The reading room
Into each mind a little rain must fall…
01 / Short story
This is a light comedic piece, with serious societal overtones. It reflects current trends in justice and the media. The story of a futuristic society based on our own, and perhaps the next logical extreme if the trend continues.
02 / Chapter four
This is the fourth chapter of a large work in progress about a family which has been inbreeding for "second sight" and other extra-sensory talents since the 1500's and has gradually grown to be a force of major corruption throughout the world. Each year they hold "The Festival" in which all members of the family are brought before The Elders, judged for their fitness to carry the name... then subtle sentences are carried out, along with a complex breeding program the details of which are known only to The Elders. Pandora is heading to her first "Festival"...
03 / Novel
Can the Earth really be brought to ruins by good intentions? Who would use "Good Works" to try and bring about the end of the world? Leave it to Lazarus Kane, the idiosyncratic narcissist. to turn his mis-wired, afflicted brain to this dilemma... If not, you can always have a word with the millennia-old Priestess of the Temple Of Bastet. In a world where nothing is ever as it seems, the path to good intentions can certainly lead to Hell... A problem with my publisher has resulted in this work being temporarily unavailable in softcover, so I have put it online for free until that can be sorted out. Enjoy!
04 / Short story
A study of adult "grief" and greed, as seen through the eyes of a child. It is the tale of the legacy left behind by his grandfather-- who may have been rich, but could never rightly be accused of being vain or foolish. A seemingly innocent story with a "Twilight Zone" twist that should cause surprise.
05 / Short story
This is a story set in a post-apocalyptic world, where the remnants of society have gathered together to try and rebuild their shattered lives and their nation. Unfortunately, one of the first things they discover is that in order to be "free". they are often forced to descend to the very same tactics which brought the world to ruin in their lifetimes. A study of parallels, and irony; an attempt to demonstrate the necessity of certain "evils".
06 / Short story
A detective story, set in a futuristic world where the genome is the true measure of a man or a woman, and all identification includes a person's percentage of accepted racial purity. A look at racism so stratified and entrenched that it is no longer even seen as prejudice by most of the people practicing it, and even by those suffering under its weight. Not your typical murder mystery.
07 / Short story
The tale of a stubborn man who knows "everything" but can't fathom the tiny details that make everything work. This story shows the inadequacy of every tale ever told on the subject of "Time Travel" and how woefully uninformed many people are about the realities of the physical universe. How easy it is to overlook something one is surrounded by every day, like the air or the sky; how dangerous that approach can be. The "devil is in the details" as the expression goes.
08 / Novel excerpt
This is the first section of a work in progress. It is a historical fiction, using many of the details history has recorded as a backdrop to tell a tale as old as time and as current as today. It is a search for "something extra" for divine knowledge and foresight; a story of witches and secret powers played out in the court of Queen Elizabeth the First... a woman who died a virgin to keep her throne and her power uncompromised.
09 / Short story
You've seen the cartoon. Man tears down a building, finds a box in the cornerstone with a talented and loud frog that patently refuses to sing or dance in the presence of anyone but him. But what if the box contained something different just once; what if it contained something lost to time-- a spirit of such fury and violence that modern man has all but forgotten such forces even exist outside of myths and legends. After something like that... well, a singing frog might not seem so bad.