#stories

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The real downside here is that new writers will have an even higher barrier to entry. Voices will be missed in the noise. Stories will go untold. Those voices, those stories, are what billionaires and governments should be investing in. That's how we make the world a better place.
https://newsletter.mattdragon.com/archive/things-im-reading-2026-04-27/

There's a pop-up window on my website, sophiajanehayden.com, where you can get a link to a PDF of The Story of Rockit by joining my email list. It's a short children's tale. Rockit is an adorable Australian herder pup with big dreams of herding cattle like her famous grandfather, Mick. But when she is adopted into a California home, she's met with two mean cats and a couple of elderly, very slow-moving tortoises, Herman and his wife, Morticia, in the backyard. It seems her dreams of being a herder have been dashed. But are they? Wise old Herman, who has lived for 105 years, tells Rockit never to give up on her dreams.

I wrote a cute little story for young children and am giving readers a chance to download it by joining my mailing list at sophiajanehayden.com. Rockit is an adorable pup with a famous Australian cattle herding grandfather, Mick. Her dream is to one day herd cattle like Mick. But her dreams are dashed when she moves into a California home with only a couple of very slow tortoises to herd. But Herman, the wise, old tortoise won't let Rockit give up on her dream.

From my wife:

Hoping the hive mind can help identify this:
During the mid-late 70s I read a paperback collection of short stories of which I remember only this:
A bartender feels sorry for the old down-and-out stranger in his bar and offers him a free drink (I think) which gets the stranger talking. He reminisces about how in the old days he used to be worshipped and offered ambrosia etc
The bartender thinks the old man is nuts but harmless, so out of curiosity he searches for a place that stocks this "ambrosia" drink he's never heard of and eventually ends up ordering some from some place in Greece.
Next time the old man comes in, the bartender offers him ambrosia.
Turns out the old man was the forgotten god Apollo and this small act of worship is like a sip of water to someone who's been lost …

You know a trope that bothers me? The idea that there are only five or six different stories.

Because, yes, if you reduce everything down to its basic elements, sure, there are only a handful of stories.

But is that really accurate? Because if you reduce a story down to: Bad Guy does bad, Good Guy kills Bad Guy, a billions works of fiction fit that.

But that feels like a weak concept to me. If you reduce things down enough, everything will fit.

But when you look at individual stories, often there are important plot details that are necessary to tell that story. You can through any number of necessary events that need to happen before the story comes to its conclusion.

So does that really make all stories virtually the same?

The 'handful of stories' thing is just said to …

Took a guided tour by Foundation yesterday. Two hours walking around downtown, looking at wonderful buildings. Went into Exchange Building, Seattle Tower, some others. Learned about details and of many more. This was a fine way to appreciate buildings I've sort-of but not really seen for most of my 40 years here. Spirited guide, and a congenial, pleasant group. Only $22 for . SAF offers many other tours around town. Check them out.

Engraved ornamentation on a bronze panel on an elevator door in the Seattle Tower combines wave-form and curly horizontal and intersecting vertical shapes with decorative elements that evoke flowers, clouds, wind, and the movement of light throughout the day.
The Second Avenue of the Exchange Building, with marble floor, marble walls in dark colors, ceiling of gilt cast plaster, chandeliers with white bursts of light, scrumptious elevator doors framed by bronze ornamentation, and a lone security guard wearing a maroon sleeveless sweater, sitting at his desk near a tall, illuminated Christmas tree.
A chandelier in the First Avenue lobby of the Exchange Building is a structure or white cloudy glass with two partly overlapping cylinders made from eight vertical slats of glass.

reviewed Inspiring Forgiveness by Barbara Bonner

Barbara Bonner: Inspiring Forgiveness (EBook, 2020, Wisdom Publications)

Sometimes forgiveness can feel unfathomable, unreachable, or even just plain wrong. Inspiring Forgiveness throws wide …

Aptly Titled, Effective

An excellent and very readable #anthology full of #stories, #quotes, and #poetry geared toward inspiring #forgiveness. I found it helpful for its variety and diversity of description and presentation regarding how forgiveness can look, how to think about it, and the many kinds of forgiveness (or non-forgiveness). Beyond that, I think the particular strength of Inspiring Forgiveness is that it is probably still accessible to people not (yet) interested in #forgiving, much more so than one of the many works offering advice on how to #forgive.

The one thing that bothered me was that the formatting seemed poorly adapted to ebook readers. I've heard that the printed version is quite nicely done, though, so if you're thinking about reading it and have the choice, you're probably better off with a hardcopy.

#BarbaraBonner #InspiringForgiveness

Folklore read live!

When you're done screaming, the giant monk in this dark mine would like to give you lamp oil.

Hear Tales of Pagan Gods & Mining Spirits tonight @ 6:30 pm PST/9:30 pm EST: https://youtube.com/live/bVpkEBx47O0

A storybook-style drawing of two shirtless men mining a rock wall with picks while two suited men watch them work. Overlaid text: The Mountain Monk

@saltphoenix on how to develop solarpunk stories:

"Live it. LIVE IT. I believe that the only way you can have some of these experiences, make these connections, and have stories to tell, is through actual experience on the land, and the chronological passage of time. You can't just get more creative w storytelling; things have to actually occur to experience these changes in thinking and living."

i agree! for example: before moving to the forest, i did not anticipate how many of the stories would involve animals making problems: pigs, rats, birds, plant pests, mosquitoes, fire ants, etc. not to mention domestic animals making problems: livestock, cats, dogs, etc. living with the land means living with all these other creatures who inhabit the land. if i were to write a solarpunk story back when i was a city girl, it wouldn't have any of these elements and …