Here’s a select list of some of the stories I’ve had published.
“ffuns” – Pseudopod – Episode 692
I have a spreadsheet where I make notes for short story ideas. I don’t keep up with it nearly as well as I should. Upon revisiting it once after a particularly long period of neglect, I saw a note for a story idea that just said, “Reverse snuff film.” That’s it. I couldn’t remember what else I had planned for the story or how it had even popped into my head, but I felt compelled to make a legitimate story out of it. Turned out to be one of my better works thus far, I think.
Beyond the initial idea of the story, the inspiration for its lead character came from the film Widows (which in turn reminded me of a small part in an unpublished story I’d written around fifteen years ago), but I can’t go into much detail without spoiling a key twist of that film, which I think more people should watch. Additionally, I ended up excising almost all the suggestions of that inspiration anyway. It all got left behind the curtain. I might share more about it at some point down the road.
I’m thankful for this story on multiple levels: it allowed me to merge a horror story with some crime fiction elements, which I’ve been longing to do, and it was my first pro sale. Thanks to Cherrae L. Stuart for the narration.
“TMI” – Devolution Z Magazine – July 2016 issue
When I was very young, my parents let me host a Halloween party, which, of course, meant that they had to put in a lot of the work by putting up decorations and buying atmosphere-establishing music, while I “helped” by mostly being in the way.
The record they bought featured some appropriately haunting music and sound effects. At one point, a man’s voice on the record cried out, “Don’t cross the bridge! Don’t cross the bridge!” Nothing before or after that point in the record made any mention of a bridge, or provided any context for his warning. It came out of nowhere, apropos of nothing, and that made it so much more frightening for me.
One of the earliest short stories I wrote as an adult was based on this single line that stuck in my memory. I remembered one long drive across the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, when a heavy rain reduced visibility, that felt particularly tense, and tried to replicate that feeling in a story. Unfortunately, this was when I was just starting to take writing seriously, so the story wasn’t very good. Since then, I’ve improved and had the fortune of having some stories published, so I decided to try my hand at a haunting bridge-crossing again, this time switching the setting to the Atchafalya Basin Bridge, which my family crossed at least twice a year when I was a kid. I also updated the story to feature a handy, horrifying phone app.
“The Genie and the Inquisitor” – Fantasy Scroll Magazine issue #10
Same old story: man meets genie; genie offers man three wishes; man presses genie for answers that cause the situation to quickly turn ugly. I’d been sitting on this story idea for a long time, even though it isn’t terribly complicated. Nonetheless, I didn’t actually write it until the summer of 2014 when I was out of state visiting relatives. After three or four rewrites and touch-ups, I sent it out into the world, where it promptly found a home at (the now defunct and missed) Fantasy Scroll Mag.
“Giving Grounds” – Arkham Tales issue #8
I know some writers who hate the question of “where do you get your ideas?” I love it, even though sometimes the answer is relatively uninteresting or embarrassing. The idea for “Giving Grounds” sprouted (pun unintended, probably) from a throwaway joke from an episode of Family Guy of all things. I’m not a huge fan of the show, but there was an episode where the family was sent to live in the south in the Witness Protection program. Inside their new home, the son finds a hand inside a jar and says he’s going to plant it outside to see if a human grows. Because I’m a horror writer, my mind immediately latched onto the interesting, grotesque idea of growing a human being through traditional agriculture. And so from a lowbrow animated sitcom, a grim, serious short story was born.
“Miss Branson Calling” – Pseudopod
This is the first story I ever sold that was based on a nightmare. I actually used to work with the lady Miss Branson was based on. An eccentric chain smoking, overall harmless elderly woman who coughed like she had a lagoon in her lungs and had skin that seemed like it might disintegrate at any second. Based on the comments, many of the Pseudopod fans didn’t care much for this one, but I think it’s a solid effort at trying to draw fear from something that’s more melancholy than aggressively terrifying.
Will Erickson over at TooMuchHorrorFiction recently coined the term “Heartbreak Horror,” and I think that term fits this story.
“Thanks For Using Forced Honesty Assassinations” – From the Asylum
Damn shame that From the Asylum is closed, because they housed some excellent stories during the years that they were open. I had been trying to break into their ranks for a while before they finally accepted this flash fiction piece. I really like this story, short as it is. I can’t remember where the idea came from, but I love the ambiguity of the ending.
“Civilized Monsters” – Pseudopod
I received a lot of comments about how graphic this story was, which sort of surprised me. I actually tend to think myself a bit squeamish and don’t think I lingered on any exceedingly gruesome parts here. Could it be that I’m mistaken? Me? Perish the thought. Can’t remember where I got this idea from. If I could go back and touch up some parts here and there I would, but I still like this story, particularly the ending.
