Melody Writes

Happy Halloween!   Had a fun time handing out candy with Rebel the Clown:     Also have an announcement:  Just released: Halloween Frights from Black Ink Fiction with 3 drabbles by me: The Invitation, The Midnight Statue, and Too Old to Trick or Treat. My personal favourite of the three is The Midnight Statue because it's loosely based on an urban legend from the city I grew up near about a black angel statue that would supposedly cry at midnight. And check out this fantastic volume of Halloween flash fiction released last year from The Macabre Ladies as part of their Holiday Horror Series     Dark Halloween This work includes my first publication: The Stone House about a costume contest with a mysterious prize.    How will you be celebrating Halloween this year? Thanks for reading!  Want to keep in touch? Sign up for my newsletter or Find me around the web Want to support my writing? Buy one of my books or Support me on Ko-fi

The Future Dido woke after her magical night in the cave with Aeneas. Her first night with a man since her husband had died. Dido’s heart was full of a mix of joy and guilt, but she knew that her husband would want her to be happy.   She got dressed and joined Aeneas outside. The scent of last night’s storm still hung in the air and Dido inhaled deeply. Aeneas cut a handsome figure against the sunrise and Dido imagined their life together as king and queen of Carthage.   But Aeneas’ eyes were already on the horizon and his future in Rome. Photo by The New York Public Library on Unsplash Thanks for reading!  Want to keep in touch? Sign up for my newsletter or Find me around the web Want to support my writing? Buy one of my books or Support me on Ko-fi

As a child, the darker elements of the Peter Pan story eluded me. There was a tv show adaptation that gave me nightmares and I remember getting chills when Peter's children are kidnapped in Hook , but it was always Captain Hook that scared me. Him and that relentless crocodile. It wasn't until I read the original book that I realized that the truly scary person was Peter himself. It's been a few years, but I still remember the darkness in the story. As an immortal child, Peter is inconstant and casually cruel. In a battle he will turn on the other Lost Boys, not out of malice, just because he's so caught up in the moment he forgets who the enemy is. When Wendy is in danger, he laughs at the fun of it. And, at the end of the book when he returns to Wendy, he has forgotten who Tinkerbell is. It's this darkness that A.C. Wise captures so well in her novel. She gives us an adult Wendy who has faced only trauma and persecution since her days in Neverland. Her brothers ar...