A brief encounter with a talking cicada compels a journey of self-discovery.

Lucy is having a bad day at work and to top it off a cicada named Lenny just told her she has three days to live. Thus begins a surreal journey of self-discovery, where animals talk, bears play polka, and spiders tango. Over the course of three days Lucy must care for her alcoholic mother, come to terms with the loss of her father, and confront her feelings for her best friend Faye, all while trying to understand what her "potential" is and why a cicada wants it before she dies.

For fans of Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli, Haruki Murakami, The Alligator Report, and TV series like Wonderfalls and Pushing Daisies.

Cover designed by Sabine Krauss
A novelette. approximately 50 print pages in length.

"Bernard Cox's The Space Within These Lines Is Not Dedicated is a fantasy with a radically inclusive vision. Lucy, a one-time rescuer of animals, confronts her father's death, her mother's despair, a complicated love, a meaningless job, and, as a result, finds herself in an emotional limbo. When the smart-aleck cicada arrives, she has to wonder whether she's losing her mind. Is she facing the inevitable passage of life or the possibility of renewal or both? The progress of this compassionate narrative critiques our society's neglect and abuse of the world and those who inhabit it."--Frank Rogaczewski author of The Fate of Humanity in Verse.

"Give us your potential.'With that request [The Space Within These Lines Is Not Dedicated], a story that revolves around a woman, her imminent death, her troubled life and lots of talking animals (that she can hear) is off and running. Does it all sound crazy? Well, it is! It's also entertaining. Cox is a great storyteller. There are more of these novellas to come from him and I look forward to them. This is good stuff, all the way around!"--Shelly's LGBT Book Review Blog at Shellysbookstore