Under Janey's Garden

Artwork by Nick Greenwood

Reading Room

Short Stories

Under Janey's Garden (5000 words)

This is not your usual, fluffy, bunny story. I am a huge fan of gardens but I don’t have a green thumb. While I can admire the look and smell of a garden, I haven’t the first notion of how to go about encouraging one to actually thrive. If the landlord didn’t come and water my lawn on a regular basis, I’d be living in a dust bowl. But “Janey’s Garden” is the one I would grow if I could, full of flowers and vegetables and trees. A lazy, welcoming place for sunny afternoons – though my ideal would be without matrimonially-minded rabbits.

This story was published in Issue 5 of Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show and was the Orson Picks for that issue. It can be

Also, this story received an honorable mention in .

The Moon for Kira (6000 words)

How can an educational video game really measure what you’ve learned if it can’t read your thoughts? Is there such a thing as putting too much of yourself into your work? In “The Moon for Kira,” a little girl is trapped inside an obsessive programmer’s magnum opus, and her estranged parents have to find a way to rescue her from the prison of her own mind.

Sparrowjunk (8800 words)

Fairytales really are addictive. I've often wondered what happens to the elves and fairies who are not as lucky as Peter Pan's fleet-winged island sweetheart. How do magical creatures live, if no one is there to clap hands and prove they really do believe? What sustains them through the Age of Reason, and the ever darkening century when belief in magic is eroded by television and the downturning economy? In this story, a father is confronted with a creature both like and unlike any storybook princess he has ever known. She offers to grant him a wish, and all he has to do is tell her stories. What happens next is a darker twist on the idea of what makes happily ever after, and who, in any story, is really the wicked witch.

Novels

Cat's Paw (in progress)

Gaspar the Terrible earned his name by being the worst sorcerer in all the world, but when his sister is accidentally transformed into an animal, and a thief makes off with her soul, Gaspar, and his uncertain command of magic, are the only things that can save her.

Children's Stories

Blue Balloon and the Man in the Moon

What goes up... must end up at the Man in the Moon's house. This rollicking, rhyming journey takes a new look at some favorite, old rhymes.

Dragons Don't Drive

The dragon is hungry, and the nearest pizza place is blocks and blocks away. Mom's car keys are in reach, and thus begins a silly story about two friends on a short, fast, bumpy adventure.