Free through January 14, 2018 with coupon code ZE68J: "Eternal Quest" short story

On its surface, this speculative fiction short story (7,800 words) deals with one man's obsessive quest for knowledge and the devastating price he must pay for the knowledge he ultimately acquires. Beneath the surface, this story is about deep friendships complicated by unrequited love, split loyalties, the interplay of id, ego and superego, and existentialist lessons learned too late in life.

This is one of my earliest short stories, written when I was a writing major at Queens College in the late 1970s and only lightly edited in the intervening years. It is intended as a cautionary tale about the tragic consequences that can result from the obsessive, single-minded pursuit of any goal, even for the brightest, most well-intentioned souls among us. 

In the intervening four decades since I first wrote the original version of this short story on my trusty electric typewriter for an undergraduate writing course, I have earned a couple of degrees, published dozens of books and scholarly articles, and read countless books by authors and scholars far wiser than I across many disciplines, reflecting my eclectic tastes and interests. But I have learned no greater truth along the way than that I intuited as a young old man of 19 when I wrote this short story. That may itself be tragic, yet it (and the sonnet it incorporates--my first, written about the same time, though not specifically for this short story) remains my favorite. 

You can download a free copy of "Eternal Quest"  by clicking on its Smashwords page here or on the "Eternal Quest" book cover below. You can also get more information about two of the short story collections in which it appears by clicking on the book covers (or audiobook cover) below.   Please note that the free download is ONLY available at Smashwords and NOT at the other retailers at which the book is sold as I cannot provide coupons for these.