Second Chance Summer: A Short Love Story - Shawn Inmon

Can we sneak in a quick summer read on this next-to-last weekend of summer 2015? Why, yes, I believe we can.

Second Chance Summer continues the story of Elizabeth and Steve, who ran into one another on a Christmas tree lot several months back and rekindled an old romance. Now, Steve is on the verge of making a fortune on a high-flying real estate deal involving the construction of a resort hotel in the Philippines. He's about to whisk Elizabeth off on vacation -- just the two of them -- when a typhoon hits the island where his big deal is going down. This intervention by Mother Nature will tax the couple, both physically and financially. But what will it mean for their relationship?

This is the third installment in Inmon's five Second Chance Love stories. He has since collected all five into a single volume. But the stories can be read separately, and the fact that I haven't read any of the others affected neither my understanding nor my enjoyment of this one.

Inmon is a wonderful writer whose romances always deliver. If you enjoy reading contemporary romance, you could do much worse than any -- or all -- of the stories in Second Chance Love.

Once Upon a Dragon - Tabitha Ormiston-Smith

Yeah, yeah, I know. Summer is supposed to be the season for long, not-very-thought-provoking beach reads. But sometimes the mind wanders, or your attention span is short, and all you want is a little something to occupy your brain for a few minutes.

In that instance, I highly recommend Once Upon a Dragon. This collection of twelve short stories has something for almost everyone: fantasy, science fiction, and horror. And humor, too -- I laughed aloud at the end of "Professor Tomlinson's Last Experiment," although perhaps that wasn't the reaction the author was going for. "Perspectives on a Dragon" Parts I and II are nicely-paired point-of-view studies of all those fairy tales in which an unlikely lad rescues a princess from a dragon. Later in the collection, the story continues with "The Last Dragon." "Lifestyle Choice" takes a turn for the macabre when the heroine doesn't get the job she covets. And "User Pays" was a creepy, if all-too-plausible, look at what might happen if your average family followed a political proposition to its inevitable conclusion.

In short, the stories in Once Upon a Dragon are well-crafted, and the collection is well-edited. I thoroughly enjoyed them.

***
Speaking of summer vacation, Rursday Reads is taking a break next week. See you back here on Rursday, August 20th.

Mix Tape No. 1 - J.D. Mader

So Christmas is only a week away, and you don't even have time to read a short story? Is that what's troubling ya, Bunky? Well, then. How about some flash fiction?

J.D. Mader does this feature on his blog on Fridays. He calls it, "Two minutes...go!" The idea is to set a timer for two minutes, open a vein, and let the words pour out of you onto the virtual paper in the comment section of the blog. Mader himself opens the festivities with his own offering, and usually contributes a few more as the day goes on. They are always intriguing and often amazing.

Here in this short volume, Mader has collected 16 flash fiction gems, at least some of which had their beginnings in "Two minutes...go!" His work is dark and often profane (the "parental advisory" sticker on the front cover is there for a reason), but it's so worth checking out. Save it, maybe, for some dark day in the winter months to come.

And feel free to stop by Unemployed Imagination some Friday and see what we're up to. Maybe even try your own hand at some flash fiction. It'll only take two minutes.

Stories of Genesis Vol. 1 - Chris James

Week 3 in my ad hoc holiday gift guide brings us to a volume of short stories. And why not? I mean, it's the holidays, for crying out loud. Who's got time to sit down and read a whole novel?

Chris James has subtitled his Stories of Genesis "A New Kind of Fan Fiction." He is not wrong. Authors have used song titles and lyrics as springboards for their own creative endeavors for generations, but I don't know of anybody else who has taken the idea to such a fascinating extreme.

The five stories in this collection all have their, uh, genesis in one or another of the songs by the prog-rock group Genesis. And each story has something to recommend it. "Mr. Magrew's Incredible Journey" is a sci-fi coming-of-age story about why, sometimes, it's better just to stay home. "The Chat Show" features a conniving talk-show host who is determined to advance his career, no matter what it costs. "One Regret" is about a dying man who contemplates going to his grave with the biggest secret of his life. "The Final Battle" is full-on weird sci-fi, set in a world where special forces battle the Eternal Sanctuary Man. But perhaps my favorite is "The Agent Lunges," a bit of metafiction in which a copyright agent harasses an author very much like James himself.

The real Chris James needn't worry about that; Genesis lead guitarist Steve Hackett has endorsed the book. So do I. And if you read these stories and enjoy them, I have good news for you: James has written two more volumes of Stories of Genesis.

Wonders of the Invisible World - Patricia A. McKillip

I seem to be reading a fair number of short works lately. Rest assured that I'll be back on the novel track pretty soon. But first....

 

When I grow up, I want to write like Patricia McKillip.

 

McKillip's fantasy novels are almost all told in a lyrical, once-upon-a-time voice. I marvel at her ability to sustain that voice throughout an entire novel. (When I met her, I told her so. She thanked me and said, "It's hard." Yeah, I can just imagine.)

 

Some of the stories in this collection have that same fairy-tale feel to them; one, "Kelpie," has an Edwardian artiste feel, with a dollop of faerie; and a couple of them feel very modern.

 

The title story tells about a time-traveling researcher who is sent back to meet Cotton Mather; the result felt darker to me than Connie Willis's books on the same general topic.

 

My favorites in this collection are probably "Byndley," in which a mage tries desperately to find his way back to an enchanted wood, so he can return something he stole from the fairy queen who lives there; and "The Doorkeeper of Khaat," the final story, in which a young poet agrees to help his terminally-ill father end his life.

 

But we're talking about minor degrees of favoritism here. I can't think of a single story in this collection that I hated. If you've never read any McKillip, this collection would be a good way to sample her work. Highly recommended.

The Art Collection: Three Short Stories - Carla Sarett

I liked Carla Sarett's stories in 13 Bites Vol. 1 and Summer Dreams, anthologies in which I also participated. I  So I felt confident that I would enjoy the three short stories in The Art Collection. I was not disappointed.

All three of the stories in this collection have art, or works of art, as a theme, and there's a mystery at the heart of each one. My favorite is probably the final story, "The Captain's House." It's about a woman who volunteers with the committee that runs a historic house on Philadelphia's Main Line. The house is a showcase of period decorative arts, but something's not quite right about at least one of them.

Sarett's characters are well-drawn and believable. In particular, I loved her description of the president of the board of directors of the Captain's House, Evan Beamish: "a tall, white-haired man who seemed serenely absent-minded. He wore an endearingly bright yellow bow-tie, and he seemed somewhere between the ages of sixty and ninety. It was hard to tell. He might have looked the same at forty." I'm pretty sure I've met that guy, and I'd bet you have, too.

The Art Collection is a quick read that I very much enjoyed.

Passage to Belize - L.A. Lewandowski

Passage to Belize is a short story -- really, a quickie travel memoir -- about the author's adventure Belize with her mother-in-law, Rose Marie.

Rose Marie's health is failing. She and her husband used to take cruises together; now that he has passed away, the author agrees to go on a Caribbean cruise with the older woman. At each port of call, they go in search of local art -- not the ticky-tacky made-in-China stuff, but authentic pieces by local artists.

When they arrive in Belize, the city outside of the port area is locked down due to recent violence. But the author is determined to find some local art to take home -- and where there's a will, there's a way.

This is a quick and entertaining read that I very much enjoyed.

Strange Savior: A Short Story - Leland Dirks

The topic of suicide has been in the news lately, with the death of comedian Robin Williams. So my Rursday Read this week couldn't be more timely. 

***

For a 3,000-word short story, Strange Savior packs a hefty punch.

In the late 1970s in Boulder, Colorado, a college student is coming to grips with his homosexuality. One bleak night, he contemplates ending it all by jumping off a bridge into a frozen creek. What happens next is...well, I have my own opinion. But I urge you to read it yourself and decide: is it magic, or divine intervention, or a rare show of humanity?

Dirks is a wonderful writer. Please pick up this book. And if you know anyone who is contemplating suicide, please give them the hotline number at the end of the book.