I am very happy to announce the publication of my flash fiction collection Bold As Love. These are my favorite stories that I have written. They represent all the hard work I’ve put into writing since dedicating to it in 2013. This book is effectively the thesis of my DIY MFA.
I love the early work. It’s fun to look back on it and feel it was written by a different writer. At scary moments of self-doubt, it can even feel like a better writer. In 2008, I wrote a weird little poem that I felt opened something new for me as a writer. It was a little spark. Five years later, I converted it to a flash fiction piece called Rabbit and it won the 2013 SJI Holliday/ British Fantasy Society Flash Fiction Competition. These words from the judge (Susi Holliday) gave me such a boost early in this journey: “I think this did everything a piece of flash fiction should do. It gives you a snippet of a story that somehow manages to tell you the whole without cramming too much in. It was very well constructed, subtle, and chilling. I loved it.”
Another early work is Mother Goose that I wrote at my first Iowa Summer Writer’s Festival in response to a picture prompt. It was another pivotal moment in forming my writing identity. I remember the night vividly: I was stuck on the photo. I had nothing. And then I let go, and I found one of my favorite fictional characters in Sydney, a troubled young woman finding solace with pigeons in the ped-mall and later in a plush elevator. Reading it the next morning to my class and the moment of silence between reading it and their feedback is still one of my favorite writing moments.
I love the recent work too. Six of the stories are previously unpublished, such as Current Resident. I worked on it this summer at the Iowa Writer’s Festival. It takes place in the late seventies and is about a young man who is sure the guy living in the apartment above him is Charles Bukowski.
All my favorite stories are in here. They demonstrate who I am as a writer. They demonstrate the ways I have looked at the world over the last thirteen years.
I would be honored if you read it and shared with me your thoughts on the work. I’d be extra thrilled if you would put a quick review for it out on Amazon or Goodreads.
SILVERBACKED PUNK
Bold as Love was released under my new imprint Silverbacked Punk. I did this book now partly to get more experience with the publishing processes so I would be ready for future projects, including one coming very soon. But I also did it because this book is definitive of the type of projects Silverbacked Punk stands for. Over the last ten years, I submitted many forms of a flash fiction collection or chapbook. I made a few short lists, a couple close calls, but found no home for the work. That’s part of the process. There are more books out there than can be published. I believe in the book. I believe in all the work that went into it. I wanted to have a physical representation of the work. I wanted to be able to share it with you. In the end, I don’t think there was a better home for it than Silverbacked Punk.
I’m happy to get this one out in the world, share the stories, and then move on to my first release with another author. Breaking news on that front will be coming soon! We’re working on producing a great book!
Al Kratz 