In Search of the Creators Released in a New Fred Patten Anthology

During Anthrocon 2018, FurPlanet released its new anthology, Exploring New Places, that contains my short story, In Search of the Creators. Coupled with 18 other short stories, the theme deals with anthropomorphic animals venturing into unknown places.

In Search of the Creators centers on Illatha, an anthropomorphic rabbit, and her crew searching the galaxy for the strange beings that uplifted her ancestors millennia ago before mysteriously disappearing. Exploring another solar system, they discover a planet that shows signs of habitation. Could it be, after fruitless years of searching, Illatha and her crew have finally found the answers to their genesis?

Exploring New Places is not yet available from Amazon, but can be ordered directly from FurPlanet.

Story Excerpt:

Illatha and her crew stayed in silent orbit waiting for orders from Homeworld. A subspace squirt took one week out and back and assuming a few days for the leaders of Homeworld to debate what they should do, a response was expected soon.

Illatha stared at the dots of light that speckled the night side of the planet, each one declaring the presence of a city. Sensors had shown the lights were not electrical in nature, but the glow from fires that appeared to be from natural gas.

One of the lights dimmed slowly and then brightened again. Illatha’s gaze focused on it.

It blinked again, twice in succession in a slow, but steady pattern.

Illatha’s furred brow furrowed in curiosity and concentration.

The light blinked again, three times in succession.

Immediately, the captain’s four-fingered hands flashed over the control board to put her ship in a stationary orbit.

Fascinated, she watched as it blinked five times and then went back and blinked once. And then twice, then three times and then five, cycling back to repeat the pattern of prime numbers in a base ten system.

Fear welled up in Illatha’s heart. They had been spotted.

Contact had been made.

Taking Apart The "Cat Hotel"

From many, many years ago, filched from an old blog no longer available:


Many years ago, a relative who owned many cats gave us their old "cat hotel."

Think of a wooden crate 3 feet wide by 7 feet long and 4 and a half feet high with windows and little shelves for kitties to play on, etc. and you'll know what I am talking about. It sat behind our garage for many years decaying in rain, snow, and heat.

Today, I took it all apart and put the wood on a burn pile for the world's most awesome bonfire.

I also have a garbage can filled with screws. Hundreds of them. I thank heaven for an electric drill that has a Philips screw bit. I would have lost my wrist otherwise.

So what did I learn from this 5-hour long demolition project?

1. I believe I found several new species of spiders never before known in south-central Pennsylvania. 
2. After the first two hours of having spiders crawl all over you, you will eventually stop screaming just so you can get the job done. 
3. Wood that has been in contact with wet ground for many years develops several types of mold that would inspire the minds of all Grade-B horror film directors. 
4. Mold feels fuzzy. 
5. My lower back in its agony can use obscenities that I do not personally know. 
6. Working in the hot sun while Michael Jackson's Smooth Criminal plays nonstop in your inner mind is a type of torment very few people will ever appreciate. 
7. When you are dismantling something and tearing it apart using a hammer and other tools while pieces of destruction lay about your feet, children are still capable of asking, "Are you taking the cat hotel apart?" 

Nonetheless, I now have a 3 x 7 foot patch of bare ground on the southward side of my garage fertilized by a decade of mice nests and Monday, I plant my herb garden.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go shower the spiders off of myself.

I'm All Over the Internet! (And Update)

Please come and visit me in my many cyberspace abodes:

• Instagram (mostly book covers and sushi)
• Facebook (click on my banner and read my caveats in their entirety before friending)
• Twitter (mostly links to the Blogger account you are currently reading)
• Google + (mostly links to the Blogger account you are currently reading)
• Amazon U.S. (Buy a book! LEAVE A REVIEW!)
• Wattpad (Free stories!)

I've been way too silent for far too long and I regret that I have not been using that time for writing. Though I would love to write full time, the reality is I make such little money in writing, I have to work full time. Currently, life and vocational responsibilities are demanding my full attention.

Don't give up on me as I hope to have a lot more good news in the future as I complete The Shrine War and then move on to other projects just as fascinating.

Christian Horror: On the Compatibility of a Biblical Worldview and the Horror Genre: A Review

Author Mike Duran is not one to shy away from exploring controversy. As an avid reader of his Facebook posts, Mike also has his own blog and he is well equipped to address the issues closest to his heart. Yesterday, I completed one of Mike’s rare nonfiction books, Christian Horror: On the Compatibility of a Biblical Worldview and the Horror Genre, a lengthy analysis of a genre rejected off-hand by most Christians as being a legitimate expression of artistic creativity. Nonetheless, there is a growing cadre of Christian authors who are tackling horror in its many forms including myself and the book was a breath of fresh air compared to the criticism so often leveled at people of faith who read or write in the horror field. 

Mike’s five chapters cover a number of topics starting with religious themes within horror as well as horror themes within religion. Jumping to an exploration of evangelical Christian culture and its relationship to literary and cinematic horror, Mike ends his book with an apologetic explaining his definition of Christian horror and then tackles in the final chapter several popular objections to what some consider the oxymoron: Christian horror. Along the way, he explores the work and philosophies of Stephen King, H. P. Lovecraft, Arthur Machen, Dean Koontz, and others like Ted Dekker and Frank Peretti. 

The result is a satisfying apologetic for those of us who write in the horror genre, but also written with a maturity to understand that there are pitfalls and dangers for the Christian artist regardless of their chosen field.

The Big Grey Man of Ben MacDhui: Myth or Monster: A Review

First published in 1970 and then republished with a new Foreward in 1989, Affleck Gray’s The Big Grey Man of Ben MacDhui: Myth or Monster is an exploration of the supposed entity that haunts Scotland’s second highest peak in the Cairngorms, a mountain range in the eastern Highlands of Scotland. 

The late Affleck Gray is certainly qualified to discuss the subject. A mountaineer, a historian, an author, and a former forester and landscape consultant, Gray was born in the shadows of the mountain range and has wandered its crags and ridges starting when he was twelve years of age. 

Starting his book with an encounter with the Big Grey Man of Ben MacDhui by Professor Norman Collie in 1891, we are asked if the entity is a real creature, a ghost, or the result of the human mind overstressed from exertion, high altitude, and solitude interpreting natural phenomenon as a visit from some guardian of the Scottish highlands. 

Examining report after report of supernatural encounters with the entity, sometimes seen, sometimes only heard, the reader is taken on a tour of the lonely peaks and introduced to the typography and wildlife of the Cairngorm range. Odd natural phenomena such as optical illusions are explored and Gray leaves no stone unturned in his quest for answers, even exploring the theories of those who try to interpret the Big Grey Man as a member of fairie or even an extraterrestrial visitor. 

In the end, Gray reveals his own thoughts that the encounters are merely misinterpretations of natural occurrences, but the experiences he relates from other climbers make one wonder if there may actually be something else roaming the slopes and peak of Ben MacDhui. 

In spite of Gray’s more materialistic explanation, too many climbers, too many witnesses leave the reader wondering just how much Affleck Gray’s skepticism may be based more on his lack of an encounter with the Big Grey Man than the numerous eye witness reports. It’s left up to the reader to make his or her own decision.

In Search of the Creators to Be Published

From "current work" to "completed work."

Today I received some badly needed good news from editor Fred Patten:

Dear Alan; 

Hello again. I am happy to say that your story, "In Search of the Creators", has been selected to appear in Exploring New Places, to be published by FurPlanet Productions in time to go on sale at the Anthrocon 2018 convention in Pittsburgh on July 5-8. It will be on sale through the FurPlanet online catalogue, on Amazon, and other places after that.

I wrote back:

Totally delighted. Thank you for the good news. I wish you success on the anthology. As always, it's a pleasure to be part of the team.

This will be the third or fourth anthology edited by Fred Patten I have had the pleasure of being part of. It is always an honor. 

Do You Keep A Reading List?

On August 5th, 2010, I made a decision to read a million books before I die. As I was as of that writing 55 years old, I suspect this is a goal I will die reaching.

Today I finished book #276, The God Who Walks Besides Us, by David Roper. That means that in the last 2,856 days when I started this project, I read an average of one book every 10 days.

That actually is remarkably low from my more youthful rate of one book every six days.

I keep my list hidden on an old blog, but it is no longer public as I came under sharp criticism in the choice of my reading material. None of it is questionable as life is too short to waste on garbage, but as a writer I read a lot of genre material and there are people who believe the writing and reading of fiction is nothing more than a waste of time. I ignore them, but I keep my reading list to myself.

Anyway, do any of you keep a list of books you've read? Movies maybe? I'm curious as to your progress, not to compare as we are all different, but just curious.