Delilah Des Anges - Tiny Fictions 2011

Delilah Des Anges 2011
Published by House of D Publications & Lulu.com ISBN: #: 978-1-4478-2707-8
All rights reserved

Other books by this author published by House of D Know Your Words (with Al Kennedy & Amy Kreines) Shots in the Dark
Kissing Carrion (with G K Blekkenhorst) Hamilton
Pass the Parcel
For the Love of a City: Poems for and About London Poems for MSF
Tiny Fiction #1
Tiny Fiction #2
Tiny Fiction #3
Tiny Fiction #4
How Not to Write by Someone Who Doesnt The Other Daughter
Protect Me From What I Want

Other books published by House of D Help: Twelve Tales of Healing

CONTENTS
I NTRODUCTION /S UMMARY ..............................................................5
R ADIO F REE I NDIA ............................................................................9
C AT IN G ADDA .................................................................................19
W E C ANNOT BE S AVED ...................................................................27
F AME /I NFAMY ..................................................................................35
I NTENT ...............................................................................................45
A V ALEDICTION F ORBIDDING C URIOSITY ..................................53
M ASTER S ONG ..................................................................................61

H OW TO S URVIVE I F Y OU W AKE U P N EXT TO S OMEONE W HOSE N AME Y OU D ON T R EMEMBER .................................................................77

I NCARCERATION ...............................................................................87
L ITTLE T HINGS T HAT K ILL ..........................................................125
D ODGING B ULLETS .......................................................................173
S POTTING F OXES ...........................................................................199
F ATHER ............................................................................................209
S HOTS IN THE D ARK ......................................................................215
M AINLAND ......................................................................................233
T ONE D EAF , C OLOUR B LIND ......................................................249
O NE V ERSION OF THE T ALE ........................................................255
H OW THE G OD B ECAME ..............................................................263

B EING A N I MPRECISE A CCOUNT O F E VENTS S URROUNDING A P ARTY I N L ONDON D URING A N U NSPECIFIED Y EAR S OME T IME A FTER B ISLEY S A DVENTURES I N B LACK M AGIC H AVE B EEN B ROUGHT T O A N A BRUPT E ND ...................................................................................273

T HE C APTAIN S F RENCHWOMAN ................................................287
J OHN L ANCASTER , T RAITOR ........................................................297
F OR O UR C OUNTRY S G OOD .......................................................307
A CKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................321

Introduction/Summary

Tiny Fictions are for people with short attention spans and shallow pockets; collections of stories which are compact and easy to get through before you get distracted or bored, perfect for commutes and all the more so as the book in your hands should fit nicely into the back pocket of your jeans, into your handbags, or to be slipped beside your iPhone in whatever it is trendy kids are using these days (this introduction is going to date terribly ).

The stories in #1 are drawn from a variety of backgrounds: Radio Free India is, for example, a piece which led to the creation of a particular storyline in the in-progress sequel to my first published novel, Pass the Parcel , and as such should be considered back-story; Master Song was an attempt made in around 2006 to exorcise an idea from my head which had been haunting me for years every time I heard Master Song by Leonard Cohen; and Cat In Gadda, We Cannot Be Saved, Fame/Infamy and A Valediction Forbidding Curiosity were all written for a photo-assignment writing challenge in early 2010, and relate to specific images to which I do not hold the copyright and therefore cannot reproduce here. Intent is a piece written for a prompt regarding hurt and comfort, blood loss.
#2: Sorka Collins is a collection of stories revolving around moments from the life of a specific character. Sorka came about in the summer of 2005 when I was working at an extremely dull data entry job and needed a channel through which to vent; after a little development and growing an entire personal history, Sorka Collins was ready for use first in Incarcertaion , which was written at the request of a friend obsessed with the Rodney Carrington song Prison Bitch, and later for a song-related writing contest in which I was allotted Bushs Little Things. How to Survive if You Wake Up Next to Someone Whose Name You Dont Remember is from a list of survival scenarios which were suggested as writing prompts some time later, in which I decided to see what this rather brutal character looked like from the perspective of someone very different, and found my framing device in Tom Connor.
#3: Dodging Bullets and Spotting Foxes have both had previous incarnations, and some readers may be able to guess what these were. I shall leave the mystery hanging for those who arent in on the joke.
Father was written sometime in the grim hinterland of writers block that comprised the years 2004 to 2006, in response to a series of one-word prompts. These prompts proved surprisingly successful, and one of them, Lethe, sowed the seed which later became a novella.
Shots in the Dark is, as you may have noticed from the other books section on the previous page, the title of another publication by House of D. This short story is the original from which the narrative poem is derived, the story which I showed to a dear friend whose far more skillful eye noticed that in places it read almost like poetry. Some people are not fans of narrative poetry, and I hope that they will enjoy this, the narrative prose version of the same tale, instead.

Mainland has the difficult task of acting as both speculative fiction and homage to William Goldings excellent Lord of the Flies .
#4: All the stories in this book were written with one specific recipient in mind, often told directly to them via an instant messenger service, which I believe more or less constitutes the equivalent of campfire stories in our fascinating modern age. They are also almost all works which derive from other works, stories based on stories both written and unwritten, and as gifts have already served their purpose in making their recipients happy. Being an Imprecise Account {} , for example, is a birthday gift to my very dear friend on the occasion of her birthday, set after the events of a story which I have yet to finish writing (but whose particulars should become immediately apparent), and featuring in it two characters from my own friends as yet unwritten story.

Likewise, The Captains Frenchwoman explores the lives of minor characters from a story which I wrote in 2005, and was written at the behest of a very generous friend who won my services in a charity auction; For Our Countrys Good , set in the same dystopian alternative world as Mainland in Tiny Fictions #3 , was written as a graduation present for another friend, whose desire was for fiction obliquely referencing the Catholic saint Sebastian, and John Lancaster, Traitor (the fore-runner to an upcoming novel) was written for the edification of my closest friend in response to an advert.