Cafe Aphra: An Online Community for Writers

Here Cafe Aphra barista Sara Roberts interviews writer Chris Fielden about his work and the highly successful flash fiction challenges he has been running since last year. Cafe Aphra: Hi Chris, so tell us what is your main interest as a writer, in terms of form and genre? Chris Fielden: Dark humour. Most of the stories I write involve an element of fantasy too, but are often set in our world. So there might be a demon in London, or a zombie in Washington. I’ve always been a fan of writers with vivid imaginations – Stephen King, Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. Le Guin, Terry Pratchett and Roald Dahl to name a few – so I’m drawn towards the weird, the wonderful, the macabre and the amusing. CA: Do you also teach creative writing? Tell us about your latest course. CF: I’m not a teacher in the academic sense, but I have written a book called How to Write a Short Story, Get Published and Make Money . That uses my own published stories as case studies, clearly showing how all the advice ...

Dim flame dying like a senile candle, a flickering old woman, crinkled fingers drooping  from large jeweled rings  as she sobs in septic sleep  that no lover’s steps  tread the midnights  of her bedroom.  by Gary Beck Gary Beck's poetry collection Rude Awakenings will be published by Winter Goose Publishing this spring.

From the bending willow’s grasp, she slides into the river. Eyes to the sky, she floats downstream, opens her mouth and sings. Good morrow, ’tis Saint Valentine’s day, All in the morning betime, And I a maid at your window, To be your Valentine.   Borne by her skirt’s twin billows, she sings of the fickleness of Princes, of he who called her celestial, his soul’s idol, sending her letters drenched with longing, “Doubt thou the stars are fire, Doubt that the sun doth move, Doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt I love.” Words that gave him leave to slide his arm around her waist, to kiss her neck under the heavy hair that floats around her now, mossy with crow-flowers and dead men’s fingers. But all too soon love turned to ashes in his mouth, and he called her bawd and wanton, as a riddling madness drove his mind to fever and his hand too quick to the sword. One thrust, and her father’s blood, a waxen pool of scarlet, seeped up the arras like a blush....