All posts tagged: original fiction

Fiction Friday:

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By Leslie Lindsay Okay, so I’ve been a slacker when it comes to “Fiction Friday.” But that doesn’t mean I haven’t been writing. It just means…well, that I’ve been focusing all my efforts on this little nagging thing called a manuscript. It’s pretty much consuming me. I think about at the gym, at Target, while browsing at the bookstore or library. No one else better take my title (it’s not that fabulous, anyway). Oh wait–here’s a great title…what’s this one about?! Oh man…Joyce Carol Oates, yeah…I’ll never be able to write as good as you. Ooh, I like that description: compelling suspense-driven fiction. Look–a squirrel! Yes, being a writer means teasing out all of the wonderfully creative ideas and telling the voices [characters] to stop, slow down, or change tact from time to time. Like me. And maybe you. We all need to slow down and remember why we got ourselves into this ‘mess’ to begin with. Here’s a little something from what I’m currently working on: Jo Ellen January 20th 1989 “Doubt is a …

Fiction Friday: Excerpt from “Zombie Road,” Chapter 1

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By Leslie Lindsay Let’s take it from the top. Here’s an excerpt from chapter one from my WIP. We meet one of several POVs. This is James, an old man in a nursing home. CHAPTER 1 The End 1984 The baby woke James McCullough. He struggled to a sitting position, kicking the pilled institution-issued blanket from his pale, knobby feet and then twisted his frame and sat on the edge of the bed, listening. That goddamned baby wasn’t crying anymore.   He rubbed his eyes and blew out a breath of air. His chest wheezed and rattled. Death’s cough, the nurses around here called it. He wasn’t supposed to have heard them murmuring at the nurse’s station, but his suite was so close, he couldn’t not hear. That was one thing he still had—his sense of hearing, unlike so many of the other old folks around River’s Bluff Retirement Home. In spite of the nightlights plugged into every outlet, he couldn’t see the hand in front of his face, thanks to glaucoma and cataracts; but …

Fiction Friday: Little Sally Water

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By Leslie Lindsay I have a senior basset hound named Sally. She has a kidney issue and that means she has some house-training accidents from time to time. Okay, a lot. Was it because little Sally was peeping on the floor that my brain recalled this old nursery rhyme, Little Sally Water or was it the muses at play? In any case, this old childhood game, jingle, rhyme–what have you–has been floating through my head of late. So I got curious, like all good writers do and did a little research. Here’s the rhyme/song:  Little Sally Waters sitting in the sun Trying to find her love The one & only one Rise Sally rise Open up your eyes Look to the east Look to the west Maybe you’ll find the one that you love best The lyrics actually continue and are quite extensive. Seems the rhyme/children’s yard game has something to do with marriage. Little Sally Water is sitting in her saucer. In fact, the real story goes: Sally was on her way to her wedding, when …

Fiction Friday: What does Grief Feel Like?

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By Leslie Lindsay Here’s a little something from my WIP. Working on a novel set in the St. Louis suburbs based on a urban legend. This is a tiny little epitaph that our main charcter, Mel shares on grief: “What does grief feel like? This is the question the ladies at grief group want us to focus on this week. Grief feels like a barbed wire fence being shoved down my throat and pulled out many times over and over. Grief feels numb and barren, like nothing but bad thoughts can grow. It hits me when I least expect it, at the grocery store and in line at the bank. And yes, it strikes when I see a baby, bundled in a car seat toted into Starbucks, her tiny face peeking out from a little hole in the blankets, parents overly doting and cooing. Grief is an evil entity that wants me for itself, like a phantom taking me in, inhabiting my body. If I am not lucky, it will. His ugliness will throw his head …

Fiction Friday: The Caul

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By Leslie Lindsay I’m a getting a good sense of character, Melanie Dunbar (Mel) from my new novel-in-progress, “Zombie Road.”  Here she in the shower just after giving birth to her daughter, Enye. It’s one of those strange postpartum moments of elation and exhaustion, the innate need to protect one’s offspring. “The warm spray from the shower pelted my back, a strange tingling sensation that somehow made me feel whole, even though I was at my most vulnerable—naked and postpartum.           Suddenly, as the slick bar of pale-green soap slipped through my fingers, I stepped on Enye, my feet squishing through her tiny body slumped against the shower stall, a contusion of limbs—purple and unmoving. “My baby!” I shrieked, “Enye!”  The room spun, black and gray, the water cascading down my shoulders, a moment of vertigo. I clutched the soap dish to break my fall. If I fell, I’d be that much closer to my dead baby. I gripped the metal side rail on our double-shower, blood clots running down my puffy legs.  “Ran! Ran, I …

Fiction Friday: Met My Old Lover at Grocery Store

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By Leslie Lindsay What happens when your antagonist sees the love of his life at the grocery store?  It’s been years and she’s all grown up with a kid…why, you stalk her of course!   (image source: wikipedia.  Retrived 8.16.13) When the doors finally slide open revealing Annie and her shopping cart, my pulse quickens.  I toss back the remainder of the beer and watch like a hawk drawn to its prey.  Annie Fuckin’ Kelley.  God, she looks good, even behind a kid-laden shopping cart.  I swallow, part of me crazy-jealous of the man she married, who must be the father of this kid and the other part of me in awe, proud to say she was once mine.  I watch as she struggles with the cart over a pothole, unsnap the kid from the front seat and place her in the minivan.  If only I could help her.  I would; I’d smile and say, “Looks like you could use a little help with that.”  She’d startle because she’d recognize the voice; a familiar feeling would …

Fiction Friday: Excerpt from Slippery Slope

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By Leslie Lindsay Combing back through that novel-in-progress–trimming, saving, adding–general revising.  Here’s one of the early chapters.  [Remember, this is a work of original fiction and is not intended to represent anyone living or dead.  It it a figment of the author’s imagination.  Borrowing or making your own is strictly prohibited.  Thanks for your understanding].  Enjoy! An excepert from Slippery Slope: “I married Joe for several reasons.  One, he asked me.  Two, he had good genes.  And perhaps three, I was in love.  With a mass of coiled PhD brains in his head, I knew he’d pass on intelligence, a trait 86% of the population finds valuable, along with a sense of humor, creativity, and problem-solving ability.  And so we made babies.  Two of them to be exact, at the preferred two-and-a-half year interval, enough time physicians believe a woman’s body has healed and returned to normal, and psychologists have determined is the “appropriate developmental spacing.”  But now I wonder, would Kenna and Madi’s sweet chatter somehow sound differently if they had been conceived with Steve, …

Ficiton Friday: Amoxicillin Meets Decorating Meets Literary Agent

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By Leslie Lindsay Today I learned that an literary agent who I have had some “interest” in will be featured at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Writer’s Institute.  I have been to both continuing studies programs the university hosts for writers.  I love them.  I was kind of considering going again this April, but hadn’t made a formal committment.  Now that this agent is going to be there–and offering a chance for me to pitch my novel–I just may sign up.  But it scares the bejeesus outta me!  Sure–my ultimate hope is for is my book face out at a local bookstore.  Sure, I want readers.  And I guess it’s got to start somewhere, right?  That means I need to finish polishing this darn thing pronto!  That means I need to get some homework done before I pitch–what does my book compare to?  What else is out there like it?  Who do I write like?  And then I need to drop 10 lbs and get a new outfit.  Sounds so simple, right? Okay–here’s my revised chapter …