"Cold Talks"
(Science
fiction)
 I
have a general rule: I don't publish my stuff on Web sites or in
electronic-only publications. Not that I'll be the next Stephen King, but
if I happen to strike it big, I'd hate for all my stuff to be floating
around for free out there. Plus, electronic publications have nothing
invested in what they publish, so they tend to publish anything. There's
some truly dreadful writing out there on Web sites, often by writers with
dozens of publication credits, yet they don't even understand basic
grammar and proper use of punctuation. It's easy to publish an e-zine when
it costs you nothing to post a story you've received.
Then again, there are many print
ventures out there that aren't too far behind. But I digress.
I have published online before, with
"The End of an Era," but have made it a point not to do so. Having
this story appear online at The Cud is different. My friend Evan Kanarakis
runs the site, and he publishes good stuff. Plus, it's the least I can do
for one of the finest guys I know.
So for his annual January "All Things
Lit" issue, I sent him a short-short that he used. You can read it in its
entirety at
http://www.thecud.com.au/live/content/cud-short-fiction-1.
Let me tell you a bit about "Cold
Talks," though. This story is entirely dialog, with no narrative of any
kind, not even dialog tags. It's sort of a tip of the hat to Terry Bisson,
a fantastic writer who penned one of my favorite stories ever, "They're
Made Out of Meat." It's also a dialog-only tale, which I read when it was
originally published in OMNI magazine. (Ah, those were the days.
OMNI took a daring plunge in 1996 when it went electronic-only, an
idea that was way ahead of its time; sadly, the venture flopped and the
magazine folded. But I'm digressing again.) The story is a conversation
between an alien captain and his first officer; they've come upon Earth
and are trying to figure out these strange creatures that are made
entirely out of meat. I always liked how Bisson told a complete story with
nothing more than dialog, and always wanted to try it. "Cold Talks" is my
attempt.
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