A Quick Read: One Minute A to Z Stories

It’s official. I’ve contributed to yet another anthology!

In fact, I contributed two stories to A Quick Read: One Minute Stories from all over the World. I’ve also included them in this post, so you can see the variety that this book offers.

About A Quick Read: One Minute Stories from all over the World

This book was just released on May 2, 2015.

It began as a fun experiment on LinkedIn. A challenge was given to authors to create a complete story in twenty-six sentences — A through Z. Each sentence had to begin with a letter of the alphabet.

Wonderful stories appeared, from all over the world. With each author’s permission, Candace Simonson compiled these stories into a small, quick, easy-to-read book. What has resulted is a book easy to carry with you anywhere so that you may enjoy a “quick read” anytime.

I originally had the idea to do this, but Candace was the woman who took action! I’m so grateful to her, too, as the stories in this book are AMAZING!

A Quick Read: One Minute Stories from all over the World is available in paperback, on Kindle, Nook, or iReader at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

The Origins of the First Contribution

Back when I first started blogging, I had a free blog on WordPress.com called Lorraine Reguly’s Life. It was a small blog that grew and grew. It eventually ended up being Wording Well.

When the creative challenge of writing an A to Z story arised on LinkedIn, I decided to tell part of my story with this blog in one of the “quick read stories.”

Here is a sample of a quick read story that I contributed to this book:

At last, I’m getting a new website for my blog. Blogging is something I have grown to love during the past year. Carol, my mother, has no idea what blogging is, but she is slowly understanding the concept, as I get her to proofread some of my longer posts.

December marked the turning point for me. Edits were made to many of my professional profiles online. Family relations have suffered too, because I’ve spent more time online than usual.

Growth on my blog has prompted me to consider moving it to a self-hosted site. Hosts have been contacted and questioned. In my attempts to select a good host, I had an affair with Google, and learned a lot! Joomla was a name I had only heard of once before, but didn’t know what it was until recently.

Knowing WordPress is kind of my thing. Lorraine Reguly’s Life is the name of my current blog, but I’m going to be re-naming it when I make the move.

Moving is scary. Never had I imagined I would move! Of course, I didn’t expect to write such popular posts, or attain a PageRank of 2 on my free little blog. People now land on my site each day, by the hundreds. Really! Statistics prove it!

Too bad I didn’t make this decision sooner; I regret it. Usually I have the foresight to make good decisions faster than this!

Victory will be mine soon, though. What is weird is how one particular post has hit the number one slot in Google and has stayed there, providing me with excellent exposure.

X-ray vision is not something I have, otherwise I would have moved to my own site long ago, utilizing the opportunity to grow my PageRank faster. Yesterday I checked my Alexa rank and was pleased to see over 400 sites linking into my blog.

Zero is probably where my PageRank will start at when I move, but that’s okay with me, as my posts will remain in the number one slot in the search engines, and people will continue to link to my site wherever it’s located, enabling me to grow my PageRank again.

A Second Contribution of a Quick Read Story

I also contributed another story, too, called Child’s Play, which serves to show the variety of the stories in A Quick Read: One Minute Stories from all over the World:

Always the entertainer, I had to laugh at my nephew, Bobby. Bobby was hilarious. Crouched on a chair, he was babbling to his sister, Tammy, in a language all their own.

Down below, Tammy hid beneath the tablecloth. Everyone knew she was there. Fooling no one, Tammy giggled in response to Bobby. Granted, she was cute no matter what, but she was being particularly cute today. Having had celebrated her second birthday yesterday, she was still wearing her hat.

Instead of trying to speak, Tammy simply babbled back. Jumping up, she revealed her whereabouts by yelling, “Boo!”

Kangaroo-like, she started to hop around the dining room. Laughing, Gran sat and watched the children’s antics. Maybe Tammy looked more like a frog than a kangaroo, it’s hard to say. Naturally, Tammy didn’t care what she looked like; she was having fun. Often she acted silly— that’s what two-year-olds do!

Party hat tilted sideways atop her blond curls, Tammy nearly knocked Gran over, misjudging the distance of her last jump.

Quickly, Gran righted herself, chuckling at the tot’s behavior.

“Ribbit! Ribbit!” Bobby said, jumping and joining his sister on the floor.

Starting to hop across the room with Tammy, Bobby suddenly cocked his head.

“Try to get me, Tammy,” he shouted, continuing to hop around and Tammy gave chase to her five-year-old brother. Under the table they went.

Vying for attention, Tammy mimicked him with a “Ribbit!” of her own until Bobby spotted a toy and asked Gran to remind him of its name.

“What’s this called, Gran?” he queried.

“Xylophone,” she said, enunciating each syllable.

“Yes!” Bobby repeated. “Zy-lo-phone!” he shouted, pride lacing his voice.

Again, A Quick Read: One Minute Stories from all over the World is available in paperback, on Kindle, Nook, or iReader at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Be sure to buy the book  A Quick Read: One Minute Stories from all over the World, too! It’s available in paperback, on Kindle, Nook, or iReader at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Talk to you soon! 🙂