Short Story published: Civilisation

'Civilization' is a story set in the near future where life has just got that bit harder for people. They live in smaller apartments, work longer hours for less pay. There are more rules which they must obey or face violence from stressed out guards.

I like the fact that Marco, the main character has such a simple aim, to get to work, but it becomes nearly impossible to achieve. I also like Marco’s determination. So many things are going wrong for him but he just keeps going. So even though the world I’ve created is quite grim, it’s ultimately quite an uplifting story.

Movies involving future dystopias are very popular these days with films like ‘The Hunger Games’, ‘Divergent’ and ‘Ender’s Game’ getting a lot of success. Each one of these has a discernible bad guy. That’s fine, movies don’t get much traction without the foe to be overcome but I’ve often wondered what if life just kept getting steadily worse and worse. If the pace of the decline was slow enough, humans would adapt and perhaps not realise just how bad things had gotten. They’d be like the frog in the pot of slowly heated water not realising it's predicament until it was too late.


Civilisation can be found here:
https://issuu.com/peteraoconnor/docs/civilisation_-_peter_o_connor

If you like 'Civilisation' then I have good news. I have another story set in the same world. It features Marco's wife, Maria, who got a bit of a raw deal in 'Civilisation,' as all we saw of her was a furious woman attacking her partner.

SEARCHING

I searched for ‘adventure’ and it said it was an unusual, exciting or daring experience. The searching wasn't that exciting. I was still sat in front of my computer. 

I searched for inspiration and I decided that image of a lightbulb that was returned wasn't at all inspirational in and of itself.

So I searched for ‘enlightenment’ and what do you know? I spent a whole hour finding out stuff around the subject of 'The enlightenment’. 

But I still hadn't moved.

I sat stock-still like a tree, roots reaching out into a world of facts and information, roots that stretched around the world sucking at the sap of our accumulated knowledge. What did I learn? Lots of stuff. I saw a million images as if I'd sprouted many extra sets of eyes that popped from my head and flew out into the world. Omniscience only eluded me because the shininess of each new fact dimmed so quickly when the next one came along.

So I shutdown my computer and went out. It was cold. There was a light drizzle. It prickled my skin and formed dew drops on my eyelashes until I blinked them away. Some people that I passed gave me strange looks. I think it was because I was smiling.

Captive Uploaded

I've just uploaded short story No.5 "Captive."

http://issuu.com/peteraoconnor/docs/captive_-_peter_o_connor

Here's the blurb:

Set in the time of the Spanish conquest of South America, "Captive" is the story of Franciscan monk, taken prisoner after the Spanish Conquistadors desecrate a number of Mayan temples. In order to escape he must face his fears and his prejudices and decide what price he's willing to pay for freedom. 

It's one of the longest stories I've ever written at over 8000 words, more of a novella really. Most of it was written in 1994 so, yeah, I'm a bit of a slow writer. I had a problem with the ending so I've dug it up, dusted it off and I'm pretty happy with the ending now.

I've you happen to read it I'd love to hear any comments or feedback whether good or bad.

"Captive" was inspired in part by Edgar Allen Poe's "The Pit and the Pendulum" where the main character wakes up in a horrible situation and they must do their best to escape.

I've always been interested in Mayan, culture and did a fair bit of research whilse writing this. Diego De Landa is an actual historical figure and the accounts of the desecration of Mayan temples and destruction of their culture, by the Franciscan's are also historically accurate.

If you like this story or any of my other writing please follow me on Issuu, share on Facemuck.

https://www.facebook.com/Peter-OConnor-360839490599334/?ref=bookmarks

Story 1: Darwin's Army Uploaded.

My first story is up on Amazon and available for purchase for a measly 89 pence or 99cents or 3 fish fingers, a paper-clip and a sprout if you use the barter system.

For the folks in Europe:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00P6F1BMA?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

For the folks in Asia Pacific:
http://www.amazon.com.au/gp/product/B00P6F1BMA?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

Not forgetting the folks in Mexico. Ola!

http://www.amazon.com.mx/gp/product/B00P6F1BMA?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

I feel very happy to have my story out there on the inter-galactic super highway rather than gathering virtual dust on my hard disk.

It's A Start

I've signed up for this blog thingamabob because I figured I needed a spot to waffle on about my writing without boring my facebook friends to death.

So here it is.

I've started it.

I write short stories or I should say I wrote short stories. I've not actually finished one in a very long time so my plan is to dust off the ones I have written and send them out to the universe by way of Kindle Direct Publishing or Facebook and try to get inspired to write some new ones.

I've got somewhere around 20 completed stories that I'm happy with. They range from drama to sci-fi to fantasy to just downright weird. Hopefully I can knock the best of these together into a collection for a book.

I love the feeling of finishing a story and I love those moments when you get a spark of an idea and the world seems full of possiblilities. 

The first one I'm going to upload is called 'Darwin's Army'.