I am going back to the first collection SLOW DESCENT AND OTHER LITTLE STORIES to discuss the short story "Hungry". That short story was unique in many respects. It was the first short story I had ever written. It was the first story that I felt really had an unpredictable ending. If any of you predicted it, please let me know as well as how you figured it out. Because I do not want to give it away, I cannot say to much about it in the post. Also, it was the only short story included, and the final entry in, the first book I published.
I really enjoyed writing this story. Once I had written the first short story, I wanted to write more. I also wanted to write those stories with more unpredictable aspects. That became the theme for the second collection.
I came up with the idea for "Hungry" in January 2023 when we were still living near Grecia, Costa Rica. This was just before we started our journey through South America with the first stop in Colombia. That seems like ages ago now. Since we started that trip, we have visited eight countries with only one repeat to the U.S. and one to Costa Rica. Besides those two we visited Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay and Bolivia.
I can't exactly say what inspired me to write it. It seemed to be another one of those ideas that fell out of the sky in the middle of the night. Once I began, it flowed out like water from the faucet. I finished it in just a couple of weeks.
The story contains only one main character. In some respects that actually made it harder to write. I really had to bear down to give the character life and personality. All readers eyes would be focused on just this one character, so there was no chance to deflect that focus.
In the next blog posts, I will continue to dig deeper into the background of the short stories in the second collection.
I look forward to all the back stories! Good to spend time being quiet in CO.