Keith B. Darrell's Blog, page 43

The 200th Post - Where's Keith?

Perceptive perusers of this periodical will have perceived a paucity of posts of late. OK, enough alliteration. I haven't been posting as much lately, so on the occasion of this, my 200th post, let me tell you what I've been up to instead.
I've finished The Witches' Cauldron, the fourth book in the Halos & Horns fantasy saga and am looking forward to the eBook coming out in late April and the paperback the following month. I've completed the first chapter of Fangs & Fur, the second arc...

The Truth About Pinocchio’s Lie

Last time, I talked about how Walt Disney made a career out of re-imagining other writers’ creations. To his credit, his adaptations of printed stories to animation were, unlike most book-to-movie attempts, superb. But he often took liberties with the source material. In Pinocchio’s case, what most of you saw on the theater screen was a mirror image of the original, darker tale.
Pinocchio’s creator, Carlo Lorenzini, wrote under the pseudonym Collodi, derived from his eponymous village in Flore...

It Happened in the Forest

I think the most terrifying moment of my childhood occurred when, at age 4, I was seated in a movie theater watching Bambi with my mother when, without warning, a shot rang out and Bambi’s mother fell dead to the ground, a victim of a hunter’s bullet. Up until that instant, I had been entertained by a light-hearted cartoon. Suddenly, like Bambi, I was thrust into a coming of age moment.
The thought of losing one’s mother to a violent death would probably traumatize most young children. It has...

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

 A drunken Irishman stumbles across a man he believes to be a leprechaun, who shows him the true treasure he already has but doesn't appreciate. A short story by Keith B. Darrell. 4,041 words.

The Imperious Pair of Fools

This has been a disturbing week in which two democratic leaders revealed they really don’t understand the concept of democracy. In a democracy, “all men are created equal”, as Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson said that precept was “sacred” and “undeniable”. Benjamin Franklin called it “self-evident”. Abraham Lincoln held the American democracy was “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” The corollary to that principle is every citizen...

Chicken Little Was Right

Millions of years ago, before man or his predecessor ape walked the planet, dinosaurs ruled the earth. They were enormous and fierce, and these fearsome creatures’ reign was undisputed. No living creatures rose to challenge them for dominance and they would still be the sole occupants of our world were it not for a few rocks.
Yes, the most powerful creatures in existence, lords of the planet, were obliterated from the face of the earth, relegated to illustrated history books and occasional ske...

Happy Valentine's Day!

 A paranormal coming of age story. Brendan has a hard time fitting in as the new kid in town, especially on Valentine's Day. Although he hasn't made any friends at his new school, there is one girl he hopes will be his Valentine. But will their holiday end in newfound romance or heartbreak? A short story for young adults by Keith B. Darrell. 2,564 words.

Death of the Pony Express Redux

I first published this article more than a year ago but, in light of the announced termination of Saturday mail delivery (effective August 2013), several readers have asked me to reprint it in a more prominent spot on the blog.



Death of the Pony Express
"Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds" reads the inscription on the James Farley New York City post office. Herodotus penned those words describ...

The Voyage of Discovery

When we gaze into a classroom, we see the faces of 30 young students endowed with differing innate abilities and skills. They were not all designed to work the same way. Our educational system teaches them as if they were monolithic, or at least fungible entities. But they are not. One might be good with his hands, capable of creating fine pottery or crafts; a second might be a thinker; a third, a strategic planner; yet another, an artist or poet. One might be good with numbers, while another...

Get Your Stocking Stuffer

Fire up your Kindle! It's time to download your Christmas short story! Where else can you get this many laughs and still get change back from your dollar? Click now to download!
It's the Trial of the Century, as prosecutor Nicholas Scratch presents his case against Santa Claus. An irreverent short story by Keith B. Darrell. 3,690 words.