James Pyles's Blog, page 232

Hijacked!

From the Flight Log of Freighter Pilot Camdon Rod They say it’s impossible to hijack a jump freighter, but there’s always an exception to a rule. I mean, jump ships are monitored by ground control when they lift off, then satellite monitoring until the ship reaches the jump point and enters hyperspace. Forget about intercepting […]

The Haunting of the Ginger’s Regret

From the Flight Log of Freighter Pilot Camdon Rod For a single op jump freighter from that era, she was in fantastic shape, but I still couldn’t shake the feeling I was missing something. Oh, my name is Camdon Rod and I’m shopping for a replacement for my dearly departed freighter the Cynnabar Breen. The […]

Shadow of the Dark Wizard

The Third Story in the Adventures of the Ambrosial Dragon: A Children’s Fantasy Series For the first two stories in this series, see The Day the Dragon Came to Live with Us and Rescuing a Dragon. Tarmreiboth the Dark Wizard had become very interested in the spaces between worlds recently, and with good reason. It […]

The Day I Destroyed the Universe

From the Flight Log of Freighter Pilot Camdon Rod I was only three days out of Delta Epsiloni Four aboard the freighter Cleric’s Hope as her replacement First Mate when I got into a religious argument with the Engineer. I knew when I signed on that the ship was crewed by devotees of the Chosen […]

Ed Meets God in Church

This is a continuation of the original short story First Encounter where Ed and Phil are introduced. Ed Tillman crept into the worship hall like a thief. He hated being greeted at the door of the church, he hated walking through the crowd of parishioners as they chit-chatted with each other while finishing off their […]

The Last Flight of the Cynnabar Breen

From the Flight Log of Freighter Pilot Camdon Rod I’d just finished the hyperjump and arrived in the Delta Epsiloni star system when the meteor struck my craft’s main drive section. Fortunately, it was a small meteor, otherwise the ship might have been destroyed and me along with it. Unfortunately, it was large enough and […]

Rescuing a Dragon

The Second Story in the Adventures of the Ambrosial Dragon: A Children’s Fantasy Series If you haven’t done so yet, read the first story The Day a Dragon Came to Live with Us. Grandpa sat in a chair on his back patio pretending to manipulate a drone’s controls while Buddy the Dragon flew high above. […]

First Encounter

Ed left church just as the service ended and headed to the nearest liquor store. He didn’t wait until the ushers came along to release people row by row. He didn’t wait until the Pastor was ready at the door to shake hands with each parishioner as they left. He just left. He needed a […]

Gene Wilder Dead at 83

Not the sort of thing I normally write about here, but Wilder was an incredible comic talent. I became most aware of Wilder through two films, Blazing Saddles (1974) and Young Frankenstein (1974), both directed by Mel Brooks. I suppose the latter film somewhat justifies me posting my thoughts about Wilder here since it was […]

404 Words is Accepting Short Stories for Publication Until September 1st!

So I was on the writing subreddit and I found a link to something called 404 Words which all short story writers should start paying attention to, especially if you are looking to get published with the possibility of winning $200.00 USD. You can find out who they are on their About Us page, but […]