Day Terrors Table of Contents
Here’s the proposed table of contents for Day Terrors. Our publication date will be February 2011.
1. Ataraxia — Scott Brendel — They stood until they died, leaving their loved ones to watch their slow but steady deterioration.
2. Sea of Green, Sea of Gold — Aaron Polson — The rocky nature of those hills had protected the Konza from pioneers and farmers, and now the government guaranteed protection by making it a national preserve, a piece of land lost in time.
3. The Wish Man and the Worm — J.M. Heluk — The worm in Georgia’s mouth slipped when he yanked her head back.
4. The Woman in the Ditch — Scott Lininger — At the very bottom of the thirty feet of ditch there was a fancy car, completely upside-down, with its hood smashed through the ice that covered the creek.
5. And the Crowd Goes Wild — John Jasper Owens — “I believe,” I told Bellows, “we are witnessing the end times.” Bellows shrugged. “That’s gonna play hell with residuals.”
6. No Sin Remains A Secret — Jack Bowdren — In the dark coolness of the church hall basement it had appeared quite ordinary, but once I had lugged it up into the light I could see that it wasn’t like any other statue of Christ I’d known.
7. The Heat Has Fangs — Trent Roman — This is one heck of a heat wave, and it doesn’t show sign of breaking anytime soon, either. But not the worse I’ve seen, no sir.
8. In Lieu of Flowers — Chad McKee — The shock of discovering you had missed the last breaths of your wife by a mere handful of days after six years in exile weighed on a man.
9. Down Where the Blue Bonnets Grow — Daniel R. Robichaud — Instinct made me train the rifle on the bare patch. If the earth itself sat up, I could take a head shot.
10. The Infatuate — Adam Walter — Though the two of them knew nothing of each other, they shared the most improbable secret, and no one looking at them — now, in this place — could ever hope to guess it.
11. Fiddleback — Lorna D. Keach — Fever and chills were one thing, but “I think something’s wrong with this bite, Walt,” she’d said.
12. Daddy Long Legs — Harper Hull — “Saw him clear as day, striding across those top branches with those spindly legs like he was on the sidewalk. It was the morning that Ella – that your momma – my Ella, the morning she died.”
13. Miss Riley’s Lot — Gregory Miller — How ’bout when my big brother Chris took me up on Still Creek Hill during hunting season and let me watch while he and his buds shot a woman?
14. Closing the Deal — Lee Clark Zumpe — “We seek a specific class of transgressors and malefactors for a combination of institutional castigation and cultivation.”
15. Customs — Mark Rigney — The wait begins, and this time it is more than a little unnerving because we have been separated from our passports, the little booklets that legitimize us, make us official and human and real.
16. A Day at the Beach — Lawrence Conquest — The motion of her hand disturbed the waters, her view of the creature instantly dissolving into a thousand pieces.
17. Uncle Alec’s Gargoyle — Rebecca Fraser — It winked at me once, Uncle Alec’s gargoyle.
18. Carrington Cove — Davin Ireland — There was little love lost between the professional fossil hunters who scoured Dorset’s Jurassic Coast.
19. Lollipop — Jason Sizemore — The ghost and the man stared at each other. They remained like that for several minutes, water dripping from one, brains from the other.
20. Companion — Rob E. Boley — Every trip I’ve ever taken, I think I’m going to meet someone, find a companion who sees all I have to offer, but it never seems to happen.
21. Sands of Time — E. C. Seaman — The Grey Lady saw it all. Every argument, every drama; from childishly scraped knees to first boyfriends and broken hearts.