Ten-Word Tragedies

Wandering lonely through the snow streets of New York
I stumbled on a thrift store that sold postcards by the yard
I bought a mile and shipped them home so I could read
Ten thousand ten-word tragedies, the lives these strangers lead
To remind myself the things I need

Inspired by Frank Turner and his songs especially that evocative verse from Mittens the editors were delighted to learn that he really did find that box of postcards in a New York thrift store. Frank was kind enough to send us the box, and from it we chose a series of postcards and forwarded them to the writers in this book. Gaining inspiration from the postcards and their 'ten word tragedies', the contributors wrote an amazingly eclectic selection of tales moving, funny, horrific, bizarre, and delightful, these are the lives these strangers lead.

CONTENTS

I Am Here Michael Marshall Smith
London Safe Stuart Neville
The War Within Kelley Armstrong
The New Boyfriend Scott Smith
From the Living Room of Cottage 6 Josh Malerman
Beat the Card Home Stephen Volk
She Forgot The All, She Could Not Remember Anything But Longing Kelly Braffet
Give Me Two Michael Koryta
The Letter from Elsie Matt Bechtel
I Hate to Leave This Delilah S. Dawson
Howard Sturgis and the Letters and the Van and What He Found When He Went Back to His House Paul Tremblay
The House in My Heart Rachel Autumn Deering
Fort Lauderdale Rio Youers
Broken For You Alyson Noel
The Lions Keith Buckley
The Same as the Air Alison Littlewood
Lowcountry Tidings Dan Chaon
Taproot Mike Carey
Royal Gorge Frank Turner