Paula’s Comments (group member since Oct 28, 2015)

Paula’s comments from the Science Fiction Microstory Contest group.

Neat story, Karl--great pacing/timing!

Indeed, very helpful, Tom.

So, Atlantis, Garden of Eden, site of Jacob's Ladder, Buddha Tree, are okay, or do they need some "paranormal" appearance/epiphenomena in addition to the known myth/s?

Do these have to be currently famous "hot spots" or can they be fictional? --or places called, at some time in the past (or future), hot spots?

Fine story! Well deserved, Tom. Congratulations!

Oh Jot, that is wonderful! Congratulations!

In a rock cottage, while the Ginny watches
Copyright 2021 by Paula Friedman

In a tiny rock cottage on a 15-acre North Sea island, a crone leans forward in her ancient kitchen, her pockets empty as her weathered features, telling the little girl who is shivering through another day as every day since the child fell prey to the Vorken bacterium, “Endure, Sylvie. And recall, our wee sweet Ginny meant you no harm.”

The child smiles but sobs. Quietly, the granma strokes the teary face. But the tiny lumpen have already risen on the girl’s thin wrists and there is no hope.

Their sentient Ginny, healthy so far but imported, like the market fish, utensils, breeches, flock, and so much else, from the Inner Cloud worlds, clucks from its perch, empathing. No, Vorken is not its fault; no blame. But no hope, either.

“Your granma’s generation went through much—but worlds were very different then,” the crone now murmurs. “The Hunger. The War. Yes, we were born amidst the Inter-Systems Wars; we turned adult during the first Antares 6—Antocha Empire Crisis, watching the 32 known sentient species balance on the long edge of irremediable explosive extinction. Somehow we did survive, and so did the not-really so-alien mamas of our Ginnies. Hear how she clucks to you!”

Again the child smiles, sobs.

“Three generations since, now, we have borne new young, new crops, new ways—like your silver-hair Sleek Chevaux, dearling, like the zonacs you and your friends love watching—”

“Reading.” With patient rasps, small hands crimping the coverlet.

“I’ll bring you more water.” The crone rises, climbs down into the cellar. Water is scarce, these last months.

“Help me, Granma.”

“I will.” Returning, she pats the pale hands. This child had hoped to be a spiro-painter. A gravity dancer. A physicist.

Vorken had struck first on the “monkey-like” Grovenkos’ worlds. Then, on their trade partners’ planets and neighboring systems. And suddenly was everywhere throughout this spiral arm.

The tired crone sweeps the day’s mixed vomitus and dust from the damp tile floor. Evening is coming.

“I want dawn.”

“Soon, child.”

Out the doorway, in the last light people and other sentients are eating, speaking together, trying to about the rest of life, though each cure, each vaccine, faith, discouragement—all—have failed. When the tiny lumpen break through to urface, there is no more hope.

She helps the girl lift her head to sip from the cup. The potion, people say, first kills pain. “Now drink. See, Ginny is watching. That’s right, and now sleep.”

[416 words]

Okay, getting the story in now. Just under the wire. I hope.

A very good Thanksgiving to all of you and yours! Stay healthy, eat well, write lots of new stories!
I'm trying to get a story in by midnight tonight; it's done but need to do lots of stuff today, hope to find time to type the tale in timely.
Looks like some fine stories this month.

All sounds very sensible, though I see loopholes there for post-18th century variations--CEOs, space-crew captains, and the like.
-----Also, "no one can be killed" by other characters? nor by wars, plagues, colliding planets, runaway horses, A.I.'s,--? by the author? (Just being difficult . . . .)
Really, very nifty new parameters, Jack.

Congratulations, Jack--superb story!

P.S. I'm lost on what is the October theme. I had a story semi-ready based on what Thaddeus had called--I thought, but perhaps misunderstood--his main theme for the month, "Seeds and Mystery - how you choose to interpret these two elements is up to you." But now the optional parameters--breaking rules, 2 others--seem to be named, instead, the themes. Granted, changing theme/subject in mid-contest-month is, in a sense, "rules-breaking," but, sorry to say, I, and perhaps some others, haven't time this month to come up with another story here. Fortunately, many good stories already in, and many of them break a rule or use mad science or a rival, though!

Wishing you the best with all of them, Jot!

Thaddeus wrote: "Thank you, all. Just getting to my online life. I appreciate the support and validation of my writing. I hope to try and expand my circles very soon."
Yes, definitely time to try the BigLeague thing, Thaddeus.

Congratulations, Thaddeus. Exceptional, powerful story.

Jot wrote: "The architecture job was not what I was expecting. More learning how to utilize other systems than designing microsystems from scratch to act as one. For me, I'm a coder. Had to resign the second d..."
Sorry the position wasn't a good fit for you, Jot. And yes, that time to work on your new language is a great compensatory plus!

Surprised you didn't "get" the narrator of my piece, J.F. Tells me to leave IN the "hints" I tend too often to cut out; thank you. That said, your capsule reviews of the stories this month are terrific--thanks for the hard work!

--Justin, I had pretty much the same reaction that Thaddeus had to your story's last line. Up to there, it was a terrific piece.
--Jeremy, the script style worked superbly for your story. Good having stories here in nonconventional form--especially when they work so well.

Oh my, this is one of the better months of stories this group has ever had, I think. Haven't read them all yet, but from those--in no particular order of their posting--I have read, super.
What is particularly strong is the range of styles, approaches, visions, and breadth, this month--much wider range than usual!

Secret Thinker
Copyright 2021 by Paula Friedman

Ohno! Omg! Oh no, oh no, oh no. . .. Oh my God. I shouldn’t have.

Should have rushed out, flashed in fast, raced out, done anything and everything, gone shoppin’, carried on, biz just like usual, “first one, and then the next,” from first to last, the way they’ve told us ever since the start that we’re supposed to. Should have. Should’ve done just anything, smiled, waved “keep wavin’ all your worries away,” oh-swim-oh-swim-your fears-away, just like they say to. ANYthing, done anything except not flapped here THINKING about it.

’cause I knew already—like I knew, like we been told—it’s thinking about it, harping on it, clinging ADDICTED to this focus on NEGATIVITIES that makes all this worse. Hell, that makes this happen.

And how they screech, the Big Ones, when I swish my way in even as I keep on thinking, CANNOT (or just DO NOT?) keep myself from thinking, dreamily thinking, like a purple-white mammalian unicorn, about what may be possible--how safe, how comfy, and sweet-distanced from each other in our crowded, jostling masses we’ll—I’ll—feel when one by one, we’ll—

Oh God, how they screech, the Big Ones, when I cannot/do not stop myself but, rather, keep the thinking swimming through me (Just remember, “wishing makes it so!”) of how pink-bloody joyous we’ll all be, every teensy now-still-hungry-homeless one of us, mi comrados, when at last we’re finally ensconced in them, our novel homelands! Joy on joy!

(Except of course their screeching!)

I kept thinking. (And their slipping, sliding, all around our Stick'ums as they overheat!) (Their stupid giant squirt-attacks, as if I can’t outsmart—!)

Yes, I'd kept thinking—yes, wishing, wishing secretly—we might invade, outwit, take over such warm, soft new homelands. And, you know, you know--guess what? We did. We won.

I won.

Yes, won. Unable to stop thinking, unable to, instead, “Go out and colonize,” I--lanky, slinky, swift-swimming I--had made it happen. Thus we’d won.

"Won." Except, it had shrunk them all up, heat-dried from inside--the Big Ones, all our brave new homelands crunched down tight upon us. Because I couldn’t—didn’t, wouldn’t—stop from thinking, couldn’t just “Rush out and infect someone!” teeny toes clipping tight, all filaments waving, joying in our New World, like I knew I should.
[360 words]