e c l e c t i c a
f i c t i o n
e c l e c t i c a
f i c t i o n
(These are excerpts—click on the title to view the whole piece!)
The house smells of pot and rain and Tollhouse cookies baking in the kitchen. You know your mother is still at work. You hear Linda's voice in the living room. You hear your father's low chuckle.
Eric Bosse
I remember looking in at her in the incubator, tubes in and out and over. She looked like some raw thing, a skinned knee, a tiny lump of sunburn, a veal cutlet—a shame. I didn't feel sad; I felt resigned. I finally get what everyone else already has, I thought, and still it's not quite right. It just figures.
Jennifer Hersh
It wasn't long before the cops came knocking to ask if we had seen what went with the knife used in the murder down below. My mother said, "We didn't see nothing,” and closed the door.
Harold Bowman
Manhattan Evening, Eighty Degrees
Francine picks a cigarette from a pack on the counter. "I'd like to be just about anyplace else," she says, blowing smoke. "I've had it with this town. Take me away. Take me to England." She rests her hand on his knee. "You'll have to excuse me," she says. "I'm a little drunk."
Richard Hollins
"Don't be afraid to talk to her, son. Don't be afraid to grab what you want the most in life. But don't grab it just because you can. You respect the women you keep company with, or you won't be worth respecting yourself.”"
Thurman Hart
Was I born with a tattoo of a mole on the back of my hand? Of course not: it's impossible to be born with a tattoo, at least the kind that requires a needle and ink to apply. And yet for me to say it's impossible—to say anything is impossible—is impossible in light of my strong belief in the notion that nothing, ultimately, is impossible.
D. Harlan Wilson
The Second Birthing of Young Tim
After school, Bobby and I raced outside to find our kites. Indonesians were a kite-flying and kite-fighting culture, and Bobby and I got right in the middle of it. In trade for our discarded soda bottles, the native boys showed us how to make fighting kites from bent bamboo and rice paper, and how to arm them with glass-coated string.
Lad Moore
