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Category Archives: inspirations

It Takes a Thief

Austin Kleon’s Steal Like an Artist has been a huge influence on me, helping me get past a lot of creative blocks I’d set up for myself long, long ago and then hit my head against ever since. But after reading this post quoting David Bowie, I had one of those flashes of insight that feels […]

Through the Looking-Glass, Diversely

There’s been a lot of talk lately about diversity in fiction (and if I were less lazy, I’d link to some articles and blog posts on the subject). This is something I’ve always been concerned about. For one thing, just because I’m a white man, it doesn’t mean I only like stories about white men. […]

Notes on “The Game of Puppets and Devils”

I wrote this piece of flash fiction for Chuck Wendig’s regular Friday flash fic challenge. It was heavily inspired by a short short story by Robert Sheckley, “Zirn Left Unguarded, The Jenghik Palace In Flames, Jon Westerley Dead”, which I read in an anthology, The Space Opera Renaissance, some years ago. Although Sheckley’s story is […]

A Peek Inside

The finale of the first season of The Flash was last night and I loved it so much, I was Kermit flailing for hours after it ended. The episode write-up on io9 pretty much nails why it was so amazing. In the wake of the episode, fueled by my excitement over it, I made some […]

The Carnival of the Strange

A recent post on io9 about the Doom Patrol, “the world’s strangest heroes,” reminded me of my profound, uncanny love for Grant Morrison’s version of the team. I was 19 or 20 when I stumbled upon Doom Patrol #28. I was mostly burned out on the superhero comics of the time and wasn’t completely up […]

A Letter to Ray Bradbury

My friend Ellie Ann tweeted a wonderful quote from Ray Bradbury that reminded me of just how much I loved him and how much he’s influenced my writing and my life. So I’ve decided to reprint an open letter I wrote to him on my old blog, a letter he never got to see before he […]