Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Graven: Ebook Edition!



My web novel Graven is now in ebook format!

Graven is a dark superhero adventure. The world has undergone catastrophic changes as the result of superhuman conflict. Entire continents have been lost, a supervillain epidemic threatens America, and the country's greatest superhero team has been killed. To track down the source of these disasters, a band of superhuman bounty hunters must come together and save what remains of the falling world.

You can still read the entire story for free on this blog: http://gravenserial.blogspot.com/

But if you have enjoyed this story and wish to support my work in general, please consider supporting my work by purchasing a copy at Amazon.

Sunday, July 22, 2018

Graven: A Web Serial

I'm pleased to announce my first web serial project: GRAVEN! Despite my many ideas, I have struggled for many years with writing long form heroic fiction stories, be they continuous sagas or episodic adventures. This project is largely an experiment for me to learn how to write a longer story, as well as an exercise in self-discipline. It may be a bit of a rough ride, but I intend to stick it through to the end. If you decide to give it a read, let me know your thoughts, and I hope you'll find something to enjoy along the way.

-----

In 2029, mysterious structures called Doorways appeared across the world. Any human that entered immediately disappeared. Thousands were never seen again, but every once in a while, someone would come back out after a few days, garbed in strange clothing and possessing superhuman powers. Despite the odds, many of the desperate, ambitious, and hopeful surged through the Doorways in search of personal power.

Eleven years have passed, and the world has undergone catastrophic changes as the result of superhuman conflict. Entire continents and civilizations have been lost, a supervillain epidimic threatens those societies that remain, and the world's greatest superhero team has just been destroyed. In the wake of this latest tragedy, the world's first superhuman returns to America, seeking to gather a band of powerful bounty hunters. Together they hope to track down the source of these disasters, and perhaps save what remains of the falling world.

Click here to begin the story!

Tuesday, June 26, 2018

The Wyld Hunt

The Wyld Hunt was one of many post-Old Multiverse series concepts that sort of uniquely evolved through the background of several other setting and series concepts. Many of these characters were either background characters in the supernatural side of various hero settings, or were intended to be the "magic-themed" members of various teams. At some point, they just sort of developed their own continuity independent of whatever other hero stuff was going on, and I realized that didn't really fit in a standard superhero universe.

Ergo, this sort of became my first dedicated urban fantasy/modern fantasy type world, with no connection to a superhero universe proper. Although, rechecking these notes, I see that I still had them be tangentially related to an version of Tabitha Cain universe, which sort of still fits, given that at the time , given there were a couple figures in the Wyld Hunt lore that were part of the Tabitha Cain stories at the time. Eventually, however, I realized I didn't actually want to write a bunch of tedious "monster of the week" short stories, so, like most of my series concepts, this never really got off the ground.

I did, however, use several of these characters in co-writes and forum RPGs, so I can at least say some of these guys got some actual mileage in the written word, unlike a lot of characters I made concepts for, but ended up never using.


BACKSTORY
In the two thousand years since Tabitha Cain forced the Elder Gods to remove much of their influence, as well as most of their creations, from Earth, humanity has moved on. Technology brought power to the masses and the horrible creatures of the night were driven back by increasingly deadlier weapons.  Magic was left behind due its difficult and often impractical learning curve. By the time the later 1800s rolled around, the only authentic practitioners of magic were those who were innately born with magical talent or empowered by accident, and monsters had become virtually extinct. Humanity was on the fast track to a bright future ahead of them, with science as their new beacon. Soon enough, by the mid 1900s, people practically dismissed the supernatural as little more than an archaic notion.

This, however, suited the monsters and mages of the world just fine. Humanity was letting its guard down. Their technology was making them soft and lazy, easy pickings. And though they spread like wildfire across the world, there were always nooks and crannies in which the predatory forces of the supernatural could hide. Some simply tucked themselves away in dark allies and sewers or in the increasingly shrinking wilds. Others insinuated themselves into human society, hiding in plain site.

Thankfully, those with ill intent were not the only ones who retained their supernatural power. Over the decades, empowered champions and defenders rise to protect humanity from the shadows they have forgotten to fear.

Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Apocryphal Earths

The concept of this setting was to consider that most science fiction stories dealing with multiverses almost always show off realities where the changes to history are extremely recent (within a couple centuries at most), and are almost always in regards to differences in human civilization as a result of human actions. That’s interesting and all, but I wondered about a story where, instead of finding other human-inhabited Earths, it turns out the changes across the multiverse were a lot more drastic.
 
 
OUR EARTH, circa 2145 A.D.
Dimensional-crossing experimentation is discovered, and believed to be a much more “practical” means of expanding humanity off-planet, since Faster Than Light technology never developed. Tenuous explorations using probes sent to several alternate universes confirm that habitable versions of Earth do exist, but the typical view of Multiverse Theory involving Infinite Timelines doesn’t seem to hold up. In no other version of Earth thus far found is there any form of humanity, save a couple of worlds where they no longer exist. In fact, most versions of Earth are not even hospitable to Earthly life.
 
If the more traditional idea of alternate timelines are at play, where all known worlds branched off from a prime world at some point in an otherwise similar history, then the divergences across the multiverse seem to have occurred in wildly different eras, which change Earth into what may as well be entirely different planets in these alternate worlds.
 
The Earths found initially are colloquially called: