welcome to
Anthologiesonline.com
Featured Writer Guess who won Writer’s Digest first Zine Publishing Award? The Grand Prize went to www.Cyberageadventures.com. President and editor Frank Fradella has a passion for literary writing, superheroes, and publishing. You’ll find Cyberage advertures full of fascinating reads, anthologies for sale, and it’s a paying market.
Don’t miss his short story-- in this article.
Frank Fradella is a Champion of Justice, Thwarter of Evil and self-professed "upstart godling." He also writes. Prior to his creation of Cyber Age Adventures (http://www.cyberageadventures.com), he was best known for his often-imitated business The Cyrano Conspiracy, where he wrote love letters and poems for the lovelorn. His work has appeared in over 50 countries and was once taught as literature to high school students in Israel. He has also developed a small, but loyal, following on Saturn's moon, Titan. Why do you write? First and foremost, I write because I enjoy it. No matter what anyone else says, writer's write for the enjoyment of it. Are there a thousand factors which go into that? Absolutely. But no one holds a gun to our heads. We write because we choose to, and not because we would perish if we didn't Imagine you’ve just been published in an anthlogy with your favorite authors. Who’s published with you? Alan Moore. Neil Gaiman. Harlan Ellison. Michael Moorcock. Jennifer Roberson. Peter David. Robert B. Parker. And, you know, that Shakespeare guy. It's not supposed to be this fresh. It's not supposed to hurt this much after all this time. A simple phone call. Innocent. That was all. A phone rings and you answer it. Like you've done a thousand times before. A phone rings and you answer it and the next thing you know, you've got the wind knocked out of you like a sledgehammer just connected with your stomach. The phone rings and you say hello and the voice on the other end of the phone, oblivious to the havoc they're about to wreak on your barely contained semblance of a life, a voice says hello and suddenly you can't breathe. Just hello. Nothing more profound than that. Just a simple greeting and the sincere desire to play catch up after all these months. But it's not simple. You smile and you laugh and say, of course I'm not busy, and you do your best to avoid any mention of "The Couple Formerly Known As Us." But it's notsimple and it's not just hello. It can't ever be just hello ever again. You pick up the phone expecting a friend or, at the very least a telemarketer, and what you get for your trouble is the sudden realization that this isn't your life. Not the life you wanted. It wasn't supposed to be like this and it isn't supposed to hurt this bad. You say hello and still manage to bite your tongue at all the things you swore you'd say if you ever had the chance again. But it's never going to happen and you know it. Those things will remain unsaid until you can spout them at the cold grey stone above her grave and by then it won't matter anymore. It was just a simple phone call, but the party on the other end is one of THEM. One of the two, maybe three, people in your whole life that will be able to blindside you like that. The Blind Spots. They come and they go and no matter how long they've been gone this time, the look in their eye or the sound of their voice can put you right back there. They come up in your blind spots and the second you're aware of their presence, your heart skips a beat and you forget how to breathe. All of the bodily functions that normally occur without any thought from you whatsoever are suddenly in desperate need of a coach. Breathe. Heart beat. Swallow.Blink. And in that hollow moment when you might just as well die, in the space of that heartbeat that didn't happen, you're just as much in love with them as you ever were and the sound of their voice is enough to break your heart all over again. It was just a phone call and it was just a hello and it was just a lifetime ago when you knew how to breathe. But the sound of their voice reminds you that there was a time when you trusted people a little more. There was a point in your life when you still believed in Destiny and Hope and you were much more willing to let yourself fall in love than you are right now. You remember that and you know they had something to do with it. They're a little responsible for the fact that your life isn't the way you always hoped it would be. They talk and you listen and, despite yourself, you find that you still remember the old routines. You still remember how to flirt. And then, unbidden, come the other memories, too. The smell of her skin after that rainstorm you got caught in. That half-smile that used to drive you so crazy, or the way she used to bite her lip with a look that could have melted steel. So, finally, you say good-bye and wish them well and surprise yourself when you realize that you mean it. And some people will call it chemistry. Some people will call it soulmates. Some will just call it a connection. But they are the Blind Spots. And it is best that they don't know that you're going to be a little screwed up for the next few days. And maybe longer than that. It was just a hello. And you can't undo it. And you can't live with it. And knowing all this doesn't help the fact that it's not supposed to be like this and it's not supposed to hurt this bad. But it does. And it will. And that's all there is to it. THE END E-mail: Editor@cyberageadventures.com Copyright 2001
Frank Fradella by Frank Fradella
Authors' description. Out of the Digital Revolution rises a great new age of fiction. The Cyber Age. Each ground-breaking story in this volume introduces you to characters so real, so fully-formed, that the tales themselves seem almost possible. These are the events in the lives of people not unlike you and me. People... who may just happen to have extraordinary powers or abilities. Forget what you think you know about superheroes and prepare to take an evolutionary step up. Welcome to the future of superheroes. Cyber Age Adventures
by Frank Fradella