Sol Crafter's Blog, page 20

4th of July Blog Hop open to everyone [book bundle]

Welcome to my stop on the 4th of July Blog Hop. My name is Harper Kingsley and I will be leading you on this tour through the history of my brain.

First there was “Visions of Blood & Shadow,” my vampire, elf, Other murder story. A young girl is hit by a car, and an uncontrollable snowball of events take place, culminating to the apocalypse. From there, we follow Valerie Pendleton Hardain into “Blood Wine” where he has to get used to his new way of life. And yes, the band playing at the beginning of “Blood Wine” is Ashes & Bones, but no worries. Ashley Valentine has his own story beginning in “Little Boy Blue” and to be concluded in “Residual Blue.”

In the same world as “Visions of Blood & Shadow” is the Julian Duncan series, about my psychic police consultant. Julian even had a cameo in “Visions of Blood & Shadow,” though his first story “The Center” is set before everything. I thought that I could start at the very beginning and go through his whole history. “Cannot Hold” is the next story and should be available in the near future.

After that, I switched gears and fell into the world of “Heroes & Villains.” A love story between an ex-superhero turned supervillain and one of the world’s penultimate superheroes. The love story between Darkstar (Vereint Georges) and Blue Ice (Warrick Reidenger Tobias) is one that makes me really happy. It’s basically the “how they met” as they handle dealing with terrorists and murderers and the unjust way the government controls metahuman criminals. My social discourse thinly veiled as a romance, “Muhahaha!” Not really. It’s more like a romance story between two very confused and stubborn men, from the first time they met (insta hate) right on until they get married in “Heroes & Villains: The Wedding” (which doesn’t need to be read and contains a Mature mm scene).

From romantic metahumans, I turned to the story of an amnesiac girl, Susie Smith, in the prequel to “Supergroup,” my YA superhero series. We follow Susie as she wanders through her own book, trying to figure out who she is, and dealing with the drama of discovering she used to run with heroes in “Pulse of the City.”

About here is when I started publishing my mm stories under Sol Crafter.

I started with “Narcissus,” my series of sci-fi shorts dealing with Ego-Corp and the erotic/romantic/horror aspects of cloning in the future. If your loved one dies, all you have to do is bring a sample to Ego-Corp and in ten months (just like a real baby!) you get your loved one back just the way you remembered. Bodies and minds intact. All of the stories are based on Greek myths, which corresponds to their titles: Narcissus; Orpheus; and Endymion. Features self-love and Mature depictions of mm.

I’m working on the next Ego-Corp stories, “Ganymede” and “Icarus.” They’re each novella length, like “Echo,” my contemporary mm romance about a shy man with a speech impediment falling in love with his boss. People seem to really enjoy this particular story (Goodreads) and that makes me very happy. I am incredibly grateful to everyone that has reviewed because it really helps me to know what kinds of things you all enjoy and what kinds of details you would like to see. Like maybe you wish I would describe the characters more, which is what Wendy asked for when she beta read “Echo,” and I was only too happy to oblige because I could see them in my head.

Anyways, to wrap up my life, we’ve arrived at our current location. Um, I’ve got a finished story “Centrifical” that should be making an appearance, and I’ve got “Fiends” soonish. Oh, and I entered the Fantasy Fiction Contest. So no matter what happens, my short story will be available for you somewhere. I was really pleased with it, and I don’t care what anyone else might say. It was a really good short and it gave me some great ideas for my novel “Nyxti” that I’m writing for Sam Argent, who wanted some mpreg (though it’s not super really gross, I promise). I swear, my brain is building a whole world.

First there’s “Vedran’s Hand,” about Dragon Knight, the man known as Emperor Vedran’s Hand. He is an assassin, a diplomat, and a rogue, though the only person he cares for in the world is Vedran Malvorta. They have been companions and friends since childhood, which is why Vedran gives Dragon the task of overseeing the distribution of passes to see a duel to the death. Oh, and there’s some dangerous plots and machinations happening in the background.

After “Vedran’s Hand,” the events in “Black Hood” and “Nyxti” take place. And I think maybe my short story fits somewhere between “Black Hood” and “Nyxti” in the timeline.

 

Anyways, thanks for joining me on this journey through my writing life.

 

Leave a comment below and you’ll be entered to win 1 of 4 ebook bundles containing copies of: “Visions of Blood & Shadow,” “Heroes & Villains,” “Pulse of the City,” and “Echo.”

So you could win what I think is a really awesome prize. Four books from four different periods of my life given out to four people for entering an American blog hop celebrating the 4th.

It’s totally mind-bottling [sic].

Anyways, enjoy the rest of the hop. And happy Fourth!

 

Superhumans

I love metahuman stories. I’ve written several of them and will continue to write many more. So you can probably tell that I’m a big fan of comics and movies featuring superheroes and supervillains. I love watching amazing things and seeing splashy pictures.

But when I write them, I like to find out the secrets that no one else knows. Slice of life segments of heroes and villains, explaining why they do some of the crazy things they do. Because when you’re just looking at some guy, you don’t get the ideas running through his head. You just see the peerless hero or the cackling madman.

You don’t see the guy that has to go buy milk, but has to hide the fact that he’s got one giant gorilla arm under a trench coat. You don’t see someone like Sunfire [Supergroup] washing dishes and doing his own laundry. You don’t see the feelings that run through a superhero like Blue Ice when he realizes he loves a supervillain.

There’s something so awesome about reading a superhero novel. And there’s something awesome about writing one too.

 

I really like this “Patriot” trailer from Bleeding Cool Ink, so I thought I’d share this too.

This is one comic I can’t wait to read. The premise is so good, and if it’s done right it can be so good.

RAW story: Shine 04

Title: Beta Test 01

Subtitle: Bitches got me rolling

Author: Harper Kingsley

Rating: teen +

POV: First person

.Bitches got me rolling.

Working for Damien Storm wasn’t the debacle I’d halfway feared it would be.

All I had to do was take packages to wherever he told me to and deliver them to their new owners. I could have been working for UPS and I was getting paid good money to boot. Awesome.

The packages were all the same size and shape, fitting easily between my two hands like a bird’s nest. They were all carefully wrapped so not even a single loose fold was showing, not that I was tempted to look inside.

I may have a hyperaware sense of curiosity, but I’m not stupid. I knew what I was carrying had to be something important and probably illegal, so just knowing what was inside could probably see me serving some hard time. So I was better off not knowing for sure, that way I could pass the LieTests.

I ended up traveling all over the city and it kind of sucked, but really wasn’t so bad because I would stop and eat lunch or dinner after I made my deliveries, so I got to try all kinds of food. My stomach had never been so happy and my wallet had never been so flush with cash.

I felt like my life was looking up and I was grateful to Curtis for being so cool in helping to get me a job. He really was a good friend and I’d have to remind myself of that later, in those moments when I was being a completely selfish fuck and treating everyone in the world like scumbags and losers.

Curtis had won himself an exemption in having to deal with my darker moods. Because coming down to it, awesome was awesome, and he was awesome.

With my first money, I bought myself some more clothes. I’d been wearing the same outfit for weeks and I was already tired of it. I also grabbed myself a full shower kit to keep the stink down and a pair of cheap Knucklebusters to use just in case.

Being the mule for illegal goods meant there was a chance someone was going to try to steal from me at some point. I wanted to be ready, and literally being able to bust their chops was a good leg up.

Three months into my job and I’d moved out of Curtis’ place and into a closet of my own and had even bought a bed and some secondhand furniture. I  was really starting to feel that my life was on a total upswing. There was hope just over the horizon and everything was going to be all right.

So about then, Damien told me to take Tiny — the big black guy that usually handled Damien’s personal security — and go make a delivery to a real sleazebag neighborhood. Tiny was to watch my back so I didn’t end up on a slab in the morgue.

I didn’t argue. Because if Damien was that worried about my safety, then there was a more than good chance I was going to be looking at trouble. Trouble that might be averted by having a hulk like Tiny around.

“You cool with this?” I asked him as we hoofed it up G-street.

He flashed me a look that made me want to cringe in shame. “It’s my job.”

“All right, all right.”

We started off, crossing the street toward our building of choice and I was wearing my Knucklebusters and I didn’t even give a fuck. If anyone tried to kill me I was going to bust their jaw. We were on G-street and there was nothing sacred or safe.

So it wasn’t much of a surprise when we were stopped before we could get into the building. A big dude with a wicked sneer and five buddies lurking in the shadows of the alley, waiting to see what was up.

“What’s you deal?” I asked, cocking my head.

“I’m thinking you’ve got something that belongs to me,” he said in the weirdest accent I’d ever heard. It was kind of whistly-clicky and I had to strain to understand what he was saying, which made me instantly hate him.

“And what’s that?” I asked. Tiny was standing at my back, letting me handle the talking while he kept his eyes on the toughs too scared to approach.

“You deliver for the King. Give me the package,” the guy ordered.

There was no thinking involved. Just pure spite moving through my body and making my eyes squint dangerously. I could have stopped it, called up all my anger management tricks, but I didn’t. Sometimes it just felt too good letting go.

I sneered at him. “You look like an old man’s vagina.”

He gave me a “WTF?” look, but before he could say anything I punched him in his face. He went right down and I couldn’t help my grin. There’s something so awesome about bringing the hurt on. He’d be spitting up teeth once he woke up and there was a good chance he’d be wearing the mark of my Knucklebusters for a long time.

I turned my glare on the rest of the goons, but they were busy looking off in other directions. I may be a skinny guy, but obviously I was tougher than they’d been expecting, and with Tiny to bring on the pain, we just weren’t worth attacking, not by that bunch of lowlifes.

I turned to Tiny. “Let’s go. We got a delivery to make.”

He gave me a long look, then shrugged. “All right.”

.

Damien was a little pissed, but not too bad. In the end, he said “You know how to handle yourself. It’s good I don’t have to worry.”

I just said “Okay.”

And I didn’t mention how nice it had felt to hit that guy, to just jab-punch him a good one and see the results of my “thunder punch,” but that was the kind of thing I’d learned not to say to people because they got all uncomfortable.

And I know that it’s wrong, how good it feels to me when I knock someone down and don’t give them the chance to get up. It was the kind of thing I’d spent my whole life trying to learn not to do. But it lurks there inside me, the violence that wants to get out. But that’s my secret as long as I can keep it. Because I’d learned how to pretend to be like other people.

“You got anymore work for me today?” I asked.

He smiled with all those teeth and my hand itched.

RAW story: Shine 03

Title: Beta Test 01

Subtitle: Into which job opportunities enter my life

Author: Harper Kingsley

Rating: teen +

POV: First person

.Into which job opportunities enter my life.

There’s only so long that you can surf on someone’s couch before they either tell you to get a job or get the fuck out.

Curtis lasted for two weeks, which was four days longer than I’d thought he’d last.

“I have no job skills. I have bad credit. I dropped out of high school, so I have no education.” I thumped my head against the table. “Who’s going to give me a job? I’m fucked, man.”

“How have you been living this whole time?” Curtis asked mock-patiently. He was sitting across from me at the diner table, the ravages of a hamburger and French fries ruining the plate in front of him. He’d managed to get ketchup everywhere. It was like splatters of blood.

I sighed and raised my head, chewing on my lip. “I get money from a trust my parents set up for me before they died. It’s just enough to pay my rent with a little — a very little — left over. But I’ve already spent my money for the month and there’s no way I’d be able to rebuy all my stuff anyway. And to get a new place I’d need security deposit money and all that.”

Curtis sighed. “It does sound like you’re pretty close to fucked.” He slurped loudly at his soda. “I don’t mind you staying with me until you get yourself back on your feet, but you need to get some money rolling in.”

No duh, I barely didn’t say.

“I know a guy,” Curtis said slowly. “He’s looking for some reliable people that know how to keep their mouths shut.”

“I can do that,” I said excitedly, sitting up.

“It’s…” Curtis leaned forward very seriously, his voice lowering until I could barely hear him. “The job is pretty shady. If you go into this… it’s some very serious business.”

“Dude, I need the money. I’m in.” I gave him my most serious look, which was then ruined by my stomach rumbling loudly. I hadn’t eaten anything all day and no matter how disgusting his leftover food looked, it was food and I was starving.

Curtis sighed. “I’ll give you the guy’s address and I’ll call him to give him a heads up.” He waved his hand at the little blond waitress flouncing by in her tiny denim shorts. “Until then, order something to eat.”

I opened my mouth to protest, “I…”

He pointed at my nose, making me snap my mouth shut. “Be quiet. I’ll pay for your food, so stop acting like a bitch. You can pay me back later when you’re rich.”

“Okay,” I said meekly. There’s always something so humiliating about having to let someone help me out, but there wasn’t a whole lot I could do about it now. I’m poor. I’m hopeless. I’m about an inch away from driving right over the edge.

So what was the big drama about letting Curtis buy me a burger?

——

The address Curtis sent me to was a third-floor walk-up that gave me a bit of a danger vibe. I had a definite sense that I was about to enter a career in crime and I should have probably felt bad about it or something.

Honestly, I don’t give a damn. i need the money and I’m going to get the money. That’s just the way the world shakes itself out.

Drawing in a deep breath, I pulled open the lobby doors and strode inside, trying to pretend that I belonged. I could feel eyes passing over my skin, but I just hunched my shoulders and ignored all those assholes that just couldn’t mind their own business.

There was no elevator, so I took the stairs two at a time just because.

It was super hot in the stairwell and every impulse burning through my brain urged me to get back out into the open, back into the places where I could breathe. There was a faint buzzing in my ears and I had to wonder if all the heat was going to make me throw up or something equally embarrassing.

God but I hate the heat.

I burst out of the stairwell like I was escaping the womb. It wouldn’t have been such a great surprise to look back and see that I was trailing blood and amniotic fluid. I drew in great big gasps of breath and shook my head back and forth like a dog, trying to clear my mind of disturbing imagery and the awfulness of having been trapped, even if it was just in my own mind.

Once I was in the hallway, my heartbeat slowed down and I felt calmer and less like I was about to start screaming like a maniac. I glanced down at my hand where I’d written the address and walked until I found the right door.

I stood there for several long minutes just getting up my energy before I was able to ring the doorbell. Which sounded like a high-pitched scream.

Almost immediately the door was jerked partway open and I caught a view of half of a big black guy’s face. “Yeah?”

I licked my lips, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “Hey, yeah, dude, uh, I’m Shine. I’m supposed to see a dude.”

The guy pursed his lips, his eyes flowing up and down my body as he tried to judge whether I was telling the truth. Finally he released the bolt and pulled the door open. I couldn’t help a squirm of fear when I caught a good look at him. He was at least two feet taller than me and was three times as wide with a thick layer of fat over powerful muscles.

“Well? Are you going to get your ass in here?” he demanded.

“Oh, yeah, right.” I tried not to brush against any part of him as I went inside an apartment that smelled like weed and day old booze. There was a mishmash of people arrayed around the living room, with a couple doing something at a small table with their backs to the room. Some dangerous looking guys were sitting on the couch in front of the TV playing video games and drinking booze. They didn’t glance up at me, but I knew I had their attention and if I cause any trouble I’d probably be dead.

“Who are you?” A white guy with red dreads demanded from the black leather recliner. He was wearing a large white tee shirt and blue jeans and there were about twenty dozen black bands jangling on his wrist as he raised his hand to his mouth and took a big toke, smoke swirling around his head like the face of the devil.

“I’m Shine,” I said, trying to keep my spine straight. My eyes wanted to flick to everyone else in the room and away. There was a sickening churn going through my stomach and I suddenly felt like I had to pee.

I’m okay once I know what I’m supposed to do, but it’s the unknowing that drives me to the brink of crazy. I have a thing for rules and routines and standing in front of a guy about ready to beg for a job was messing me all up.

“Full name,” he demanded, flashing me a pair of snake-eyes. I’d never seen someone with a real life EyeJob before and it was pretty creepy, those slit-eyed pupils in an otherwise human face.

I wanted to mutter it so no one else could hear, but there was no way I was getting a job if I acted like a pussy. “Sunshine Moon Beam.”

I braced myself for the mockery and I wasn’t disappointed.

His laugh was a rich deep sound so much louder than the laughs of the rest of his crew, but they were all laughing at me. Humiliation burned my cheeks and somewhere in my brain there was a sudden bright rush of hatred I hurriedly controlled. I needed a job from this guy, and letting myself go bonzo on him wasn’t going to get me very far. Especially if his guys just turned around and killed me.

“What kind of name is that?” he asked once he’d regained control.

I shrugged. “My parents thought they were hippies. Since our last name is ‘Beam,’ they thought they were being clever or something.”

“You sound bitter,” he said.

“Yeah, maybe a little. They got to be cool for five minutes and I was left with a funny name for the rest of my life.” My hands twitched to go into the safety of my pockets, but I stopped myself. There was no room to be a weirdo, not right now. “I just go by Shine.”

He grunted. “All right. Good enough. You’re hired.”

I was shocked. “What?”

He laughed. “Curtis called me and got you the job already. He said you’ve got anxiety issues and shit so you’d be bad for an interview, but you didn’t do so bad. You’re hired.”

“Oh, wow.” I huffed a disbelieving laugh. “Thanks, uh, sir.?”

“Did you hear him boys?” He turned his head toward the other guys. “He called me ‘sir.’ That’s the sign of a good upbringing.” He looked back at me. “My name is Damien Storm. You can call me Damien.”

I fought to keep my face still. What a lame fucking name, obviously a fake. Who did he think he was kidding, picking something out of a romance novel? I said aloud, “Thank you for the job Damien. What exactly am I supposed to do?”

He smiled at me and I fought not to notice that he had an awful lot of teeth. It looked like he’d had more done than an EyeJob, though I’d never met an animal with so many pearly whites.

“All you’ve gotta do is deliver a few packages for me, no questions asked, no peeking. It’s not that hard.” His eyes were serious, assessing me for my worth. “Do you think you can do something like that?”

“Uh, yeah,” I said, nodding my head. “I can do that. I’m not a very curious person at all.”

“Good. Good.” He bobbed his head up and down as though hearing some silent music. “I think we’re going to have a great relationship. Very workmanlike and solid. You will be my new go-to guy, at least, if Curtis is to be believed. He seems to think you hung the moon and pissed on Jesus.”

I didn’t know how to respond, though inside I thought I heard a voice mouth a disbelieving “Wow.” I mean, what do you even say in response to something like that? I did the only thing I could do. I completely ignored the way he’d phrased it and focused on the main idea.

“I promise to do a good job,” I said fervently, nodding my head to show I was honest and trustworthy. Because I really need the money and I could put up with a lot as long as I was being paid.

“Fire,” he agreed, like that was supposed to mean something to me.

I just nodded and smiled. I was no longer unemployed.

RAW story: My brain goes to strange places. This couch smells like cat pee.

Title: Beta Test 01

Author: Harper Kingsley

Rating: teen +

POV: First person

Summary: In which there is a stinky couch. We meet the ubiquitous “Curtis.” And nothing really happens.

I’m not the nicest person around, I know that. It makes having friends really difficult, but I have at least two that I know of.

Curtis is a guy with a crazy amount of acne and this weird hunched shoulder thing. You can tell that something is going on beneath his shirt and you kind of want to see it, but you really kind of don’t either. Still, my eyes are always drawn to the cloth covering his shoulder and I have to wonder how everything’s put together there under his skin.

He’s caught me looking several times, but he’s never said anything. Which makes him cool people in my book.

I know I have some serious issues, mental shit and whatever. Who cares, right?

“You can stay here for as long as you want.” Curtis has a really skinny chest, so it’s always a surprise to hear that deep voice come out of it. He could give the Chocolate Rain guy a run for the money.

“Thanks,” I said, sitting on the edge of the couch. He’d made it up into a pseudo-bed with a sheet, pillow and blanket, but I still couldn’t help missing my bed. My nice, comfortable bed that had followed me around all the times I’d moved and that I’d slept in since I was ten years old.

I felt like I wanted to cry again, but I swallowed it back down. What good would crying do? My stuff would still be all burned up and I would still be homeless and I would still be poor and it just was what it was. Get over it, move on. You’re a homeless vagabond now.

I looked up at him. “Do you think I could borrow something to wear from you and maybe use your shower? I stink like fire.” And sweat and despair, but we don’t have to go into that.

“Oh, yeah, sure,” he said. heading back down the short hallway to his room. I heard the sound of drawers opening and things clattering around, then he was back with a bundle of cloth in his hands. “Here you go. Sorry they’re not much, but they’re about the only thing I’ve got that will fit you.”

So I’m short, fuck you very much. “Thank you.”

He gestured toward the bathroom. “Towels are on the shelf. Help yourself to whatever you need. I’m going to bed.”

“Thanks,” I said again, then couldn’t help feeling stupidly forlorn when he went into his room and closed the door.

It’s dumb that I didn’t want to be alone. Just because everything in my life was falling apart and there was nothing I could do to fix it. Fuck that noise.

I went into the bathroom and fumbled around for a while brushing my teeth and turning on the shower, then I was under the spray and it was probably the nicest thing that had happened to me all day. I hadn’t even gotten to eat my Subway sandwich, since someone had managed to step on it during the whole “Watching my life go up in smoke” thing. And it had looked like a really good sub too, all chicken and spinach and cheese with just enough tomato and cucumber.

I threw my head back and let the water run down my face, and maybe I cried a little, but who knows. Sometimes I think I’m doing one thing when I’m really doing something completely different. Hitting when I should be comforting, crying when I should be laughing, or smiling when I really wanted to kill people.

I am an enigma wrapped up in a puzzle and there were some days—most days—when I couldn’t even figure my own self out.

Curtis had this really stinky shampoo, so I only used a little bit before quickly rinsing it out of my short hair. At least my scalp was clean.

When I’d gotten out and tried off with one of his threadbare towels, I found that he’d given me a large black tee shirt and a pair of black and red plaid shorts. I looked like I was a heavy metal golfer or something, which might have been kind of funny if I wasn’t currently losing my mind.

I glanced at myself in the steamy mirror and was mildly shocked by my own wide-eyed stare. My brown hair was standing up in crazy tufts around my head and my skin looked really pale and kind of grayish. I looked like I’d just gotten a really huge shock or something, or like I was about to go on a murderous rampage. I definitely didn’t look like I was on the right side of sane. Not that I ever do.

“It’s going to be all right,” I told my reflection, who in turn gave me a “Who are you trying to fool look?” that made me want to punch him in the face. But I don’t do that kind of thing anymore, not since that one time.

Getting glass out of your knuckles is a misery, one I don’t want to have to go through again. Because even after all the glass is gone, it still feels like there’s broken shards shoved in under the surface of the skin and that feeling just lingers and lingers and lingers.

I clicked off the light behind me as I left the bathroom and padded back into Curtis’ rather delapitated living room. I’m sorry, but the place looks like a drug den or something, and knowing Curtis, it probably doubled up as one whenever I’m not around.

I turned off the living room light and settled on the couch, trying to ignore all the sounds of a strange apartment.

I closed my eyes and tried to sleep. I tried to keep my breathing gentle and deep, but having my face so close to the couch I couldn’t help noticing the distracting stink of what might have been cat pee.  Faint at first, then stronger and stronger until it was the only thing I could smell.

My whole world was filled with the smell of stinky cat urine.

It must have been a metaphor for something.

Groaning quietly, I brought my arm up over my face and forced myself to sleep.

I tried to focus on the smell of my own clean skin, but all night long and even in my dreams I kept getting a whiff of cat pee. God, but I hated it.

I especially hated the thought that Curtis was about as anti-cat as a man could be. He’d never even owned one. Which made me have to wonder how a cat could have pissed all over his couch.

Rewriting a story

Wrote these tweets, got to thinking.

I look at old stuff I’ve written and I can see a definite improvement between then and now. But does that mean I should change things?

— Harper Kingsley (@HarperKingsley0) June 27, 2012

 

I’m not talking about simple edits either. I’m talking about ripping the guts out and rearranging things. Rewriting history

— Harper Kingsley (@HarperKingsley0) June 27, 2012

 

If  I decide to completely rewrite part of a story, what should I do about the original? If I completely change the end of a story, what responsibility do I have to people that read the first version? It’s not currently something I’m doing now, but I can possibly see me wanting to do it in a few years if my writing style keeps evolving.

Both versions would have to be made available because there’s always someone that loves the original more. There’s nothing so painful as re-reading a beloved story and find out you’ve gotten hold of the “Special Edition.” Which makes me wonder if George Lucas ever stops to think about what he’s doing before he changes Star Wars again. Is there ever going to be a time when he tells himself “No, that’s enough” and just stops?

Anyways, I’m currently reworking a story I wrote a long ass time ago. I love the idea of such a crazy sewer rat kind of future. Unfortunately, I didn’t have very much skill at writing when I penned it. There was some beautiful imagery, but it was mostly written in a truly crap style. The characters need a bit more development and some of the stuff is very Mary Sue. But I can fix that!

Picture it: Dystopian future where everything’s dark and grim. It’s like the whole world was taken over by Gotham — the Tim Buron version of Gotham. Dark, but not too depressing, with people wiling away their days and hoping the future is going to be better.

There are gangs everywhere and violence and it’s just the way things are.

One of the gangs is the WoD led by a beautiful girl with the nickname “Angel of Death.” Her teenaged followers are a band of murderous misfits that run their section of The City with an iron fist. They take no prisoners, they are an army, and in the darkest of times they are a beacon of light.

Yeah, so I’m trying to make it into something readable. I hope it goes well because it’s a story I really want to share.

~Pax

RAW Story: My brain goes to strange places. Sometimes I go there too.

Title: Beta Test 01

Author: Harper Kingsley

Rating: teen+

POV: First person

This story is being written in the Raw as it were. No editing, no beta’ing, nothing. Straight from my brain to you.

Feel free not to read, it’s not mandatory

I just thought it would be cool to find out how I would respond to the challenge of writing straight onto the screen and straight out into the world. And of course I will then edit everything and make changes and do all that magic stuff like betas, back story, and writing all the things I’m bound to skip in my rush.

This is my beta test. Enjoy.

There are times when my brain seems to be processing so fast that I just can’t keep up. So much is going on and things are moving so fast that even as I’m screaming “Slow down!” there’s not a whole lot I can do about it. I just have to keep on running while I’m hanging outside a car door with my sneakers melting off against the asphalt.

There are so many things I want to do, so many people I want to be. And in those moments of latent insanity, or maybe it’s blatant insanity, who knows. I’m not a scientist or nothing. I’m just one man living out my life the way I want to live it and never mind that I get confused when I’m trying to make change. And who cares that sometimes I talk so fast my words all slur together into one word. What’s the big deal? It’s just the way I am.

“I yam what I yam,” as Popeye would say.

So was it so entirely weird that when I met my soul mate I totally flubbed it?

Stuttering and mumbling and so jittery that I couldn’t even get the money out of my pocket to pay for my sandwich. I just stood there staring like an idiot and I could have shot myself in the head.

Then the moment was done and I was standing there alone, one hand shoved in my pocket like a moron, looking like I was copping a feel on myself. How stupid is that?

The guy behind the Subway counter gave me a pitying look, but at least he didn’t say anything about it. I just hunched my shoulders and pretended like nothing had even happened. And once I’d paid and gotten my food I was practically running out the door, trying to get away from what had to have been a mocking glance.

Everyone is always laughing at me. Their eyes are like staring birds pecking their way into my brain.

I left the restaurant and ran down the street, my jacket flapping around me as I dodged my way across the parking lot. I nearly got hit by a little red Beetle, but I just gave the girl a nasty face and ran on.

The sun was pounding down on the top of my head and everything looked so bright, the buildings looking tired and worn. I could nearly feel the heat rising up through the bottoms of my shoes.

It hadn’t seemed like it was going to be so bright this morning, but it looked like the heat was coming on early. It had to be a cool 90-degrees already and it was only ten o’clock. It made me wish I could go back in time and change into shorts and a tee shirt, but I was stuck with my jacket and jeans.

Squinting my eyes, I rushed across the street to the other side. There wasn’t very much traffic, but most of the drivers were old and there was a chance I could still be splattered.

Pausing on the sidewalk, I set the bag holding my sandwich on the ground and quickly shrugged out of my jacket. I held it for a moment, wondering what I was supposed to do with it. Finally, I just shrugged and tied it around my waist.

Who cared what the world thought. It was too hot to have it hanging from my arms.

Grabbing up my sandwich, I started walking the five blocks home. My shirt was already sticking to my back unpleasantly and I was worried that I was already starting to stink.

It was actually a very beautiful day. The bright light with just the faintest of breezes brushing against my skin. I closed my eyes occasionally and tilted my face back, liking the warmth against my eyelids. Everything look red behind the hoods of flesh.

I could hear my sneakers slapping against the cement and it was the closest to happy I’d been in a long time. I wished I’d brought my music player, but there was no room for regret in the midst of such personal contentment.

I moved in a bubble of silence, away entirely from the rest of the world and all the people in it.

My happiness was broken when I reached my apartment complex and saw smoke rising above the tops of the buildings. There was the sound of fire engines and as I cam around from the back I felt my stomach drop.

All the noise and rush-rush-rush was happening in front of my building.In my building, I found when I got close.

“Wh… what?” I asked loudly, joining the amassing throng of spectators. My neighbors that I couldn’t even recognize on sight. Dozens and dozens of other human stink animals all standing together on the crushed green grass.

A woman in a pink shirt turned to face me, her face twisting in lines of regret. I vaguely recognized her, had spoken to here on occasion even. “That’s your building, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “What happened?”

She shrugged. “The alarm just started going off and we all came out.”

I stood there watching the firefighters running around and there was lots of hoses sounding and things happening and I just kind of wanted to throw up. There was a good chance that everything I owned in the entire world had just been burnt to a crisp or was right now being soaked with gushes of water.

Tears burned the backs of my eyes and my hands were clenched into tight fists at my side as I just stood there and breathed. Sweat was beading from every single one of my pores and I drew rasping breaths of the dry air into my mouth.

The world was moving quick-quick around me and there was nothing I could do about that. I just watched everything happened and did nothing because there was nothing I could do.

 

Listening to:

“Ironic Diatribe: Tired” by Sol Crafter [short story, mm YA drama]

Title: Tired

Author: Sol Crafter

Series: Ironic Diatribe — Four childhood friends and their families as they battle the horrors of teenager-hood and life.

Genre: mm YA drama

Word count: 1330 words

Rating: teen

Summary: All the reasons not to say a single word.

IRONIC DIATRIBE: TIRED

by Sol Crafter

 

He had never really thought about it before, but his love for Brian was always just kind of there. Some might have confused it for hero worship, but as the years passed, it didn’t fade away into plain friendship, but grew into something more, an inexplicable driving need to be as close to Brian as possible.

They had been friends since they were babies, and it was pretty much assumed that they would stay friends forever. They’d promised and they’d even made themselves blood brothers that one time. But Eddie wasn’t a hundred percent sure that their friendship would last if he told Brian what he really felt for him.

The realization of what he felt about Brian had started off innocuously enough with a conversation between him and Brian’s girlfriend, Haley.

“You know, he always talks about you,” she said.

“Oh yeah?” He took a big bite out of his sandwich, not even bothering to look up from his comic book. He’d been brown bagging it for most of the month, ever since he got a look at the scheduled school lunch list. It had turned his stomach and made his allergies flare in psychosomatic readiness.

“Whenever we’re together, it’s always ‘Eddie said this,’ or ‘Eddie said that.’ It’s kind of annoying.” Haley was stabbing at her school lunch so hard her plastic fork was bending nearly in half. Her brown bangs were swept to one side while the rest of her long hair was caught up in a high ponytail, the large red poof jiggling every time she moved her head. She was really very pretty with big blue eyes and clear skin he couldn’t help envying from behind his freckly mess.

You’re kind of annoying, he thought, though he managed not to say it, barely. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. I think you guys shouldn’t hang out so much together for a while,” she said. “People are starting to talk.”

He glanced up at her through the lenses of his glasses and the fringe of hair that fell across his forehead. “About what?”

“About how you’re really his boyfriend.” She crossed her arms over her chest and slumped backward a little in her chair. “I know he loves me, but still… there’s a lot of rumors, you know? It kind of makes me have to wonder.”

Eddie felt his heart begin to pound. No way, no f’ing way. “You’re lying,” he said.

“Nuh uh,” Haley said. “Do you think I like it that everyone thinks I broke up the ‘Wonder Duo?’ You guys were like the idols of all the gay kids in the school, being so open with your relationship and everything, or at least, that’s what everyone thinks. Now I’m the bitch that broke you guys up, and everyone hates me. It sucks mass ass.”

“How can we be a gay couple when we’re not even gay?” Eddie asked, forcing his eyes back down on his comic book. He didn’t want to look at her with her perfect prettiness. She was just the kind of girl that he had always thought Brian would have—should have. It always hurt to look straight at her, and he didn’t know why.

“I have no idea, but I’m tired of being the bad guy,” she said. “Me and Brian are happy. We want to stay happy. So why don’t you just back off for a while, huh? Just let things cool off and people will get over the whole thinking you guys are gay thing and realize that you’ve always just been friends. Back off a little. It’s the best thing you can do for Brian.”

Feeling it mush between his fingers, Eddie saw that he had crushed his sandwich in his hands. “I don’t want to talk to you anymore,” he said, standing up. He tossed his ruined sandwich into the paper bag, grabbed his comic book, and walked away.

He really didn’t like Haley, especially when what she had said made sense.

.

Lying in his bed that night, Eddie couldn’t force himself to sleep. He just felt like he’d been slugged hard in the stomach. It was hard even to breathe.

The realization that he was in love with his best friend was slamming its way into his brain, and he didn’t like it.

For as long as he could remember, he had always believed that Brian was the best person in his life. Brian was just so strong and brave and smart and clever and…

“Oh God,” he whispered, “I am so gay.”

The realization didn’t feel as much of a shock as he thought it should be. Instead, if felt more like an emotional “Oh duh.”

On some level he had always kind of known that he was different from everyone else, so being gay was just a part of who he was and he could accept that. What he couldn’t accept was that his weirdness might cause trouble for Brian, shining, wonderful Brian.

I won’t say a word to him, he thought. I’ll pretend everything is the same as always and he’ll never have to know.

Filled with a new resolution, he decided that he was going to distance himself a little from Brian.

Haley was a bitch, but she had been right. If there were rumors about him and Brian, then something had to be done because Brian didn’t need that kind of trouble in his life. He deserved better.

.

The next week, sitting with Drew and Nancy at their usual table, Eddie resolutely kept his eyes from crossing the crowded room to focus on Brian like they wanted to. He was playing it cool, letting their friendship fade a little to a more normal standard. It was for Brian’s own good.

Besides, it hadn’t been his idea that Brian not sit with them at lunch anymore. Haley had been the one to drag Brian off to her table and her friends, and Brian hadn’t put up any kind of fight, though the look he’d given Eddie as he was led away had almost… but no. Brian was happy now, with Haley and her clique, and Eddie wasn’t going to do anything to ruin it for him.

The feelings he had for Brian didn’t mean anything and he couldn’t let them be the center of his whole world. Brian was his best friend, and he was straight, which meant that if he said anything, it would just screw up everything, and he wasn’t going to do that.

Sighing heavily, Eddie turned back to Drew and Nancy and their roundabout conversation that was spoken in what he liked to term “Twinspeak,” which basically meant that they were the only ones that could understand their babble. Usually when they fell into Twinspeak, he and Brian would joke and have their own stuff to talk about, but he was alone now.

He picked at his sandwich with his fingers, leaving crumbs and bits of meat and cheese all over his part of the table. He just felt so tired all of a sudden. Tired and lonely without his best friend.

* * *

Across the cafeteria, Brian watched Eddie and wondered why Eddie didn’t want to be his friend anymore. It hurt so bad not to have Eddie to talk to whenever he wanted, and, well, Haley was nice and everything, but she was just his girlfriend, she wasn’t his best friend, not like Eddie had always been.

He just couldn’t understand what was happening. For some reason Eddie didn’t want to talk to him anymore or hang out. And whenever he tried to talk to him, Eddie got this distant look in his eye and would eventually just turn away. He just couldn’t understand it.

Sighing heavily, Brian turned back to Chris and Tina, Haley’s friends, and tried to ignore the weight of his girlfriend leaning on his arm, cuddling against him. He just felt so tired all of a sudden.

=THE END==

Re: The Faculty [movie]

So this is one of those teen movies where a bunch of kids fight the alien invasion by killing people and doing drugs. Basically, it’s high school.

Btw, this movie has a crazy number of famous actors in it — Elijah Wood, Josh Hartnett, Jordana Brewster, Clea DuVall, Shawn Hatosy, Salma Hayek, Famke Janssen, Christopher McDonald, Bebe Neuwirth, Robert Patrick, Usher, and Jon Stewart.

*spoiler alert* Elijah Wood is Casey Connor, a nerdy kid being bullied. At the very beginning, he’s grabbed by his arms and legs by a bunch of jocks and slammed crotch first into the flag pole. So at the end of the movie, I hate the fact that Casey doesn’t use his newfound popularity to help that poor kid getting his ass kicked. He was totally hating life while he was being bullied, but he doesn’t do anything to help some other poor shmoe? Forget that you just saved the world or whatever, you’ve lost a ton of cred with me.

Anyways, watching this movie, I like to imagine what would have happened if it turned out they were just hallucinating the alien invasion and they went on a drug-fueled killing spree. It’s like, what if the Matrix isn’t real, and Neo is just some crackpot with a bunch of machine guns running around in too much leather.

Also, the ending was weak because in real life, they totally would have blamed those kids for everything during the clean up, and there would have been a massive government cover up. Maybe the guys who came up with “The Crazies” saw this movie.

Here’s clippies:

Upcoming Revisions and Rundowns

THE RED BEAD — So what the hell is this? Well, I watched “The Black Donnellys,” “Hatfields & McCoys” and “The Sopranos” and my little brain started percolating. Then I read the bios of a couple of guys named John Brisker and Jack Johnson, and of course I’m completely in love with “Daron’s Guitar Chronicles.”

All that being said, I was struck by a deluge of awesome and the character of Anselm “Devil Anse” Lotham came into being along with the rest of his crazy ass family.

The free webserial follows the life of Anse, either through his own short introspection pieces, or through his top enforcer Lee Shuman. Starts at the very beginning when they’re not famous, and follows through to all the stuff with Interpol and the bodies chopped up in the bay.

I started a page just for The Red Bead, and it’s here at http://altredes.wordpress.com so you can just follow the story with none of the other shenanigans that go on here

 

UPCOMING REVISIONS — Because sometimes they need to happen.

So I love to read and there have been some stories that have completely irked my every sensibility. Which means that I understand that sometimes you read a story and it just doesn’t work for you or basically anyone else… and if the majority of people say a story doesn’t work, well, then a story doesn’t work.

Because of things I’ve inferred from reviews and ratings and from my own feelings upon rereading certain of my stories, I’ve made the decision to make some revamps. Because that’s the best part of epublishing — I can make the changes that need to be made and it doesn’t cost me a million dollars to do it.

SHAME — This story has always been fairly uncomfortable to me. It basically just presses every single one of my creep buttons at one time. I wrote it in a minimalist style that gave everything a kind of cold feel. And I’m not going to change that.

The story of “Shame” is a very unpleasant one and there’s no way I would ever try to sugar coat the events. I also would never want to romanticize what happened and the story was meant to feel kind of grimy, without going too far into perversion.

That being said, I’m at work on “Fierce” and “Conflagration,” two sister stories that I’ll be adding to “Shame.” They’ll just be addons to the ebook and they take everything into a new direction. So the same ebook on Amazon and Smashwords will have a new revision and hopefully I’ll be happier with the way the story went without having to do the horrible turn I was going to give “From Diamond to Coal” where alterna-Simon meets canon Simon and it’s a complete and utter headsuck. I decided to go in a whole other direction with the Simon Peter’s AU story and I’ve been writing and revising on it.

“Fierce” is Simon getting past what happened and we actually get to climb inside his head and feel the things he feels and the colors are bright as he loudly proclaims: “I am not a victim. I was victimized, but I am not a victim.”

“Conflagration” is Simon moving on with his life. And he maybe possibly finds love with an incredibly hot and wonderful man that’s totally not Alan Trent, but a new character.

ERSATZ — Okay, so this one was prompted by the picture I found of just a guy’s torso with a pillow on his lap. I stuck him on a bed and that gave me the ending. Then I had to figure out how he got there and whose room and bed he was defacing with his naked butt cheeks.

I was attempting to write a funny story, but it kind of morphed on me into a bunch of melodramatic fluff. Best friends that don’t know they love each other, but why can’t they just be together with no problem? Well, one dude has a dark past from a sucky childhood and the other has undiagnosed bipolar disorder. What, you didn’t get that from the story? Yeah, neither did anyone else.

And that’s totally my fault. I either stretched a very short story too long, or I took a longer story and crushed all the juice out of it, leaving only the pulp behind with none of the heart.

So I’ll leave the original version in the ebook, but I’ll be adding the revised edition as well.

Now that I’m done dissecting my work, what was the purpose? Well, I just wanted everyone to know that I do listen to the opinions of the people nice enough to read my work.

Also, link porn: