Optima

When I was young, around 12 or 13 years old, I went to a school that was very old and made of brick and oak, with high ceilings and thick bannisters on the stairs and hardwood floors, like something out of Hoosiers. I loved that old school - especially the third-floor library, which was also where we had study hall. Every day, I would zip through my homework and raise my hand so the study hall teacher would let me vanish into the library stacks to choose a book to read for the remainder of the period. Sometimes it was Ray Bradbury. Sometimes, Robert Heinlein. Sometimes Isaac Asimov. But I always picked tales of wonder - from The Martian Chronicles or I, Robot or The Illustrated Man. I loved those stories! They fired up my imagination and took me to amazing places. They filled me with awe. I've written many stories of my own in the decades since, and a handful are like those wonderous tales I read in that long-ago third-story school library - tales of hope and light, stories that stir the imagination and provide inspiration. Positive, upbeat, with happy endings. There are ten of them within, and they are all over the place: there are some time travel stories, some stories that take place in space, a couple of magical tales. A few are very light-hearted, a few are very serious - but all of them have happy endings, and all of them (I hope!) offer that hope and light that once illuminated my own future.