Triple Threat

By Samantha Blair

These three stories are very short glimpses into the lives of some unusual and extraordinary people.

Strings of Life - Word Count: 1837
Norton Cart has always played the violin as he drifts from town to town, but never did he expect a day like today.

The Mad Hatter - Word Count: 722
A creepy twist on Alice and her Hatter.

The Rape Diet - Word Count: 4895
With the terror of a traumatic rape nipping at her heels ...she runs.

All of her life Karen has been told that her obesity is the cause of all of her problems, so when two boys in the locker room at school rape her, it seems natural to blame the fat. Obsessed with weight loss, she struggles to out run the past and the present.

This short story, written in a post-modern minimalist style, is an expression of the fear that many young people experience as a result of poor school security, distant parents, and an unhealthy self-image.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Samantha Blair
• Release date: May 11, 2011

Samantha Blair

Ms. Blair lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with her loving husband and two cats. Her writing slows every fall with the start of the Steelers season before making an amazing rebound shortly after the Super Bowl. She has a full time career as a marketing director and website designer, but in her spare time she can frequently be found writing for the shear joy of it. She and her husband enjoy traveling, camping, down-hill snow skiing, and reading post-apocalyptic fiction together. Taking hikes and wilderness survival classes are among their typical bonding activities. An avid reader, Samantha devours about 250 books a year from all genres and time periods. Her favorite authors include Stephen King, Fannie Flagg, Stephanie Meyer, and Henry David Thoreau. Q. Was there ever a book that changed your life? A. Absolutely, but it’s actually a series of seven books. The Dark Tower by Stephen King started me down a long road that traveled through all of his writing. There’s a lot of it, and I learned a lot from reading his works. What an imagination! I’ll take a good storyteller over a Pulitzer Prize winner any day. Q. Where do your stories begin? A. It’s usually a mental short film of an unusual situation. With Protectors it was a young woman running through a cornfield in the dead of night. The story that I’m working on now was originally about a very poor woman leaving a very wealthy man. It has since turned into a story about a young woman who auctions off her virginity to an oil tycoon. I try to figure out why the people in my head are in those awkward situations, and then I write them a way out of it. Q. What is your guiltiest pleasure? A. I’m a sucker for m/m fiction or chocolate mousse cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory. It’s a tie. If someone writes a steamy guy on guy scene involving chocolate cake, I’m doomed. Q. What is your greatest fear? A. Failure. I can be kind of hard on myself. Q. Why did you start writing? A. I’m a professional graphic designer in my “real life” and I needed an outlet for my creativity that wasn’t tied to my job. Q. What do you find is the hardest thing about writing? A. Keeping to a steady schedule. I always want to write fifty different stories all at one time, and I have trouble finishing one idea before moving on to the next.

Book preview

©2011 Samantha Blair

All rights reserved. This work in whole or in part may not be reproduced without written permission from the author.

This is a work of fiction. The characters in this book do not exist outside of the imagination of the author and are in no way meant to represent any persons living or dead.

Smashwords Edition

Strings of Life

By Samantha Blair

Norton Cart stepped out of the alleyway before six o’clock that morning carrying his violin, still in its case. He was thinking about his name as he watched the sun coming up at the end of the narrow city street. He had never really liked the name Norton, but he had never been motivated enough to change it. Norton Cart may not have been the name of a great violin virtuoso, and it wasn’t really the name of the most popular kid in school either, but it suited him. After all, a long time ago, when he was in school, he never was the most popular kid.

Norton rounded the side of the old brick building and shuffled along to his usual corner. He knelt down to open the very familiar case. His bones creaked more and more each day. Joints popped uncomfortably as he bent in the cool morning breeze with the fall leaves swirling around his feet. The creak in his bones seemed very distant in his mind. No matter how often he went to reach for his violin, he still got that same rush each time. He felt as if he were ten years old again, peering into the glass case in a fancy music shop, looking at the hand-carved wood for the very first time. He didn’t remember the specifics of where or when he had gotten the instrument, and that never struck him as odd. It had always just been a part of him. He flipped the silver hinges open, the smooth black case giving way to the faded, red interior. His heart leapt as the polished wood came into view.

Norton