An e-zine about spaceships, aliens, science, memory, motherhood, magic, and cats.
by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in AE: The Canadian Science Fiction Review, Issue No. 15, May 2014
The hospital lights flash in my eyes, and a man wearing blue scrubs injects me with a needle. I can’t feel my body anymore, and all I can see is his blue-clothed back and the nervous faces of my owners, Geoff and Bree, looking down at me. I can see them holding my paws, reaching to pat my ears, but all the sensations are distant.
1000 rejections! I was looking forward to this milestone… but it’s also… disappointing…
I am ready for my thousandth rejection — I have rainbow, striped, and gold paperclips to make a thousand paper clip long chain.
It’s raining flower petals outside my window!
Wesley: “I’m a bunny! Bunny. Bunny. Bunny. Ribbit.” *falls off chair*
Thus far, Deep Sky Anchor has been a web-zine for reprints. We’ve taken you to the stars, the future, and to the world all around you — but seen through other eyes. Yet, all those paths had been tread before. Now we’re forging a brand new path, leaving fresh footprints.
Our first original story comes from the universe of Mary E. Lowd’s Otters In Space series. Join the young high school cat, Katasha, at a school dance. Imagine what it’s like to be a cat in a world of dogs, surrounded by “High School Dogs.” Continue reading “Original Story: “High School Dogs””
by Mary E. Lowd
A Deep Sky Anchor Original, March 2016
The dance was over, like most high school dances, around eleven. The music stopped, and amid barks and yips of outrage, the lights came on. Without the blasting music and strobing lights, the crowd dissolved into a mass of individual dogs standing around awkwardly. Katasha’s ears flattened, and she drifted away from the bandstand, suddenly feeling weird as the only cat in the audience. The band playing tonight, Dog-Step, didn’t exactly have a lot of feline fans. Continue reading “High School Dogs”
What can I say about “All the Cats of the Rainbow“? It’s the last story I wrote for The Necromouser and Other Magical Cats. I hadn’t planned to write another story, but “Cold Tail and the Eyes” turned out so much sadder than I expected…
I wrote “Cold Tail and the Eyes” at the Wordcrafters Ghost Story Weekend where everyone writes a ghost story between Friday and Saturday dinner — then Saturday evening, we all read our ghost stories aloud to each other. Continue reading “Spotlight on “All the Cats of the Rainbow””
Sometimes fiction is a way to process real life pain. That’s the case with “Cold Tail and the Eyes.” It was inspired by a cat named Ray.
My mother and I rescued a litter of kittens from under her house. There were four of them, so we named them after the Ghostbusters — Ray, Peter, Winston, and Egon. Three of them adjusted very well to their new lives. Ray… did not. Continue reading “Spotlight on “Cold Tail and the Eyes””
Occasionally, my writing group runs out of stories to critique, so we have a writing session instead. One time, another writer brought cards from a fairy tale story-telling game for us to use as story prompts. We all drew five cards, and my cards read:
For the final Shreddy story in The Necromouser and Other Magical Cats, it seemed only right to bring the character back to where he had started — chewing on plants. And it needed to be a big finish, since — while I occasionally entertain ideas of writing a Shreddy novel — this might be Shreddy’s last story ever.
I listened to the soundtrack for Little Shop of Horrors a lot while writing “Shreddy and the Carnivorous Plant.” A lot. My eight-year-old daughter, who wants to be an actress, became so enamored of the musical that she declared her life goal was to play Audrey on stage some day. Continue reading “Spotlight on “Shreddy and the Carnivorous Plant””