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Time for another giveaway! Since this summer will see the release of the second Cheap Caffeine cartoon collection, this giveaway is for one of three SPECIAL SKETCH EDITIONS of the first collection, Ethnic Albanians Need Not Apply! Goodreads Book Giveaway Ethnic Albanians Need Not Apply by Nathan Shumate Giveaway ends July 03, 2015. See the giveaway details…
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The Goodreads giveaway for Levels was so much fun, we’re doing it for Shared Nightmares too! Just enter to have a chance to win one of two paperback copies of this horror anthology!   Goodreads Book Giveaway Shared Nightmares by Steven Diamond Giveaway ends May 22, 2015. See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter to…
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Thanks to reader Amy, who noticed some formatting problems with the print edition of Levels. Those problems have been corrected, and the new-and-improved version should be on sale at Amazon shortly. (Those who bought the problematic version? It’s now a rare collector’s item!!1!)

If you’re detail-oriented (or obsessive), you may have noticed that, while Levels is listed as having seventeen stories, only sixteen story excerpts have shown up here. That’s not a mistake; one story, “Special Guest Stars,” is a flash-fiction piece, and a five-hundred-word excerpt would contain the entire story. Gotta preserve some mystery, you know. Also, reminder:…
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The doctor’s waiting room smell like toilet bowl cleaner. Meredith sat uncomfortably in a chair molded from plastic, cushioned with a thin layer of synthetic rust-colored material the texture of burlap and bolted to three identical chairs before the row was broken by a featureless table on which were strewn a handful of magazines. There…
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Malachi and his partners met the Ruk caravan at the trading hill outside the village, after a single Ruk, sweating and nervous, had come as herald into the village square to announce their approach and then scrabbled away as fast as his bandy legs could carry him. The hill was far enough away from the…
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Finding the plantation house was a blessing from heaven. As the family wearily and silently hauled their wagon down the rutted road, they first saw its roof, a flat line of slate over the kudzu-covered trees, and quickened their plodding steps. When the full house came into view, it was all they could do to…
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So it’s night, black night, not even the moon is out, and we’re driving a road that cuts through the pines on either side and not a house anywhere. Every once in a while I see the light from a house far back in the trees, but I can’t tell for the life of me…
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Larry leaned toward the fellow sitting on the barstool two down. “So,” he said, “how’d you lose the leg?” The man swiveled slightly on his stool and looked at Larry, and Larry looked back. He knew he wasn’t much to look at—Cindy had told him so for years, first jokingly, then simply as a matter…
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Note: This story was written specifically for the Monsters & Mormons anthology, which deals—as the title suggests—with monsters and Mormons. As such, it’s replete with LDS in-jokes. I apologize if non-Mormons don’t get them. Trust me, they’re funny. The voice on the other end of the telephone line overflowed with nervousness and apology. “Hi— Bishop…
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