Stupefying Stories issue 2.1, which includes my short story "Lucky," is available starting today through Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I'm fortunate enough to know a few of the talented scribes published in this issue, including, in no particular order, Samuel M. Johnston, Ada Milenkovic Brown, Courtney Valdes, and Elizabeth Berger. Be sure to check out their work, too.
Here's a quick excerpt of "Lucky":
Dr. Gustaw stopped walking, turning to face Alan. “Here’s the Wikipedia version. Think of luck as a form of magnetism. It pulls you toward a certain outcome based on the positive or negative charge of certain particles.”
“Luck particles? There are luck particles?” Alan said
“Until they’re officially named Gustaw particles, yes. The guy at MIT wants to call them Ludtener particles even though I discovered them first. But that’s neither here nor there. An instance of good luck causes a buildup of positive luck particles. Bad luck, negative charge. With me?”
“I guess.” Alan wondered if he could find his way out of the building from here.
“Unlike magnetism, opposites don’t attract. Good luck attracts more good luck, and vice versa. The bigger the charge you’ve accumulated, the more good or bad luck you get. That’s happenstantial attraction. Ludtener uses a snowball/avalanche analogy, but I think it’s more cyclonic. Tornado.”
“So why am I supposed to lose an eye? Too many black cats crossing my path?”
Dr. Gustaw glared at Alan. “You don’t believe in that hokum, do you? I’m a scientist, sir, not some witch-doctor.”
“No offense.”
“You are what I call a class-four attractor,” Dr. Gustaw said. “If your test results are accurate, your luck center is a hundred times more attractive than class ones—average people.
“How many classes are there?”
“Theoretically infinite, but practically speaking, seven is as high as you could go. If you could attract more good or bad luck than that, you’d either be a god or suddenly burst into flames. I’ve met one class six, and she won two lotteries before dying in a bowling accident."