Do you love to read but never have the time? Or is your life so busy youāve fallen out of love with reading?
Reading is wonderful, but how many times have you failed to finish a novel or lost interest because youāre too busy or exhausted to remember all the details?
If we spend most of our time working and doing things for other people, reading tends to be something we put aside. Modern life is busy and difficult, but we need to make some time for ourselves ā we deserve it.
This book is the answer to your reading woes. H.D. Michaels has created The Gift of Stories: one story a day for 28 days. They start at less than 100 words (thatās less than a minute you need to find!).
The stories are all different; youāll experience mystery, suspense, love, fear, and laughter. They will ignite your imagination, open your mind and help you fall in love with reading all over again.
Get ready for a journey of rediscovery.
Buy the gift of stories and start your journey today. Then share it with your loved ones and friends!
Do you love to read but never have the time? Or is your life so busy youāve fallen out of love with reading?
Reading is wonderful, but how many times have you failed to finish a novel or lost interest because youāre too busy or exhausted to remember all the details?
If we spend most of our time working and doing things for other people, reading tends to be something we put aside. Modern life is busy and difficult, but we need to make some time for ourselves ā we deserve it.
This book is the answer to your reading woes. H.D. Michaels has created The Gift of Stories: one story a day for 28 days. They start at less than 100 words (thatās less than a minute you need to find!).
The stories are all different; youāll experience mystery, suspense, love, fear, and laughter. They will ignite your imagination, open your mind and help you fall in love with reading all over again.
Get ready for a journey of rediscovery.
Buy the gift of stories and start your journey today. Then share it with your loved ones and friends!
Iām cooking steaks for us; it would be good to have a nice evening for once. Things havenāt been right for a while now. I hear him come in the door. I hope heās hungry.
āCanāt you put the extractor fan on? It stinks in here.ā
āWill do, sorry. I donāt like to when youāre not here. It makes me think someone is going to sneak up behind me.ā
He rolls his eyes. āYouāre a total nut job. Who exactly is going to come and attack you at the cooker with the door locked?ā
āI know itās stupid. Itās justā¦ā
āGive me that, you canāt cook steak for shit anyway.ā He overacts switching the cooker hood on. He is such a prick sometimes.
āOpen some wine, would you, if you can manage that.ā I suspect this isnāt going to be a nice evening but Iām not ready to give up on it yet. I step away and my foot disappears from underneath me. At first, I think heās pushed me. Iām horrified, heās a cantankerous old bastard but never violent. I realise too late that Iāve slipped on grease. My arms grab out frantically, but they canāt save me. He doesnāt even hear it happen with the cooker hood on full blast. The last thing I feel is my head and neck striking the counter. I feel the break, deep down inside, everything goes black for the shortest of moments and then all feeling is gone. Iām floating to the ground, the noise of the cooker seems far away somehow and the outline of Ianās back is blurry and his movements slow. He still hasnāt seen me and I canāt move or talk.
āI can get it my...ā He stands on my outstretched arm as he turns to tell me off for being slow with the wine. I donāt feel it; itās only at that moment I realise that Iām not really me anymore, Iām just watching. He looks shocked but not upset. He looks scared, terrified in fact, and I think heās also a little annoyed at the mess. Heās never had what I would call normal emotions or responses. Heās wired up wrong.
āFuck.ā He looks around, Iām not sure what for. I thought he might check my pulse but when I look at me again, itās obvious Iām dead. He stops cooking and turns the cooker hood off, then leaps over me and runs into the hallway and out of the front door. I hear the garage open, but he doesnāt get into the car. I think I could follow him, but somehow, I know Iāve got eternity to do that. I think Iāll stay here with my body; she wonāt be around much longer. I donāt feel sad about that, and maybe thatās part of it all. I hear Ian clattering around. He doesnāt seem to have called the police. I hope heās not going to do anything stupid. Heās a grumpy old shit with a foul mouth but heād never have laid a finger on me.
He comes back with a saw, hammer, tarpaulin, bin bags and a rope. Heās about to make a huge mistake, and I canāt watch. He dumps his makeshift dismembering kit onto the kitchen floor and runs off again. I pray heās coming to his senses. This was an accident, and heās not in any trouble, but the longer he leaves it, and if he does anything other than call the police, he will be. Thereās no instruction manual that comes with this, but somehow I know what to do.
I close my eyes and pull myself back down. Itās like trying to remember something youāve forgotten but you know is in your brain somewhere. I feel a shift, I open my eyes again and Iām on the floor. I know I havenāt got long to fix this, and Iām definitely dead, but I know I can communicate from here. He comes running back in with a change of clothes for him and my handbag. I donāt know what heās thinking. I concentrate again and turn my head towards him. I plan my message very clearly and play it in my head, willing my dead lips to move. āIan, please, I fell, just call the police, please.ā
My head is slow, and my neck is broken. It cracks and wobbles towards him, my eyes staring and lifeless. My words come out slow and pained, like a mixture between a growl and a scream. Itās a hideous noise and a horrifying sight.
āIa... Ian...ā I see my already terrified husband become struck with horror; he is visibly shaking. No other words will come. Iām not strong enough, I canāt hold my head anymore and it hits the floor with a sickening thump. My face is grotesque and twisted from my failed attempts to warn him. He grabs the phone and dials frantically, then shouts down the phone.
āMum, oh Mum, help, please help!ā
Oh no, not that old bitch. Well, at least it beats watching yourself be chopped up and put in plastic bags. He runs out of the room and I wait. I start to feel lighter, the room starts to blur a little more, I can still see everything but I know Iām getting ready to leave and I know that where Iām going is good. I can feel warmth and a kindness upon me. I donāt know how long I wait; I donāt feel time passing. The room is a blur now and I feel myself slipping away towards the kind and gentle place that is waiting for me. I know I can leave; heās getting help and heāll be fine. I hear him crying and I can sense his mother in the room with him. Sheāll make sure heās OK. I hear her voice before I drift into eternity.
āYou grab her legs, Iāll get her arms. We need to do this in the bathroom. It would be too messy in here.ā
I've been chatting with a lot of people about how the pandemic has been awful for our attention spans. So many of my friends who are readers have found it very hard to stick with books this year, myself included. For obvious reasons our attention has been averted elsewhere. Whenever I've found it difficult to focus on reading in the past, I've often gone to short stories since they are short and you sense a feeling of accomplishment once you finish one. Not only that, they can often motivate you to read more.
All that to say The Gift of Stories is the perfect pandemic read. The structure is set up so you read one story a day for 28 days (4 weeks), Week One stories being considerably shorter than Week Two stories, and so on; you are eased into reading longer stories essentially, and I think it's a great approach to encourage people to read more, or to get people back into their love of reading. Between the weeks the author asks you questions that cause you to look into yourself and wonder what it is about that particular story you liked.
I really enjoyed the stories. They were well-written and a mixture of intriguing, shocking, and witty. Also thought-provoking. After each story I was always left with the residue of some sort of human emotion, be it disbelief, awe, shock, or other. There were quite a few stories I wish I'd have read in a longer format, that's how intrigued I was by them. I definitely noticed that the type of stories I was drawn to in this collection were the ones with a little mystery and intrigue, which usually are not themes I come across in my readings, but perhaps during the pandemic that's what I'm looking for! It makes sense!
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