Saturday, August 4, 2012

Day Two Hundred Seventeen: "Letter from the Understudy" by Kathryn Simmonds

Focus. Disturbed.

An understudy writes a letter anonymously about how he gradually poisoned the actor he was shadowing in order to get his shot at the spotlight. It works at first but just when the understudy is about to get his chance to really shine, the night when critics will be there to see him, the actor himself decides to perform despite a fever. This is when the story turns dark and the understudy resorts to a more obvious form of violence, taking a bat to the actor in order to keep him from performing.

Of course, the irony is that the actions of the understudy result in him going into hiding and thus stripping him of the very opportunity he had been seeking. This was quite a sinister and well written story and unlike any I've read so far.

Nice job!


A link to the story online is here:

http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/LettUnde.shtml

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