Serial Novel: ISLA
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Volume Two
Maybe you’ve seen a post or two about a thing I’ve got coming?
About a year ago I put out my first book, Tiny Worlds Volume One. These stories might have flittered off as a lark had I not found a group of kindred spirits that helped champion them, and me, on Substack.
So I kept going.
Another year has passed, and I am, hopefully, a better writer who is more tuned to stories that intrigue me. While my stories don’t have a single genre or style—the story itself kind of dictates that for me—I have started to lean into the idea that writing itself feels like home. The pieces I’ve published in the last year are deeper, maybe angling closer to the heart than the wild fandangos of Volume One.
So, I present to you: Tiny Worlds Volume Two. It’s a compendium of my favorites from the last year. A few have been updated, fixed or torn apart to be reassembled for this edition. Those changes are here, too, behind the paywall now.
A few wonderful folks have provided blurbs:
“...a feast for your imagination, your heart, your soul.”
, New York Times & USA Today Bestselling Author“A small, mighty, eclectic story collection”
, author of The Spider“...a ride into unlimited imagination”
, author of The Strangeness Kit
It’s available on July 31st in paperback through all the retail channels. That’s the version you should buy if it’s in your budget. Why? Because holding something in your hand produced by an independent author is the mensch-y thing to do.
But, if an ebook version is more to your liking, the only place to get that is in my store.
Both versions include the wonderful cover created by
.Introduction to Tiny Worlds Volume Two
This is my eighth—or maybe tenth—full draft of this introduction. I say “full” because the other versions had hundreds of small edits and countless hours of me pushing pixels around to say things I don’t yet feel qualified to say.
The one piece I’ll keep, mostly intact, from those previous drafts is this: ideas change us. You, me, everyone. If we’re honest, they don’t even have to be good ideas, really. They can be last season’s ideas, or ideas stacked in bulk at the discount store, or tucked between the pages of a dusty tome you found at a secondhand bookstore.
The point here is that an idea you happened upon—from wherever—changed you in some way. It shifted your thinking ever so slightly.
And if we go just a bit further, the writer of that idea probably has no way of knowing they did that. And never will. I’d like to have a fancy name for this interaction, but serendipity pretty much fits the bill.
You see, writing—being what it is—is a mostly solo job. It’s a one-person tennis match with no scorekeeper. And after some months or years, that thing you wrote is out there, holding this idea without your interaction. Writers don’t get to choose their audience or stand over their shoulder and point out some turn of phrase they find interesting. We don’t get to underline passages for our readers.
So, reading and absorbing those words becomes a solo act, too.
But sometimes, with far less precision than we might hope for, an idea lands in a fertile pasture. And it blooms if the conditions are right.
Sometimes quickly—think of any bestseller that caught fire. Or among the shelf of books at a vacation rental, forgotten and overlooked, until it’s plucked to sit poolside and be discovered later. But that act—the idea growing and becoming a new window to view life—is really the point, not the timing of it.
Changing perceptions with only a handful of words is the thing writers aspire to. It’s what I’ve been chasing in every story in this collection
This is my second book, and it lands around my 51st birthday. That wasn’t really planned, but it feels right. Another quiet gift to myself. No champagne, no party. Just a way of saying: I’m still doing the work. Still showing up. Still trying to figure these things out. Proof that whatever this is—a need to explore ideas, to wonder—still has me chasing what stories can do.
And maybe that’s the point.
We’re not just telling stories. We’re trying to send something into the world that might matter, might endure—even if the ideas within are something we don’t fully understand.
Writing won’t save lives. It won’t stop storms or cure disease.
But it can still reach something quiet and human—the part of us that shifts slowly, that listens differently after a good story, that starts to ask better questions.
Not wholly because of what we wrote—but because of what you carry with you.
If one of these stories lingers in your mind, if it tugs at you days later in the middle of something else, I hope you’ll let it.
And if you feel like it, drop me a line and say so: info@jcurtisauthor.com
The TBR Stack
I’ve recently finished
’s audio production of The Memory of my Shadow. It’s a fantastic showcase not just for his writing but his characterizations and production chops. I’m thankful for this, with two little ones around, sometimes an audiobook is the only way I get through longer works.
Ben’s characters are reflective, admittedly fallable–a trait I wish we’d see more often in tech–and quirky in just the right ways to make them real.
Set in the future, the novel does something truly remarkable by avoiding the trap of defining that future with extremes. Instead, it skillfully weaves in our current issues, presenting them as the ouroboros they may well be—from gun violence to our obsession with technology and its impact on human connection.I’m still thinking about this story and how it plays with memory and those moments that stay with us—sometimes haunting us, forever unseen. And how an overt drive, like the one Maggie carries, can serve as a cloak for what we’re really searching for: answers to the past.
While listening, I kept wanting to underline passages—things I’d love to revisit or ask Ben about. I think I need a physical copy on my shelf for exactly that. You should get one, too.Linda Michel-Cassidy released a collection of short stories: When We Were Hardcore. I had the pleasure of seeing her wry wit firsthand at a writing group nearly a decade ago, and she quickly became one of my favorites. This book is a perfect showcase for her talent—shining a light on the kinds of misfit and forgotten characters you might otherwise miss on a road trip through her version of New Mexico.
I’d be remiss…
…if I didn’t mention ISLA, the ongoing novel I’m publishing here on Substack.
For me it’s a swing-for-the-fences kind of endeavor. Of course for length, it is a novel after all, but also for the kind of storytelling that I miss in some modern literature: a coming of age adventure story.
I’m thankful for the handful of folks who have been reading along, commenting and liking it—those little pushes do actually help. The story, as of today, is rounding into the back half but it’s not too late to jump in and read along. The chapter index can be found here and ongoing chapter notes here (may contain spoilers).
Also, because music plays a substantial role in the story, I’ve been compiling an ongoing playlist. You can find it here.
J, thank you so much for the shoutout here! I've been away from Substack for a while and just now saw this. I'm so glad you enjoyed listening to the novel.