Beautiful Sorrows
This collection features works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Publication History:
“The Boy Who Hangs the Stars”
Neverlands and Otherwheres
(2008)
“Pixies Don’t Get Names”
Reflection’s Edge
(2008)
“Show Your Bones”
The Vestal Review
(2008),
The Shine Journal
(2008)
“The ABCs of Murder”
On the Premises
(2009)
“The Container of Sorrows”
The Pedestal Magazine
(2009)
“Flat, Flat World”
Silverthought
(2009)
“Life”
Abandoned Towers
(2009)
“She Called Him Sky” (as “Flowers”)
BluePrintReview
(2009)
“Broken”
Wigleaf
(2010)
“Blossom Bones”
The Binnacle
(2010/2011)
“The Container of Sorrows”
The Gate: 13 Dark and Odd Tales
(2010)
“Heartless”
Shock Totem: Holiday Tales of the Macabre and Twisted
(2011)
“Stars”
Best New Writing 2012
(2012)
“Black Mary”
The Gate 2: 13 Tales of Isolation and Despair
(2012)
All other stories are published here for the first time.
Cover art and illustrations by Yannick Bouchard
Cover layout by Yannick Bouchard
Digital layout by K. Allen Wood
Digital Edition Copyright © 2012 by Mercedes M. Yardley
Shock Totem Publications
Established in 2009
www.shocktotem.com
FIRST DIGITAL EDITION
Published in the United States of America.
For Mein. All of you.
INTRODUCTION
The Daughter of Achelos: A Paean to Friendship
by P. Gardner Goldsmith
In Greek mythology, the Sirens were vocal enchantresses possessed of such aural power and lyrical beauty they could lure unwitting sailors to their deaths by smashing their ships upon the rocks. These daughters of Achelos could even entice listeners to dive out of vessels, only to perish while swimming toward the rapturous sounds. No one could resist. To hear them was doom.
Listen...
A song is starting...
Mercedes M. Yardley is here. And she is calling...
You hold in your hands one of the most fantastic collections of truly creative fiction to have been published in decades. It will enthrall you. It will amuse you. It will break your heart and make you cry. And it will sing to you with word-songs of such epic beauty, such profound grace and symmetry, you will realize, like I have, that you’re hearing the song of a Siren. And you’ll happily give up everything to hear more.
To know Mercedes is to understand that she is unique, a one-in-a-million scion of myth. I first encountered her at the debut KillerCon, in Las Vegas. Tall, beautiful, with a smile that could power a thousand cities, she struck a chord. She immediately welcomed me as a friend. We had similar musical tastes, similar perspectives on individualism and ethics, on the importance of fidelity and family. It blew my mind. If ever there was a template for internal and external beauty, she was it.
Then I joined a group of people to hear her read flash-fiction.
And everybody in the room stopped breathing for a moment.
We must’ve felt like town-league hoop players in the presence of Michael Jordan, because none of us had ever encountered a talent like her. In twenty minutes she had taken four words and a phrase tossed to the competing writers and used them to create a story of such poetic and narrative force and beauty that I realized I was in the presence of someone truly different, naturally unique, and focused to use her talents to the utmost. Heck, this girl was some kinda Siren, and I was ready to jump ship and swim!
Now
you
have the opportunity to understand.
It is my firm belief that while reading
Beautiful Sorrows
you will fall in love and hate at least four times. You will want to sing and see flowers in the air, and you will want to fly with birds. You will remember what it is like to be an innocent child. And at times you will become receptive to timeless wisdom, carried to you through characters who are unique and magical, yet fundamental to the core.
Come listen to the music as she sings of wonders. Relish in the absurd-realism of “Untied.” Swoon to the wry, somehow innocent wisdom of “The Boy Who Hangs the Stars.” Chuckle with mom as she helps balance her little corner of the universe in “Crosswise Cosmos Sabotage.”
And swim. Dive with me into the ocean of delight as Mercedes draws us into additional realms uniquely like-unlike our world. In each tale, she deftly, almost slyly, reveals new facets of her skills and talents.
A keen understanding of the most fundamental human emotions runs through Mercedes’s work. Look at “The Container of Sorrows,” and you’ll see... If you share any of my sensibilities, you’ll find yourself compelled to turn the pages of “Luna e Volk”, enthralled and aghast as the tale unfolds... You’ll realize you are wistful and hopeful at the same time when you read “A Place of Beauty”... And you will understand the emotional power she wields as you identify with “the girl” in “She Called Him Sky.”
You’ll be near tears when you read that one.
Upon delving into “Sweet, Sweet Sonja T,” you’ll begin to see the jagged precipices of psychological danger down which Mercedes can propel you.
When you read “Black Mary” the narrative sophistication that Mercedes employs will hit you like a comet, and the psychological danger will turn to horror. Believe me. You might want to stop reading. You might want to pull away. It’s going to hurt. It’s correct, precise, fueled by the highest level of cogency and understanding. Watch out.
I can’t believe how well this woman can write.
Perhaps, if you are like I am, when you read “Pixies Don’t Get Names” you will think,
God. Life is short, and I want to feel it with someone, give that person something lasting
. It’s good to think it. It’s one of the things that gives life meaning.
And when you read “Big Man Ben,” you will cry.
I just re-read it, and I am crying now.
Life is short. Time passes. Grab goodness when you can. Strive for goodness and offer it to others. Be kind. Love beauty. Love.
And as you swim in the ocean near the island Mercedes and her great family call home, as you hear the songs she sings to you like a mythological force, ask yourself this:
What if the songs the Sirens sang were so wonderful that the sailors died
happy
? What if one could put himself in the mind of a sailor, spitting salt water as he feverishly swims toward the glorious sound? What if the Sirens created such beautiful and wondrous magic that to die in their thrall was the most desirable way to meet one’s fate?
Turn the page...
You are about to find out...
And thank you. I am not only a fan of Mercedes’s work. I am a friend. She is living evidence that the world can be a wonderful, beautiful, caring, amazing place. I hope my words can come close to doing her and her work justice.
Thank you, Mercedes, for what you do.
P. Gardner Goldsmith
July 2012
BROKEN
The dried twigs cracking under her feet broke exactly like the small bones of children. She wished she didn't know that.
