Tag Archives: Free Story

Nov 24 2025

Procrastinating Patreon: Solitary Company / Wanderers in the Dark

It’s interesting to rub these two stories together and see how werewolves have evolved over thirty years; “Solitary Company” would have been written in the early 1990s, while “Wanderers in the Dark” was written just a few years ago. Banning Deerblood is a heavyset, leather-wearing biker who owns a dive bar on a decrepit back road; Garrebor and Tarrock are ascetic scouts for a secluded tribe of New England werewolves. Banning is shy and timid, keeping his dual nature under his hat for discretion, while Garrebor and Tarrock are loud and fulsome about their circumstances.

But the one that caught my eye is that Banning Deerblood can shapeshift, and Garrebor and Tarrock cannot.

The elimination of shapeshifting was an odd turn for my writing to take. It’s pretty much what werewolves are famous for. In fact, a lot of my characters would have a much easier time of it if they could shapeshift. But in my current work, becoming a werewolf involves finding a Pack that will have you, and undergoing a grueling initiation and painful transformation. Nobody gets randomly bit during a hike in the gloaming. And the transformation is one-way. There’s no going back.

Oct 26 2025

Peculiar Patreon: Swirlie / Monster’s Buffet

I don’t really have an explanation for “Swirlie.” I don’t remember exactly when it was written, but it was long before the “anything for attention” social media days, where people gleefully light themselves on fire for clicks. I did see one disturbing little TikTok recently in which some kid proudly drank out of the toilet, so I guess the possibility of “Swirlie” was always there, even if the medium wasn’t.

“Monster’s Buffet” is one of the “Licensed Beasts” stories. The Tribe also uses licenses in some cases. Werewolves are allowed to move unrestricted among humans as long as they’re licensed; there’s a fee and a written test, and the license has to be renewed every five years. And if a human accuses a werewolf of threats or violence, it can be revoked. It’s a terrible form of oppression, but it’s also not taken seriously. Some towns are strict about licenses, others don’t bother to check. Public places decide more or less on an individual basis to enforce licensing, and judges may be strict or lenient on whether those licenses are revoked.

What it does create is a wonderful incentive for werewolf-hating humans to pick fights, knowing that werewolves can’t even show their teeth without risking everything. An unlicensed werewolf basically has no rights; if they’re lucky, they’ll just be handed over to their own Pack and told to stay out of town. If they’re unlucky…well…they’d better hope they’re lucky.

Oct 12 2025

Past Patreon: Cave of the Bear Clan / In the Cave

“In the Cave” was written as a college assignment in the early 1990s. To be honest (rub back of neck, nervous glance about the room) I didn’t get much out of college writing classes. I never received anything but the most ebullient praise in them, which is nice, but one doesn’t learn much from it. I would have been better served with lessons in an absorbing opening, rising action, building suspense, characterization, and a memorable climax. Instead, it was a circle of a dozen students reading their prose and clapping each other on the back for their genius. The professor might as well have gone out for coffee.

Later, I rewrote “In the Cave” into “Cave of the Bear Clan.” There’s not much resemblance between the two stories, and I bet you can guess which one has bear-people in it. They’re both about troubled college students exploring a cave and discovering how the past and present can redeem each other.

I don’t know much about spelunking myself, as I’ve seen enough YouTube videos to horrify me out of ever visiting any cave that doesn’t have a tour guide and a gift shop. (Seriously, what are you people doing?) So the caves in these stories are big and roomy and atmospheric instead of the tight little cracks in the rock that seem to attract every claustrophile with a selfie stick looking for a granite hug. Honesty, props to the mission, but it’s not for me.

Sep 21 2025

Personable Patreon: Wet / This Thing that I’ve Become

I think I wrote “Wet” in 2014, when the idea of being able to escape the pressures of American life by turning into a fish and swimming away would have had a certain appeal. I was wondering whether this story had some Jonathan Livingston Seagull influence when I re-read it. It’s specifically set in Scarborough Marsh, a tidal saltwater wildlife preserve in Maine.

There’s no paywall on “This Thing that I’ve Become,” a Kilimanjaro Rising story written around 1993 or 1994. I don’t know whether its guilt-ridden protagonist chose to become a werewolf or whether it was something that just happened, but dealing with the reality of it has complicated his life, and now he’s on the run. This would have been a very different story if I’d written it thirty years later, but I like its isolated intimacy.

Sep 14 2025

Perceptive Patreon: Citywolf / In the Soup

Two Patreon stories again this week, and one of them has no paywall.

I first wrote “Citywolf” in 1993. The Citywolf is probably my most unreliable narrator and is certainly my most delusional, convincing himself that a simple trip to the library to drop off some books is an adventure only he can see through a wasteland only he can accept. However, a lot happens on this simple trip to the library – more than might happen if he was truly delusional…

I wrote “In the Soup” a couple of months ago. I started thinking about the old and frankly racist trope of the two explorers sitting in the cookpot surrounded by cannibals waiting for dinner, a trope made famous in Warner Bros. cartoons, New Yorker pages, and Mad Magazine articles. My brain started begging for a subversion. The result was this story of two human explorers, one experienced and one naive, finding themselves in a similar position, with one explorer completely misinterpreting the situation.

Aug 10 2025

Pedantic Patreon: Werewolves on a Waterslide / Trash Men

This week’s a double-header because they’re kind of short. Also, one of them is free-to-read.

“Werewolves on a Waterslide” is the newest story in the pile, written just this last week. The title crossed my mind and wouldn’t go away, but I ended up debating with myself for a while about posting it, since I wasn’t sure that now was the best time for a story about compliance in a repressive environment.

I had a long talk with myself about the sort of bargains we strike to survive in society, about what freedoms we’re willing to sell, hoping that selling them will grant us privileges. An indolent society of peaceful forest denizens isn’t going to have to compromise with humans very much. I decided to go ahead with the story when I realized that compliance can be its own form of dissent if the privilege earned grants access to the tools to change or overturn the system.

Or maybe a bunch of werewolves just wanted to play on the waterslides.

The other story this week is “Trash Men,” the only story I ever wrote about the pandemic, during the pandemic. It’s set in the same universe as the “Akela” novels, where people are haunted by the specter of some great, unnamed cataclysm about to befall the world. A form of bird flu with a 23% fatality rate has put the world on lockdown, but Ambimorphs have relative immunity. Two Raccoon-Men (Procyons) have taken jobs as sanitation workers in a very quiet Manhattan, and grow closer together as the rest of the world falls apart.