D.T. Iverson: Stories

It's the classic story. He was a divorced college professor... cynical, detached, and supercilious. She was a farmer’s ex-wife with little education, no husband, two kids, and all the spirit in the world. They stumbled on each other under the oddest of circumstances. And then the universe did everything it could to keep them apart. But sometimes even fate can’t prevent the inevitable. Read on and see how bumping into the right person can make your life infinitely better.

A while back I created a minor female character in an unmemorable tale. She must have tickled people's fancy because readers started asking me to continue her story. I had no idea how to do that; until a guy who has given me some great ideas, told me about his nephew, a former Ranger. It was one of those hackneyed, "nurse runs off with doctor" stories, but he suggested a truly clever twist; which let me satisfy both requests. So Rick at rkv330, this one's for you

She cheated and he found out. It was a huge coincidence. But that illustrates why you shouldn't do the crime if you can't do the time. Nevertheless, fate intervened and he never got to confront her. So, how do you move on if you can't get the satisfaction of knowing why? This piece explores that question. There are some sharp twists and turns so fasten your seat belts.

I try to post something every Fourth, to honor those who've served. So, please let the length of this little tale be a testament to the respect that I have for all of you. This is, in-effect, Pilgrim's Progress, set in World War Two. It takes our hero on the fraught journey from youthful naïveté to adult capability via virtues that everybody in the military understand, honor, courage, and commitment. The war crime at the center of this happened, even if the payback is in my imagination.

A few of you wanted a western. So here it is. He was a blue water sailor. She was a New Orleans fancy lady. There was gold in them thar hills and they were aimin' to find it. They also found love on the Santa Fe trail. Of course, there were a few lingering wrongs to right and some scores to settle. But in the end, "Until death do us part," really meant something. Read on and discover what. This is part of Randi's "Open Road" challenge and my thanks to her. I hope you all enjoy - DT

Part of 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover
RichardGerald and I wrote this jointly for Bebop and Nora's "50 Ways to Leave your Lover" event. Since one of those options is a bus, we modeled our story on the classic Hollywood 'meet cute' film "It Happened One Night." Which means that we changed the characters, swapped the sexes, radically altered the plot, and wrote a whole new story. But we DID think about the film while we were trashing it. So as the pitchmen would say: It's exactly like the original except on a train and....

I wanted to include this story along with my reposting of The Sun Also Rises. I tend to carry over characters from story-to-story. And I know that it can be confusing when people from prior stories appear in the middle of new ones. Especially if a lot of time has passed as is the case here. This was written over a year after the Sun Also Rises. I wanted to explore the theme of infidelity between people who are essentially made for each other. The title is from a Hemingway short story.

This story is about Midwest, blue collar insecurity and the redeeming quality of love. It follows the main character's path from a simple uncomplicated life, through a world of wealth and power. But it eventually returns to the only thing that matters

This is a modern cover of a Greek myth ala Netflix’s Kaos. I have never seen Netflix’s version, but I understand that it covers Orpheus and Eurydike. Mine is based on Artemis and Orion. I also threw in the myth of Kallisto because I’m addicted to happy endings. I buried some Easter eggs for any mythology nerds, and for you grammar Nazis – I am using the Greek spelling of Kallisto’s name. I know that NASA calls her Callisto. I hope you enjoy this little story as much as I did writing it.

A Farewell to Arms is the definitive war novel. It is hard to cover because we don't fight wars like that anymore. But the love story is the real heart of the piece. And that's what I centered on here. For you closet existentialists out there. If you stayed awake during American Lit you will notice that the Hemingway story stops at the Epilogue... I am a hopeless romantic and I can't write an ending as dark as his. So I had to give it a happy ending... Kind-of... Sort of... Enjoy