Author Archives: Val

Fantastic Friday: Peace

One of my favorite positive websites to browse is humanprogress.org. The site is ripe with examples of the strides we’ve made as humans over generations. The site is highly “clickable,” allowing you to find data and statistics for things like … Continue reading

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Flash Fiction: A Christmas Tale by Chiara De Giorgi

Welcome to The Spot Writers. The June prompt is to update a legend or legendary character/beast: bring it into the modern world, or add a twist that isn’t consistent with the original legend. This week’s story comes from Chiara De … Continue reading

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Flash Fiction: Silkie Samaritan by Phil Yeats

Welcome to The Spot Writers. The June prompt is to update a legend or legendary character/beast: bring it into the modern world, or add a twist that isn’t consistent with the original legend. This week’s story comes from Phil Yeats. … Continue reading

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Flash Fiction: On the Edge, the Story of Peggy and Sam by Cathy MacKenzie

Welcome to The Spot Writers. The June prompt is to update a legend or legendary character/beast: bring it into the modern world, or add a twist that isn’t consistent with the original legend. This week’s story comes from Cathy MacKenzie. … Continue reading

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Flash Fiction: Cerebus by Val Muller

Welcome to the Spot Writers. This month’s prompt is among the most difficult I’ve tackled. In fact, when I shared it with my student writing group, they were all stumped. Update a legend or legendary character/beast: bring it into the … Continue reading

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Fantastic Friday: In Loving Memory

I lost my uncle unexpectedly recently, and that got me thinking about life. What does a life boil down to? What are the ways we all affect each other? More people than expected showed for the viewing, and it seems … Continue reading

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Flash Fiction: A Fuse for a Book by Chiara De Giorgi

Welcome to The Spot Writers. May’s prompt is to write a story about a character playing a prank on another. This week’s story comes from Chiara De Giorgi. Chiara dreams, reads, edits texts, translates, and occasionally writes in two languages. She also has lot of fun.     A fuse for a book Chiara De Giorgi My elderly upstairs neighbor is very cute, but quite deaf.   She’s also lonely, especially at night. Her small flat suddenly becomes too big, the emptiness of it filling every inch. And she can’t sleep if she’s alone. So she turns on the TV while she lays in bed, waiting for sweet slumber and hopefully some happy dreams.   This is all very moving, and I feel sorry for her. That is, until at 2.00 am she turns in her sleep and accidentally presses all the buttons in the remote and the volume goes up and a crazy zapping starts, right over my head. Which happens more often than … Continue reading

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Writer Wednesday: Madeleine Romeyer Dherbey’s The Fortress

Welcome to today’s Writer Wednesday feature. Today I had the chance to highlight Madeleine Romeyer Dherbey, author of The Fortress, releasing today with Freedom Forge Press. Six weeks before Operation Overlord, a thousand kilometers from the beaches of Normandy… There … Continue reading

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Fantastic Friday: Nature’s Gifts

Maybe it’s just this time of year, on the cusp of summer, but I sure feel like a transcendentalist lately. It seems no matter what is happening, it feels better out in nature. Battling a stressful literary magazine seemed impossible … Continue reading

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Flash Fiction: Painted Red by Eric Egger

Welcome to The Spot Writers. May’s prompt is to write a story about a character playing a prank on another. This week’s story comes from a guest writer to the group. Eric Egger is founder and publisher at Freedom Forge … Continue reading

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