Robert Bocking, $0.99, ISBN 978-0463122211
Historical Fiction, 2020

Robert Bocking’s Naledi is a short episode on a significant, somewhat poignant, and heartbreaking turning point in the lives of the heavily pregnant hominid Ama and her mate Aya during the prehistoric days on Earth.

Think of this as Jean M Auel’s Earth’s Children, only with the main characters not exactly model-esque hot people in fur bikinis and with far, far, far fewer—actually, zero—big dongs and super-groovy honey pots.

I suppose this one is alright.

It’s super short, even for things sold at $0.99, as there are far longer stories out there that one can buy with that same amount of money. However, the story itself is okay.

The prose can feel tad forced to me, like the author is trying a little too hard to be descriptive and flowery. Still, no big deal. I’ve read worse and lived to tell the tale.

The sun creeps over the horizon, the sky bursts into a thousand shades of fire – Orange, red, blue and purple illuminating the valley in the dying light of day. Deep from within a chasm in the rock Ama, ambles into the fading light. Her brown supple bare skin absorbing the energy of the great light. Her dark brown eyes scanning the savannah.

The biggest issue, though, as it often is when comes to super short stories, is my reaction to it: so what. Yeah, yeah, this and that happen, but because the characters are sort of there, so what.

Perhaps it is the narrative or the structure of the story, maybe both, that is supposed to leave an indelible impression on me. Thing is, I’ve read so many stories and watched so many things that have similar fates befalling their main characters, and this one doesn’t give me many reasons to be moved in any way. So what, in other words.

Shame, really. Maybe if this had been a far longer story, Aya, Ama, and their kid may make a bigger impact on me. With it being what it is, though, this is a textbook case of easy come, easy go.