As an anthropologist who spends a great deal of time
thinking about culture, I’m always on the lookout for professions that appear
to be vanishing from our world.
Alchemists are few and far between.
Shamans are having a hard time making a living. Conjurers, shape-shifters, taxidermists, and
jesters have all been hit hard by recent economic downturns.
But nobody is currently experiencing more economic and social
woe than the headhunter and the short-story writer. Vilified, feared, and loved by none, the
short-story writer lurks at the edge of polite society, practicing dark
unsavory arts, choosing words carefully, willfully ignoring the lack of
audience. The tribal headhunter, though somewhat more respected and appreciated, must also become something of an outcast in
order to thrive. The market for shrunken
heads, about as robust as the market for short stories, gives constant reminder
that these labors are no longer appreciated.
So I decided to write a short story about headhunters. I began with Robert James Waller’s masterful
tome “The Bridges of Madison County.”
Weighing in at a whopping 38,000 words, this book was a massive hit,
inspiring a movie and scores of action figures.
I enjoyed the book, but found it lacking. Waller had the perfect set-up for
headhunting, and every time I turned the page, I thought it was coming. But it never did. I had to do something about that.
My short-story “The Cannibals of Madison County” is a
cannibal-laden homage to Waller’s vision.
And being a short story, it has no home in the modern world unless one
can be crafted.
I put the story up as a Kindle short story, because let’s
face it, there’s nowhere else to publish these days except Highlights for
Children, and they’re cagey when it comes to headhunting. I intend this as an experiment. The story is only 18 pages long, and you can
download it free today. If you get a
moment, you could help out by reading the story and then, if you like it, give
a short review. If I can get 15 good
reviews, I can blast the story on all the sharing pages and get thousands of
readers.
In any case, this has been a fun project, and I plan to keep
you posted as to the results. Thanks for
reading.
Get your free copy today by clicking HERE
7 comments:
yeah, the cannibal in the title might be a bit much for Highlights! sounds pretty interesting as a tale, though
Thanks, Charles!
I thoroughly enjoyed it, William. Sweet satire of a story I also enjoyed but couldn't for the life of me figure out why it became such a huge phenomenon. Off to leave you a review now.
Thanks for the wonderful review, Liane. You made my day!
You're welcome, William. Thanks for the story!
Short stories can do well as anthologies when grouped with similar themed stories. So maybe after you've written a few, you may want to group them together, or better yet, invite like-minded authors to share in a head-hunter (or other) themed anthology.
I do love short stories.
That's an interesting idea, Jewel. I have to do some thinking on that.
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