Ramey Tumbles @svramey - Tumblr Blog

He sits in the computer lab every day amid the whir and heat, and reads love letters one after another. He's supposed to help us if we have problems, but it's usually easier just to move to another...

Pure Slush turns four!

Happy Birthday, Pure Slush, and congrats to Matt Potter for raising such a fine young lit mag. Here's my tribute.

http://pureslush.webs.com/prodigy.htm

#pure slush #flash fiction

Pretty proud of this one that was accepted as a blind submission.

My flash was published at Digging Through the Fat today. It's a great venue.

Flash for these cold mornings.

"The Baby" has been picked up for a best of the month blog at Towerbabel. Thanks! If you read it and like it, please take a moment to vote for the story at Bartleby Snopes. http://www.bartlebysnopes.com/stories.htm

So many Post-Its, so little time. I’ve been too busy keeping up with various duties, e.g. daily review of 2014, two anthologies, moderating Show Me Your Lits and posting at Write 1 Sub 1, among others, to do much personal blogging. It’s important from time to time to take stock... #rameywrites

#writing; awards; reviews

Seeking purrfection. May 18 brings “Grace” by Stephen V. Ramey (reviewed by Susan Tepper). Susan Tepper’s soundtrack for today’s reading is: A river rolls into a vast black sea. There is no churn, no rippling struggle, just the unceasing flow of water, warm into cold. I... #pureslush2014

Flash fiction from yours truly, and something a bit different from my "usual".

Stella! Today, we’re reading “White Rabbit” by Teresa Burns Gunther. Susan Tepper’s soundtrack for today’s reading is: Nine days ago Stella does her business out back then starts digging at the fence. I poke my head over. The neighbors are making a racket. Joyce is... #pureslush2014

Flash fiction from yours truly. More mainstream that my usual work.

"Living Dead" in Pure Slush's February edition of 2014: A Year in Stories.

Men are not dragons, but there are many things that one man can learn from an aging dragon when compelled.

A flashy flash at Every Day Fiction today. Enjoy!

Happy to report my flash is up at Apocrypha and Abstraction. Cool beans.

stilleatingoranges

Nasty, brutish and short

Hobbes’s remark about human life, abridged in the title above, perfectly summarizes contemporary short fiction. Most stories follow a simple formula. First, the author grabs the reader by the throat with a tabloidesque opening line. (Recently in The New Yorker: “Jane Allsop was abducted when she was fifteen, and nobody noticed.”) Second, ploddingly naturalistic characters and dialogue are introduced, alongside the inevitable cut(s) to backstory revelation. Third, the author goes for the gut punch: an attempt to get a savage, visceral reaction out of the reader. The best traffickers in this type of fiction—such as Raymond Carver and Tobias Wolff, who made it famous—can prolong step three throughout an entire story. Tying it all together is the comfortable ironic distance assumed by the author. No event is to be taken at face value.

Trending Blogs

Recently Viewed Blogs

Ramey Tumbles