Tag: dark

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

“Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night…” is Available on Amazon Kindle

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover is a collection of my poetry written from the mid-80’s to mid-90s, a turbulent, fluid time in my life in many ways, but especially romantically. I have taken many of the poems written during those years and compiled them into a dark narrative capturing the emotional turmoil of a narrator who descends from romantic love for a woman into a lonely world of alcohol and night clubs, where his only love is the night that envelopes him psychologically, emotionally, and physically.  It is about 110 print pages in length and lavishly illustrated with photos I found in the public domain (no, those are not photos of me or of my former paramours).

You can read a sample of it and my other works at my Amazon author’s page:  Amazon.com/author/philslattery.

I have tried to make this a wonderful experience for the reader, exploring the bliss of love to the depths of despair and then to resignation to one’s fate in an existential crisis.

Don’t forget to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads or other social media!

While there, you might want to check out my other work on relationships: The Scent and Other Stories.  In this collection of short stories, I explore the dark, sometimes violent, sometimes twisted, sometimes touching side of love, the side kept not only from public view, but sometimes from our mates. Set in the modern era, these stories range from regretting losing a lover to forbidden interracial love in the hills of 1970’s Kentucky to a mother’s deathbed confession in present-day New Mexico to debating pursuing a hateful man’s wife to the callous manipulation of a lover in Texas.

Two reviews have warm praise for Nocturne…:

J. Muckley calls it “Beautiful, Sad, Authentic and Vulnerable Look at Love and Loss” and gives it five stars, saying:

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover by Phil Slattery is a deep and raw “picture” of experiencing love and lovers of varying type, capturing the moments of ecstasy and pain in a most beautiful way.

Slattery speaks with one voice as his words and pictures depict the full range of human love and loss that both tempts the soul to engage and urges the heart to resist. His opening quote by Augustine of Hippo captures this work perfectly: “I was not yet in love, yet I loved to love…I sought what I might love, in love with loving.”  –Augustine of Hippo

The poems are mostly untitled and written in free verse form. The reader meanders through the past relationships as they ebb and flow through varying stages. The introduction poem tells of the types of poem you will soon encounter:
nights of love
full of life and laughter
as empty as an empty
bottle

The poem closes:
Bring me to that ultimate pleasure
in your all-consuming eyes.
Let us become one
and share the horrors of this
world

All in all, Nocturne, is a beautiful but sad read that speaks to the reality of love and holds nothing back. It engages the mind and the heart longing for lasting, meaningful love that always seems just outside of its reach.

P.S. Winn calls it “Great Poems with Pictures”, gives it four stars, and says:

I like this author’s poems which have a great feel to them. The book is about love but a lot more is included inside the pages. I like the photos the author included to enhance the poetry. A few of the poems held descriptive words about nature and I enjoyed the way the picture author paints in the readers mind is also displayed in the photographs that correspond with the words.

Check back frequently for updates.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

Update: June 4, 2019, 5:52 p.m. — Major Changes to the Website

After some deliberation today, I have decided to make a couple of major changes to this website.

  1.  I will be taking submissions of literary fiction of all genres and announcements for publication on this website.  Please see my submissions and announcements page for more details and guidelines. There will be no pay in the foreseeable future. You will have, however, all the glory that comes with being published on this website. They will probably be published on Friday nights.
  2. I am changing the name of the website to Slattery’s Magazine, so that the publication credit will look good on the resume of anyone published here.
  3. I will be focusing less on horror on this website and will be leaning more toward mainstream and popular fiction.  That does not mean that I will not publish horror.  I love good horror. I will just be throwing other genres into the mix.
  4. I have removed the pages focused on horror and migrated them to The Chamber Magazine, which is also accepting submissions.  The guidelines are close to the same as these, but focused more on horror and on flash fiction.
  5. I am restarting the Saturday Night Special feature that I ran for 43 installments a few years ago.  It will run on Saturday nights, of course, at 6:00 p.m. eastern standard time (11:00 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time–i.e. in London, England).  In accordance with the website changes, I will incorporate more mainstream literature into it, though I will initially re-run a lot of the original horror stories until I can find some good mainstream stories. Originally, I ran stories from prior to 1923, the year of institution of copyright laws in the US, in order to avoid copyright problems. I will probably continue to do so. I will focus on what are generally considered to be classic short stories, e.g. by Poe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and others.

Stand by for more updates as they occur.  Check back frequently.

“Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night…” is Available on Amazon Kindle

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover is a collection of my poetry written from the mid-80’s to mid-90s, a turbulent, fluid time in my life in many ways, but especially romantically. I have taken many of the poems written during those years and compiled them into a dark narrative capturing the emotional turmoil of a narrator who descends from romantic love for a woman into a lonely world of alcohol and night clubs, where his only love is the night that envelopes him psychologically, emotionally, and physically.  It is about 110 print pages in length and lavishly illustrated with photos I found in the public domain (no, those are not photos of me or of my former paramours).

You can read samples of it and my other works at my Amazon author’s page:  Amazon.com/author/philslattery.

I have tried to make this a wonderful experience for the reader, exploring the bliss of love to the depths of despair and then to resignation to one’s fate in an existential crisis.

Don’t forget to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads or other social media!

While there, you might want to check out my other work on relationships: The Scent and Other Stories.  In this collection of short stories, I explore the dark, sometimes violent, sometimes twisted, sometimes touching side of love, the side kept not only from public view, but sometimes from our mates. Set in the modern era, these stories range from regretting losing a lover to forbidden interracial love in the hills of 1970’s Kentucky to a mother’s deathbed confession in present-day New Mexico to debating pursuing a hateful man’s wife to the callous manipulation of a lover in Texas.

Two reviews have warm praise for Nocturne…:

J. Muckley calls it “Beautiful, Sad, Authentic and Vulnerable Look at Love and Loss” and gives it five stars, saying:

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover by Phil Slattery is a deep and raw “picture” of experiencing love and lovers of varying type, capturing the moments of ecstasy and pain in a most beautiful way.

Slattery speaks with one voice as his words and pictures depict the full range of human love and loss that both tempts the soul to engage and urges the heart to resist. His opening quote by Augustine of Hippo captures this work perfectly: “I was not yet in love, yet I loved to love…I sought what I might love, in love with loving.”  –Augustine of Hippo

The poems are mostly untitled and written in free verse form. The reader meanders through the past relationships as they ebb and flow through varying stages. The introduction poem tells of the types of poem you will soon encounter:
nights of love
full of life and laughter
as empty as an empty
bottle

The poem closes:
Bring me to that ultimate pleasure
in your all-consuming eyes.
Let us become one
and share the horrors of this
world

All in all, Nocturne, is a beautiful but sad read that speaks to the reality of love and holds nothing back. It engages the mind and the heart longing for lasting, meaningful love that always seems just outside of its reach.

P.S. Winn calls it “Great Poems with Pictures”, gives it four stars, and says:

I like this author’s poems which have a great feel to them. The book is about love but a lot more is included inside the pages. I like the photos the author included to enhance the poetry. A few of the poems held descriptive words about nature and I enjoyed the way the picture author paints in the readers mind is also displayed in the photographs that correspond with the words.

Check back frequently for updates.

“Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night…” is Available on Amazon Kindle

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover is a collection of my poetry written from the mid-80’s to mid-90s, a turbulent, fluid time in my life in many ways, but especially romantically. I have taken many of the poems written during those years and compiled them into a dark narrative capturing the emotional turmoil of a narrator who descends from romantic love for a woman into a lonely world of alcohol and night clubs, where his only love is the night that envelopes him psychologically, emotionally, and physically.  It is about 110 print pages in length and lavishly illustrated with photos I found in the public domain (no, those are not photos of me or of my former paramours).

You can read a sample of it and my other works at my Amazon author’s page:  Amazon.com/author/philslattery.

I have tried to make this a wonderful experience for the reader, exploring the bliss of love to the depths of despair and then to resignation to one’s fate in an existential crisis.

Don’t forget to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads or other social media!

While there, you might want to check out my other work on relationships: The Scent and Other Stories.  In this collection of short stories, I explore the dark, sometimes violent, sometimes twisted, sometimes touching side of love, the side kept not only from public view, but sometimes from our mates. Set in the modern era, these stories range from regretting losing a lover to forbidden interracial love in the hills of 1970’s Kentucky to a mother’s deathbed confession in present-day New Mexico to debating pursuing a hateful man’s wife to the callous manipulation of a lover in Texas.

Two reviews have warm praise for Nocturne…:

J. Muckley calls it “Beautiful, Sad, Authentic and Vulnerable Look at Love and Loss” and gives it five stars, saying:

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover by Phil Slattery is a deep and raw “picture” of experiencing love and lovers of varying type, capturing the moments of ecstasy and pain in a most beautiful way.

Slattery speaks with one voice as his words and pictures depict the full range of human love and loss that both tempts the soul to engage and urges the heart to resist. His opening quote by Augustine of Hippo captures this work perfectly: “I was not yet in love, yet I loved to love…I sought what I might love, in love with loving.”  –Augustine of Hippo

The poems are mostly untitled and written in free verse form. The reader meanders through the past relationships as they ebb and flow through varying stages. The introduction poem tells of the types of poem you will soon encounter:
nights of love
full of life and laughter
as empty as an empty
bottle

The poem closes:
Bring me to that ultimate pleasure
in your all-consuming eyes.
Let us become one
and share the horrors of this
world

All in all, Nocturne, is a beautiful but sad read that speaks to the reality of love and holds nothing back. It engages the mind and the heart longing for lasting, meaningful love that always seems just outside of its reach.

P.S. Winn calls it “Great Poems with Pictures”, gives it four stars, and says:

I like this author’s poems which have a great feel to them. The book is about love but a lot more is included inside the pages. I like the photos the author included to enhance the poetry. A few of the poems held descriptive words about nature and I enjoyed the way the picture author paints in the readers mind is also displayed in the photographs that correspond with the words.

Check back frequently for updates.

“Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night…” is Available on Amazon Kindle

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover is a collection of my poetry written from the mid-80’s to mid-90s, a turbulent, fluid time in my life in many ways, but especially romantically. I have taken many of the poems written during those years and compiled them into a dark narrative capturing the emotional turmoil of a narrator who descends from romantic love for a woman into a lonely world of alcohol and night clubs, where his only love is the night that envelopes him psychologically, emotionally, and physically.  It is about 110 print pages in length and lavishly illustrated with photos I found in the public domain (no, those are not photos of me or of my former paramours).

You can find it and my other works at my Amazon author’s page:  Amazon.com/author/philslattery.

I have tried to make this a wonderful experience for the reader, exploring the bliss of love to the depths of despair and then to resignation to one’s fate in an existential crisis.

Don’t forget to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads or other social media!

While there, you might want to check out my other work on relationships: The Scent and Other Stories.  In this collection of short stories, I explore the dark, sometimes violent, sometimes twisted, sometimes touching side of love, the side kept not only from public view, but sometimes from our mates. Set in the modern era, these stories range from regretting losing a lover to forbidden interracial love in the hills of 1970’s Kentucky to a mother’s deathbed confession in present-day New Mexico to debating pursuing a hateful man’s wife to the callous manipulation of a lover in Texas.

Two reviews have warm praise for Nocturne…:

J. Muckley calls it “Beautiful, Sad, Authentic and Vulnerable Look at Love and Loss” and gives it five stars, saying:

Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover by Phil Slattery is a deep and raw “picture” of experiencing love and lovers of varying type, capturing the moments of ecstasy and pain in a most beautiful way.

Slattery speaks with one voice as his words and pictures depict the full range of human love and loss that both tempts the soul to engage and urges the heart to resist. His opening quote by Augustine of Hippo captures this work perfectly: “I was not yet in love, yet I loved to love…I sought what I might love, in love with loving.”  –Augustine of Hippo

The poems are mostly untitled and written in free verse form. The reader meanders through the past relationships as they ebb and flow through varying stages. The introduction poem tells of the types of poem you will soon encounter:
nights of love
full of life and laughter
as empty as an empty
bottle

The poem closes:
Bring me to that ultimate pleasure
in your all-consuming eyes.
Let us become one
and share the horrors of this
world

All in all, Nocturne, is a beautiful but sad read that speaks to the reality of love and holds nothing back. It engages the mind and the heart longing for lasting, meaningful love that always seems just outside of its reach.

P.S. Winn calls it “Great Poems with Pictures”, gives it four stars, and says:

I like this author’s poems which have a great feel to them. The book is about love but a lot more is included inside the pages. I like the photos the author included to enhance the poetry. A few of the poems held descriptive words about nature and I enjoyed the way the picture author paints in the readers mind is also displayed in the photographs that correspond with the words.

Check back frequently for updates.

My Poetry Collection “Nocturne” is Free May 25 in Commemoration of Theodore Roethke’s Birthday

Today, I am giving away copies of the e-version of my only poetry collection Nocturne: Poems of Love, Distance, and the Night, a callous and disinterested lover to commemorate the birthday of American poet Theodore Roethke.

Nocturne is a collection of my poetry written from the mid-80’s to mid-90s, a turbulent, fluid time in my life in many ways, but especially romantically. I have taken many of the poems written during those years and compiled them into a dark narrative capturing the emotional turmoil of a narrator who descends from romantic love for a woman into a lonely world of alcohol and night clubs, where his only love is the night that envelopes him psychologically, emotionally, and physically.  It is about 110 print pages in length and lavishly illustrated with photos I found in the public domain (no, those are not photos of me or my former paramours).

You can find it and my other works at my Amazon author’s page:  Amazon.com/author/philslattery.

I have tried to make this a wonderful experience for the reader, exploring the bliss of love to the depths of despair and then to resignation to one’s fate in an existential crisis.

Don’t forget to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads!

While there, you might want to check out my other work on relationships: The Scent and Other Stories.  In this collection of short stories, I explore the dark, sometimes violent, sometimes twisted, sometimes touching side of love, the side kept not only from public view, but sometimes from our mates. Set in the modern era, these stories range from regretting losing a lover to forbidden interracial love in the hills of 1970’s Kentucky to a mother’s deathbed confession in present-day New Mexico to debating pursuing a hateful man’s wife to the callous manipulation of a lover in Texas.

Check back frequently for updates.