Christopher B. Wright's Blog, page 25

Horeb's Shadow: Chapter 04

Post-Interview

“He didn't do it.” Harold Morris puts his spiral notebook down on his desk and looks out the window, watching Pastor Marks get into his car and rive off.

“Agree.” George Ellers drinks cold coffee out of a cermaic mug with WORLD'S WORST DAD stamped on it. He's divorced, but he gets along with his ex: apparently it was a joke gift. Ellers thinks it's hilarious. “I'd like to know why you think so, though.”

Morris gestures toward his notebook. “nothing adds up with him as the perp....

Horeb's Shadow: Chapter 03

Elijah sits uncomfortably in the straight-backed wooden chair as he stares across the table at the two plainclothes detectives. The room is both too cold and too hot: the hot water convector radiators pop and spit and hiss as they try and fail to heat the room. It's clear they need to be bled, and that they've needed it for a long time. When Eli gets too close, the room is uncomfortably humid and warm, but after a certain point the heat disappears. The humidity remains, however.

Elijah wears...

Horeb's Shadow: Chapter 02

Fullerton Chronicle, Saturday Edition

A local community is in shock as violence strikes the Hillsford Hollow subdivision of Fullerton Heights.

Late Thursday night neighbors reported hearing a disturbance at the home of Elijah and Sarah Marks—the sound of “breaking wood” and then shouts and screams from someone inside. The police were called immediately, and neighbors arrived to provide assistance. Charles Reilly, 47, was one of the neighbors on the scene.

“My wife and I were watching TV,” Reil...

Horeb's Shadow: Chapter 01

First Corinthians, 10:13

“ No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.”

Has any other passage of Scripture been as misunderstood, misused, and misrepresented? Certainly it has also been used for great things—used to bring hope, to give the promise of light to those who could see only darkness, to give resolve to t...

Horeb's Shadow

Although I'm not sure it's still widely celebrated, today is International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day. As a Pixel-Stained Technopeasant, I would like to offer up this fragment for your potential, theoretical enjoyment.

This was my NaNoWriMo project from... 2014, I think. I didn't make the 50K mark (obviously! It's a little over 11K) but I liked the setup enough to think I might do something with it someday.

I still like the setup, and I still might do something with it someday.

Help Desk Turns 20

In 1993 I’d just graduated college and I decided I wanted to do two things: play punk rock music and publish a radical political newspaper or magazine. To do the first I needed a band; to do the second, I needed a printing press.

I had no idea how to actually put a band together. Putting a band together required people skills—while I’m not exactly a recluse, I’m not good at forging alliances. I’d done some solo recording in the past and hoped that would entice like-minded musicians to sort of...

A Rake by Starlight - Chapter 18

WHEREIN Our Hero Must Wrestle With Offers, Refusals, and the Inherent Tensions Between Them

“So,” Grif said, leaving the noisy din of Dyorbid’s behind him as he stepped out onto the walkway, “I think that went rather well.”

Amys fell into step beside him, saying nothing. Cyrus, Ktk, and Morgan followed, Morgan trailing behind as he watched Ktk and Cyrus argue over the merits of the latest Tachyon Induction Drive from Tylaris Drive Mechanics, the ATID 515. Ktk was saying it didn’t see the point...

A Rake by Starlight - Chapter 17

WHEREIN Loyalties are Questioned, and Deception is Practiced with Depressing Regularity

Baron Minerva Tyrelos fumed beneath her respirator mask as she began the long trek back to her palace. It was ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. If Vindh was telling the truth, then somehow he’d managed to stumble onto one of the most explosive secrets in Trade Baron space… by accident. A small-time smuggler had just managed to find one of the most powerful gamepieces that could end—or escalate—one of the most...

Grif Vindh vs. Malcom Reynolds

There have been a number of reviews for Pay Me, Bug! that have compared it to Firefly. I love those reviews, because a) Firefly is awesome, b) I wrote PMB! a year after Firefly’s painfully short-lived run (it came out in 2002, I wrote PMB! in 2003) and yes, the show did leave its mark on me so some comparison is apt, and c) Firefly did a lot of things, story-wise, that I want to do when I write—so being compared to it is a good sign.

(Though I should note that while I was writing PMB! I found...

A Rake by Starlight - Chapter 16

WHEREIN the Business Parter Evaluates the Merits of the Pitch

Baron Minerva Tyrelos was young for a Trade Baron. She wasn’t a girl by any means—in most professions, she would be considered someone with an extensive resume. But politics, as a profession, skewed old by default; with technology capable of extending human life by decades even without the use of age-slowing anagathics, the “default setting” was beginning to be viewed more as a minimum requirement. Most of the other Trade Barons had...