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Letter from the Editor
Welcome! We’re celebrating the
first anniversary of InkSpin. A year ago last June, after much discussion and
deliberation, we published Volume I, Issue 1. A second issue followed in
December. We hope you will enjoy the contents of this one.
Writers (and readers) click on
Angie Blanco’s “Solitaire, The Novel” for a hilarious and farcical view of the
writerly life. “Becoming Her Creation” by C. Lynn Cloude reveals how a sculptor
overcomes doubt about her artistic ability. Margaret Kenyon’s “Sam’s Gift” takes
us into the world of magical realism where a child brings comfort and mystical
recollection to his mother. Our fourth story, “Fearful Symmetry” by Dr. Lynn
Veach Sadler obtains its title from William Blake’s poem The Tyger. Much
like Dianne Fossey, who sought to preserve the silverback gorillas of Africa,
the letter writer in “Fearful Symmetry” also struggles to save animals,
especially her beloved tigers. We’re pleased to be able to reprint Beverly Carol
Lucey’s “Just Aiming to Pass.” Originally published in flashquake, where
it won honorable mention, Ms. Lucey’s poignant story explores the plight of a
home aide worker hoping to better her education.
Writers may benefit from Editor
Paul Ferguson’s “Every Sentence a Story.” His scholarly essay details how the
basic English sentence consisting of a verb and predicate may be structured into
coordinate and subordinate clauses. He also stresses the importance of
“practicing” the writing of sentences.
I wish to extend special thanks
to my Associate Editor, Jim Bell, for his encouragement and editorial
assistance. And, of course, InkSpin would not exist were it not for the
commitment of our Editorial Board – Amelia Klock, Mary Ellen Knox, Paul
Ferguson, Gerry Kozak and Robert Laszlo. My heartfelt thanks to them as well.
Em Kersey (Editor-in-Chief) |
Just Aiming to Pass
by Beverly Carol Lucey
Maddie squeezes her bulky square
body into the last desk in the last row. She sets her brown canvas satchel down
on the warped wood floor. The writing surface in front of her is gouged from
thirty years of insolence and boredom at the hands of the hostile day students.
Pen clips, protractors, and jackknives have left hacked shapes to tell people
how dull it all was when they sat here.
Usually Maddie gets to night class early enough to sit at one of the few tables
where she can spread out. She likes to arrange her notebooks and highlighters,
her pens and Wite-Out. Nothing is more important than looking like a good
student. It’s the least she can do. From the very first night she has hoped the
teacher noticed how seriously Maddie takes this opportunity. ....
Read More
Fearful Symmetry
by Dr.Lynn Veach Sadler
Tyger, tyger, burning bright,
In the forest of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
From William Blake’s “The Tyger”
All I knew was that I had an
old-maid aunt who’d been a missionary in China and barely escaped with her
life. I was to call her “Aunt Petey,” her true name being Petula Evelina and
abhorrent to her. A rising college senior at the time I learned she was coming
to live with us, I carelessly voiced my doubts as to the suitability of a
“missionary lady” thinking anything “abhorrent.” ...Read More
Sam’s Gift
by Margaret Kenyon
Hannah hid on the
back porch in the moonlight. The night was calm, iridescently blue, full of the
rasp of
insects and the distant bark of dogs excited
by the
boundless, luminous sky. She had not been out
here
for months: she only used the back door in
the winter,
so she didn’t track snow and mud through the
living
room. Her hand moved slowly across the
chipped and peeling paint on the wooden railing and sent a flurry of dust and
flakes onto the floor at her feet. She sighed, punctured by the realization that
she was sitting on the
unopened bucket of outdoor paint that Ray had
bought
almost two years ago. He had planned to paint
the
house that year as soon as he got back from
halibut
fishing, but he never came home; three
seiners and
their crews were lost in that sudden and
fierce North
Pacific storm.
...Read
More
Solitaire, The Novel
by Evangeline Blanco
Casey Cats—not his real
name—stares at a pyramid of twenty-eight red and black playing cards on the
monitor of his brand new Compac computer bought last night on sale for $398.00
at the Wiz. The front of his white cotton shirt—riddled with burn marks from his
smoking days—hangs over the crotch of almost bald corduroy pants that used to be
dark brown. He has given up cigarettes because floppy discs do not like smoke,
and has taken up Solitaire 13 instead. He squints at the exposed cards.
In a fast game, several pairs that add up to thirteen huddle close at the base
of the pyramid. Twenty-four cards remain hidden with which to deal hands of
three cards each. The mix of threes that will come out of the deals is up to
Lady Luck and computer devils. As he deals cards he cannot use, he keeps track
of which are under which so he can pick right when he needs them. If he wins, he
gets a free game. If the free game does not look fast or easy, Casey mouse
clicks the "Give Up" button and does not count that game as a loss. ....Read More
About the Authors
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Every Sentence a Story
by Paul Ferguson (InkSpin Editor)
All
stories proceed on the sentence level. One thing you learn as a fiction writer,
especially when you start writing fairly long short stories, and especially when
you start writing novels, is that the overarching structure of plot, that we
usually associate only with the whole short story or the whole novel, is really
mirrored in the smaller structures of a work. In other words, each scene in a
story is a smaller version of the plot, with an initial incident, complication,
rising action, climax, and falling action/resolution. Brigid O’Shaughnessy walks
into Sam Spade’s office in The Maltese Falcon and hires him to follow
someone she is supposed to meet, then walks out of the office. The scene is a
complete drama in itself. Moreover, the scene is composed of paragraphs, the
paragraph of sentences, and each of these elements mirrors a similar structure.
The sentence is a dramatic incident in small: Someone does something to someone.
...Read More
Becoming Her Creation
by C. Lynne Cloude Saula plunged her arms into the
mixture, relishing the feeling of cool mush closing around her skin in a wet
embrace. Snowy, half-liquid plaster warmed as she squished lumps between her
fingers, massaging dry bits, encouraging them to become part of the whole. As
setup time neared, the familiar claustrophobia came, the fear that this time the
blend would harden before she could wrench her arms away. The white paste grew
hot against her skin. She withdrew her arms, feeling relief. By the time she had
rinsed the creamy residue away, she had a bucket-shaped chunk of rock-hard
plaster. She had to clean up and meet Kay. Maybe
there would be good news about the guy who had been interested in buying her
sculpture. .... Read More
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