Conan the Inspiration

I have been a Conan fan since my childhood in the 1970s. My interest began with the Frank Frazetta covers. It was intensified by a gory graphic novel by Marvel comics. I read the original Robert E. Howard short story Jewels of Gwalhur. I was not allowed to watch the 1982 Conan the Barbarian movie till later because my mother disapproved of the nudity and gore.

I read every Conan story written by its original author... but they were modified by the pulp magazine Weird Tales and later by L. Sprague de Camp. I loved them... but was disappointed to learn they were not entirely true Robert E. Howard's work.

I read the true Robert E. Howard versions... and love them.

I write my own fiction. It is very much inspired by the works of Robert E. Howard. His relationship with H.P. Lovecraft encouraged me to read Lovecraft too, and I was not disappointed. I was inspired yet again.

Conan is about a hero in a world of survival-of-the-fittest. Savagery ultimately outmatches civilization. Even the civilized thrive as brutes. The universe is still one that favors good over evil, however. It simply distinguishes goodness from law and order and compassion from ethics or pity.

Like the original Conan stories, my work is mostly novellas, novelettes and short stories. The settings, like the Hyborean Age of Conan are worlds where the wars of tribes, nations and empires are not struggles of good against evil. The heroes are antiheroes until they do what they do for the sake of the innocent... and they are especially brutal when protecting or avenging the innocent.

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Twelve of Three and Counting

I have written over seven hundred thousand words as twelve books since December of 2022. More books are pending. I have already designed their covers.

I am an artist. My books are my art, both inside and out.

Creativity is not waiting for time that never comes. It is not starting what is never finished. You find the time by making it. You finish by starting and never stopping.

I am deaf to excuses. I judge every tree by the fruit it bears. Those who have nothing to show for themselves are nothing accordingly.

The Sorcerer books of my White Empires universe are military science fiction. The nuanced villain and his strangely wholesome relationship with his evil daughter are perhaps my greatest dramatic accomplishment.

My Weird World books are surreal horror, usually as survival horror. I was able to craft an immersive setting based on the weirdness of my actual dreams.

Black Death is black comedy as action-adventure. Its antihero protagonists are strangely endearing. Their murderous hobby is strangely righteous, without vilifying the victims.

My tree bears fruit. Though few are reading my many books, I did write them. I documented my imagination. It is available to be found and appreciated.

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Weird World

I started writing Weird World on February 15, 2024. It began with a short story that became the novel The Wayward School for Girls. The universe was named in the title of the second book, the collection Tales of a Weird World.

Since childhood, I am fascinated by the surreal and scary. My favorite thing to imagine is the easy killing of clueless guards by the bare hands of someone bigger and stronger. I created Weird World to express these interests.

A fantasy can be a simple idea imagined as one scenario. It can be written as a short story. That is how Weird World began. It became a novel as the very idea inspired more ideas. Other interests were incorporated.

Immersion requires context... and context requires depth and consistency.

A universe is limited if merely the setting of one story and its cast of characters. Tales of a Weird World had nothing to do with The Wayward School for Girls... except that the villain was a villain in other stories with different heroes.

The novel The Wayward Monster Girl is the third Weird World book written, followed by the collection Stories of a Weird World. The universe expanded into a setting distinct from its protagonists. The villains became suitable baddies for countless stories with new heroes.

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Impersonally Intimate

I write fiction. My Weird Word universe is a dreamlike horror setting. Characters are children or elderly because of their state of mind, not actual age. The same character can go from one to the other then back again, but not by will. It happens naturally.

The villains are typically adults. They use children as cheap labor and cannon-fodder.

Not every character is human. These Other Folk are what they are from the beginning and indefinitely.

The novel The Wayward Monster Girl is about a little girl turned into a monster by adults meaning to use her as a weapon. She is bitten by her vampiric doppelganger and seemingly dies. Alas, the blood is the life of the body... and the girl becomes the doppelganger. The human becomes a monster without losing her humanity.

The victim becomes the hero. Girls turned into killers by mind control are sent to kill her... only to be slaughtered in droves. Monsters are sent after her... only to be slain by their intended prey.

The protagonist becomes a hero by becoming a monster. She enjoys killing girls like herself with pathetic ease... and is a monster accordingly. She only kills armed hostiles, however, never the innocent... and is human accordingly.

The monstrous heroine prefers the easy killing of humans to the challenge of killing other monsters. When asked about it, she explains, “Easy is fun. You can do something and relax at the same time.”

The heroine is whimsical. She does not think about her motives unless asked. Her answer is always immediate and flippant, though sincere. It is not merely the ease that makes the killing of humans fun. It is her own humanity. She can relate to her victims, though they are strangers. The violence is impersonally intimate accordingly.

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Dramatically Happy

I am a storyteller as a writer of fiction. As such, I am mindful that it is easier to make a story dramatic by making it tragic. Simply craft a character according to what is obviously sympathetic and then kill him or his dearest loved one.

I do better than what is easy.

My most dramatic work is the Sorcerer series of my White Empires universe. Its most endearing character is its villain, a genocidal war criminal. His specialty is mass-murdering children. He recruits his teenage daughter to assist him. The reader wants him to be defeated... yet is likely to weep when he is. His archenemy, the sympathetic mother of his daughter prevails, so the story is not a tragedy.

A story that makes you weep by its happy ending is greater than any tragedy. Unlike a sad ending, it inspires you. It gives you hope rather than makes you cynical.

I do write tragedies. It is not to easily evoke strong emotions. It is to convey something meaningful. The doom of the protagonist is spiritual before physical, thus justified.

We yearn for goodness in a world of evil. You are the evil... though you are not alone. Despite your desperate wickedness, you intuitively understand that there is no satisfaction without justice. There is only gratification at best... and you become numb and restless whether gratified or not.

Even fiction ultimately fails to satisfy unless justice prevails, for better or worse. A tragedy is ultimately pathetic even as make-believe unless its victim deserves his grim fate. The innocent victims must be avenged... or the story is lacking.

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A Weird World to Read, Watch or Play

I write fiction... as novels or short stories. I create universes by doing so. Each universe is with a particular genre in mind, though stories can be of any genre so long as they are consistent with established lore.

I write the prose with the idea that it can be converted into any other medium of fiction. The books lend themselves to being turned into comic books, shows, movies, tabletop role-playing games or video games.

My Weird World universe is already four books, as two novels and two collections of short stories. The genre is dark fantasy as survival horror. Children are usually the heroes. They are often characters of classical literature re-imagined into new characters with the surnames of the original authors.

The strangeness of Weird World would make it visually amazing as comic books. The stories emphasize dialog, which would make a show dramatic. The action lends itself to movies.

The protagonists usually seem like normal children... but prove superhuman. They have special skills and powers, which are not always obvious at first.

Weird World is the lore of many heroes. They travel to various and exotic locales while adventuring. They find various items and treasures. They encounter many creatures, some of them helpful but others hostile. The universe is ideal for role-playing games.

Heroes are most interesting as the slayers of monsters and baddies. Weird World has many monsters and baddies. The lore itself provides plenty of enemies for players to fight.

Everything about Weird World is what it is because of its rogue's gallery. The masterminds challenge the heroes to think. The monsters challenge the heroes to be brave. The foot soldiers of villainy set a standard by which the heroes can be objectively measured. The variety of baddies provides a challenge for every aspect of human nature. The universe is immersive accordingly. Its heroes are endearing accordingly... even if player characters in a story that is actually a game.

I do hope Weird World becomes more than prose. I want to see it in action. I am eager to play.

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Two Novels Inspired by Two Movies

Since childhood, I have been fascinated by dreamlike survival horror stories. The interest was inspired by my interpretation of the movies Alice in Wonderland (1951) and The Wizard of Oz (1939).

I wrote novels that are mature expressions of my childhood fancy. I finished The Goddess of Self in 2017 and The Wayward School for Girls in 2024. They are very similar... yet very different.

The Goddess of Self is about a girl from our world who travels back and forth between reality and an alternate reality. What is normal to us is normal to her. What is weird to us is weird to her. She is our representative. The novel is very much like Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz in this regard.

The Wayward School for Girls is about girls native to an alternate reality. What is weird to us is normal to them. They are as strange as anything else in the story.

The protagonists of The Wayward School for Girls are “Alice” of Alice in Wonderland and “Dorothy” of The Wizard of Oz... but as girls in the modern day. They have special powers based on their strange abilities in their original fiction.

The Goddess of Self is my version of Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz. It is not fan-fiction, however. It is original.

Though the protagonists of The Wayward School for Girls were inspired by those of Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz, the story is not. It is my actual dreams, my nightmares specifically, but turned into fiction with “Alice” and “Dorothy” instead of myself as the main characters.

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