FLASH FICTION

For many years, editors have requested manuscripts that tell a complete story, but do it succinctly. The development of computer drives with many gigabytes of storage makes it possible for us to store large amounts of text efficiently and cheaply, but it has caused many of us to develop some bad writing habits. Our novels have become longer, more expensive to print, but not necessarily better. Recently, I joined a group writing Flash Fiction. I had a brief idea of what this involved. A story of this type is ideally only five hundred words in length. I knew that, but I did not know how hard it was to gather all of the elements of a story together into a coherent pattern. Then I ran across a short anecdote about Ernest Hemingway that was rather amusing. According to the story, he made a bar bet that he could write the shortest story on earth. His contribution consisted of only six words, and it is definitely a complete story.

“For sale: Baby shoes, never worn.”

I haven’t reached Hemingway’s proficiency yet, but I am working on it.

READER'S DIGEST SELECT EDITIONS

When someone visits my office, their eyes always go to the top shelf of my bookcase where I have a long row of books from Reader’s Digest Select Editions displayed. For guests who aren’t familiar with Select Editions, it is probably the attractiveness of the books that catch their eye, but for others, it is almost like they are waking up on Christmas morning when they were a kid. I often hear, “I love to read, and I wonder if I could borrow just one . . .”

I always allow them to do so, because after a half century of reading almost all of the 800 novels the editors at Reader’s Digest have selected, I am still as excited as I was when I held that first edition in my hand. Many readers spend long hours in book stores trying to find something they haven’t read, while others depend on the New York Times Bestseller List. You might be surprised to learn that most of the books on the bestseller list also appear in Select Editions. If you love James Patterson, John Grisham, Nora Roberts, and all of the other great writers, you will find them there. I could go on for hours about this, but I am in the middle of one of the best novels I have read in a long time. The name of it is Iris and Ruby, and yes, it is in the current issue of Select Editions. You might want to check their website to see a complete list of the books Reader’s Digest has published since 1950. It is an astonishing list, but I need to get back to my book . . .

For more information visit the Select Editions blogsite at:

http://selecteditions.blogspot.com/

Joe Prentis

SOUTHERN WRITERS

Stories by Southern writers have always been popular among fiction fans, and I think a lot of the appeal is in the realistic settings that always seem to be present in this type of book. High school and college literature classes would not be complete without a review of William Faulkner, Margaret Mitchell, and Eudora Welty, for each of them brings something to the table that would not be complete without them. While these writers are important, a new generation is continuing to introduce readers to the uniqueness and mystery of the Southern experience. Fannie Flagg, John Grisham, and Willie Morris are among the best Southern writers of our era. Each of them presents a different view of Southern life, exploring the temperament and the feel of the times. If you are already familiar with these writers, let me add another name to your list. In the crime novel, The Sweet and the Dead, Milton T. Burton has captured the essence of the Southern criminal. You can feel the tension from the first page to the last, and the sweat and fear of the characters becomes frighteningly real as the tension mounts.

THE SWEET AND THE DEAD

by Milton T. Burton

MANFRED EUGENE ‘HOG’ WEBERN a retired Dallas County deputy sheriff, is talked into going undercover in Biloxi, Mississippi, in a multistate effort to nail a group of traveling Southern criminals who have been tagged by the press with the lurid name “Dixie Mafia”. After making contact with the gang’s nominal leader, the notorious Jasper Sparks, Webern begins to worm his way into the group’s confidence. He also meets and becomes involved with an old friend of Sparks, the mysterious Neil Bigelow, a former assistant federal prosecutor whose daddy ‘owns half of the Delta.’

Having gained the gang’s trust, Webern soon learns that the score being planned is the massive robbery of a wintering carnival of an entire year’s receipts. Joining in planning the job, he meets such well-known hijackers as Slops Moline, a Charleston, South Carolina, killer and armed robber; Lardass Collins, the country’s premier car thief; Tom-Tom Reed, one of the world’s most skilled safecrackers; and the infamous Raymond “Hardhead” Weiler, and Alabama-born moonshiner who has pulled off more than two dozen high-profile contract killings in his seventy years.

As the story develops, Webern is drawn into a maelstrom of robbery, mayhem, and senseless violence that threatens to engulf his very being. And before the final curtain falls on The Sweet and the Dead, we learn that in the murky world of Southern professional crime, nothing is ever quite what it seems to be.

ANGELA WILSON'S BLOG

I am pleased the Angela Wilson is featuring me on her web site on Pop Syndicate. Angela is not only an author with a great deal of talent, she is also involved in a number of other projects. She produces copy and pod cast for clients. Angela is also a columnist for various writing publications. She has worked as a print and broadcast journalist, marketing PR executive and radio host. Take some time to check out her web site, her blog, and some of her other projects on the web -- and while you are there, read through the articles she will be posting this week concerning my novels. Click on this link for more information.
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http://www.popsyndicate.com/books

MEMORIAL DAY

In celebrating holidays, we sometimes forget that holidays were originally holy days, a time set aside to give thanks to our creator for some special remembrance. Christmas, Easter, and Thanksgiving retain strong elements of their former status as holy days, despite the fact that we have commercialized them to ridiculous extremes. As we celebrate Memorial Day, honoring the many men and women who have served their country, we should not forget that this day is holy too. We should never forget their sacrifice nor take our liberty too lightly.

CHILDREN NEVER CEASE TO AMAZE ME

Almost as soon as the earthquake ended, China invited aid workers from all over the world to come into their country and help with the victims of this disaster. Large amounts of food and emergency supplies were gathered and were on the way within hours. The stories and video footage that came back from the devastated area were heart rendering, but the acts of heroism seemed to give hope to the ones who were suffering. People were pulled from the wreckage while their families waited. Some of them were still alive, while others were less fortunate. It is hard to conceive of such a terrible event. Then in the midst of all of this terror, pain, and suffering, I saw it. A young boy who couldn’t have been over 9 years old, was seated on a pile of rubble slowly thumbing through the pages of a book. He could very easily have been the last survivor of his family, but somehow he was finding comfort from what he was reading. All across the world, books, computers, and cell phones are reaching into areas where communications with the outside world were impossible only a few years before. We will see a change in the months to come, and it will be from people like that young man who was setting on top of that pile of rubble. Never underestimate the power of the written word or the determination of the people who read it.

HAVE YOU TRIED AN EBOOK?

No one knows for sure when the concept of an electronic book came into existence, but ebooks in one form or another were in existence long before Google 'invented' them in 2004. The argument could be settled very easily if everyone was willing to agree on what is meant by a 'book.' The first use of an electronic retrieval system dates back to 1969 when the manufacturer of a computer placed help files on board their system. It didn't take long for this to catch on because it was cheaper, and much easier to search through an online data base than to thumb through the pages of a book for some elusive piece of data.

If you define the term book to mean something like the thick tomes that William Shakespeare wrote, then you can trace the first electronic book to Michael S. Hart's Gutenberg project where he entered over 300 manuscripts into his system by hand. With the help of a group of volunteers, he later expanded this to over 100,000 different volumes, starting with Shakespeare, the Bible, and then to other classic works.

Starting in 2004, Google offered a system that would make electronic books available in a more accessible format. Many people were reluctant to read a long book from a computer screen. There was also the possibility of being able to market a lot of books if two things were offered to the reader. One was a smaller sized reader. How small? The ideal choice seemed to be something the size and shape of the average book. The Kindle ebook reader went one better when they redesigned the case where it was tapered on the edges and more comfortable to hold. Another desirable feature was to be able to carry a whole library of books in one reader. One long novel is approximately one megabyte in length. With chips capable to holding a couple of terabytes, the ebook reader suddenly became very attractive for the man or woman on the go.

The first ebook readers had the same problem of eye strain many people were familiar with from many hours of computer use at the office. Todays ebook readers use a technology very similar to what is used to produce the numbers on the face of a watch. This results in a system that produces little eye strain and looks very similar to a hardbound book. It also saves a lot of trees.

Would I recommend an ebook reader? To that question I will give an unequivocal maybe. The price is still unacceptably high for most people, but the prices are likely to come down as is the price of the books. In the next few years most books will probably be available in both paper and digital format. Will the printed book go the way of the Dodo bird? Not in the foreseeable future and perhaps never. There is something comforting about a book that you can't get from a plastic case, and I haven't found a way to dog-ear the pages in an electronic book.

A Spark Of Faith

When the Iron Curtain fell on the Soviet Union a half-century ago, government officials were determined to extinguish the practice of religion, along with other personal freedoms. The same policy was soon to follow in China. Many people were hopeful that the fall of communism in Russia would have a positive effect on organized religion. Thankfully, their wishes are becoming a reality. After so many years of repression, the church in Russia is flourishing, and an even bigger surprise is what is happening in China. Today, almost a third of the young people in China identify themselves as religious, with 300 million of them professing to being Christians. Another surprise is the fact that the government is either ignoring or encouraging this resurgence of faith. Economic, cultural, and language barriers can sometimes seem insurmountable. Perhaps we can reach out as followers of a common faith.

World Hunger

In a world capable of producing enough food to eradicate hunger and starvation, it is astonishing that we seem to be slipping further and further behind. Almost 850 million people in the world are malnourished, with over 5 million children perishing each year of starvation. As bleak as this picture seems, it is likely to get much worse. On a worldwide basis, the cost of food has jumped almost 50 percent in the last year. Rice, the staple food of over half of the world’s population, has gone up 100 percent. Factor in the expected storms, droughts, and other natural disasters, plus political unrest and war, and you have a bleak picture that will probably get even worse than the current estimates. Relief organizations are already overtaxed. It is time for churches and other private organizations to do what they can. Check with your church, synagogue, or mosque and see if they already have a program in place. If they don’t, you might want to start an effort yourself to elevate some of the suffering.

DON'T FORGET THE SMALL MAGAZINES

I was pleased when NEWN Magazine printed the first chapter of Abraham’s Bones in their Spring Issue. NEWN is a small but prestigious magazine that has served writers since 1994. During those years they have published many hundreds of stories, poems and essays, many of them by beginning writers. At the end of the year they will cease publication, but will continue to serve writers with correspondence courses, workshops, and personal contact. I salute Glenda Baker and the fine staff who have meant so much to struggling writers through the years.

Are we headed toward another boycott of the Olympics?

The origin of the Olympics is shrouded in mystery, but we know the first competition was organized more than 3000 years ago. Combat in that era was frequent and intense, but it was agreed that any battle would be postponed for the duration of the competition. This was a worthwhile goal, but in reality it has not been realized. Today, politics has often reared its ugly head in the form of boycotts, riots, and terrorism. There has not been an Olympics in recent years that was not effected in some way with political protest. Sixty-two nations supported us when we banned our athletes from performing in the Moscow events, 22 African countries boycotted the games in Montreal, and the Russians boycotted . . . well, I can't remember the reason for that. In all of this political posturing, we seem to forget the poor athletes. All of them have trained long and hard for their chance, and we ban them from participating because . . . I will let you fill in the blanks. I have a suggestion. Why don't we ban rocking chairs, or inline skates, or how about coffee, and leave the athletes alone. Banning any of the aforementioned makes just as much sense, and would probably accomplish just as much. That is my suggestion. What is yours?

Looking for the perfect weight loss program?

A friend of mine was a little heavy, not fat mind you, but just a few pounds more than she should have been carrying on her five foot four inch frame. The men who liked her used the word ‘ample’ to describe her figure, while a few of the women referred to her as ‘chunky.’ Dieting was a frequent topic of discussion when she was in the break room. These discussions were usually instigated by the ones who ate like a bird and had never carried an extra pound in their life.

Tired of the subtle hints and the sidelong glances from some of her coworkers, she searched and found the perfect weight loss program. It came in a box that looked remarkably like the ones containing a game called Monopoly. I could not see what the cards and pads had to do with losing weight, so she explained it to me. The most interesting item was a little cardboard envelope shaped like the ones they use to serve fries in at the fast food places. This was called the ‘point container,’ and you were supposed to keep it nearby—in a shirt pocket or in the top of a purse—where is would serve as a reminder.

Leaving off an extra helping of potatoes earned you a point that went into the ‘point container.’ A large slice of chocolate cake was worth two points. The goal was to try to accumulate 35 points in any given week. Now here is the good part and I can whip up an appetite just thinking about it. You could redeem the points by trading twelve of them for a banana split or nine for a small T-bone steak.

“I don’t think this is going to help,” I told her as gently as I could. “Here is what I do to control my weight,” I began, but I had only reached the middle of the second sentence when she interrupted.

“What do you know about dieting?" she demanded. "You have never carried an extra ounce in your life! I have talked to Bill about this and he thinks it will work.”

At that time, Bill weighed around 300 pounds, and none of it was in the right places. I tried again, explaining that she should talk to someone who was thin, and see what they were eating and the size of the portions.

“Look, you idiot!” she screamed at me. “Bill has been on a hundred diets during his lifetime. Why should I talk to someone who has never had any weight problems?”

There is a strange logic in her way of thinking. If I figure it out—and I am still working on this—I am going to use it in a novel.