You shout and tell me it’s not fair,
To give you one more chance, to dare.
That moon and all the stars are mine,
If I bow down just one more time.
Six Sentence Stories
The Big Bang
Source: PNGEgg.com
“What is all this stuff?” George leaned into the workroom, one hand on the door frame, afraid to step beyond the door sill and into what looked to him like an explosion in a junk yard. Continue reading
Early Morning Ski Patrol
They’d gotten a good ten inches of snow, on top of a well-seasoned base from earlier, lighter, snowfall. Heavy enough to soften the trail that ran by the still-open creek and led the woods, she figured she’d get the best skiing at sunrise, as cold as it was. Continue reading
Town Hall Meeting
She perched, edge and center, on the metal folding chair, ankles crossed and angled toes barely touching the floor, her SoftRose painted lips pursed, her eyebrows raised even higher above their normally penciled boundaries, a single vertical line deepening between those brows, but slightly favoring the left, while two small circles of color heated each cheek, as if they’d been purposefully applied with a sable brush. Continue reading
Sundown
Source: Matt Fraser
“I’ll get that for you,” murmured Kathy, sighing, as she rose to fetch her mother’s favorite wool blanket; it had been in the family for ages, but it was the one Elinore had always favored. Continue reading
Bonus Points
He scanned her personal ad quickly before carefully composing his response and invitation; a woman with Suzy’s level of sophistication, stunning beauty, and sparkling sense of humor would not be on that dating site for very long, before she’d be wooed and snatched up by a bevy of beautiful boys. Continue reading
So, this is happening…
Hugo, in the early days, as seen by Kittelson
I have the great pleasure of being allowed to sit in the Author’s Chair in the Saddle Up Saloon over at the Carrot Ranch. It’s headquartered somewhere in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and around the world, where Rough Writers play with weekly prompts, poetry challenges, and the occasional Online Karaoke. Cowpoke or not, all are welcome to play and/or read.
My time in this week’s Author’s Chair is a bit of dark humor about a hungry giant, some carelessly spunky spelunkers, and the townsfolk nestled in the valley below (based on a Six Sentence Story that like Hugo, got a bit larger). Here’s an excerpt to start, or go on ahead and belly right up to the bar at the Saloon for the full text, and an audio of me reading the tale. Once upon a time:
Giant Problem Solved by Liz Husebye Hartmann
(Trigger alert: Not a tale for the wee ones)
Hugo’s belly pangs rumbled down the darkening mountainside above Heffinger Hollow. He was sorely tempted to nibble on a half-cooked morsel or two of the spunky spelunkers that frequented Carbuncle Caverns. This particular group of spelunkers had surprised the village by sneaking in to the Carbuncle and setting out to explore without a guide. They’d zigged when they should have zagged on that seventh leg of the descent, and had fallen deep into the bowels of the lowest cavern of Carbuncle.
This had proved deadly for them, but put their corpses within easy reach of Hugo…
But a bit of history, first…”
[Please click here to continue]
© Liz Husebye Hartmann (2021)
Valley of the Trolls 