The Little Black Fish by Samad Behrangi

Painting by Farshid Mesqali

The Little Black Fish is a revolutionary tale dressed up as a children's story but in actuality, a political allegory.

Do we continue to live as we've always done? What if one dares to choose another path?

I hope you will enjoy this. It was my first glimpse into Persian literature. ~~GH

The Little Black Fish
By: Samad Behrangi

The Little Black Fish; painting by: Farshid Mesqali

It was the longest night of winter. At the bottom of the sea an old fish gathered together 12,000 of her children and grandchildren and began to tell them this story: 

Once upon a time a little black fish lived with her mother in a small pond on the side of a mountain. Their home was behind a black, moss-covered rock, under which they both slept at night. The little fish longed to see the moonlight in their home just once. From morning till evening, the mother and child swam after each other. Sometimes they joined other fish and rapidly darted in and out of small crevices. The little fish was an only child, for of the 10,000 eggs which the mother had laid, only she had survived. 

For several days the little fish had been deep in thought and had talked very little. She swam slowly behind her mother around the pond and did not play with the other fish. Her mother thought her child was sick and would soon be well. In fact, the black fish's sickness was really something else! 

Early one morning before the sun had risen, the little fish woke her mother and said . . .
(click here to read the rest of the story)

I Survived Camp NaNoWriMo (and all I got out of it was this lousy banner -- and a novel)

NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month. It began as an annual event designed to encourage writers to scratch out an entire novel in thirty days' time. 50,000 words. No editing, no cleaning it up as you go along -- just down and dirty slapping the words in a recordable form. 

I started my novel "Party Line" during NaNoWriMo 2004, I believe, and promptly had a stroke long about the eleventh day. I spent the next few years learning how to write again, talk, and comprehend language. NaNo felt intimidating and dangerous to me after that. Although more than a few times, I toyed with participating, I chickened out at the last minute.

So this year a summer NaNoWriMo came along. It was set up as a summer camp, replete with tents and related themes, but the best part was the word count goals ranged as low as 10,000. 

I was piddling with writing a children's story I made up for my two older children -- getting it on paper and preserving it for posterity -- and I kept getting distracted by Life. Bottom line, I wasn't getting it done. And 10,000 words (I thought) was outrageous for a children's book. I didn't think I could come up with a full 10,000, but I figured I would at least get the story done.

So I signed on. And I ended up on July 27th with 10,013 words. The story isn't finished! New characters kept showing up behind trees, inside of trees, in the brook, and what-have-you. That's the way of enchanted forests. 

But I have my certificate and my Winner's banner, and I am pleased with myself. And I'm that much closer to completing my story. Only now, I foresee a series of books. Ain't Life interesting? ~GH