Dec 22, 2023
Sammy receives an unusual birthday gift, a smart device with a face, a set life span, and an unrelenting imperative to help.
Genre: Science Fiction
Excerpt:
The figurine suddenly
collapsed, then sprung up, wheeled her arms around, stretched them
out, then up, then bopped up and down by bending at the
knees.
She gazed up at Sammy. “Hello there!” she said. “Are you the one who needs help?”
Sammy said nothing. The figurine’s movements were smooth and graceful and quiet. She made no jerking motions, emitted no mechanical sounds of motors or gears. She blinked, and she breathed. She moved as if she were a living creature.
What’s the Writing Prompt that
inspired the story?
Ills, Pills, and Bills, Explore the
subject of illness. Discover how one of your characters handles it.
Or, select a moment from a personal experience of being sick or
being a caregiver. Notice your perspective: is the incident
humorous? poignant? clinical? dark? What means did you choose for
writing: description? dialogue? narration of the event?
Source: Room to Write: Daily Invitations to a Writer’s Life. Bonni Goldberg. Copyright © 1996. TarcherPerigee.
Faster Fictioneer
I
held my first free writing workshop over Zoom to teach my method of
writing short stories (an abbreviated version) on 11/8/2023. The
workshop is based on my course, called “Faster Fictioneer: A Doable
Method to Write a Short Story from Start to Finish in Five
Weeks.”
You can watch a replay of the workshop here: FASTER FICTIONEER
(You can also buy the course there.)
Follow my Fictioneering
Mischief
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Storyfeather Gazette is a monthly round-up of my recent podcast
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CREDITS
Story: “Roxie's
Wake-up Call” Copyright © 2019 by Nila L. Patel
Narration, Episode
Art, Editing, and Production: Nila L. Patel
Music:
“Trip-Hop
Lounge Abstract Background” by Digital
Emotions (Intro/Outro)
Music by ANDREA BARONI (Cyberleaf)*
“Fugue for One Synthetic Heart (No Percussion)”
“Forest Bathing”
“Night Time (No Percussion)”
“Evolving Cities”
“Ground Control”
“You Were Always in the Right Place (No Percussion)”
Music by ANDREW SITKOV (MuzStation Game Music)*
“Casual Theme #1”
“Casual Theme #3”
“Medieval Theme #5”
“Medieval Theme #2”
*These tracks were part of a music and sound effects bundles I purchased from Humble Bundle and sourced from GameDev Market.
Music by Andrea Baroni and Andrew Sitkov licensed from GameDev
Market
Vocal effects created with Audacity
Find more music by Digital_Emotions
at audiojungle.net
Find more
music by Andrea Baroni and Andrew Sitkov at gamedevmarket.net
Find
more stories by Nila at storyfeather.com
Episode Art Description: Digital drawing. Central image with a left and right border to make the format square. A humanoid figure standing with crossed arms, looking upward, and facing forward in front of a corkboard. The figure has right foot propped on the heel at the side, wears a satchel across the body, hanging from the right shoulder, and wears pants, a turtleneck, and a small-brimmed hat. Pinned to the corkboard to the figure’s left is a sticky note labeled “Return Cathy’s Call (see email for #),” and to the right is a cluster of push pins.