Dora Reads: short stories

Showing posts with label short stories. Show all posts

Sunday 19 November 2023

Nerd Church - Short Story: Mornings Dawn, Whether You Want Them To Or Not

Originally published in the Medium publication Promptly Written, for the quote-prompt '“Some people live just looking for someone to die for.”― Dominic Riccitello' set by Ravyne Hawke.

Warning: this story deals with grief a lot, as well as generally discussing death and related topics.

Mornings Dawn, Whether You Want Them To Or Not

Image by Martina Bulková from Pixabay

Nerd Church - Short Story: Bex Is On Her Own

Originally published in the Medium publication Promptly Written, for the following prompt set by Ravyne Hawke:

Use any or all of the following concepts for a story:

— ancient runes/ruins
— a ghostly appearance
— danger is afoot!

Content Warning: I’m not sure what happened to this woman, but I don’t think it was anything good — I felt like I should add a warning, but it was kind of difficult to figure out what for exactly. So just be *waves hands* generally careful!

Bex Is On Her Own

A horror-ish short story

Nerd Church - Short Story: Some Space

A short story originally published in the Medium publication 'Promptly Written,' and based on a prompt by Ravyne Hawke.

The prompt:

Write a ‘moody’ piece around the following:

— out of this world
— wonderstruck
— a dark night

Some Space

Mountain path descending into the Rhondda Valley

Path descending towards the Rhondda Valley by Gareth James, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Nerd Church - Short Story: The Greatest Thieves

A short story originally published in the Medium publication 'Promptly Written'

The Greatest Thieves

...do not take jewels.

Image by Enrique Meseguer from Pixabay

Nerd Church - Short Story: New Money

This was first published by me in the Medium publication Promptly Written.

This is the first story I wrote which featured a character called Anna Sinclair - to date, I've written three stories about her, and given her her own Medium list titled 'Snapshots of Anna Sinclair.' (She won't leave me alone, so I've given in and accepted it.)

Content Warning: one potential drug reference. (Yes, I said ‘potential’ — it’s a little ambiguous, even to me 😅)

New Money

graffiti-style artsy illustration of a woman with red hair

Image by André Santana AndreMS from Pixabay

Nerd Church - Short Story: Crystal Clarity

This story was originally published in the Promptly Written publication on Medium by yours truly, in response to the prompt 'Either dream or reality' from editor Ravyne Hawke.

Crystal Clarity

Image by meineresterampe from Pixabay

He stepped out onto the crystal deck. Unable — unwilling — to look through the refracted layers of light beneath his feet.

It seemed so fantastical. A miracle of modern craftsmanship and engineering, they called it. He hated it.

Layers of quartz and glass melded into one another to create this sturdy viewing platform, over the crater. It didn’t seem real. And yet… it was strong beneath him. Physical.

He wouldn’t look down, through the surface, the prism, the light. Instead he looked across at the crater itself, ragged, raw, a bleeding wound on the landscape.

They told him the platform was very beautiful — stark contrast, they said, with the catastrophe it looked out upon. But he kept his eyes resolutely ahead, away from the glimpses of sublime achievement beneath him.

Beauty had no place here — not like this. No matter how much the tourists clicked and clacked across the quartz and crystal, oohing and ahing, he would not look down.

He wondered how many of them had even taken a videogram or a panoramiograph of the real attraction — the reason the platform was even here: the ugly crater which once held so many hopes, dreams, lives. None of them seemed to care.

They’ll tell people they visited this place. Not quite the truth.

If you enjoyed this story, please consider buying me a coffee here.

Whatcha think?

Talk to me! 😊💬

You can follow me on Twitter @CeeDoraReads, on Pinterest, and on Dora Reads @ BlogLovin. For more ways to support me, check out the Support Me page

Previous Short Stories on Dora Reads:

Nerd Church - Short Story: The Midday Sun

Nerd Church - Short Story: A Broken Princess

Sharing and commenting is a welcome boost to my fragile writer's ego! 😅

← Previous Post

Sunday 16 April 2023

Nerd Church - Short Story: The Midday Sun

I have a bunch of stories from Medium that I was thinking about posting here once a month-ish, because why not? (Possibly gonna regret asking that! 😅)

This story was originally published by yours truly in the Promptly Written publication on Medium, for the following prompt, set by Ravyne Hawke:

‘Write a ‘moody’ piece around the following:

— a monumental decision
— confusion
— a fork in the road’

The Midday Sun

An artsy minimalist-looking illustration of telegraph poles and a large hot sun

Image by Ruben from Pixabay

Nerd Church - The Black Phone: The Film Adaptation of A Horror Masterpiece

The Black Phone is one of my favourite short stories of all time, from one of my favourite authors of all time, Joe Hill.

I've read the collection 20th Century Ghosts (where The Black Phone appears,) more times than it's truly a good thing to admit to - it's my comfort reading, don't judge me.

Title: The Black Phone: The Film Adaptation of A Horror Masterpiece. Background: grey. Image: a retro black phone

So I love this story. It's a masterpiece.

Not perfect, no - it mentions how fat the villain is at least six times too many, for a start - but a masterpiece, all the same.

And I'm fully prepared to admit that I'm entirely biased when it comes to this story. So be aware of that. 😅

Nerd Church - Short Story: A Broken Princess

This is a (very) short story, first published by yours truly in the Medium publication EwhyE after I found it languishing in an old notebook.

Content warning: refs. to violence/murder.

Also whatever spell my mother put on me to stop me from swearing doesn't seem to work on fiction, so this is quite sweary - and without *'s for once!

Image by Ruth Archer from Pixabay

Nerd Church - Short Story: Girl, Alone

'The neighbours have come home. I can hear Mr L pulling his filtration system off – the sound seeps through the walls. Our walls are so thin – doesn’t seem like it could keep what’s going on out there at bay, does it?'

About mid-week this story was slammed into my brain, without warning, by the universe.

And I am but a simple writer - the universe calls, and I answer.

So... have this sci-fi-ish/dystopian-ish short story, I guess! 😅

(Bo Burnham's Inside (especially All Eyes On Me,) was pretty much my writing soundtrack for this - for anyone who finds that sort of insight interesting! ...Plus, it, uh, might explain a lot 😅)

Content Warnings:

- isolation

- life-threatening climate/environmental catastrophes

- brief non-sexual nudity and mentions of anatomy

- life-threatening heat and physical stress

- implied physical disability/health condition

- mental health issues/extreme stress

...I've never done a full Content Warnings list like this for one of my stories before, so be careful and tell me if I missed anything that needs to be listed!

'Girl, Alone' against a background of diamond-patterned translucent glass

Mini-Review! - Dat's Love and Other Stories by Leonora Brito

**This post contains affiliate links for Amazon.com (US). I earn commission from qualifying purchases**

Dat's Love & Other Stories title image with red willow branches hanging down over the corner

Title: Dat's Love and Other Stories

(Also published as 'Selected Stories)

Author: Leonora Brito

'Selected Stories' book cover with an artsy illustration of a Black woman

Genres: Anthology, Short Stories, Contemporary(-ish,) Historical Fiction

Buy now on Amazon.com

Month in Review(s) - September 2018

Ohmygod September.

September was a f**king rollercoaster. The type where you throw up a lot.

September title image with purple and pink leaves on an autumn forest background

(I'm actually kind of quietly impressed with this graphic that I threw together in like, 15 minutes! Lol.)

On the good side:

It was my birthday! Woop!

(If you wanna give me a present, you can get me a coffee here! If not, I still love ya! 😊)

Really Mini-Reviews! - The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen and The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories by Ken Liu

'Really Mini-Reviews' title image, with title images for The Refugees, and The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, inset. Stacked books icon in bottom-right corner

I have two reviews for stunning collections of short stories by Asian-American writers for you today dear nerdlets!

Check out my reviews of The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen, and The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories by Ken Liu: