Justin Pyfrom's Blog, page 15

32nd Short Story Released

Everybody saw this day coming. Everybody knew that they were going to fight back. However, no one could anticipate the events leading to this fateful day nor the violence that would follow.

It is available for Amazon Kindle.

31st Short Story Released

A prison cell becomes a confessional booth, of sorts, as two men from different walks of life make a connection while spending their last days on Earth. However, they never actually meet…

It is available for Amazon Kindle.

30th Short Story Released

The confrontation between a homophobe and a gay man is revealed. But it doesn’t help either party, as the hatred for each other, is still there. It’s pretty evident that no one is going to come out a winner.

It is available for Amazon Kindle.

Where Darkness Could Loom

Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody.”
― Mark Twain

What if the trans community had finally snapped?

For Pride, I made the conscious decision to write two sets of stories. One set of lights and one set of the dark. I wanted to have the light stories to be inspirational and hopeful towards the future of the LGBTQ+ community. On the flip side, I wanted the dark stories to serve as cautionary tales for people in – and out – of the LGBQT+ community. It’s A Damn Shame, Really falls under the latter category and for really good reasons.

Now, just to be clear, I wrote this story way before the bill was passed regarding federal trans rights which my friends and I leaped for joy about. A major step forward for everybody – both in and out of the trans community. But remember that the fight isn’t over. Not by a long shot.

I based this story on a conversation I had with a friend of mine who did security with me in The Gayborhood (Philadelphia’s gay village). We were talking about how wonderful his then-boyfriend was and how much humility he had. This led me to shift the conversation in a darker direction by saying a few simple words: I wonder what would happen if he went dark? He didn’t take offense to it. In fact, he was just as intrigued as I was and we spent another hour or so talking about it.

We spoke about it at great length and I took mental notes of it all and I already had a story building from it. Since his then-boyfriend was a transgender man, we started with, at the time, the lack of trans right in our country and what would happen if a transgender man has enough of all the abuse. It was a common question with a predictable outcome but the magnitude was something you couldn’t predict – only speculate. However, speculating is one of my fortes as a science fiction writer.

Anyway, I told everything we talk about and got it down on paper while I was on the train ride home. And, while I was at it, I began to form a character that would be an outsider looking in and regretting what he found. I wanted the crime to so repulsive that he began to question everybody around him. The outline took me about three outlines. It was the quickest I’ve ever written an outline; usually, it takes me a full day – if I’m lucky.

Well, I told my friend about the story I was writing and he was in a little shock and awe about it all. He didn’t expect that dark of the story from me and I enlighten him that I’m always inspired by Rob Sterling’s Twilight Zone and it all made sense to him. I even gave him the heads-up about the twist ending I was planning for the story. He opted not to read the full story until I released it. I hope he likes it. And, with that, I hope you enjoy the story.

You can buy the book on Amazon. The link is here.

You can also learn about it on Goodreads. The link for it is here.

First Attempt At Writing Romance

You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.”
― Dr. Seuss

What if a werewolf met a bookworm?

Puppy Love was my first attempt at a love story. Romance is my least favorite genre to read because, to be frank, the genre is a bit generic for me. I mean, the formula is the same and I wasn’t finding anything that deviated from it. But, my friends told me to reconsider and take a look at paranormal romance. Of course, it’s literature so I said, “Sure”, and ask them for recommendations. They gave me enough to make me figure out that I was wrong about the whole thing. It also gave me the inspiration I needed to tackle this interesting genre.

So, I’ve always been a fan of werewolves. My reasons are both homo and non-homo. They are always sexy and almost always hairy. I have a thing for hairy-built men. Not muscle, but built. Anyway, I also have been a huge reader of their literary and mythos history. That’s what I wanted to bring to this story. I wanted to leave the sex out of it and tell a genuine love story.

I picked Ireland because of another story I wrote and release called The Silver Plague. It was easier for me and, no, there is no relation to the characters. If anything, this story is more contemporary with fantasy undertones in its telling while The Silver Plague was vice versa. I really wanted this love story to be grounded in reality. This meant that I had to make the characters relatable and likable as quickly as possible.

The werewolves’ relationship resembles the relationship between my best friend and his little brother, who coincidently are Irish. They are always playful and pushing enough others to get out of their comfort zone. They always have each other’s back and anybody can sense that just by looking at them. True brotherly love and I wanted my characters to resemble that.

For the love interest, I thought of the sexiest aspect of a woman and made a character off of that. Guys may approach a woman based on her looks but they will talk to a woman based on her mind. So, I decided to make her a bookworm and a writer; it was simpler for me and it works. I figure that it would make their first interaction that much funnier for the readers especially if I dismiss the typical troupes that come with the romance genre. I was really trying to avoid them. Hopefully, I did.

I think I might revisit this story and revamp it in the future. I had a lot of fun writing this story and I already have all the pieces I need to make a mini-series out of it. And, with that, I hope you enjoy the story.

You can buy the book on Amazon. The link is here.

You can also learn about it on Goodreads. The link for it is here.

29th Short Story Released

It’s a bad idea to lie to your boyfriend. It becomes a terrible idea when your boyfriend is a Space Marshal. And it becomes the worst idea when you antagonize your Space Marshal boyfriend.

It is available for Amazon Kindle.

28th Short Story Released

A classic love story between a man and woman. Well, there are some key differences. Like, one of them is a very dedicated writer and another is a werewolf. But it’s still a love story.

It is available for Amazon Kindle.

To Put Someone Through The Unimaginable

There are moments that the words don’t reach

You hold your child as tight as you can
And push away the unimaginable
The moments when you’re in so deep
It feels easier to just swim down”

-Lin-Manuel Miranda, Phillipa Soo, Original Broadway Cast of “Hamilton” & Renée Elise Goldsberry, “It’s Quiet Uptown” from the 2015 musical, Hamilton: An American Musical

I’m an uncle. I’m a teacher. I’m a big cousin. But I’m not a father. Not yet, anyway. However, I have so many friends who have been blessed to bring a child into the world.  Unfortunately, life being what it is, I also have friends who have been burdened with the loss of their child. One of them told me that it was a result of bullying and it just made my blood boil. It also brought inspiration to the short story, The Burden of Parenthood.

A parent should never have to bury their child. It’s supposed to be the other way around. Even though it’s equally painful, it’s also natural. But for a parent to have to give up their child through death, I would never wish on anybody – not even my enemy. I don’t care how much I don’t like somebody. Kids are the single most important beings and they are a treasure.

Unfortunately, as I listened to “It’s Quiet Uptown” from the musical Hamilton, I was forced to accept that there are just some things that can’t be helped. Parents try to keep their kids close to them and protect them, but life doesn’t discriminate between sinners and saints.  That’s what I wanted to convey in this story. There are just some things that you can’t protect your kid from.

I didn’t intend for the story to have two timelines. Originally, I wanted to be in a single room with the police and a confessed killer but I felt that I’ve done that kind of writing a bit too much for my life. I wanted to do something new and I realized that I haven’t done a dual timeline. So, that’s what I did. I made it so that I could have two parents with the same sorrow come together.

However, me being me, I took a much darker approach. Both of them are going through the imaginable and they’re going about it darkly. But one has already acted and another is preparing to act so it gave me a lot of wiggle room for my usual theme of duality. I wanted to really understand what goes through the mind of a justice-seeking killer and how they feel after the fact.

Now, I don’t condone the act of murder of any kind for any reason. But, my job as a writer, is to make my readers understand and see why they did what they did. I want my readers to say, “I can see why they did that.” It doesn’t make it right, but they can digest and accept the reasoning.

I don’t want to give anything away but I will say that this story was the hardest for me to write. Unlike Childhood Lost…and Found, a short story that had an acceptable ending, this one didn’t. This story had an ending that will have my readers thinking “Seriously?”. I like the ending but a few of my friends didn’t.  But I’ll let you be the judge of that. And, with that, I hope you enjoy the story.

You can buy the book on Amazon. The link is here.

You can also learn about it on Goodreads. The link for it is here.

27th Short Story Released

It’s the worst day for two parents as they meet for the first time. But how they have come to this same point where they have to live with the unimaginable?

It is available for Amazon Kindle.

My Wish For Ending Prejudice

“When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but with creatures bristling with prejudice and motivated by pride and vanity.”
― Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends and Influence People

The duality of intolerance

The Silver Plague was the easiest story for me to write because it was from a dream I had. I mean a very vivid one. I was actually going to save it for the fantasy series that I’m currently worldbuilding for along with my LGBTQ+ Crimeverse series. Anyway, I had this dream and I wanted to get it down on my paper before it escaped me. Glad I did, too, because I felt like this would be a close candidate for My Top Ten Favorite Short Stories.

Racial and social intolerance has always been a hot-button topic for me. I could never understand how people can have so much hatred and disdain for things that can’t be controlled. In addition, I’m mystified at their justification for their hatred as if it’s their right to be cruel to people that are different than them. Granted the First Amendment gives them freedom of speech but they always take it too far and without remorse. So, I got to thinking after having this dream: Wouldn’t that be a great story? A better I had was “Wouldn’t that be great if it was possible”? That’s the thing about fantasy and science fiction. The shoulda, woulda, coulda. Especially with topics as dark as this.

So, for the story, I wanted to keep the basic troupes in a fantasy story. You know, werewolves and witches? But this time, I added something that I started to become fond of after reading the Colin McCool series by M.D. Massey.  Druids don’t get a lot of credit in literature and I wanted to contribute. However, I didn’t know too much, and I wanted to get these short stories done, so I kept it as basic as possible. A type of witch who draws magic from the four elements. Easy peasy…until I decided I wanted to create a unique druid. You know, me being me. I won’t tell you how unique he is; you’re going to have to read to find out.

Anyway, I took a moment to create a brief string of events because I wanted the main conflict to be disjointed and shrouded in inconsistencies like the natural state of intolerance. No one knows where it came from but they do that it’s here and it’s causing problems. I also wanted to show how far someone with magic can spread hate and, vice versa spread peace. It’s the magical battles of the extremes and there will be no clear winner.  I can assure you of that. There never is. People will go to great lengths to get their point across. We’ve all seen that throughout the media.

The letter format of the story was something that I decided on a whim, really. I wanted to see if it could work since I’ve done something similar for Revenge or Justice (click here and here). A diary format and people seemed to like it. Plus, I think it’s a dying art form. The whole letter story thing.

I managed to get the story done within a couple of days. I had my notes that I wrote about my dream and everything else was just smooth sailing. Oh! Side note, don’t be surprised if you see the main character, the writer of the letter,  in another story. And, with that, I hope you enjoy the story.

You can buy the book on Amazon. The link is here.

You can also learn about it on Goodreads. The link for it is here.