Dime-Story Danny #SampleSunday

I was just notified that LONNIE, ME, AND…: A SHORT STORY COLLECTION is a finalist for an Imadjinn Award at the 2019 Imaginarium. I neither expect nor deserve to win, seeing as how I’m not the only entry. Still.

Here’s a sample from one of the stories. I share it because Tony Acree, author of the HAND OF GOD thriller series, and I are working on a crossover story called “Lonnie, Me, and the Hand of God”. Father Dan has a bit part in it, so he’s in the sample.

Dime-Store Danny

excerpt from “Lonnie, Me, and the Battle of St. Crispin’s Day”
by Marian Allen

I reached up and picked a dry brown catalpa pod off the tree above us.

“Remember the time we tried smoking these things?”

A big voice boomed, “I prefer cigars these days, and I’m trying to cut down on those.”

The big voice belonged to a tubby priest with a round red nose, bright blue eyes and thinning strawberry blond hair.

If Lonnie hadn’t told me who we were meeting, I would never have known him.

“Danny? Dang, Dime-Store! Long time!”

“Tiny! Weasel!”

We wrung each other’s hands and slapped each other’s shoulders and stood around laughing with our hands in our pockets until a thin old woman opened the back door.

“Tea’s getting cold, Father Dan.”

We followed Danny through the kitchen and down a hall into a cluttered and comfortable sitting room that might have belonged to any normal bachelor. Well, except that there was a tray on the coffee table with a teapot on it, and tea cups and a bowl of sugar lumps and a tray of cookies.

When the old lady had closed the door behind herself, Lonnie put on a high voice and said, “May I have two lumps of sugar, Miss Halloran?”

Danny shook a fist and said, “Two lumps upside the head, Weasel!”

“Folks don’t call me that no more, Dime-Store. I’m just plain Lonnie, now.”

“Folks don’t call me Dime-Store, either, you know.”

Lonnie said, “Naw, it’s Father Dime-Store, these days.”

“I’m still Tiny,” I said, and they both laughed.

Danny reached around to a cabinet behind his chair and pulled out a bottle of Beam. He tipped some into his own cup and held the open neck toward ours. “Touch of Kentucky?”

“I married me a hardshell Baptist,” Lonnie said. Then he winked and said, “But what the little woman don’t know won’t hurt me.”

I waved the bottle off. Not that I don’t drink–I just don’t like whiskey.

“I’m saving myself for the beer garden,” I said. “You do still have a beer garden, don’t you?”

That set Lonnie back off on the “happy days” magical memory tour about how us boys would sneak into the festival’s beer garden and drink the leftovers and get sick. Yeah, I really wanted to relive those moments. It’s a wonder we didn’t catch AIDS or diphtheria or something.

~*~

Buy LONNIE, ME, AND….

Amazon Print
Kindle
Indiebound

Or you can buy LONNIE, ME AND THE HOUND OF HELL, which contains the first Lonnie and Tiny story plus about nine other of my odd animal stories, for 99 cents.

A WRITING PROMPT FROM ME TO YOU: Someone meets a childhood friend who has turned out differently that anyone expected.

MA

About

I was born in Louisville, Kentucky, but now live in the woods in southern Indiana. Though I only write fiction, I love to read non-fiction. The more I learn about this world, the more fantastic I see it is.

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One thought on “Dime-Story Danny #SampleSunday

  1. Dan Antion

    August 11, 2019 at 8:53am

    I’m reading on my iPad and I like the change you made to the header image. I also like Dime Store Danny – something about that name.

    Permalink  ⋅ Reply
  2. Deborah

    August 11, 2019 at 5:07pm

    Congratulations Marian! You’re a very good writer and do so deserve it!!

    Permalink  ⋅ Reply
  3. Alicia Butcher Ehrhardt

    August 13, 2019 at 10:14pm

    How exciting! Congratulations on the nomination – and fingers crossed for you! When do you find out? Who judges? Who votes? What do they know?

    I saw that there are all kinds of genres there – what genre is Fr. Beer Garden in? And the crossover story?

    Permalink  ⋅ Reply
    • Author

      Marian Allen

      August 14, 2019 at 8:07am

      The Lonnie and Tiny stories are pure humor. Lonnie often thinks he’s in a different sort of story, but he’s always just in real life. “Fr. Beer Garden” — ~cackling~ Dime-Store is in “Lonnie, Me, and the Battle of St. Crispin’s Day”, in which Lonnie gets tiddly, dances with the wrong girl, and starts a Donnybrook in the church activity hall. The crossover is paranormal, proving Lonnie right about something at long last.

      Permalink  ⋅ Reply

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