The Curio Cabinet: A Collection of MIniature Stories

By Carol Beth Anderson

Enchanted tattoos, slashed tires, and first kisses . . .

Peek inside The Curio Cabinet for an assortment of 150 stories, each about fifty words long.

Explore all four shelves:

In Other Worlds
Mind-bending fantasy, sci-fi, and horror

Love in Miniature
Romance to savor

Rhythm & Rhyme
Vibrant poetry

Curios
Eclectic, unique tales

You'll be delighted with the tiny treasures in The Curio Cabinet.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eliana Press
• Release date: Jul 9, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393598251

Book preview

1

They’d warned us for decades.

Who had, Gramma?

Climate scientists, celebrities, sidewalk prophets.

I look out the thick glass of our dome. What changed first?

Hard to say. But what caught our attention was when autumn came, and all the leaves turned black.

2

She came to be on a mountaintop. For millennia, she watched the sad, lovely cycles of human lives.

They visited her: hunters and seers, children and shamans. When a boy caught her and swallowed her, he prayed for eternal life.

And she prayed for the gift of mortality.

3

But there’s people down there. My eight-year-old voice shook.

Not people. Enemies. General Fen stared at me. Do it.

I squinted at the dark sea of army tents and imagined they were empty. Just canvas shells.

I held out my hand, and the earth swallowed them all.

4

We only meet at night.

He used to be afraid to touch my hair. I won’t bite, I promised. Now he runs his fingers through it with abandon.

As dawn approaches, he shuts his eye and gives me one last kiss.

Goodbye, sweet Cyclops, I say.

Until tomorrow, Medusa.

5

We met and married online, and our iChild was conceived in the cloud, with our DNA and the best AI. A million people attended his birth, and we digitally baptized him at First Church of the Internet.

The worldwide EMP took more than my electricity. It took everything.

6

Grandma collected animal figurines, so realistic I swore the wolf would attack and the crow would fly.

One day, I noticed a tiny, stone chihuahua. It looks like your neighbor’s dog, I said. The yippy one. I haven’t seen him in months!

Grandma gave me a guilty look.

7

He instructed me to deliver this after his cremation.

The letter leads me to Dad’s garage. Oh, great, it’s one more wacky invention. Looks like an ‘80s tanning bed. On it is another note in Dad’s handwriting:

Resurrection Machine. Yes, it works. But not on ashes.

8

The day Daddy left, the goblin arrived. She had avocado-rough skin, amber eyes and a winsome smile. We played card games and told stories.

You’re smiling again, she said one day.

I eyed her bag. "Don’t

Reviews for The Curio Cabinet

[Camilla Hjertø · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I discovered Carol Beth Anderson on TikTok, reading from this book, and I knew I had to check it out. I was right -I enjoyed these miniature stories and poems so so much! This collection somehow managed to fit me and all my tastes perfectly, as well – I got the perfect mix of sci-fi, romance, fantasy, dark realism, humour, reflection…. These stories are so varied, and I really loved them all. I had almost forgotten how thick with meaning (sorry, I can't recall the right English word, compact?) short stories and poetry can be, and I’m very glad for the reminder. Loved this.