Short Stories

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Exploring Cliche

How do cliches become cliched? Do cliches force us to take things on face value and not look for the truth within? The short story is an excellent form in which to explore cliche, and A.J Kirby's portfolio of tales all explore what lies beneath what we take for granted. A.J Kirby's stories are available in a variety of formats - in print, on the web, or on podcast.

Publishing History, Short Stories

  • ‘Day in the Life', published by Skrev Press in Texts' Bones journal: August 2007, ISBN-10: 0980133807/ ISBN-13: 978-0980133806
  • ‘An Army Marches on its Stomach', published by Graveside Tales in Fried! Fast Food, Slow Deaths anthology: October 2007, ISBN 978-1-904646-47-1
  • ‘Think Tank', published on-line by Sein und Werden: March 2008, URL: http://www.kissthewitch.co.uk/seinundwerden/2_4/page24.html
  • ‘The One Wish Foundation', published on-line on Huddersfield Literature Festival website: March 2008, URL:  http://www.litfest.org.uk/ (Story was runner-up in the Creative Writing Competition 2008)
  • ‘The Allotment', published on-line by The Second Hand (US Literary journal), URL: http://www.the2ndhand.com/web69/allotment.html
  • ‘Skeleton in the Closet', accepted for publication as a downloadable podcast by Shortalk: expected publication in July 2008.
  • 'The Sugar Footprint', accepted for publication by Necrology magazine (expected in September 2008 issue - to be published August 2008)
  • 'Business as Usual', published in Word Weavers General Fiction Anthology 2008: Of Shadows and Substance (Buy now: http://www.lulu.com/content/2719693)
  • 'Survival of the Fittest', third place in the Golden Visions Magazine Freedom Writing Contest - (story published in the July 2008 print edition - ISSN1940-817X)
  • Unnamed story published in Nemonymous 8: Cone Zero anthology: July 2008 (ISSN1474-2020)
  • 'No two Snowflakes are the Same', features in the 'Sein, Cos, Tan' issue of Sein und Werden (Summer 2008) : to purchase your copy, please follow this link: http://www.kissthewitch.co.uk/seinundwerden/print.html
  • ‘Me and My Shadow', pending publication in January 2009 in Champagne Shivers annual magazine.
    • >
  • ‘By Hook or By Crook', pending publication in Underground magazine.
  • ‘The Game of World Domination'; short-listed for the Cinnamon Press Short Story Award 2008
  • 'Too Many Cooks'; short-listed for An Ink Writing competition 2008
  • 'A Question of Trust'; short-listed for Writers' News magazine competition (March 2008)
  • 'Last Chance Saloon' and 'Sleep's Slippery Tentacles', to be published in August-October edition of New Voices in Fiction magazine www.freewebs.com/nvhstories/ajkirby.htm
  • 'The Sticky End of the Wrong', to be published in the New Voices in Fiction magazine e-book anthology, Ten Nails. For more information, see www.freewebs.com/tennailsebook

 

 

No Two Snowflakes Are The Same

This story, which placed highly in the prestigious Bridport Prize, features in the 'Sein; Cosein; Tangent' issue of Sein und Werden, and is another tale written in a markedly different style to A.J Kirby's more lengthier fiction. It is a magical tale of one boy's self-discovery, against all the odds. Horrendously disfigured, orphaned and left alone in the wilderness, he searches for the answers which will make him a complete person. Is it his lost mother which has made him this way? Or maybe he is just mad?  The story proposes that "we are all as indefinable as falling snow" - it is down to the reader to decide which one.The change in style gives Andy a chance to be a little more lyrical with his prose, indeed, the story is almost poetic at times...
 
One reviewer wrote: "This is a great short story! And actually, I think the short story form suits A.J Kirby well- it's long enough to put meat in the tale, not too long to become unwieldy. Excellent."

 

Just Desserts

‘Just Desserts’ is a tale very much in the vein of Roald Dahl's short stories. It is an exercise in confounding the reader’s expectations – leading them up the garden path – before the final ‘reveal’. Importantly though, the tale does not have any tricks up its sleeve; the reader will not feel short-changed by the outcome, as though the writer has withheld important information; ‘Just Desserts’ plays with narrative structure so that the reader is carried along with the expectations of the characters. How do you get away with a crime? You become the person that nobody expects to have done it…

 

 

 

An Army Marches On Its Stomach

This story appears in Fried! Fast Food, Slow Deaths, edited by Colleen Morris and Joel A. Sutherland and published by Graveside Tales. Meet a man who lives life at breakneck pace, a man who has inherited his father's fast food restaurant chain, but in making changes to the place, has quite literally trampled all over his father's grave. He's revamped a once charming little place as a soulless identikit plastic hovel which pokes fun at his father's old-time appeal. He was a war veteran, a hard-man...

Meanwhile, something is lurking in the shadows behind the restaurant. Something which has murder on its mind.

Could the two be connected?
 

Cat in Hell's Chance

A supernatural tale featuring cats. In memory of Eric. This was the first piece that Andy wrote at Creative Writing class, all those years ago... in 2006.

 

Here's the first paragraph: "There is a third cat in the front room; I see him first as he curls a questioning tail around the legs of the dining table; his eyes sparkling menacingly in the shadow. A low, guttural sound emanates from under the table; at first I think he’s purring. But as I watch him out of the corner of my eye I see that he’s not a particularly happy cat – that questioning tail now snakes quickly backwards like a bull-whip."

 

Skeleton In The Closet

'Skeleton in the Closet' has appeared in print and as a podcast. Please visit the 'Catalogue 2' page in order to find out purchase information regarding its appearance in Sein und Werden's 2008 Summer issue, 'Sein, Cos, Tan'...

..if you can't wait that long, click on the link below for a local radio podcast of 'Skeleton in the Closet'- which was given a 15 rating by the Bradford Radio station, BCB. And by the way, it's the author reading it...

http://www.bcbradio.co.uk/index.php?module=pagemaster&PAGE_user_op=view_page&PAGE_id=32&MMN_position=5:5 

If this doesn’t work, what you need to do is visit www.bcbradio.co.uk, then click on the 'presenters' tab on the left hand side of the page, then look for someone called Joe Ogden, and it'll link you up to a local arts program called ACT Now. Click on this link, and you'll be able to download 'Skeleton in the Closet' from here. Be warned, it has a 15 certificate.