Just in time for the holidays, my novella "Ascension" is now available on AnthologyBuilder.
This was originally published in Absolutely Brilliant in Chrome. I talked about it a bit in my recent interview on Blogging the Muse:
“Ascension” was inspired by the 1996 Mt. Everest disaster, in which eight climbers—two of them seasoned veterans who had summitted the mountain many times—perished when a snow storm stranded them near the peak. I remember watching a news program about it, and as the story unfolded, as more and more people died on the mountain, while others suffered the effects of severe frostbite, hypoxia, and high altitude pulmonary edema, I found myself wondering about the bodies. It’s something that was never mentioned in the program. No one was talking about any efforts to get the remains off the mountain, so that they might be shipped home to the families. This made some sense; it was certainly hard enough just getting the survivors down. But still, I kept wondering, “What about the bodies? Did they just leave them there?” As it turns out, the answer was yes. Later, watching another documentary on ascending Everest, I saw footage of climbers moving past human remains. One person commented that the mountain was the world’s highest graveyard.
That struck a chord with me. It’s no coincidence that “Ascension” opens with a climber coming across a corpse in the snow.
And if you’re of a mind, check out my other stories currently available on AnthologyBuilder.
I’ve neglected this market for too long. I expect I’ll be sending a few more pieces that way soon.
That is all.
