James Pyles's Blog, page 133

Playing Games

25 year old Brian Russell saw the pile of junk mail sitting on his chair which was situated near his gaming console. “I thought I told you to throw away the snail mail crap.” His roommate and fellow graduate student Ricky Briggs shook his head, wagging his long pony tail as he continued to focus […]

The Pleiades Mystery

Elio Hudson let out a deep breath as he looked at the idylic scene on the small console monitor. It was a photo he had taken of a field of wildflowers last Spring in southeast Texas, a hundred miles from the Houston Space Center and his other life. “Hey, you might want to save that for later. Where we’re […]

Adventures of a Pantser (no, it’s not like that)

I came across this on twitter: Yeah, that pretty much describes me, or more specifically, this does: It’s come back to bite me in the butt more than once. Okay, here’s the deal. I have the first draft of one novel fully finished, I’m stalled in the middle of the first draft of the second, […]

Frozen Memories

Noah Banks stopped in front of the four-star restaurant his Grandparents used to take the family to when he and his sister were kids. Mom told him when he was six that this wasn’t the sort of place you ordered a PB&J or hot dog with extra relish at, but what did he know? The […]

Planning and Timing

“Wheatgrass might even kill cancer cells. You should try it.” Jack Murphy proudly displayed his small window box garden to his friend Martin Katz. “I appreciate your support, but…” “But nothing. Couldn’t hurt.” “What do you do with it?” “I’ll show you how to…” “Oops. Got an oncologist appointment. Be back soon.” “Good luck.” “Thanks.” […]

Getting Ready for School

“You seem depressed, Joey. The older man looked at his nine-year-old grandson sitting on the bench beside him. “I’ve got less than two weeks of freedom left.” “What do you mean?” “School. I won’t be able to hang out with you at the park and tell stories.” “I thought you liked school.” The boy absent-mindedly […]

The Purpose of Descent

A descent for the purpose of an ascent. -attributed to the Frierkiker Rebbe “Get up. What do you think you’re doing?” Michael Taylor rushed into the tiny clearing in the forest hoping he’d avoided the men chasing him. “The world is going to Hell in a hand basket, and you’re sitting there clutching your head like […]

Has a New Civil War Been Declared?

Warning: This essay discusses issues of Donald Trump, racism, physical assault, and other forms of violence, hate crimes, and whether or not people are ultimately responsible for their own actions. If you think reading about all that might be upsetting to you, please find something else with which to occupy your time. By the way, […]

Ryazan

Jonathan Cypher was atemporal, so when he found himself leaving the Eurythmics concert, he wasn’t sure where or when he was. Almost everyone around him was speaking German. There was a screenwriter talking about filming the group’s performance later in the year, a couple arguing about marriage, an aging academic expressing his opinion to his […]

The New Dragon Saga: Training

Chapter 1: Buddy the Ambrosial Dragon had only been sporadically living with Landon and his family for the past year or so. Now that he had grown to his full stature (about the size of a school bus), he always had to shrink himself downwhen he came to stay with them, as he had right now. He […]