Category: ALTERNATIVE HISTORY

18 May Updates – Preview of Lacunashka

This Week’s Excerpt
Instead of a preview this week I have something different for you. For a long time I have been a fan of Russian literature. As a tribute I wrote Lacunashka some time ago, but it has been languishing quietly on my computer. I think I may have published it briefly on Amazon or Books2Read but I withdrew it, probably because it is such a relentlessly dark tale. People who lived through the terror of Stalin’s reign must have experienced such darkness and a bleak existence, so as a tribute to them I have placed it inside Vampire: Beneficence (Short Stories Volume III). Here is an excerpt:

Lacunashka

Lacuna: a blank gap or missing part.
-shka: Russian diminutive ending for male names.

For Comrade Ilya it was like any other day in the Ministry. At 9.30, after already working for two hours, they broke for coffee or a shot of vodka. Volodya, as usual, was holding forth in his loud voice, leaning back against the edge of his desk.
“Ilya! Have a shot of vodka. Just once?”
“No, Misha,” he said placing his hand over the dirty porcelain cup. “I have to work anyway.” He walked the short distance, past dirty mullioned windows to his office and started to check through the list of mail for the day. Continue reading “18 May Updates – Preview of Lacunashka” →

4 May Updates – Preview of WWII Drama

Sneak Preview
This week’s sneak preview is from the soon-to-be-published Attack Hitler’s Bunker! and features the gorgeous Anna meeting Richard, one of the two heroes she is having affairs with.

Attack Hitler’s Bunker!
Copyright © 2013 by Lazlo Ferran
All Rights Reserved

Archibald led Richard out into the corridor and to the door of the next room. He fought off the pilot’s questions.” But Archie, how can I plan this if I don’t know …”
At that moment he saw Anna for the first time, and was silenced. She smelled of Pears soap.
“Richard, this is Anna Styles. Anna, this is Richard Earlgood.”
“Hello,” she said, smiling, and holding out a well-manicured hand. The man opposite clearly appreciated of her looks. Unimpressed by this, she looked beyond his stare. He had the lived-in good looks of a square-jawed film star, but there was something coy about his gaze. ‘He slouches!’ she also noted to herself, scoffing. However, his smile, which broke out as soon as she spoke to him, made her want to smile back. Continue reading “4 May Updates – Preview of WWII Drama” →

27 April Updates – Draft of WWII Drama

I am getting very close to a final draft of the WWII drama Attack Hitler’s Bunker! so hopefully there will be an excerpt from that here next week. For now, however, another excerpt from Worlds Like Dust, this time an amusing one.

(Unedited excerpt)

The four Ischians made a comical sight, squeezing their huge bodies into the small Maintenance POD. With two minutes to go, Luxmi Davidos had just finished rigging the main Nitrogen and Oxygen tanks to explode when she heard a tapping sound beside her. She had just sent the last grunt back with some tools, and grabbed her laser to defend herself.
There was a small grubber tank – filled half way with liquid around a rocky island, next to her. “Oh God, I had forgotten about you. Why the hell did you have to emerge right now! Now I will have to take you too!”
She grabbed an old oily towel, hanging next to a disfunctional diesel engine, and lifted the lid of the tank. Scooping the cat sized, grub-like, wriggling creature, she wrapped it in the towel and stuffed it under her arm.
“Who knows? You may be the only life-form from Earth alive, besides us, when this is all over! Time to go!” Continue reading “27 April Updates – Draft of WWII Drama” →