Ellen Malphrus

“There’s no way around August. In the sweltering dog days of summer in the deep South mornings haze with humidity that doesn’t end with the coming of dark. Cuts don’t heal. Grudges fester. Mold grows on damp sheets and dogs don’t bother to come out from under the house and bark. What would be the point? In more cultivated times people closed the shutters midday and sallied forth when the worst was over.
The river is a different story.
And if you are fortunate enough to have a dock with hammocks hanging under it and boats tied at the end of it and all of Jericho waiting to enfold you, not to mention the Perseid meteor showers to keep you company at night, why would you be anywhere else? Especially if you have peaches.”
― Ellen Malphrus, Untying the Moon

“Words themselves prod and confuse and may not have truth in them, but in stories truth can always be found.”
― Ellen Malphrus, Untying the Moon

“They speak of tides and rigging and lines, just as sea reapers have gathered in thousands of ports for thousands of generations while the big earth slowly tilts oceans out and in to the beckoning moon.”
― Ellen Malphrus, Untying the Moon

“Over and over again the marlin hurls herself from the sea, completely out of the water, flailing from side to side, then crashing once more, sending spray into the air like a geyser. Her eyes are the size of the saucer Padgett had set his coffee cup on that morning, forever ago. They aren’t looking at him, the eyes. They are searching wildly for what has gone wrong with the world, the world that had been hers until she felt the sting of a hook and the weight of horror behind it.”
― Ellen Malphrus, Untying the Moon