A murderous Queen of Hearts, the problems of time-traveling mail, a predatory merman who meets his fanged match, and Galactic Rangers dealing with kidnapped royals and libidinous cat queens. What do these stories have in common? They're all in Random Realities, a compilation of twenty speculative fiction tales by Melanie Fletcher, author of A Most Malicious Murder.Featuring an introduction by the award-winning author Jana Oliver, Random Realities includes a disturbing take on the future of acting ("Star Quality"), a bubba-heavy paranormal black comedy ("The Padre, the Rabbi, and the Devil His Own Self"), and a flamboyant riff on 50's space opera that predates Captain Jack Harkness by two years ("Lusts of the Cat Queen: a Dash Manning Adventure").In addition to previously published material, Random Realities also includes two never-before published stories; a dark look at a loveless queen ("All on a Summer's Day"), and two dear friends spending their final days together ("The Quiet Sound of Bees). Melanie Fletcher is an expatriate Chicagoan who currently lives in North Dallas with her husband the Bodacious Brit™ and their four fabulous furbags JJ, Jordan, Jessica, and Jeremy (yes, they were following a theme, moving along now).When not herding cats, she turns into SF Writer Girl, and has the SFWA Active membership card to prove it. But wait -- she doesn't just write specfic. She also works as a technical writer, web designer and graphic artist, and produces the comedy podcast Don't Quit Your Day Job: The Podcast with Jerry J. Davis, Patrick Gaik and Stacy the News Girl. In fact, if you want to tally up all the things Melanie can do, she can write, edit, paint, sing, dance, act, fence, play a, number of instruments, build dollhouses, knit and crochet, quilt, do needlepoint, cross stitch and crewelwork, moderate panels, edit podcasts and videocasts, fix cars, perform simple plumbing and electrical work, perform somewhat more complex carpentry, make a damn good deep dish pizza from scratch, and marry people.When she refers to herself as a Renaissance Broad, she's not kidding.
