November 7, 2015

From “My Fairy Tale” by Marty Fialey

Posted by alexp01 under Excerpt | Tags: , , , |
1 Comment 

So we’re going to have a fairy tale. But it’s not going to be like your usual fairy tale.

For starters? No fairies.

Yeah, you heard that right. No fairies. None. I hereby banish all tiny winged people from my fairy tale. It’s only a fairy tale in terms of genre rather than the presence of any actual fairies.

Is your mind blown yet? Well it gets better.

You know where most fairy tales–and again, I must emphasize, there are NO fairies in this tale–are set? That quasi-medieval, idealized vision of old Europe? None of that for MY fairy tale. It’s going to be set in a decaying industrial area north of Leeds, a land blighted by the greed of mankind and in which nothing natural can live without a thorough stunting.

And the plot? Well get ready. Instead of princes and princesses, noble steeds and great chariots, there will be petty minicipal leaders, corrupt cops, and sputtering old Leyland autos that only the poorest can afford to keep on the road.

My fairy tale will be a grounded, gritty retelling of everyday people going about their everyday lives in a world that neither knows nor cares that they exist. Original, isn’t it? I bet you wish you’d thought of it first.

Inspired by the song ‘Far from a fairy tale’ by Hiroki Kikuta, released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license.

  • Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!
 

March 29, 2014

From “Tales of the Dark” by Thad Kerne Silat

Posted by alexp01 under Excerpt | Tags: , , , |
Leave a Comment 

Children in those days knew, as children in these days have forgotten, that the world is a dark place full of nooks and crannies where the light will never reach. They were regaled with fairy tales of kings that fell due to their own hubris, lost dear ones devoured alive by the spirits of the forest they had once mocked, and fearful creatures of bright shadow who served to tempt the unwary. One thing that was the same, then as now, was the need to cloak a lesson in the guise of a tale.

But the lessons to be learned were harsher, and the abiding concern was that the lesson was learned, not how well the child liked the story.

That world still exists, insulated from the children of today by the comforting and ephemeral cloak of modernity. But the tales have changed, and the young ones are less wary than they might have been in another time, another age. The darkness has had to grow darker as well, turned in on itself by many long, lean years. And it must compete. What pied piper out of the old stories can compete with those the children see every day on the television? What false promises can a Rumplestiltskin spin into gold when falser promises issue from every mouth a young dear one sees? What wolves can invade a home with evil intent when so many things that might devour a soul are invited in willingly?

So beware, oh best beloveds. For when the darkness finds you, it will be a hungry darkness with claws and teeth ground sharp against the whetstone of the waking world.

Let me tell you of one such darkness, and the terror it wrought. Draw near, and listen to the oil-dark telling of a fairy tale of old entering into the new.

  • Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!