Author's Note

Water-colored wings and tiny little bodies….  Child height with a jaunty red cap….  Friendly….  Mischievous….  Sometimes malevolent…..  Sometimes called the little folk or our friends (because to speak the name of the fairies was to attract notice and therefore trouble), other times the Sidhe (pronounced Shee), fairies hold a special place in the human psyche, but it’s not always the same place. 

As with the Greek Gods, humans have used fairies to explain the unexplainable from time immemorial.  I’ve got a particular soft spot in my heart for these variable creatures ever since my grandmother told me I was Fae when I was a small child.  To be Fae (yet another name for fairies) as a human means that you’ve been touched by fairies in some way.  I have a small divot by my left ear, which my grandmother told me was caused by a fairy’s touch, and meant that if I listened very closely, I’d be able to hear the fairies.  So far, I haven’t picked up any strange conversations, but I’ve remained curious about the fairy folk into my adulthood. 

On my bookshelves, I have volumes and volumes of fairy lore, folktales, and fairy encyclopedias from countries and cultures around the world.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned from all this research, it’s that there’s a whole lot of variation in the fairy realm.  Some fairies, like leprechauns, are tricksters.  Other fairies, like brownies and hobs, want to help humans and actively serve them.  And still others, like will-o-the-wisps, are dangerous to humans and should be avoided at all costs.  But one thing that all fairies have in common, even the most benevolent ones, you do not want to piss them off. 

Fairies have a wide variety of skills and magical abilities, and woe to the human that crosses them.  And this is what draws me in when I write – the things that go wrong, conflict between the worlds.  What happens when fairies get blood thirsty and join The Wild Hunt, as they do in my short story, “Hounds of Winter“?  Or what happens when their homes are threatened, as it is in my as-yet unpublished short story, “In the Town of Henry’s Fence”?  These otherworldly conflicts get my writer senses tingling and make my fingers itch to hit the keyboard.

Romance.  What is it about that word that sets most men I know quivering in fear?  Not all of them mind you, but enough that it makes me wonder if it’s a gender-linked trait to avoid hearts, flowers, and all things mushy. 

Sometimes I wonder, “Is it so hard to make a small gesture?”  Even just a grocery store bouquet would do.  What about that rare man who makes the grand gesture without social prodding?  Perhaps it’s the hopeless romantic in this female’s heart, but I’d like to think such men exist – the type of man who will sweep a woman off her feet without reminders like Valentine’s Day. 

One of the advantages of being a writer is that I get to indulge in my love for the grand gesture without having to wait for someone else to do it.  Not all of my male characters are sensitive romantics, but at least some of them are. 

In “Hounds of Winter,” Devlin is a taciturn, but sensitive, man who lives deep in the forest with his beloved Faylinn.  When Faylinn disappears in the bitter depths of winter, Devlin’s love for Faylinn drives him out into the treacherous night, where even the wind has teeth, to find his lady love.  But restoring the status quo, even if it does mean fighting beasts of the other world, isn’t as grand a gesture as Mel Hippos makes in my short story “In the Land of Plenty.”   You see, Mel is no ordinary man.  He masquerades as one under the wide Montana sky, but he’s really one of four brothers who must ride forth to bring on the end of the world.  His brothers want him to ride but he refuses for one reason, and one reason only – Janie.  For the love of a woman he would stop the Apocalypse.  How’s that for romantic?  (Read it for free here)

So with Valentine’s Day not far past, and a little romance still hanging in the air, why don’t you curl up with Devlin and Mel, and see just how romantic a man can be if he just tries.

A season for joy,
A season for sorrow,
Where she’s gone
I will surely, surely follow

Those words, sung in a mournful wail by Sting, were what got my creative juices flowing for the short story that eventually became “Hounds of Winter.”   Sting’s song was all about a man missing his mate in the depths of winter, and I wanted to capture that feeling of aching sorrow and cold loneliness that he’d captured in song with a story. 

In “Hounds of Winter,” the main character, Devlin, finds himself alone in a frigid winter landscape.  His beloved, his Faylinn, has disappeared.  Most assume she has died, victim of a walk in the treacherous winter wood.  But then Devlin finds clues showing that all is not as it appears, and his Faylinn may yet be alive.

Whoo-Hoo!  The fourth short story I sold to Echelon Press Publishing is up and ready for your reading pleasure as an ebook download.  This one is called “Hounds of Winter” and is one of many of my stories that has been inspired by one of my all time favorite musicians, Sting.  Here is the teaser description:

Winter is a treacherous season.  The ice can cut, the snow can blind, and the wind has teeth.  But some winters are even more perilous, some winters are inhabited by malevolent spirits.  Devlin finds himself alone in such a winter, his lovely FayLinn gone missing.  And when The Wild Hunt shows themselves in the area, he has an idea of where she’s gone.  What would be more dangerous: the winter wind and vicious hunters or the pain of abandonment and a broken heart?

It’s only $2!  Go download it now and get a good shiver!

http://tinyurl.com/houndsowinter