Power Magazine spreads. The text lacks flavor or perspective. The bulk of the content consists of walkthroughs for 30-year-old games. The wealth of classic Nintendo artwork is a treat to look at, but, especially in a crowded retro gaming book scene, Playing with Power! falls flat.

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