Stories and Paintings
Downstairs in the kitchen, I searched the cupboards for something to eat. I found nothing. I know LaShawn was barbecuing, but what about potato salad, chips, cocktail onions, savoury biscuits, cupcakes? Maybe Budgie was going to shop for the party tomorrow morning. Where was Budgie anyway? He didn’t even have a jar of Vegemite.... Continue Reading →
A yank of the hand brake and a deft swivel of the steering wheel, and LaShawn brought his truck round to skidding halt on the dirt driveway beside Budgie’s house. He chuckled as he switched the engine off. Budgie—his last name is Finch, so we call him Budgie—had a four-acre property with a... Continue Reading →
As a child, Fernando Chang showed an extraordinary aptitude for science. While other boys would be riding their bikes outside, Fernando would be dismantling his in the garage. When he showed the boys his reconstructed bicycle—now a model of the Milky Way's planetary orbits—they just scratched their heads. A week later (after developing a shampoo... Continue Reading →
Old John Burrow died last week. I remember when he arrived in our small town back in 1979, completely hairless and wearing a strange, one-piece outfit. The outfit looked like it was made of silk. Everybody said it was silk. It wasn't. I knew it wasn't. He spoke with an unusual accent, and kind of... Continue Reading →
My grandmother gave me this book for Christmas a few years ago. Inside the cover she wrote: Merry Christmas 2016. I look forward to trying one of your cakes! What puzzled me was not how she mistook a dystopian novel for a cookbook (the cover art on this edition was a man in a helmet... Continue Reading →
