Process

Addicted to Story

Photo by Dale Anderson

With Apologies and Thanks to Robert Palmer

I might as well admit it, I’m addicted to Story. I do not remember the first time I heard a story. I DO remember the first time I read an entire story on my own. But by then I was maybe six years old and had been “on the narrative” for years.

My parents read to me before I could read myself and told me stories of their childhoods. I could not get enough.

Story was soothing at the end of a tough day when I couldn’t sleep. Then it was soothing at the end of ANY day. Soon I needed story in the middle of the day. Before long I was reading stories at the breakfast table.

In Third grade I would come home from school and write MY OWN stories.

Thankfully, college and grad school were story-dry years. Textbooks occupied my reading hours; tests, term papers and thesis projects commanded my writing efforts. My work life was mathematics and memos.

Eventually, I had two children and Story came back into my life. I read to them and told them stories of my childhood. But it didn’t stop there.

I took them to the local public library for more stories and checked out books for myself. I read late at night after the kids had gone to bed. In the morning, I read at the breakfast table.

I started writing again. I don’t want to stop . . . my keyboard is calling me. I thought I was immune to this stuff but I’m going to have to face it, I’m addicted to Story.

Robin Anderson

History- Love It, Hate It

French troops at Talavera by Hippolyte Belange

I’ve always wanted to be an author but I never dreamed of writing historical fiction. High school and college history teachers focused on memorizing dates. Having a good memory, I aced the tests and promptly forgot all the meaningless data. Then I discovered Regency romance and mystery and social history. I was hooked. Seeing how people lived and why things happened tickled my brain like amorphous dates and events never did.

The excerpt from my wip, Mayhem and Mudlarks, is an example of how I used a story about a general’s hat from the Peninsular Wars.

“Lord Major Kenyon Randall Jamieson ushered Sherry into his small office at Whitehall, pointing out a chair in front a well-worn desk of indeterminate wood, before seating himself.

“I thought you had no friends alive here?” Sherry pulled his chair closer to the lamp on the desk and sat.

“I did not, until John Beckett, the undersecretary, read a recounting of my exploits in Talavera with the 29^th Regiment.” Major pulled a bottle and two glasses out of a drawer.

Sherry nodded a yes. “The battle that solidified your role and started mine as an exploring officer’”

Major poured a substantial quaff of amber liquid in each glass and handed one to Sherry. “Or made my superiors afraid of ever sending me into battle again, especially after I told the story of the two officers who had their hats blown away by a cannon ball flying overhead.”

“Lieutenant Duguid wasn’t too happy to return the only hat recovered to its rightful owner.”

“I’m not sure that hat belonged to General Stewart. But rank has its privileges.” Major raised his glass in salute. “Now he war is over but the fears of rebellion on the home front have all the politicians and career civil servants yanking out their hair. They have no knowledge of real intrigue. Hence men such as ourselves have increased in value.”

“But I refuse to spy on my fellow Englishmen.” Sherry sipped on his whiskey to drown the sour taste in his mouth. He had been approached to do so on his return to London after Napoleon was safely ensconced at Elba…

check out britishbattles.com

CHANGES

TheNightMail is changing!! You may have noticed the new WordPress theme. But wait, there’s more!

TheNightMail was originally created as a show place for Becky and Robin’s short fiction related to their screenwriting project, FREAKTOWN. It soon morphed into a straight out site for Flash Fiction accompanied by carefully curated images. It was not long before poetry, particularly haiku, made an appearance. More recently, there have been guest author contributions as well. Yes, evolution happens.

Now TheNightMail is changing again. Robin and Becky have returned to decades old writing habits and are producing novels and novellas under TheNightMail imprint. These farcical romance and mystery stories have historical settings, so you will find new sections on the blog devoted to “Regency”, “Flash Facts” and “Publications”. We will still endeavor to punch out flash fiction pieces for your consideration but hope you’ll click around the site and see what else is available in longer form.

Thanks for reading.

Image from flickr commons

Power Down

Tonight I write by candlelight. A scheduled outage they said.

No light, no heat, no electronic hum but in the shadows story pours from my pen. Stream of consciousness, words flow like water or wine or my own blood.

Now I know I should have contrived a blackout long ago.

Image by Robin Anderson

Power Down originally published at fiftywordstories.com on September 16, 2019

syllables of small
poems occupy large portions of
my befuddled brain

writing process, what
is my writing process? do
I even have one?

a mental blender
is what I need to create
my word salad

Image by Harrison Fulop