Eden’s Dream: An Excerpt from Love and Other Pranks

Eden’s Dream is a painting by Simon Haiduk and inspired by the serpent from Love and Other Pranks. View the video below for a spectacularly animated visual treat, and here’s an opportunity to win a large (28″ x 42″), limited edition, archival canvas giclée print valued at $600!

A chapter which inspired this piece is included below… Enjoy!

Artistic expression (of any medium) inspired by my books is always welcome!

View the full-size, animated gif…

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Crow and Flaming Jane scrambled into a sitting position to discover a tremendous white serpent wound within and around the tangle of banyan trunks forming the base of the tree. As the serpent moved, shades of rainbow shimmered across the opalescent surface of its skin, yes, and if they were uncertain whether it was the serpent that had just spoken it dispelled any doubt by continuing.
 
“Please forgive the depth of my voice,” the serpent went on, pausing to lick a sparkling drool of venom from its glistening fangs. “I am not nearly so serious as the gravity of my voice may otherwise indicate.”
 
“What is this?” Crow spoke, indignant at the startle and not yet recovered of sufficient faculties to think to question how a serpent was even speaking in the first place.
 
“I intrude upon your moment,” the serpent admitted, blushing rainbows along the length of its neck. “Another pardon upon me, for it is not often that the unsullied soul discovers paradise in a droplet of water.” Slithering into a fresh position above them, the serpent dangled its head near eye level with Flaming Jane and Crow, who instinctively drew themselves back. “In my feeble defense, however, those villainous buzzards precede my bother upon you, though this is surely no excuse for the absence of my manners.”It is not often that the unsullied soul discovers paradise in a droplet of water.
 
“You’re the serpent on the map,” Flaming Jane grinned, pointing at the serpent.
 
The serpent merely blinked its onyx eyes. “What can be the meaning of this accusation?”
 
Flaming Jane held up the map as evidence, which the serpent lithely commandeered with its tail before tucking it between the fork of a branch well out of their reach.