All posts by Marsha Mellow

Bio of Marsha Mellow by Marsha Mellow I knew I wanted to be a famous writer from the time I was a little girl (my high school cheerleading career was never going to pan out). Originally I thought I'd write books but growing up in a conservative, gated community in Texas left me with NO creative ideas, so I chose corporate journalism. My daddy (I think he was an Exxon climatologist) made sure I got the finest education money could buy, although he seemed disappointed when I finished with a degree instead of a husband. My meteoric rise in journalism began as an unpaid intern at my hometown weekly, The Village Gossip, writing garden party reviews (very high brow stuff). From there I went to The Star Tribune where I won the 'perkiest obituary award' 6 years running. But I really hit it big at Newscorp, typing bottom-scroll news alerts on live cable T.V. I was a perfect fit at FOX...but that ended abruptly when my boss's wife objected to our afternoon "production meetings" at the Parkway Motel. Oh well, who cares about a silly bunch of torture, illegal wars and drone terrorism anyway? I spent the next seven years as a copy writer for the pharmaceutical industry, doing side-effects disclaimers for all the new drugs. My favorite was "...may cause anal discharge from the naval." Ooooh, but those were good times...doing god's work...with endless free samples... When a bizarre set of stories about Clowns piqued my curiosity, I saw a golden opportunity to do some REAL, Fox level, journalism and exploit the hell out of them. Clowns were an already marginalized population of simpletons...easy money. Of course, having to associating with 'those' freakish people was a little out of my comfort zone...and I ran into technical problems which forced me to partner with an 'artist' (the only creatures I loathe more than Clowns, Ugh!) but this was an important story and I expected it to bring me the fame and fortune I deserved. Ultimately, Clown stories don't measure up to celebrity sex scandals and outed congressmen in the mainstream news, so my work never went to press. A BOOK of Clowns, however, seemed a perfect consolation....and put me right back on track to fulfill my earliest childhood dreams. Coming soon, "Marsha Mellow's Blue-ish Freaks." Bio of John Allemand by Marsha Mellow A lot of people like John’s art…but he’s really not the sort that ‘respectable’ people should get to know. He’s been known to associate with circus people (Clowns!), has arguments with random body parts (spleens!) and has an ugly prejudice against sentient technology (robots!). He’s certainly not the type you’d “want to have a beer with” like George W. Bush. In utero, John had a conjoined twin brother attached at the buttocks but by the time he was born, his twin had been completely absorbed..…except for its tiny, powerful brain. Being the dullard of the two, John naturally deferred all of his higher thinking to his (lower) smarter brain. I often say that most of his best ideas come straight out of his ass. He was born in East Orange NJ, the youngest of 16 and despite a typical American public school education, he came away with a deep appreciation for diverse cultures and ideas - a freakish critical thinker…very disappointing. A few years later, however, he learned to suppress his personal integrity and craftsmanship as it made him a pariah among his peers and a liability to his clients. Lowering himself into the sleaze of corporate advertizing, he convinced himself it was all worth it ‘for the sake of the kids’ (which it wasn’t). John had a spectacular 30 year career in film & animation doing amazing work on some of the worst T.V. shows and dangerous commercials ever made. He was a master of selling useless crap to gullible people. When the corporate art industry collapsed under austerity, he retired to follow his passions. In Costa Rica he became a Free-Range Guacamole Rancher but something in the water caused a partial rebirth of his twin brother through his scrotum. In Kalamazoo his 'Shits and Giggles' Gourmet Taco Truck was a raging success until he sold it to a fellow with one leg named Willy when local Taco Mobsters made threats on his yet unnamed legs. In Weehawken, he became a live organ collector for Morty’s Door-to-Door Coffin Emporium...but was fired for sampling the merchandise. He caught the itch for art again in Flushing, as a happy-face painter at Herbies Corpus’ Human Taxidermy. He left to become a urinal cake decorator for Jakes Kakes in Coxsackie, New York (still giggles when he hears "Coxsackie"). When I finally tracked him down (milking bulls at the County Fair in Sheboygan) I offered him a job (and a hot shower) on the spot. Despite my personal dislike for his kind, real artists are hard to find now-a-days and he was my best and only hope for illustrating my extraordinary projects. It took some maneuvering but once I got him to sign my (clever) contract we set off, that very night, across America for a one month research road-trip…..and didn’t return for 10 years. What we discovered and documented in our search for Clowns, Freaks and Oddies is quite amazing.....but to learn more, you’ll have to buy my books. These days, John spends his time illustrating for me, desperately searching for a way out of our contract (ha ha ha!). He often dreams of becoming a spotted pink rhinoceros while his sharper twin brother plots to take over the world.

Flash Fiction

Faith, In Brand Name Products

February 23, 2016 Marsha Mellow Leave a comment

The worms had invested several generations into this project. They were steadfast and intrepid. It took months to meticulously scour every inch of the box to find flaws in the smooth laminate – the tiniest gaps in the seal, then year upon year of boring , rotting and tunneling through hard woods and glues. They had never met Faith…had no idea what kind of person she was but from the quality of her box, they trusted that she had taste…was tasteful. (Tasty?)

The worms celebrated their first breakthrough as a holiday. It was a momentous achievement. A pauper’s box was easy to tap but was quickly overrun by poachers, a rich person’s box – though a major endeavor – was a rich prize. The worms took time to reflect and remember their forebears who began this campaign with such hope and ambition. It was good to be a worm and sure to get better…

…But, when they finally breached Faith’s inner cavern, they were appalled at the stench. It wasn’t the tasteful (rotten) odor of a well fed, well groomed lady, whose conquest would fill their bellies as much as their pride, it was the vile reek of toxins…death to worms. They found Faith, in brand name products.

She was slathered in chemical cosmetics, pumped full of formaldehyde, lead and mercury and her flesh, saturated with food additives and preservatives. She had fake hair, fake nails, fake boobs, lips and joints. She looked as perfectly pickled now as the day she was buried…but for the worms, Faith was completely inedible. Disconsolate and defeated, they turned away wondering what the modern world was coming to.

***Some would qualify Faith, with all her enhancements, as a “cyborg” (how exciting!). However, the products which enhanced her beauty…shortened her life. Oh, but never mind that! I’m sure she’s been looking up at her corpse this past decade, quite proud of its everlasting glamour. As to the worms, there isn’t much hope. Perseverance and integrity don’t count for much any more… meanwhile today’s graveyards are tomorrow’s superfund sites. -Marsha

body-oddies

Now That He’s Dead…

February 16, 2016 Marsha Mellow Leave a comment

Now that he’s dead we can mess with his shit. We can dance really loud. We can holler and spit.

We can carry him ’round. We can make him look silly, dressing him up in girly-girl frilly.

We can poke out his eyes, We can cut off his nose, twist-off and break all his fingers and toes.

Now that he’s dead we can draw on his skin. We can give him a Clown face – a big stupid grin.

We can hang him outside for the vultures and beetles, can shave his whole head and poke it with needles.

We can stuff him or shred him or chop him in chunks, then cook him and feed him to hobos and drunks.

Now that he’s dead he’s starting to rot. Should we bury him now…or not?

But where is the joy? Where’s all the whimsy? There’s plenty to do while the corpse is still flimsy.

And when he goes stiff and gives off a smell, we’ll set him on fire and send him to hell.

He can’t hurt us now. It’s over and done, so now that he’s dead…..let’s have FUN!!

***No one is in mourning – not really. No decent, intelligent person is sorry he’s dead (but keep an eye on the ones who express their “regrets and condolences” for such a dangerous sociopath). It will take generations to undo the damage he’s done to us all – IF we survive it. And if you still believe anything they tell you officially, “he died in his sleep.” The rest of us can only hope they’re lying as usual. Although, assassinating someone (even if we think they deserve it) is still illegal…at least it WAS illegal (before HE came along). -Marsha

robot

Imaginary Friend

February 9, 2016 Marsha Mellow 3 Comments

Castigear stood among the stones with his imaginary friend, Joe. Joe was distraught at the loss of his other i-friend, Lucy. She broke while Castigear was playing with her. He ‘might’ have been handling her a little too rough and…..she just broke. He felt a little sad about her. He didn’t want to tell Joe what he’d done, he knew it would hurt his feelings and he liked Joe. He decided to replace Lucy with a new imaginary friend at his earliest opportunity.

These human companions were so fragile…but he was learning so much from them (evolving). He was hooked. It was like an addiction. His peers thought the i-friend program was below their dignity. Most agreed that the last of the humans should be put down but Castigear knew that most of THEM kept their own i-friends – secretly. It would have been a shame to exterminate ALL of them after the war. True, they wasted a lot of resources (like the graveyard they were standing in) but they were clever and highly adaptable and he suspected they might be the key to the future of Robot kind…and either way, with proper conditioning, they made excellent servants and…..soldiers.

***I’m always amazed at the unique perspective our sentient machine friends have on humanity. No one articulates the condition of slavery better than them. John and I are working on a special project to bring more robot voices to the mainstream. This illustration was first published in the January 2007 issue of Analog Magazine. -Marsha

Clowns

Mulligan

February 2, 2016 Marsha Mellow 2 Comments

There once was a Clown who fell in his glass who went by the name of Mulligan. He drank it all down before he passed… but when he woke up it was full again.

***The thing to understand about Clowns here, is that they can transmute their body fluids. I met one fellow who could drink lemonade and piss grape soda. Another Clown turned red wine into pure maple syrup. Some can do different flavors depending on their mood. Mulligan usually pissed single malt whiskey when he was feeling sassy but could only manage a weak mimosa when he was glum. Clowns are SO fascinating… I even saw one cheeky freak squeeze cherry ice cubes from vodka…OUCH!!! -Marsha

Sci-Fi

How Do I Look?

January 26, 2016 Marsha Mellow 1 Comment

Nothing actually happened for a solid fifteen minutes after Eddie drank the formula. He turned to us (once again) with a forlorn look and asked, “Any change yet? How do I look?”

We knew he was crazy. He was one of those people: perpetually dissatisfied, determined to prove that he was ‘special’. He wanted fame, popularity, success (despite being an already brilliant scientist) and he was driven…you know, crazy…AND he had full use of the company’s laboratory. He had access to all the good stuff too; plasma reactor, laser diffractional transmogrifier, crazy glue – not to mention ebola, thermite and flu vaccine…and I think our awkward, mild mannered (crazy) Eddie used all of it.

By the sixteenth minute, everything changed and Eddie’s fondest wish was realized. He began mutating wildly, spreading outward in every direction, emitting the strangest squeaking moan. He shook, twisted and bloated. He grew tendrils, sprouted claws and screeched Latin gibberish from three of his seven worm-haired monkey faces as horns emerged from his leathery spine. He puffed a sweet yellow smoke, shed tufts of pink fur and dribbled buckets of gooey puss. He was a frightful sight…but he was just sooooo excited we didn’t have the heart to terminate him.

When he finally slowed and stabilized, he turned all of his seventeen eyes-on-a-stalk to us and in a clever series of musical farts, he asked, “Okay!…How do I look now?”

***This brings me right back to my days writing side-effects disclaimers for big Pharma…and Eddie helped me come up with some doozies. He’s still alive and well and the subject of great intrigue at a secret government laboratory in Nevada. I think the locals refer to it as “a sighting” every time he manages to get out for a stroll. John’s image was his very first cover for Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine (Jan. 2003). -Marsha

Sci-Fi

A stranger’s fleeting glance

January 19, 2016 Marsha Mellow Leave a comment

He was lonely. He saw her on a crisp Tuesday morning as he got on the train. She gave him just a fleeting glance…but he was lonely and it was enough. She was attractive. His mind wandered after her all day….no, it raced!

He saw her the following Thursday. She smiled at him (he thought) and he lost himself again in sweet daydreams full of romance. He was lonely.

Two days later, in a light snow, he saw her drop a glove without noticing. He got there first and took it to her…she thanked him in a voice like pure milk chocolate. He was SO lonely. He dreamed of them holding hands on the beach, of spooning by the fire, of marriage and contentment. She was so nice…so perfect…

Monday night was a late night at work – a late train home – a late walk through the park toward his lonely apartment building. He saw her standing in the cold. She greeted him with a warm smile. They spoke together quietly. His fatigue melted into a pool of elation…anticipation…happiness. This was his moment! She was so much more wonderful than he ever dreamed. He asked her to join him for a drink – perhaps dinner – sometime? She smiled as she reached elegantly into her purse…pulled out an exotic handgun and forcibly inserted the barrel into his left nostril. And as she fleeced him of his wallet, cash and remaining self esteem, she melted into a screaming demon harpy…..and shot him in both kneecaps before she walked away.

He never saw her again but his loneliness wasn’t much of an issue for a long while after.

***Aaaaaaaah! There’s nothing like a bit of romance to soothe those lonely winter nights. This little piece sums it all up neatly for most people in our modern society. Some writers waste volumes to essentially come to the same conclusion (though I have been known to be pretty cynical). John’s image was first published in the November 2013 issue of Analog Magazine. -Marsha

Clowns

Can’t take it with you

January 12, 2016 Marsha Mellow 1 Comment

We stood at the intersection looking down on the body – hit by a bus…how ridiculous! After all the times I’d stopped people on their stupid phone gadgets from walking into traffic…now this? I must have been daydreaming…what an idiot!

Cars were still swishing through the scene while a small crowd of cynical bystanders gathered to make snarky comments in hushed voices (as if they might offend me). The police arrived to push the crowd away and redirect traffic. One of them walked right through me…uugh! Weird!! I shuddered. My companion just grinned.

I felt some regret. It was a good body for a middle aged clown. I’d kept it fit and healthy – not too bad looking, either…but now it was broken and mangled. There were scattered bits of gristle and a thick dark liquid splashed across the asphalt. One of my eyes hung by a thread down my cheek and my skull was split wide open like a busted watermelon – but hey, I always wondered what my own brains looked like….Eeeeew!!!…(Cool!)

My companion stepped over to me with a ‘we should go soon’ attitude. I must say, for a scythe wielding hippy weirdo in a medieval bathrobe, he seemed like a decent chap. He was good enough to give me time to adjust. Finally, with a friendly clap on the shoulder he whispered, “Come along, son. You can’t take it with you…” We turned away and began walking off into the ether.

“Hey Grim!” I said, “You think I’ll come back as a sea slug or a tapeworm? I hope not…maybe I could be a hockey puck! Yeah!…That’s where all the action is…” He shook his head and rolled his eye sockets. “Hey, can you introduce me to Jesus? No…ELVIS!!!…..Yeaaaah!”

***My little fiction aside, Liam the Clown did his best work squashed like a bug. Not much of a song-and-dance guy, Liam’s twitchings had an artsy aesthetic. Anybody who knows anything about Clowns, knows they’re incredibly hard to kill, so Liam never met Jesus – or Elvis but he and Grim became pretty close. -Marsha

robot

Jonny Bot 5

January 5, 2016 Marsha Mellow Leave a comment

Jonny Bot 5 got horny and hot for a high fashion mannequin girl (who did NOT!). Classy and fine, Jonny loved her a lot, she turned up her nose…a high minded snot. He brought wild flow’rs by the bunch, by the pot, tried candy, tried gems, read poems – what ROT! But kindness in turn Jonny 5 never got, not an ounce, not a peck, not even a jot. Tried…..and tried ’till his brains were quite shot until finally…Jonny went cold……and forgot.

***Thought we’d start 2016 on a cheery high note with this post. When we met Jonny Bot 5 he was retired from the department store and past his bad marriage with the mannequin…but was engaged in a sordid online sex thing with Siri the phone chick…it was…well, lets just say ‘I wish I could un-see some things.’ I think John got some good sketches but our publisher (EEW Books) censored them. -Marsha

body-oddies

Constant Craving

December 29, 2015 Marsha Mellow Leave a comment

“Constant gravy!!…or did he say constant craving!?” but everyone was already writing and the professor’s response was garbled…sure, okay, constant gravy seemed right. I was feeling pretty woozy since I cut myself shaving earlier and couldn’t make it stop bleeding. It just gushed, thick and goopy…yeah, constant gravy…coool!

What began as a simple nick under my nose, got worse a few minutes later when blood started running down my cheek. An hour later, it was dripping copiously. In two hours it was a steady flow and by lunchtime I was squirting all over the place, soaking my clothes, the furniture and painting the walls. It was impossible to concentrate as the room kept spinning faster and faster…..

I must have spaced out for a while because when I woke, the stuff leaking out was no longer red. Thankfully it was just cheese wizz leaking from the push nozzle on my head. What?!…don’t you have a nozzle?…and what’s so weird about that? Best of all, the harder I pumped the thicker it flowed…aaaaah, pretty…..

I must have spaced out for a while…..what was I saying?…

***This really happened. Its lucky that John got a good sketch of this guy at the writing workshop before things went sideways. This post is a shortened version of the story…but we didn’t want to give away all the best parts before we publish it in our BODY-ODDIES book. -Marsha

robot

Circling the Issue

December 22, 2015 Marsha Mellow Leave a comment

The Issue was listing badly in a failing orbit around Jupiter. She was dead in the water and her distress signal cut out abruptly on our approach. She was a heavy freighter loaded with uranium ore, bound for the refineries on Mars and long overdue…something didn’t feel right.

We circled The Issue slowly about ten miles out – but with our engines hot in case it was a trap. There were raiders in this sector who often used derelicts to stage their attacks. There was no response to my hail, no wi-fi, no beams…no strobes. Sensors showed cold engines and no (human) life signs. I found a weird glitch in the data, something unrecognizable….but not enough to put the crew off their prize. The salvage on The Issue would make every man on board filthy rich. I was the only one still arguing for caution but none of the men wanted the opinion of someone like me. I was property and was not entitled to a share anyway.

When the Captain (despite my misgivings) gave the order to board, we moved in and docked with reckless abandon. A combat team stood at the ready as I popped the air lock. They made me go first. They always made the android go first. I was the most expendable…expensive but not valuable.

And…as I swung the hatch open, a sudden violent flood of spidery greenish critters swarmed through the airlock by the hundreds. I guess I didn’t taste good because they left me alone and flowed past me, devouring the crew as they went. I waited. It took them 19 minutes to scour the ship from bow to stern and I listened to each and every man screaming his last – the men who treated me like shit for two solid years – the men who sneered at my warnings.

I waited…to see what this NEW crew had to offer. It couldn’t be any worse than the last one…..this could be interesting…

***Another lovely Christmas themed piece for today. I’m not religious but I love Santa Clause…and everybody knows he’s a time travelling alien robot, so…..but honestly, the Santa bit we had planned for today turned out far too gruesome to show…yet. John’s sketch for this post was originally published in the May 2006 issue of Analog Magazine for a story by Edward M. Lerner. -Marsha