“Eddie the Simp Holds Court” at Literary Garage

My story “Eddie the Simp Holds Court” has been published over at Literary Garage.

This story has had a long journey: it was the first short piece I wrote after returning my focus to fiction, but it has changed a lot from the masterpiece I thought I had created when I began submitting it to lit journals in August 2016. Over those nearly ten years it’s had a title change (formerly “Where There’s Smoke,” which I liked, but I’ve cut the part that made it make sense), and has shrunk to half the size of the original. The original story had a lot of detours. The finished piece has only one.

This is a nostalgic piece featuring some teens in the suburbs during the late 1980s. The language can be crude in spots.

You can read my story in full, free of charge, over at Literary Garage. Here’s the opening for a taste:

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