Squirrel Play Between the Sheets

There'll be more The Space between Atoms shortly. I promise. I thought I'd stop to point out a new story publication—we struggling writers need a bit of encouragement every now and again!

My weird, perhaps unnerving tale "Between the Sheets" is now live on Yellow Mama. This story is about what happens when the unexplained comes home to stay. I'm willing to admit, as most honest people are, that strange things do happen in life. Often we can find an explanation. Sometimes we can't.

I suspect that's why I like speculative fiction so much. There's a sense of wonder to it. As a friend of mine who's a published novelist likes to say, stories need a flux capacitor. It's a reference to Back to the Future. It's how Doc's time machine works. It's never explained because it can't be, but without it there's no story.

Some day I may grow brave enough to publish nonfiction about the strange things I've noted in my life. This story, however, is fiction.

Now that we're stuck at home all day during the pandemic, it might mean it's even spookier than I'd anticipated when I wrote it. Most of my stories were completed months, or years, before they find publishers. I've got a backlog right now awaiting time for submitting them.

"Between the Sheets" marks my twenty-eighth fiction publication. It's time to get some more sent on their way. By my count I've got eleven ready to go. What I don't have is pandemic time to locate publishers for them.

"Squirrel Play" has also recently appeared in The Horror Zine, also in print format. It was one of the least re-written of my stories, which makes me wonder if I edit myself too much. It seems better than letting other edit me.

In any case, I'll publish the next installment of The Space between Atoms shortly. But good news, among those of us who struggle, deserves to be shared.

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K. Marvin Bruce

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