  Short Stories
This week: The Sky Is Falling Edited by: Legerdemain  
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The Sky Is Falling!
So many of us love post-apocalypse stories and movies. The Walking Dead show has a huge following. With all of those ideas swirling around us, I'm sure lots of writers are getting inspired to write this genre story. Not all of them are about zombies, but writing about an catastrophic event can be exciting. When sitting down to brainstorm and plot your story line, keep in mind a few things.
First thing is "when"...is this story set in the future? Is it the past? Are you changing an actual event in history and morphing it to your story line? Make sure the facts you use from the past are reasonably accurate. While I'm not a history buff, I know some people grate their teeth when an author takes too many liberties about the known past.
Next, you're changing the landscape of Earth as we know it. So make sure your story has some description so your reader can see your setting. Destroyed buildings, burned out cars, or nature reclaiming what the human race has changed. If you're keeping the story short, minute details aren't necessary. Remember, our readers have imaginations and like to use them! But you need to give a framework for your readers to travel in.
Okay, next are your characters. Decide if your characters are survivors, predators, and who gets to die. A catastrophic event is going to bring out the base strengths and weaknesses in the people that survive. Be sure to take advantage of the extraordinary situation and create stellar characters.
Last, think about leaving an opening somewhere.  If your story becomes popular, it sure would be nice to create side stories for your secondary characters or move forward to a novel. Tie up your loose ends of the main people in your story, but I find it nice to imagine what happens in that "world" with other people and situations.
And as always, Write On!
This month's question: What is your favorite post-apocalyptic scene? Send in your answer below!  Editors love feedback!
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Excerpt: Around him, the others sang. They knew it was his day. The black spots had come to him in the night; the touch of the Heart Plant, from which all of their kind had been born. Their brother and their ancestor, who had come before them and lived on in every member of the People to gather the sun to their flesh. He who waited for him in paradise.
Excerpt: My mission was simple: to find a living man, another creature of intelligence and love and creativity and the capacity to understand. The other mission was to end my suffering although I realize that perhaps they are both one and the same.
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This item number is not valid.
#1999522 by Not Available. |
Excerpt: Her partner, Dr. Harrison, watched her tighten a few bolts and his thick brows arched with concern, “I still do not think we should be doing this. Think of The Terminator.”
| |  | When All's Lost (E)
Alone and wretched, the world before him gone, a man comes to a conclusion.
#1976022 by JAMcD  |
Excerpt: He stared and all for nothing, he realised. No matter how ardently he looked upon the locket, it would not yield comfort. He came to acknowledge that the past from which the image was birthed was irretrievable, alien, lost, and he could not relive it for all the hours of gazing the sun might permit. It was hopeless. The slim orange crescent of the sun had descended into the horizon and the freeze had trenched its way into the darkened earth and air. The hoary, frost-hardened flesh of his hand was now totally insensible to the slim chain lapped around his fingers. He pocketed the locket and proceeded homeward through the ash.
Excerpt: "Just tell me what's in the box. Shut it up too, if you don't mind." Satisfied that he wasn't about to be run through, William crossed the short distance between them and showed Sable the vibrating box on his palm.
"It's a phone."
"Come again?"
Excerpt: The Pastor's face lit up and I think Hope's did too, just a little. "A ride?" said the Pastor. "Do you mean to say that you have a car?"
Now, I couldn't help feeling a little proud. "I refurbished her after the war. Her top speed is only about thirty miles per hour, but it still beats walking."
"Halleujah!" shouted the Pastor. "God has answered our prayers." Then, seeing that I was a little embarrassed he said, "Will you take us to Boston?"
I groaned. "That's a little farther then I had in mind. What do you want to go there for, anyway?"
"We are on a most important mission from God. Have you heard of the goddess, Tro?"
Excerpt: It all happened suddenly enough.
There, on the morning news, barely audible above the chomping in my ears of the cereal in my mouth, it is said:
All the dandelions are gone.
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This item number is not valid.
#1720034 by Not Available. |
Excerpt: “The asteroid has diverted a degree, General,” the white-haired scientist responded. “The problem remains that the asteroid will still pass close enough to Earth to cause a dramatic gravitational disruption. The radiation within the celestial mass may very well be beyond our world’s tolerable level, as well.”
“I still think we should launch our nuclear arsenal at it.”
“That has been discussed and discounted as too dangerous, General. The fallout, combined with the clutter left behind, could be equally destructive,” Geneva sighed. “I am afraid we must leave this to nature, provenance, fate, or God. Choose your belief and pray it is looking out for us.”
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This month's question: What is your favorite post-apocalyptic scene? Send in your answer below! Editors love feedback!
Last month's question: Do you have any resource suggestions for contest listings?
No replies.
Responses to last month's newsletter "Short Stories Newsletter (March 9, 2016)" :
Joy  : Thanks for spreading the word, Leger.  Mastersreview.com is a good site to check every now and then. They put up new and immediate contests and other tips in several areas. Writers can also sign up for their newsletter. Better yet, everything's free.
willwilcox: Your editorials are always so well put together; both mentally and visually 
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Short Stories: April 06, 2016 Issue [#7577]
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