Menu

Menu
Prompts
Contests
Stories
Blog
Directory
Contests
Magazine
FAQ

John Rutherford

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Mar, 2023

Stories (34)
Comments
Library
270 Followers
579 Following

34 Stories

2413 karma pts

?

Magic Garden

Submitted to Contest #295

There was once an apartment located in Leninsky Prospekt, Moscow, where lived a family, who owned two dogs, and a small cat. One dog, a dalmatian named Cherry, and another a Jack Russell Terrier named Bella. Outside the apartment block was a small park, the park had two children’s play areas with swings, and slides. Plus, a court to play football or basketball. The park benches were situated at equal distance along the two pathways, which led to the four entrances of the small urban park. There were many trees, and a brick building to house ...

6 likes 6 comments 6
Read story

Flirty Rabbit

Submitted to Contest #294

30th September 2023Dear Mr. Spada                                                                                      &nb...

26 likes 26 comments 26
Read story

Go!

Submitted to Contest #293

The huge psychological relief of looking out of the aircraft window on the Bangkok airport taxiway and seeing the next landing aircraft with the dark green tail, the familiar logo of a palm tree and crossed swords, was one of those moments in life, when miracles do happen for insignificant people like me. Someone had looked after my family and me. Especially since I had been so foolish. It was an ambitious plan, and not without its obvious risks. The logistical problem can only be summarized as follows. A family spread out in different parts...

41 likes 33 comments 33
Read story

Lycanthrope

Submitted to Contest #291

Ketu was in the fourth house on the astrology chart when Lycaon was born into this world. It normally signaled finality; endings, but this was different. This was an advent of change, a transformation, and a transcendence from evil sources and the beginnings towards a general expansion of evil. It was old evil returning from the ancients. It represented a renunciation, a rejection of the current ambivalent fragile balance, the status quo, and it brought about malefic, harmful and destructive forces. Neptune, the psychopomp cat, the guide for...

25 likes 12 comments 12
Read story

Symphony on the Streets

Submitted to Contest #290

This is a story about stray cats, or stray animals in general. The narrator tries to explain their lives from an eyewitness or philosophical viewpoint. The word Ba has a collective meaning for human beings and their world.************************************************************Venus stretched out her furry legs and paws, with the feeling of absolute freedom and happiness. These are words to describe a state of mind in the Ba world, a comparable feeling Ba might experience. Although Ba goes to great lengths, to find it, teach th...

35 likes 21 comments 21
Read story

Capricorn's End

Submitted to Contest #289

This week’s story follows on from the previous week - Tempête du Cygne Noir. The scene commences in the police station interrogation room. Wicked (Mr. Ramstein) was being questioned by Detectives Melcom and Metzil about the murder of Cygne Noir.************************************************************“If you don’t come clean Mr. Ramstein, your freedom and future will end here tonight!”“Sounds like you are a popular dude around here. Everybody calls you Wicked – right? That’s apt! Right now, with us Wicked, you are the Wicked Witch fo...

23 likes 10 comments 10
Read story

Tempête du Cygne Noir

Submitted to Contest #288

The wind whipped the layers of storm clouds ever nearer the seashore, and the deadly scene on the sandy beach. The flashes of lightning highlighted the clumps of bodies, heaps of flesh and clothes, lying prone, face down in the sand. Dead bodies vulnerable to the sweeping heavy rain that came closer with every second, and with every gust of wind. The sea was growing, the constant tidal waves inflated in size, as the down drafts of wind pushed the waves higher. One could see the wind pressure from above pressing down, squeezing into the water...

37 likes 20 comments 20
Read story

The demise of Camellia Sinensis

Submitted to Contest #287

He was daydreaming, gazing out the window looking down at the old habour area of Colombo. With imagination one could easily visualize in a bygone day, the busy habour in the 19th century full of ocean-going wooden vessels loading and unloading their precious cargo – loading of the heavy wooden tea chests – full of cuttings from the bushy shrub named camellia sinensis. Destined for a teapot and the additional pouring of steaming hot water to make the delicious and refreshing golden nectar - tea. Destined for the white linen tables and fine ch...

22 likes 7 comments 7
Read story

A crate too big, too heavy, too far!

Submitted to Contest #286

It wasn’t a single suitcase containing my family’s worldly possessions that created the epiphanic moment in my life. It was a wooden crate, a homemade crate, made with love and consideration to handle with care, a miniature pedal car. A birthday present. It was symbolic of so many changes at that time in my life, changes in many lives. A time of upheaval, which would never ever return to the previous pattern of life for so many; ever again.The surrounding support, comfort and security of a close family would be sacrificed, for higher ideals ...

33 likes 16 comments 16
Read story

Doctor RED

Submitted to Contest #285

It is getting close to the eve of Y2K, and in the land of the clock-watchers all was not well.Across all the land, the towns, the cities, the whole populace was stirred, in an uneasy feeling which pervades their every waking second. It prolongs into every minute, every waking hour, the uneasy feeling hovers close to their every conscious thought. There is a general feeling of anxiousness that verges on clinical depression. The thought of entering the unknown, for people who are control freaks governed by precision, clock-watchers by nature. ...

32 likes 16 comments 16
Read story

The Conch

Submitted to Contest #284

Grantham, Lincolnshire, UK circa 1843“You’re dirty, you need a bath to wash away that colour. It looks like mud!” My cousin said, jerking away her outstretched arm in disdain. It was her idea, her request to compare our uncovered skin– side by side. Now the realization of the difference in skin colour, horrified and frightened her like being next to a diseased leper. Just the touch of my outstretched arms, my coffee-coloured arm, my dusty tan coloured skin, meant she might receive a tropical disease. Worst. Her alabaster white porcelain skin...

34 likes 16 comments 16
Read story

Lies

Submitted to Contest #283

CaseThe Applicant is a single woman in her 30’s. A reasonably successful writer of books and collection of poems. Well educated, and fluent in speaking both English and Chinese languages. A winner of numerous awards for her writing. She comes from an unusual mixed cultural and social background and has further enhanced those cultural experiences with travel and living in diverse countries and social environments for a woman of such a tender age.The combination of her growing up and travel experiences have enriched her writing. She gained her...

24 likes 18 comments 18
Read story

The road not taken

Submitted to Contest #282

Lady and Pluto lay opposite each other one hot summer night. The breeze lay idle over the land and sea, lethargic, listless, too tired to move. It had surrendered, hiding in the shade, deep inside the belly of the hills, after hours, since dawn, exposed to the hot baking sun. Lady as always sat upright, listening and forever on guard with all her senses on constant alert. She did this every waking hour, and remained half alert even when sleeping, or dozing for an hour. Her life was one endless vigil of alertness, it was her duty; more than t...

23 likes 8 comments 8
Read story

Bella Renard

Submitted to Contest #281

It was Christmas Eve in the Ba world, and Santa hadn’t mistakenly delivered this unusual package to the wrong address at Kubbeli Evler, he was busy elsewhere. This is not a nativity story, as the newborn in the story was not the son of God, and there are no wise men bearing gifts. “Shall we eat it? I’m hungry and haven’t eaten flesh for days.” Said the twins, Jupiter and Saturn together, they always uttered their views in unison, like a stereo sound system. It was completely out of context with the scene and situation in front of them. ...

25 likes 9 comments 9
Read story

AI or not AI that is interpretation

Submitted to Contest #280

“Hi Gemini – This is Randy Foakes from The Authors Forum; as the group’s administrator I've had an issue with your posting, and I’m giving you personally another warning due to you posting on the board an AI image. Your post has now been taken down from the group site. The post was titled – Having a Bad Day, and I’m just about to send a screenshot to your inbox. I kindly ask you not to send anymore posts with AI images. The group’s mantra is completely opposed to the use of AI in any creative form. If you continue to post AI images, we ...

45 likes 38 comments 38
Read story