Kurghan, a time-traveling Scythian blacksmith with a jewellery business in Montreal's Plateau neighbourhood, notices that his son Altai is losing the culture of his people. Kughan longs for nothing less than to feel the wind in his hair again and to ride his horse on a leopard hunt. He wants the same for his son. …
Category: Short Stories
“In the Ruins of Shambhala”
My flash fiction story "In the Ruins of Shambhala" has appeared on 600 Second Saga.
How T.E. Lawrence Came to Many-Pillared Iram
Today's post is another YouTube video, in which you will get to listen to my own reading of a piece of short fiction I wrote for the Mythgard Institute "Almost an Inkling" creative writing contest. The contest is still going on, but now that the current week's voting is over, I was really enthusiastic to share this …
Continue reading How T.E. Lawrence Came to Many-Pillared Iram
“Return to Methuselah”
"Return to Methuselah," one of my short stories, is now available at Dark Fire Fiction! It's a dark fantasy of an immortal painter who has become fed up with his immortality. I came up with this story after reflecting on the classical paradox of living an immortal life. An immortal can live forever, but in …
Eternal Guarantee
Every once in a while, two events in your life happen simultaneously and in their juxtaposition, a humorous situation appears in your imagination. I had just finished reading Guy Gavriel Kay's The Fionavar Tapestry and started a job as a salesman. Anyone familiar with the myth of King Arthur, especially as retold by Kay, and …
Bloody Caesar; or The Ides of March
Several years ago, I wrote an experimental short story: the assassination of Julius Caesar told from the perspective of his blood. I'm still quite proud of it, and I thought I'd share it with you here. A nice short story that de-familiarizes the familiar, it was originally published online at the SPACE website, an arts-sciences …
Vision: Evening Prayer
The date was Sunday 6 August 2012. I had entered the chapel of the monastery in Taizé, France, late at night during the service of evening prayer. I had scarcely slept since arriving in Paris and after two days in the City of Lights, I was exhausted. I was in the state of waking in …
Matthew Rettino 