Fictive Dream, the online fiction magazine focusing on short stories, is hosting an event this week called Editors’ Week. I illustrated the stories and I’ll be posting the images here to show you. Here’s my suggestion: take a look at the illustration and then check out the story it accompanies at Fictive Dream to take in the whole experience.
I’ll show you the illustration and give you the link to the magazine each day. Today’s story is called Sun Spots, by Kim Magowan and Michelle Ross. Look here to read it.
Here is the image with the banner:
and here it is on its own.
Claudia McGill and Her Art World 
Wonderful colors in your artwork, Claudia. The story is excellent! Tough subject to write about and so well-written.
Thank you. Yes, this story touches a nerve. I have had cats since I was out on my own and this story reminded me of one in partticular. The feeling of so many things ending in this story is in every word.
You’re welcome, Claudia. This week has been a wonderful series of artwork and writing.
The green is a great choice for the artwork. I associate it as being both the colour of vitality and life and also a colour of death and decay. It, therefore, effectively communicates ideas in the story as well as the scene enjoyed by the cat.
Yes, the green is everywhere in this story, wchi is odd to me because it is cheerful, usually, and I think it’s a contrast to the idea of so many things ending and dying. It seems kind of a stark story in a deceptive domestic setting with a family and pet and so on, and all of it in despair.
All these stories are so sad. I like the meditative quality of your art as a companion. (K)
Thank you. You are right, the stories are sad. It seems to me so many writers are focused on sadness and sorrow and loss. I wonder why. Surely there is redemption and encouragement to find a way to go on, in the world we find ourselves in?
I think so. Somehow we’ve come to think that only tragedy is worth taking seriously.
I normally associate the colour green with growth and regeneration and yet, for Sun Spots by Kim Magowan and Michelle Ross, it works wonderfully well. The illustration focusses on that quiet moment in which the cat is prepared for euthanasia. We have the patch of fake lawn and the orange wrought iron bench, and for me at least, the black splashes foreshadow the cat’s death. Just wonderful, Claudia, thank you. And thank you for the whole series.
Thank you, too, Laura, for your support of the artwork. And this story really touched my heart beacause we are a cat family and have faced the same situation with a couple of our cats. I liked how the color gree, as you say a life symbol, in this story is to me giving the needed contrast to highlight all the darkness and sadnesses.