AKA: The Reading Room
Look, despite the future saying I’m going to be a best-selling author, I know it will never pay more than the day job. I think of myself more like those bands who used to show up to Studio B with a brand new CD they’d written/recorded/engineered/produced themselves, which many times, I thought, was as good or better than what the so-called “professional musicians” were putting out.
A lot of what’s here are three-chapter intros/teasers to stuff I’m actively working on — that’s easy. A few of these are complete, readable works in what I think of as stable form. None of these are raw drafts, and they aren’t final editions either. Think of them as working manuscripts. The stories are there, the beats are intact, and the ideas are doing what they’re meant to do. From time to time (we’re talking maybe once a year at most), I revise a chapter, rebalance a scene, or clarify an idea that’s matured or just been misunderstood by readers. Occasionally, a section gets rewritten. Nothing here is volatile, but nothing is frozen. You’ll find changes recorded in the version notes, and you can decide whether they warrant your attention.
These drafts are here for readers who are curious now, not for early access hype or formal critique. If you enjoy reading them as they are, that’s enough. If you notice something worth mentioning, I’m always interested — but feedback is optional, not expected. I’m not trying to con you into being a beta-reader.
If and when these books are formally published, they will almost certainly differ in details while remaining the same stories at their core. Reading them here won’t spoil that experience; it will just mean you saw them a little earlier, in motion rather than under glass. This space exists because some stories take years to finish, and some readers don’t mind walking alongside them.
The Halferne Anthology
The “Halferne Anthology” was supposed to be a single book containing six short stories. Just some fun, in-universe backstories to play with when I wanted to stretch into new genres and styles of writing. As with all things, I got ahead of myself: the first three of those short stories are now complete drafts of 70K+ words each, two others are about halfway done, and the last one is just now getting a fresh outline. The goal is to have everything in a “readable draft” state by the end of the year.
The stories all take place in the same universe, in a chronology, but they are in slightly different genres and are standalone, though a tiny through-arc connects them and is resolved at the end of The Halferne Bodhi. The arc is only important as a setup for the next series of books, so don’t feel like you have to read them in order or read all of them. Think of them more as the solo movies before all of our heroes met up in The Avengers.
(Click a cover image to learn more about that title…)
The Perichore Saga
Okay, we’re not calling it that, but like William Gibson, I hate coming up with names for series. This one was supposed to be my magnum opus. I’ve been crafting, outlining, and scribbling on it since the spring of 2001, but it’s been in my head since I was playing with action figures as a kid. Now it’s a slightly contradictory, if not completely misaligned, sequel to “The Halferne Anthology.” Where the Anthology was supposed to be backstory, and this was supposed to be the main series, it now feels like yet another space opera, with way too many characters and plots going on, and bits that flat out contradict the Halferne Anthology.
I’m sure I’ll find a way to remake it, even though huge chunks of it are already written.
The Pessimal Comedies
This series consists of all comedy novels that inhabit a shared universe, but even that universe is a bit of a joke. Aside from a few easter-egg references to each other, the fact that the three main characters all share the same last names from novel to novel, and everything takes place either in the town of Weaver Bay or “The City” up the road, the books are in no way related. The books may be read in any order … or individually skipped if the style and subject matter don’t fit your wheelhouse.
Each book is a different genre, and the humor style differs from book to book — some are absurdist, some satirical, some dark, some more observational. This is my way of rejecting any chance at notoriety and resisting any type of consistent fanbase that loves my style.
