Short Story Accepted

I had my short story "Unquiet Sleepers" accepted by May December Publications third anthology of debut zombie writers First Time Dead, Volume 3.

Indies Unlimited were also kind enough to announce it today:

Indies Unlimited staff writer David Antrobus is happy to announce that his short story “Unquiet Slumbers” has been accepted for inclusion in the May December Publications new horror anthology First Time Dead, Volume 3. The book is now available for Kindle on Amazon.com.

David has written numerous short stories which loosely belong to the horror/dark fiction genre, but this is his first published zombie story. It is the post-apocalyptic tale of a suburban soccer mom who gets the virus and, while featuring the familiar gut-churning tropes required by fans of zombie fiction, the slow disintegration of her world is surprisingly lyrical and poignant, yet still gory.

As that writeup alludes to, I wanted to write a zombie story that doesn't simply wallow in the gore—although it does that, too, of course—but that locates the bleak heart of something I've always believed about this genre; that there's a deep sadness at the core of it, that the slow leaching of humanity from its victims is both harrowing and steeped in sorrow. So, as fun as it was to play with the idea of a zombie suburbanite/soccer mom (somebody said I should have titled it "ZILF"), I wanted to move slowly away from the goofy premise and explore those more sober and sobering aspects.

If you get around to reading it, let me know whether I succeeded, or just your thoughts on the story in general. It's not often I say this about anything I write, especially fiction, but I am fairly proud of that one.

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David Antrobus also writes for Indies Unlimited and BlergPop. Be sure to check out his work there if you like what you read here.

Story Contest

My story immediately below (see previous blog entry) won the most recent Indies Unlimited "Writing Exercise with a Twist" contest. It's a creepy little piece of flash horror fiction based on KS Brooks' enigmatic photograph and the theme of insomnia. We were limited to 250 words, and boy did I discover how strictly we were limited (ironic for a site with that name), and for which I am now very thankful, as it forced me to hone it, whittle away at the verbiage, and discover the shape within. Not a pleasant shape, but a shape all the same.

Each winner of this contest will be published in an ebook at the end of the calendar year, so it is very satisfying and I would like to express my gratitude to Stephen Hise for his apparently unlimited (ha, that word again!) energy and continued support for independent authors.

Thanks to everyone who voted.

Insomnia

This is my story in Indies Unlimited's recent Writing Exercise contest.

It's a little twisted and disquieting, but if you like it, you can vote for it here.

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Photo copyright KS BrooksI don’t recall seeing it, but I must have seen it. Something kept me awake half the night, after all. Then some dark urge made me return to it.

Bud Lilly’s Trout Shop.

A fishmonger’s, you’d think. And for the most part, you’d be right. But you would also be wrong.

Here on this quiet street, post-revelry and pre-dawn, I stood before that window once more. Odd that it should display its neon welcome at this godforsaken hour. And that such cold fluorescence still burned within.

Suddenly afraid, I turned away, wishing for sunrise, for even the spartan brevity of my home; anything but this suspended place masquerading as a city street.

Nonetheless, as if compelled, my gaze returned to the window. In time to see a flash of silver and an appalling face. A hideous sweating man was butchering someone with the efficient strokes of a squalid Samurai, amputating the limbs of his screaming victim. My blood froze. The night butcher propped up the dying man, whose rolling eyes and sagging lips resembled nothing less than a helpless trout… dressing his limbless torso and placing him, bleeding and faintly sobbing, on the shaved ice of the display beside the other staring fish.

The attacker looked up. Implacable, euphoric, he grinned a terrible grin, lifted his awful, dripping blade and pointed at it. Then pointed back at me and winked.

Then I remembered what I had seen earlier: my own name on an empty section of that same display, waiting.

Dreamscape (Transatlantic Version)

So, I was in London somewhere on the Thames Embankment and we were looking for a decent place to get coffee. It was a bright, sunny afternoon. A passerby pointed around a corner, by a bridge abutment and below a patch of grass, and we saw a tall, wooden ladder leading up into what looked like a child's tree fort. We proceeded to climb it, and just as I was able to see inside the building through the hatch, my companion started to slip and I grabbed her under her thin arms before she fell the entire way. She was panicked and I tried to soothe her. She was not exactly human, I noticed now; her head more canine, from which hung spindly arms and a body shaped like a cylinder. She had no lower limbs. Once she had calmed down and I'd pulled her through the hatch, she said, both apologetically and matter-of-factly, "there is not much to me, I'm just a head and one vital organ, probably a kidney," as we joined the cafeteria/canteen-style lineup/queue. I felt puzzled and mildly irritated.

© Art Nahpro, 2011It seemed to take forever; the proprietor—an unkempt and unattractive man—kept leaving his post at the cash register/till to attend to something fussy and seemingly unnecessary across the café and I could feel my patience stretch taut like a garotte. When it was our turn to pay, I attempted to hand him a ten pound note/twenty dollar bill, and once again he left to attend to whatever it was that was bothering him on the other side of the room, and although I planned to say something along the lines of "this is too long to wait to buy just coffee", once we were finally served I lost my resolve, paid up in silence, and walked over to the crude wooden picnic-style tables, nursing two steaming drinks. The coffee was not even particularly good, but as soon as I'd downed it, I realised I had somehow managed to eat the entire face of my companion as well, whose exposed foxlike skull was still smeared in globules of yellow fat atop her hollow tubelike body, all of her still twitching gently. My wet lips tasted of salt. Ashamed and quietly horrified, I left quickly, throwing her remains down the ladder into what was now a foggy London evening, scurrying after them like death's ugliest sibling.

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David Antrobus also writes for Indies Unlimited and BlergPop. Be sure to check out his work there if you like what you read here.