Saturday, May 13, 2017

THE MONTH OF YES YOU MAY




              THE JOY OF STORY
John M. Daniel’s Blog
May 13, 2017



§§§

Greetings, friends and celebrators of the joy to be found in stories—writing them, reading them, telling them, or hearing them. If you enjoy a good story, this weekly blog is for you.

This being the second Saturday of the month of May, it’s time to post the 99-word stories sent to me during the month of April. The prompt for this month was taken from a lyric by Alan J. Lerner for the musical Camelot. Here it is: Tra la, it's May, the lusty Month of May, That lovely month when everyone goes blissfully astray.
I received six stories, mostly from regular contributors. I’m always glad to hear from writers I’ve never met but have come to know though their short, short fiction. I’m also always glad to receive material from writers new to the gene pool. (Don’t worry, I don’t understand that metaphor either. It just happened.)
Well, I’m happy to post these six stories on my blog, but to be honest, I’m disappointed. I was hoping to receive some stories that took risks, some fiction inspired by the active hormones of spring…some R-rated fiction. “No,” you say?”
Well, why not?
Okay, okay. The prompt for June is every bit as challenging, and it doesn’t (necessarily) call for a crawl between hot sheets. See what you can do with it: What was the most important life-changing decision you ever made? Tell it in a story 99 words long.
Meanwhile, here is some tame fiction about a tame May. Tame, but otherwise and nonetheless quite readable.

§§§

             
THE MONTH OF YES YOU MAY!

Six stories
about the
month of May—
99 words apiece

§

A LETTER DATED MAY 1st
by June Kosier

Graduation is scheduled for May 23rd, 1976. I have taken day clinicals on my days off and night classes for five years to get my MS in Nursing. 
Finally. Oh, happy day!
Then it happens.  I get a letter from the Admissions Office: “You will not be able to graduate since you did not meet the admissions requirements.”  I never took the Graduate Record Exams. I can’t take the GREs in time for graduation.
The dean tells me to take the Miller Analogies.  If I do well, I will get my diploma—just in time. 
I do…and I did!
•••


A PLACE ON THE ROCK
by Mary Perrin Scott

Moon rising in the sky creates tides, high and low, predicted and expected and sometimes violent.
Wild life responds, using the highs and lows, finding needed  resting places.
Seal Rock appears and disappears with the high and low tides. The fight begins for who lounges on the rock of choice.
One, two, three.
Barking, swatting, growling.
Then the pup appears.
As the tide turns, one by one the seals slide off the rock. Mama and pup hang on until the rising water forces them off. Slowly swimming away, they sing, “Tra la, it’s May! The lusty Month of May!”
•••


HEALING IN MAY
by Marilyn London

We hadn’t been on skates in years. We wanted to have fun. He held David’s hand and was halfway around the rink, last time I looked. I kneeled to tie on Jared’s toddler skates.
The music stopped.
Silence.
A voice asked everyone to leave the rink.
I turned. He was on the floor. David moused his way around the railing back to me.
“A shattered femur,” the doctor said. Several surgeries ensued.
Five years later, cane in hand, he left for Long Island to a new job. Our house finally sold.
We followed in the merry month of May.

•••


MISS LEAD
by Diane Morelli

Sage’s devotion to The Nancy Drew Files was legendary. Two mutual acquaintances on campus taught her that she was more of a snoop than a sleuth.
Victoria sat next to Sage in Ethics class. “My fiancĂ© lives far away. No lovin’ until classes end in May.”
My eye, Sage thought, once she noticed that Raymond, her cute classmate from Photography, and Victoria were hanging out.
Raymond stopped Sage right before the Ethics final.  “Give this to Victoria, for good luck.”
Sage closed her eyes and puckered her lips.
Raymond slipped a sharpened number two pencil into her sweaty hand.
•••


REALITY
by Christine Viscuso

“Chester, you cheated. That sucks big time.”
“Technically, no, Hildy. I didn’t. However, April has turned to May. Didn’t you hear that May is the month where one may stray?
“I don’t care what month we’re in. You’re a cheat, Chester. I come home from a hard day’s work as a barista and what are you doing? Lounging on our velvet Sven sofa staring glassy-eyed at her.”
“I couldn’t help myself.”
“We agreed we wouldn’t do it. It’s cheating when you sneak around. Frankly, I question the mind that does that.”
 “Geez. All I did was watch reality TV.”
•••


LUST UNFULFILLED
by Jerry Giammatteo

May is a time for lust and baseball. Charlie’s mind was on both. But mostly lust.
He went to the club and saw her. The lady in the short black skirt with the revealing top.
After hesitating, he approached her. She eyed him disdainfully and turned away. Later, he tried again.
“Get lost, loser,” she said tartly and found the arm of some sketchy looking fellow. He gave Charlie a look that convinced him not to persist.
Charlie went home to watch the Mets. They won. It was as much fulfillment as he was to get this May evening.
•••


§§§

Call for submissions:
Your 99-Word Stories

The deadline for June’s 99-word story submissions is June 1, 2017. The stories will appear on my blog post for June 10, and will stay posted for a week.

note: this 99-word story feature is a game, not a contest. Obey the rules and I’ll include your story. I may edit the story to make it stronger, and it’s understood that you will submit to my editing willingly. That’s an unwritten rule.

Rules for the 99-word story feature are as follows:

1. Your story must be 99 words long, exactly.
2. One story per writer, per month.
3. The story must be a story. That means it needs plot (something or somebody has to change), characters, and conflict.
4. The story must be inspired by the prompt I assign.
5. The deadline: the first of the month. Stories will appear on this blog the second Saturday of the month.
6. I will copy edit the story. The author of the story retains all rights.
7. Email me your story (in the body of your email, or as a Word attachment) to: jmd@danielpublishing.com

THIS MONTH’S PROMPT FOR NEXT MONTH’S 99-WORD STORY: What was the most important life-changing decision you ever made? Tell it in a story 99 words long.

§§§

Calling all published authors—

I try to feature a guest author the third Saturday (and week following) of each month. If you’re interested in posting an essay on my blog—it’s also a chance to promote a published book—email me directly at jmd@danielpublishing.com.

§§§

Thank you for visiting. Please drop by next week!





Saturday, May 6, 2017

WHERE DO STORIES COME FROM?


   THE JOY OF STORY
John M. Daniel’s Blog
May 7, 2017



§§§

Greetings, friends and celebrators of the joy to be found in stories—writing them, reading them, telling them, or hearing them. If you enjoy a good story, this weekly blog is for you.

§§§

      THE JOY OF STORY

Brief
Essays on
Writing Fiction

§

Chapter 3
Where Do Stories Come From?


So you want to write a story?
About what? Any ideas? Pardon my impertinence, but get used to the question: “Where do you get your ideas?” Every novelist, story writer, playwright, songwriter, or screenwriter has to answer that question at some point.
I have three sources to suggest.
First let me suggest a premise: all good fiction is, at least in part, autobiographical. And by the way, that goes for historical novels, westerns, science fiction, and gritty police professionals. What may seem like flights of fancy usually have some source within our own experience, or our own dreams of glory and nightmares of disaster.
Well, perhaps this is a conversation for another time. Meanwhile, let’s just accept that your own life is a rich source of fictional stories. Flannery O’Connor is said to have said, “Any writer who survived childhood has enough material to last his whole career.” She may not really have said that, because I’ve never seen a primary source for the quotation, and it’s been quoted so differently by different secondary sources that it may be apocryphal. But that doesn’t make the statement any less true.
I would add that the rich mine of materials isn’t limited to memories of childhood. Life is full of turning points, changes, choices, and consequences, and they’re all waiting to be exploited.
Where do we find them?

The Junk Drawer of Your Memory.
Every home has at least one junk drawer. Opening memory’s junk drawer is like opening a jar of insects, some beautiful, some with stingers or teeth. Where did this key come from? Who do I know who drives a Porsche? Why did I save this snapshot of my ex-husband trying to politely carve the birthday cake I made from scratch, when we both knew he didn’t want to be reminded he was turning forty? One joker card from the MGM Grand? As I remember, the joke was on me. My first report card. All A’s except for citizenship. Ticket stubs from My Fair Lady. I still have a Gene McCarthy button? I still have my draft card?
Every one of these keepsakes has a story, and the drawer is bottomless.
Historical novelists may want to explore that trunk in the attic. Horror writers will find Steve King lurking in the basement, sorting his bone collection and tasting Amon-tillado.

Rites of Passage.
Rites of passage are life-changing events common to many within any culture. Some of them are experienced in childhood: toilet training, learning to ride a bicycle, losing teeth, first day of school, being disabused of the myth of Santa Claus. Some come in puberty and adolescence: the driver’s license, the first kiss, the first heartbreak, the first drink. Some are the business of young adulthood: moving out and moving on, military service, college, first job, marriage, parenthood, traffic tickets, debts, and finding a career. Then come later life and what comes later than later life: grandchildren, arthritis, a crummy gold watch, funerals, and the chance to write your memories down for future generations. Some rites of passage are reserved for boys becoming men: learning to shave. Some for girls becoming women: buying a bra. Some rites of passage happen mainly to rich people, some to poor people; some to religious people, others to skeptics. So we don’t all experience all the same rites, but chances are that within any culture, we know people who have gone through experiences like these.
How to make a story out of a rite of passage you’ve passed through? First, it’s important to describe the passage in such a way that all readers (who share your culture) will relate to the experience. Second, and more important, it’s the goal of the story to show how your own experience of this rite was special, your own to claim, and how it changed you and made you a different person from the one you were before you went through that creaking door, that stretch of whitewater rapids, that midterm exam.

Archetypes
In any culture, there are stories we all know. Not only do we know them well because we learned them as children, but we’ve heard them over and over in varied and different retellings.
In the American/WASP/Judeo-Christian culture, to pick only one segment of our multicultural society (but the one I know best), most of us know a few common religious myths, such as the Garden of Eden, Cain and Abel, and the Prodigal Son. A lot of us know the same Greek myths, like the Myth of Sisyphus, the Complex of Oedipus, the Midas Touch, or Pandora’s Box. Then there are the fairy tales we grew up on: Cinderella, The Ugly Duckling, Little Red Riding Hood.
These stories get shamefully recycled, to great effect. East of Eden is a retelling of Cain and Abel. Pretty Woman is a combination of Pygmalion and Cinderella. The Ugly Duckling? It’s the basis of Dumbo, “Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” and dozens of other heartwarming stories.
And you’ll no doubt find your own personal versions of archetypical stories that you can exploit for fiction, taking these stories we all know and making them into stories you alone could write.

§§§

Call for submissions:
Your 99-Word Stories

The deadline for June’s 99-word story submissions is June 1, 2017. The stories will appear on my blog post for June 10, and will stay posted for a week.

note: this 99-word story feature is a game, not a contest. Obey the rules and I’ll include your story. I may edit the story to make it stronger, and it’s understood that you will submit to my editing willingly. That’s an unwritten rule.

Rules for the 99-word story feature are as follows:

1. Your story must be 99 words long, exactly.
2. One story per writer, per month.
3. The story must be a story. That means it needs plot (something or somebody has to change), characters, and conflict.
4. The story must be inspired by the prompt I assign.
5. The deadline: the first of the month. Stories will appear on this blog the second Saturday of the month.
6. I will copy edit the story. The author of the story retains all rights.
7. Email me your story (in the body of your email, or as a Word attachment) to: jmd@danielpublishing.com

THIS MONTH’S PROMPT FOR NEXT MONTH’S 99-WORD STORY: What was the most important life-changing decision you ever made? Tell it in a story 99 words long.

§§§

Calling all published authors—

I try to feature a guest author the third Saturday (and week following) of each month. If you’re interested in posting an essay on my blog—it’s also a chance to promote a published book—email me directly at jmd@danielpublishing.com.

§§§

Thank you for visiting. Please drop by next week!





Saturday, April 29, 2017

GIFTS FROM AGGIE CRONE


 THE JOY OF STORY
John M. Daniel’s Blog
April 29, 2017



Greetings, friends and celebrators of the joy to be found in stories—writing them, reading them, telling them, or hearing them. If you enjoy a good story, this blog is for you.

This week, beginning the last Saturday in the month of April, I offer you another installment of my novel The King’s Eye: A Fantasy of the Farther Isles.
In case you missed the last installment, which appeared in February, here’s a recap:

Rodney Trapper the Goatherd’s 17-year-old son on the Isle of Goats stops at Ralf’s Alehouse at the end of the day. There he meets Prince Frogge, who has come to the Isle of Goats looking for someone to join him in his quest to kill the Giant Clobber and return the High King’s crystal eye. Rodney is interested in the idea, as he tells Bromalyn, Ralf’s daughter, with whom he is sleeping. She doesn’t like the idea, but she lets Rodney know she’s heard about this quest from another prince, Tamber of the Isle of Mirth, and she calls Tamber the handsomest man she’s ever met.

That was Chapter One, and this week you will meet Rodney’s ancient grandmother, who mixes herbs with magic and gives Rodney and Frogge some medicines and a crooked broom, which she promises them will come in handy during their dangerous adventure.

§§§

THE KING’S EYE
A Fantasy of the Farther Isles
John M. Daniel



Chapter 2: Gifts from Aggie Crone




It was difficult for Rodney to forgive his new companion, Prince Frogge, for having such short legs. It was embarrassing to walk the high road through the town on their first morning as partners, Rodney forced to shorten his long-legged stride as Frogge trotted along beside him, puffing and yammering, and stopping every few minutes to hitch up the pack on his back. “How far is this cottage?” and “Is it dark in the forest?” and “Is your grandmother really a witch?” and “Does she have a broom?” While all this time Rodney could feel the eyes of the townsfolk on the two of them—all of the townsfolk having of course heard the infectious gossip brought home from Ralf’s Alehouse the evening before. Yes, Rodney Trapper, the Goatherd’s son, had been fool enough to sign on for this foolhardy if not doomed adventure, to sail off to the faraway Farther Isle of the South Wind, to challenge the pitiless giant who had slaughtered their own island’s goats seven years before. But that wasn’t the embarrassing part.
What mortified Rodney Trapper, the Goatherd’s son, was being seen in the company of such a fancy little fop, this short, round, over-dressed child who couldn’t keep up and wouldn’t stop talking.
“I say there, Rodney,” called out Cort Butcher, “who’s your new best friend? Or will he be the bait for one of your traps?”
“Rodney Trapper, is it?” added Cort’s wife, Olie Baker. “From now on we’ll be calling you Rodney Nursemaid!”
Rodney tried to laugh them off, but he flushed hot and red and muttered under his breath, “I’m doing this for you, you ungrateful lot. You’ll thank me when I’m finished killing the tyrant. And the only reason I keep company with this boy is because he has the boat to carry me there!”

When Rodney and Frogge reached Aggie Crone’s cottage deep in the forest beyond the far side of town, they found the old woman out in her garden, on her hands and knees, up to her knuckles in the soil, yanking weeds.
“Good morning, Granny,” Rodney called from the lane. He held up his sack. “I brought you a fox.” He whispered to Frogge, “You mustn’t be alarmed by a thing my grandmother says. She speaks her mind, and tells the truth, even if at times what she says sounds peculiar.”
Aggie stood up slowly and stiffly, stretched her back, and shot Rodney a twisted-tooth grin. “About time you got here, Rascal Rodney, and I see you’ve brought along your young friend I’ve been hearing so much about.” She hobbled to the gate and let them in. She offered her hand to the boy and told him, “Hello, young prince named Frogge. I hope you become a man sometime soon, so you can make a man of my foolish grandson.”
Frogge smiled, shrugged the pack off his back, and took the old woman’s hand. She was no taller than he was, but her hands were huge, and her dirty fingers were leathery, with knuckles like rough stones the size of cobnuts. Frogge said, “I’m pleased to meet you, Mistress Aggie Crone. How in the Stars do you know my name?”
Aggie let go of the boy’s hand. “A bird told me.”
Frogge casually wiped his soiled hand on the backside of his purple breeches. “A bird?”
“It’s true,” Rodney said. “She gets her news from the birds.” He handed his sack of game to his grandmother. “Here, Granny. Two weasels, three coneys, three moles, and a fox.”
Aggie Crone took the sack and reached up to pat her grandson’s cheek. “Weasel stew tonight,” she said with a proud smile. “You’ll stay for supper.”
Rodney looked at Frogge, who appeared queasy at the prospect. “You’ve never had a meal so fine as my grandmother’s weasel stew,” he told the boy. “Yes, Granny, we’ll be here for supper, and we’ll stop here for the night as well. Then, tomorrow morning, as soon as Randy the Cock wakes us up at dawn, we’ll be off adventuring. Am I  right, Frogge?”
Frogge sucked on his lower lip. “I don’t want to put you to any trouble, Mistress Crone. Perhaps I should return to Ralf’s Alehouse for supper and a bed tonight, and then Rodney and I can meet tomorrow, down at the harbor.” He turned to his partner. “Say about noon, so we can set sail early?”
Rodney felt the time had come to establish which of the two was to give the orders. Frogge from The Fens might be a Prince, and he might own the boat, and this whole adventure might have been his idea, but he was just a boy, a spoiled whelp, pampered by privilege. “Frogge—”
“Frogge, you listen to your old Aunt Aggie,” the old woman said. “Don’t you be afraid of weasel stew. Get used to simple fare, lad. And my weasel stew may be the best meal you’ll have for quite some time. You’ll find nothing so tasty on South Wind Isle, I’ll promise you that. Nothing to eat there but grubs, slugs, and snakes, unless Rodney can trap you a vulture. There are vultures aplenty on that windswept island, legends tell, but vultures taste of rot. As for a bed tonight, you’ll sleep in the barn with young Pansy. She’ll keep you warm.”
“Oh, but I couldn’t do that,” Frogge protested. “I’ve pledged my affections to Princess Llanaa, so I—”
“Frogge, Pansy’s a heifer,” Rodney explained.
“And now,” said Aggie Crone, “the two of you can earn your keep by spending the rest of the afternoon in the garden, pulling weeds. Down on your knees, your Highness. You too, Rodney, the would-be hero. If the pair of you can’t do battle with this patch of clover and dock, how do you expect to lay low that Giant?” She nodded fiercely with that frightening face, then let it relax into a summery smile. “If you get hungry while you work, you may eat a few radishes. Not too many, mind. I don’t want you to spoil your appetites.”

That evening, the heat of the day was swallowed by a chilly fog. Supper had gone well; Aggie Crone’s weasel stew was especially tasty, and Prince Frogge, after his first timid spoonful, dug in and asked for three helpings. Now the four of them sat before the fireplace: Aggie, Rodney, their guest Frogge, and Rodney’s pa, Yvor the Goatherd. Yvor hadn’t said one word during supper, and now he didn’t say much more. He rocked back and forth and side to side on his chair, wearing a sad scowl and occasionally muttering, “Goats.”
Frogge had tried and failed to engage Yvor in polite chatter. He turned to Aggie and said, “Your son doesn’t say much, but he seems concerned about his goats.”
 “Goats.”


“That’s right,” Aggie said. “The poor man lost his spirit and most of his mind seven years ago, when our island lost its goats. My Yvor used to be the Master Goatherd, you see. As was his father before him, and his father’s father before that, and so on back farther than tales can tell. The Master Goatherd was an important man on the Isle of Goats, as you can imagine, and a chief advisor to the King. Now look at my boy. Poor Yvor’s no more important and no more with us than the wooden chair he’s sitting on.”
“Goats.”
“That’s right, Sonny. Goats indeed. Prince Frogge, I suppose you’ve heard how our island lost its goats?”
“No, Mistress Crone. I haven’t.”
“Isn’t that just like the other Isles, not to grieve for our great loss. Not even to tell the tale. Well, Your Highness, it was the Giant Clobber, of course. Him and his minions, seven years ago. They arrived in a large boat during the night of the first full moon of spring, and the next day, in broad daylight, they rounded up the herds and slaughtered nearly every goat on the island, and then butchered them in their own slippery blood. The minions did the rounding up, but the Giant Clobber did the killing. And when our good King Noel the Elder bravely walked out onto the scene to stop the senseless butchery, Clobber slaughtered the king as well, and left his body on the pile of heads and hooves and guts, to feed the foxes and the ravens.”
“You said ‘nearly every goat,’” Frogge said. “Did some of the goats escape?”
“Well, yes, there was a herd the Giant didn’t find, in a northern valley near the royal castle. Fifty goats were spared.”
“Well, that was fortunate,” Frogge offered. “Thank the Stars.”
Rodney coughed and spat into the fire. “Damn the Stars, and damn King Noel.”
“But wasn’t King Noel trying his best, doing what he could to stop—”
“Not Good King Noel the Elder,” Aggie Crone explained. “Rodney’s talking about that king’s son, King Noel the Younger, who took the throne upon his father’s death. To celebrate his coronation he slaughtered the remaining fifty goats, and fed them to his royal guests, visiting royalty from the Isles of Mirth and Worth, and the Isles of Thunder and Thorns.”
“Goats.”
“I’d like to slaughter our Young King Noel,” Rodney said, pounding his fist into his palm. “But since I can’t do that, I’ll have to kill the Giant Clobber instead.”
“And you’ll return a hero,” his grandmother said. “If you return at all.”
“I have to do this, Gran.”
“I know you do, lad.”
“And,” Frogge pointed out, “when we return triumphant from the Isle of the South Wind and give King Rohar back his crystal eye, you’ll have your reward: half of Blackberry Island to call your own. Blackberry Island is home to hundreds of wild goats, all waiting to be tamed.”
“Goats.”
“That’s right, Father, goats. Lots of goats. And you’ll come live with us too, won’t you, Gran?”
“Me? No. I shall live on the Isle of Goats, this Isle of Goats, and in this forest and in this cottage until the Stars call me home. But you’ll have plenty of company, with your pa, and your new goats, and I suppose that woman will go with you? That Bromalynn Alehouse woman?”
Rodney did not answer.
Aggie turned to Frogge and said, “Tell me, Prince, what made you choose this reckless rascal grandson of mine to be your partner in this unwise errand?”
“I didn’t choose Rodney.” Frogge smiled. “He volunteered.”
“You chose him. Don’t lie to me, child.”
Frogge dropped the smile. “Wisdom from the Island of the Stars led me to the Isle of Goats. I was told by the Stargazer that I’d find a goatherd here, and a goatherd’s son, who happened to be a restless fool—”
“A fool for goats,” Aggie said.
“Goats.”
 “And you, young Prince Frogge?” Aggie asked. “What will be your reward? If you live to claim a reward.”
The boy prince held his hands together as if in prayer to the Stars. “I’ll have my only wish. I’ll marry the Princess Llanaa.”
“Good luck with that,” the old woman said. “From what I’ve heard you’ll need it.”
Frogge nodded. “I know the odds are not in my favor when I fight the Giant, but with Rodney Trapper’s help—”
“I was wishing you luck with that marriage you think you want,” Aggie said. “I don’t know how to wish you luck in your rash plan to kill a brute who outweighs the two of you together, and would outweigh you still if there were four of you. Oh, of course I wish you foolish boys luck, but my wishes won’t do you any good. What will help you will be the potions and charms I shall give you.”
The old woman rose slowly and stiffly from her log stool, lit a candle, and shuffled to her shelves of jars of potions and sacks of herbs. Humming a tuneless song, she took her time assembling her gifts, which she then carried to the table where they had eaten supper. “Come join me,” she told them. “All of you.”
When they were all seated at the table, Aggie Crone handed Frogge a small wooden box. “Here, my young adventurer, is a powder for you to dissolve in clear water. Drink the water daily. It will give you wisdom and wiles, both of which, believe me, you sorely need.” Then she picked up a tied bundle of leaves. “Learn to like this sourmint, because if you chew it each morning upon rising and each evening before you retire, and if you swallow the juice, it will hasten your growth. Soon your voice will drop from a squeak to a rumble, thick hair will sprout in the places that give you pleasure, your hands will become large and hard, and you’ll be blessed—or cursed—with more confidence than is good for most youths, but such confidence may serve you well in battle.”
“Thank you, Mistress Crone.”
Aggie Crone then turned to her grandson. “Rodney, take this tiny blue bottle of fox-tooth powder and keep it with you always. A time may come when you are suffering from an unbearable pain. This fox-tooth powder will take away your suffering forever. You must take it all at one time, and you may use it only once. Do not treat this cure lightly, Rodney the Goatherd’s son. Use it only when you absolutely must.”
“Thank you, Grandmother.”
“And another thing, Rodney. Remember to concentrate. Pay attention. And learn. You’re a strapping young lad, but you’ve never been much good at concentrating. Isn’t that right, Yvor?”
“Goats.”
“One more thing,” the old woman said. She walked to the closet behind the stairway and returned carrying a crooked, well-worn broom. She brought it to the table and handed it to Rodney. “Here. To help you in your travels.”
<witche’s broom>
Frogge’s eyes widened. “Is that for flying? May I have a broom, too?”
“This one broom will do quite nicely for the two of you.”
“How does it work?” Rodney asked.
“You’ll know when you need to know. Now off to bed. You young men can both sleep in the barn with Young Pansy. Dream wisely, lads.”
“I’ll dream of the fair Princess Llanaa,” said Prince Frogge. “I always do.”
Rodney said, “I’ll dream of travel, adventure, and battle; and then I’ll dream of the beautiful Blackberry Island, land of—”
“Goats!” cried Yvor the Goatherd. He grinned at his son and said, “Goats.”



§§§



Thank you for visiting. I am temporarily posting only occasionally on this blog. I’ll announce these occasional posts as they appear. I hope you’ll drop by then.

<photo jmd>