The short fiction of j hardy carroll
In the late 90s. Portland experienced a “heroin renaissance” when a lot of cheap junk saturated the city. It took a toll. I would see junkies nodding in doorways, or sometimes doing the “junkie lean” in the middle of the sidewalk. When high they were ethereal beings. They seemed to dwell on a different plane. Their edges…
Rochelle picked a beauty this week for her hundred-word flash fiction prompt. Click the link below the story to see the other entries. “I’m not going.” He set his lip in that way he had. The stubborn lip, she called it. “Chas, that’s nonsense. You love it. Besides, they can’t play Bix without their cornetist. They’re…
true strangers, they since in the city the dark before the dawn is lit just the same as winter evenings since nobody is fooled by some little thing they themselves remember doing still, once since lying about an apartment makes you leave everything early and alone to walk in the dark, cursing since every single…
Friends, it’s the Friday Fictioneers flash fiction– following the featured photo. “What’s back there? Behind the house?” Watching her face, I could see what Clifton meant when he said she was shifty. For the tiniest second she scowled at us, then smoothed it away in that realtor’s smile. “I think it was a barbecue the former…
In the late nineties, I had the good fortune to be the director of Überhaus, the last bandit loft in southwest Portland. We had an anti-art event called Last Thursday that started as a protest against Portland’s famous First Thursday gallery walk and soon became its own thing. We would feature a show of work curated by Sugar from the Bone, an east…
Time again for Rochelle’s weekly 100-word flash fiction prompt based on a photo prompt. “You ain’t gotta do this. He knows it wasn’t me. Why you gotta do this?” I hate when they get like this. Tell me what I don’t gotta do. This was worse because she was right. He knew it wasn’t her. He even had…
Milk From a Bucket Once I ate cites whole every step a rending tear, tight jaws around fabric of flesh a whited glare sluicing strangers’ faces dry of all but haste the every flavor quick forgotten, ground to ash harvests of cabbage grown from small seed watered all the dry summer only to be hacked…
Ever since I was hip-high to my father I have had a thing about vintage aircraft, especially planes from the wild experimental age between the wars. I loved the stories of Jimmy Doolittle winning the Schneider Cup, flying on instruments and generally doing insane things in the air. I loved the biplanes and sleek monoplanes.…
Here’s today’s entry for Friday Fictioneers, a weekly Flash Fiction prompt. You can read other entries by clicking the blue link at the bottom. 100 words based on the picture below. Try it yourself! You chicken? I told him I wasn’t. The door was set in the ground. Both of us went down the stairs. Narrow,…
Promoting your book is a rough go. I think Barnes and Noble gives brand new books about three days before they go onto the remainder table and with big red stickers (NOW ONLY 1.00!). And that’s for best-sellers. Amazon tells new authors to rely on peer reviews, but who has time to sort through sixty…