Most of this morning has been taken up in writing another story, one I hope to share in at least rough form soon. Also, if you liked yesterday’s flash fiction, there will be more of those to follow. I’ve always been a fan of vignettes and short-shorts and such, whether by Jorge Luis Borges, Donald Barthelme, Robert Walser, or other such writers, though until recently, I haven’t written many. If you’re a writer, and you haven’t, try it. It’s a fun form, and it’s also challenge to create the impression and image of a complete story in only a few hundred  words. Since I’m about to take the plunge into novel country again, I feel I need the practice at making every word count.

This morning, I’m also cross-posting at Rose City Reader, where Book Beginnings Friday is hosted. The object is to post the first sentence (or so) of the book you’re reading and share what it means to you, if necessary. Here’s mine, from a diptych of novellas by the excellent Michigan native Jim Harrison. (Many of you might recognise the name from Legends of the Fall. That’s a great novella collection as well, but the rest of his work is equally worth checking out.)

Clive awoke before dawn in a motel in Ypsilanti, Michigan, thinking that it was altogether possible that every woman in the world was married to the wrong man.

This is from “The Land of Unlikeness,” the first novella in The River Swimmer. I picked up the book because I liked his work, but the first sentence sucked me out of the stacks in the Atlanta-Fulton County Central Library, and into a world that was thrust into being in less than thirty words.

I’ll share my full observations of the book, and possibly a recommendation, later.