Book of Diverse Writings: Volume I

By M. Oliva

The author’s first crime mystery story "Hidden, A Crime Mystery" has the suspense and twists one would expect of such theme. Ding dong, someone is dead... ding dong, the author won’t tell... dong, dong, but not for long...! The size of a novella, and the longest story in this volume, it can be read in around thirty minutes or a bit more, the reason why there could be no hints, no spoilers. Sixteen other stories follow with single or mixed genres each: action, adventure, family, fantasy, light romance and Sci-Fi. Too many different plots to read – all with surprise endings. As opposed to Hidden, the featured crime mystery, the rest of the fictional tales can be read in close to three minutes each.

Two personal anecdotes deal with real life thrilling experiences, with a touch of dry humor and drama. The nine essays are also varied, from honor and pride to inspirational and motivational themes; from personal views on life or careers, to philosophical renderings. The book ends with seven trivia, single paragraph one-minute stories based on a famous first opening line.

In this book, one story may not fit all tastes, but one personal taste will definitely find a preferred theme or many more in the following subjects: abductions, astronauts, drones, hole punch clouds, magical, mystical; pirates, tall tales, etcetera. May the readers – young to adult - enjoy this potpourri of themes on plane or train commutes; in reception rooms; in between house chores; at night, or at any other preferred time.

• Language: English
• Publisher: M. Oliva
• Release date: Apr 17, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311065018

M. Oliva

ABOUT MIRTA, THE ARTIST-WRITER Once a writer, always a writer! As a child, I used to write about anything that came to mind; later on,my writings were focused on essays, anecdotes and poems. But I also had a passion for painting, initially drawing the human figure, followed by oil renditions of landscapes and animals. When it became necessary to divert my full attention to a successful career path in banking, I had to put aside my artistic dreams. Down the road, after selective antiques collecting and planning, I opened my first store "Antiques are Forever," now inactive. My involvement in antiques brought me back to art. My new emphasis was to study the masters' techniques by visiting museums or from acquired antique paintings. My new artistic vision included abstracts and modernism. New creations included a series of over one hundred comic animals, several abstracts and, more recently, a series of paper birds set in a somewhat realistic environment. One day I realized that the paintings told a story; thus, the book-writing began. Birdyjosh and Birdylu, a Paper Birds' Story was published in 2011 in both paper back and eBook format. In 2012 a General Fiction young adult novel - Sublime Adoption, a Tale of Love and Mendacity - was published in Smashwords as an eBook. Another fully-illustrated book is in the works plus the Spanish version of the paper birds story, "Joseliyo y Lorilu, Mis Dos Pajaritos de Papel." Other projects include several novellas. For the artist at heart, the calling never fades . . .

Book preview

Book Of Diverse

Writings

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Volume I

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M. Oliva

COPYRIGHT:

BOOK OF DIVERSE WRITINGS ~ Volume I

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Copyright 2015 by Mirta Oliva (a.k.a. M. Oliva)

Cover illustration and design by M. Oliva

Smashwords Edition

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All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this Author’s anthology in whole or in part, as would apply to her individual stories or portions thereof, in any form whatsoever, in any and all currently available means - or any others as they may be devised in the future - without the prior written permission of the Copyright owner, Mirta Oliva (a/k/a M. Oliva).

This publication contains events, situations, and material that are fictional. All names, persons and their persona, are the product of the Author’s imagination. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, or to any real-life event is pure coincidence. The latter applies to any names used in any anecdotal stories part of this publication relating to the author’s own life experiences or situations.

~TABLE OF CONTENTS~

~o~

PREFACE

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CHAPTER ONE ~ Featured Story

1.**HIDDEN ~ A Crime Mystery**

~~Parts I through VIII

~o~

CHAPTER TWO ~ Other Short Stories

2. A Walk Alone in the Woods

3. A Surprising Turn of Events

4. A Tall Tale of Sorts

5. In Pursuit of a Dwarf Planet

6. Inside a Hole Punch Cloud

7. MISSY: A Cat’s Meow

8. The Drone, the Cabin and the Spies Within

9. The Frozen Grasshopper

10. The Green Invisible Mountain

11.The Irish Shoe Stop

12.The Old Man’s Trick

13.The Old West Saloon

14. The Skeleton in the Closet

15. Thieves of the Seas

16. When the Clock Struck 21

~o~

CHAPTER THREE ~ Anecdotes

17. It Happened at the Horse Ranch

18. A Very Strange Thing Happened…

~o~

CHAPTER FOUR

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ESSAYS ~ Honor, Inspirational and Motivational

19. Creation vs. Destruction

20. Keeping the Wheel in Motion and Creativity at High Levels

21. The Glory and Agony of Success

22. The Power of Thanks

23. What’s in a Last Name?

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ESSAYS ~ Philosophical

24. My One and Only Life

25. There Is No Better Feeling Than Feeling Wanted

26. Who Should Dictate: My Heart or My Mind?

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CHAPTER FIVE ~A LITTLE BIT OF TRIVIA

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It Was A Dark And Stormy Night…

~o~

27. Fishing in the Lake

28. A Man’s Shadow in the Rain

29. The Thief and the Bright Moon

30. The Masked Man and My Dog

31. A Raven’s Revenge

32. Wrong Time for Berry Picking

33. Lacking Inspiration.

~o~

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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WEBSITES

PREFACE

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As the title suggests, this Book of Diverse Writings – Volume I - compiles a variety of works: short stories, essays, anecdotes and trivia.

The book begins with a featured crime story, followed by fifteen other short stories with single or mixed genres: action, adventure, family, fantasy, light romance and science fiction (Sci-Fi), thus giving the readers a wide choice of themes and plots to read – all with surprise endings.

The Anecdotes are about personal real life thrilling experiences with a touch of drama.

The essays range from honor and pride to inspirational and motivational themes; from personal views on life or careers to philosophical renderings and other subjects. This wide variety will suit individual preferences in more than one way.

Young adults and adults can enjoy this anthology at leisure. The stories can be read in the short time frame of two minutes to thirty or more for HIDDEN, A Crime Mystery, the featured story. The book ends with seven trivia tales, each sharing a famous opening line in one single paragraph. Reading time estimated at one minute or less each.

While the first book deals with prose, Volume II, in its final stages of editing, is dedicated to poems.

DEDICATION

~o~

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To Heather M. Schuldt…

A great motivator. Thanks to her guidelines and innovative ideas introduced at her writers’ groups, I was able to switch from strictly writing family and children's stories to working on themes that I would have never dreamt of investing my time on.

The creative highlights and elaborate pointers Heather suggested for the monthly stories, prompted me to add UFO encounters; the mystery of hole punch clouds; astronauts at work; drone-spying; old pirates doing their thing, and many more categories to my monthly writings. Many of those fiction tales are part of this single-author anthology.

~o~

I also thank all others who have supported my interest in painting and writing.

CHAPTER ONE

**Featured Story**

~o~

1.-HIDDEN ~A Crime Mystery

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Part I ~ Is This All There Is?

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Five years to the day…

The indolent young man was traversing a curvy pathway known by a few, a trail to nowhere with dense hedgerows. During his favorite morning walk, Drew was divagating about the meaning of his existence, fluffing the hair with his fingers as if the invigorating exercise could solve his conundrum. Bored and frustrated, he was thinking, Is this all there is…?

Drew, an only son, dutifully co-managed his father’s huge land holdings. He loved the farm, the crops and all their animals. Although he enjoyed the daily work, at the end of the day all he had to look forward to was the next sunrise. Waking up at dawn to admire nature’s shy exuberance was his favorite way to commence a new day, though it also gave him a glimpse of what was to be expected during the next working hours. Nothing more and nothing less than any other day, unless there was a nasty change in the weather. Drew considered those ho-hum periods a waste of valuable productive time.

As it happened every other day, the young man was hoping to become enlightened, but he had no clue as to what to do with his life: how to discover a niche that would get him out of this rut. Whatever his predicament was – if indeed there was to be a change - it had not materialized, perhaps due to his strong ties to the farm and his parents. Nonetheless, Drew kept hoping and dreaming about his Revelation Day.

I know I am destined to make a difference. I should use my God-given talents to better my family, and perhaps the world too. I just do not know where to start. On one hand, I am thankful to my parents for everything they have done for me; on the other, I want to explore, to chase the infinite potential within me until I can experience the culmination of my efforts.

Having had enough desultory thoughts with no seemingly viable solutions, Drew became complacent - he saw no point in recounting the futility of his being. In a more objective mood, he abandoned those feelings of helplessness. It felt better to believe that the era of new beginnings was getting closer, most likely a difficult step toward immortalizing his family name. It probably would have served him well to remember the saying, Be careful what you wish for, lest it come true...

In a conscientious effort to take a different path to get home, Drew turned to the right, following a seldom traveled dirt road leading to an old water well. As he walked, his eyes kept gazing down at the footpath, driven by a commanding force. He must have been trying to avoid stomping on an impertinent stone when, suddenly, something unusual caught his eye.

Where could these things have come from…? He questioned himself while staring down at the fork in the road – the one leading to the well.

Drew had been through this trail before, always trying not to confuse frogs with stones or stepping on careless turtles or snakes; however, he had never seen what was on the ground in front of him. There were numerous pebbles by the roadside in perfect line formation. The last few ones appeared to have been manually diverted toward the fork way, buried under the green grass blades.

Who could have done this? Drew thought as he realized that the tiny stones were pointing toward the brick-lined, century-old water well a few feet away – a now purposeless structure. The young man had very seldom seen strangers anywhere near the farm’s perimeter. Even though there is a byway close to the private fence, he had rarely seen vehicles or pedestrians near it. He also surmised that, there being no shiny pebbles within the property, someone must have brought them there for a reason. Either the person was exhibiting his or her artistic talents or was trying to attract someone’s attention to the area.

This could not be the revelation that I was waiting for… it just does not happen that way, Drew thought, as he was trying to find a logical answer to the stone puzzle.

Though I have never seen children around this area… this has got to be the works of a youngster or somebody with lots of time on their hands. I will never know, unless I head for the old reservoir.

Despite the dense vegetation surrounding the trail, Drew kept looking for the spaced out pebbles. Through clearings in the grass, he could see them one after the other, the last one placed at the foot of the abandoned water well – now dry. After carefully searching the surroundings to see if there was a hidden message anywhere, he found no clues in the peculiar stone show. In a perturbed mood, he yelled, What do you expect of me… Should I dive head-on into the deep hole? If not, what is the purpose of bringing me here? It is not even April Fool’s Day!

Of course, Drew was not expecting that the pebbles would tell him what to do. Further, he would have been extremely frightened had he heard a voice answering his questions. One thing was sure, though, he was not going to dive into the dark guts of the structure to seek for a possible treasure hidden deep down.

Absent any drastic decision, he decided to take a quick look to see if there was anyone inside waiting to boo him. Just the thought scared him. He first peeked by lifting the heels from the floor while bending forward slightly – his hands resting on the wide border. Relieved to see no one inside, he thought it prudent to scrutinize the brick lining to see if there was a message written on the bricks. For this, he tried a risky pose: he rested both hands on the wide rim - his torso balancing his body evenly on the border, and his head dangerously pointing down. He was looking at random. If there was a written message, it could be in any brick – too many to focus on a single one. More curious than ever, he looked around in circles getting dizzy in the process.

Searching for a clue appeared to be more difficult than it really was… Drew finally noticed a brick protruding about one inch, positioned about one foot from the rim. As he began pulling it out, gravity almost sent him head down into a bed of dry leaves, twigs and weeds. Reacting fast to avoid a sure demise, he quickly lifted his upper body while his feet landed heavily on the ground. He was sweating profusely – the product of anxiety and fear.

I’ll have to give it another try. This is not a coincidence. First, it was obvious the pebbles were directing me to the water well; then, I find a loose brick, sticking out about one inch from the other evenly layered ones - out of place enough for me to see it. I wonder if someone has hidden a treasure in there, or is it a prank?

After giving the matter some consideration, Drew preferred to believe the whole thing was not a joke, that something of intrinsic value may be waiting for him inside the brick enclosure.

Acting on impulse, as a popular cartoon figure would, the young man shouted, Okay, brick, here I come! After darting toward the rim, Drew instinctively put the brakes on… common sense dictated that this time he must be more careful. He first got a good grip on the left wooden post that still held an old bucket, placing his torso on the border. In a synchronized motion, he reached down with his right hand. The brick came off without much effort, so he started to bring it up carefully. The sun, much warmer now, was casting bright rays on this side of the structure. Drew rushed to peek into the hole from the opposite side. The dutiful Helios was cooperating once more, its bright rays pointing like fingers toward the opening.