On Feeling the Silent Train

*Featuring the 1st Place winner of the 2010 CMU literary prize, On Feeing the Silent Train*


A surreal, deadpan collection of three short stories. Droughts & deadly lakes, strange visitors & mysterious solitude, Nikola Tesla & abandoned ant hills all play a role in these darkly humorous tales. Fans of Murakami and Carver may find something to like. 


Except-

The lack rain was killing me. I can't pinpoint exactly what I meant by that, but I just knew it. Sometimes a body knows things. It hadn't rained all through the month of June, and my body knew that if it didn't rain soon, I wouldn't make it. I wasn't scared of my heart stopping or of having a stroke or disease or an accident. I just felt like my little spark was going to go out if it didn't rain soon. Which seems counter-intuitive, water keeping a fire alive, but that's how it was. Like I could feel the flood waters rising. Like the levees were getting weak. But the exact opposite of that. 


About the author: Steven Olson, a graduate of the creative writing program at Colorado Mesa University, is a freelance writer and commercial fisherman in Alaska. His summers are spent aboard a small boat, his winters everywhere from teaching English in Korea to trekking in Colombia. He has no cat, dog, car, or permanent residence.