eBook Publication - Practicing

I've released a new book, called Practicing.  This is a collection of short stories, representing my early "serious" fiction work and showcasing a lot of different ideas and styles as I "practiced" at writing.  I've made this collection FREE, so you have nothing to lose in trying it out.  If you like this work, you will of course like my other novel.  I cannot post eBooks on Amazon or B&N for free (without manipulating the price-matching system, which is more trouble than it's worth), so I'm posting it as a download here.  Get it in your preferred format on the Novels page.

Here is part of the Foreword, if you are curious.

In this collection, I preface each story with a little history, a bit about what I was doing then, what I was thinking when I wrote it, etc. They are not necessary to enjoy or understand each story, so you can skip them if you like, but since this collection is somewhat of a retrospective of how I learned to be a better writer—my practice if you will—it seemed appropriate to give some background and context for each one. 

You will notice that there are a number of occult-style stories, at least in the non-traditional sense. I was fascinated with vampires and occult at the time as I read a lot of Anne Rice and Clive Barker during that period, and I was attempting to come up with some unique takes on vampires, werewolves, witches, that sort of thing. Some are a bit off the wall, but I was young and experimenting.

Most all have some sort of double meaning to them, or a second underlying theme that plays off the title. I'm a big fan of early M. Night Shyamalan films (The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, The Village), and I tried to use some of the same techniques in my stories that he did in those films—namely hidden and layered meanings for extra depth or taking a mundane or inconsequential event and turning it into something profound and very meaningful for a specific person.

Other stories are just my attempt at trying something completely different on purpose and hoping they worked. I think most of them do, and I hope you find this collection entertaining and worth the read. In the end, it's interesting to myself to go back and read all these stories and wonder what the hell I was thinking when I wrote them.

So check it out - it's free.  If you like it, also check out Bonebearer and kindly spread the word.  Thanks.