At last.

My original plan was to publish two short stories this Friday, 23 December, but I decided not to wait.

I have published the first of them, Trophies, today. It should be available for Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and on Smashwords within the next one to two days.

Trophies is a story that came from two sources. One was a note somewhere in my voluminous files that reads, "A woman in a bikini walks into a bar." The other was the reaction I had when reading one of Dashiell Hammet's novels, in which he never got into his character's head. In Trophies, I make sure to get into my main character's head, to make sure that the reader believes that her actions are plausible.

Trophies will be available in all e-reader formats.

I plan to follow it up with another story, a flash story entitled Quality Control, by Friday at the latest.

I won't be able to publish a novel by the end of the year -- it's still in the process of beta-reading. And after that is done, of course, I will have to get it edited.

 Since I want to have something published online before the end of the year, I have decided to publish two stories a week from today. Friday, 23 December, when I will be finished with my current quarter, and also done with Christmas shopping, etc., I will post two of my short stories, the previously published Trophies and the never before published Quality Control.

Trophies is about 2450 words long. It takes place in a hotel bar on the Big Island of Hawaii, and involves two characters, Amy, a customer, and Bill, the bartender. Things are not as they seem, and the ending should be a shock to you all.

Quality Control is an idea I had one night while watching TV. The idea came to me, "What would happen if someone somehow did something to hurt the reputation of a consortium of hitmen?" Quality Control is flash fiction length, at about 940 words.

 I intend to publish them both for the Nook, the Kindle, and on Smashwords. I hope they will be a good introduction to my writing.