The short fiction of j hardy carroll
He’d lost a lot of jobs, especially at first. When he bucked at what he considered a shit assignment, the editor told him an abrasive manner did not suit a cub reporter and fired him on the spot. After that he’d drifted around freelance for some years until he’d finally had enough. He moved to…
You believe that you live in one world, he said. A world where fiction and fact are different. Separate, like rooms in a house. You pass from one to the other and only think of the doorway. I don’t understand, I said. What does this have to do with what I saw last night? He…
It is always night in the jungle. Mosquitoes whine in my ears. The heat feels like a damp blanket. I can’t breathe. And they are coming. We can’t see them, only hear their horrible yelling and screaming in the dark. Where are they? Where the fuck are they? I bolt awake, rub my grainy eyes as…
Captain Truxtun could hardly contain his agitation. “They what?” he stammered. “Refuse to work, begging your pardon,” said the foreman. “All of them?” “Yes sire. To a man.” “And what is their complaint?” The foreman shrugged. “What ain’t their complaint is more to the mark. I think this time it has to do with cocoa…
A race of immortal beings on a Danish Island, but they still need to learn a trade.
“You’re limping, Houshang.” Hamid smiles up from the chessboard. “Stubbed your toe again, I suppose?” “A blister from my long walk around the city yesterday.” I chuckle. We both know why I limp. I am a lifelong communist. My boiled cynicism often serves as much to poison as shield me. Hamid is a Muslim cleric…
Malmsey stormed into the inn and flung down his bundle. “I’ll not stand for this!” he shouted. “A German? I’ll sooner die!” “Calm yourself, mate,” said the keeper, drawing off a tankard and pushing across the bar. “We’ve heard.” “Times is changing,” said Old Grumps from his corner table. “Rumor is the Queen herself is…
In an ancient Turkish legend that goes back to the time of Gilgamesh, the Shahmaran is a creature whose head is a beautiful woman and whose body is a snake. She lives in the land of the snakes under the earth and lures unsuspecting lovers into her cave of honey.
The man cut a Comanche arrow out of the mule’s flank after the fight at the tanks, but the festering wound would not knit. Crossing the rain-swollen Nueces, the mule died under him and dumped his possibles into the churning red water. He’d felt the animal falter as he spurred it down the bank, so he wasn’t…
The East India Company Director sighed. He took off his glasses and set them on the dossier. “Is it really as bad as all that?” “I’m afraid so, sir,” said Briggs. “In fact, it’s actually worse. The Chinese are well aware of our vulnerability, especially regarding tea. The tonne price is increasing almost daily.” “What of…