Although I am primarily an author of scholarly articles, textbooks and reference books on law-related subjects, fiction and poetry have always been an important part of my life both as a reader and sometime author as most all of my friends know. When my academic career draws to an end perhaps in the next decade or so, I hope to devote more time to both. But throughout my career, when my administrative, teaching and research agenda consumed most of my attention, I still found some time for a meager output of poetry and short fiction.
There is a common theme in much of my fiction about the interrelationship between dreams and reality, consciousness, and the nature of reality itself, as well as the duality of the human spirit. There is indeed more to existence than can be encompassed by our collective philosophies, to paraphrase Hamlet, and sometimes truth both great and small can appear to us through dreams or our intuition if we but listen and learn from what our subconscious mind sometimes whispers in our ear or yells with all the subtlety of a tsunami in our dreams.
My preference in fiction generally, and in both the science fiction and fantasy which I love, is stories that make me think, challenge my preconceived notions and open my mind to possibilities I may not have considered. I especially like fiction and poetry that provides a message that stays with me long after I put down a book--from Homer, to Aesop, to Shakespeare, to Wordsworth, to Rod Serling, to Robert A. Heinlein, to Arthur C Clarke, to Larry Niven, to Dean Koontz and to scores of other favorite writers in between who have left their indelible mark on my consciousness. Within y limited capacity and through my own voice and point I view, I try to do the same in my own writing.
Most of my published fiction and poetry need additional work--something I will attend to as time permits if I live long enough to get to my back-burner projects. But all are important to me--my only children whom I love with all their faults though they be beautiful only in my eyes and ugly to the rest of the more objective world. Whether ugly or beautiful, I hope they have something of some value to say to those who read with an open and receptive mind, though that something may not always be pleasant or entertaining--or anything the reader will want to hear.
One of my short stories in particular can be hard to take--in part because it lulls the reader into smiling complacently at the narrator's somewhat snarky, sarcastic attack on the hubris of scientists playing with things they little understand only to hit the readers where it hurts as the story takes a much darker turn that is unfortunately all too real in the times in which we live. It is the only thing I've ever written that made my wife angry enough to yell at me because of its dark premise. Among other central themes in this story ("End of Days") is what I believe to be my novel theory (real, not constructed for this short story) about the nature of the universe and the creation and extinction of an infinite number of universes in what I term the omniverse (not multiverse as it is commonly referred to by some cosmologists and science fiction writers alike)--the one, original, eternal universe in which infinite small and large universes are constantly created and destroyed through the enormous black holes at the center of galactic cores and elsewhere in the universe.
An article that appeared last week in The Daily Mail (UK) about a new book by prominent astronomer Professor Lord Martin Rees that details how the Large Hadron Collider featured in my short story could cause the end of the world in a manner not too different from that envisioned in my short story. This is one time I really, really want to be wrong. You can decide for yourself by downloading a free copy of the entire short story through the end of October through smashwords and most retailers where my books are sold. You can access the Daily Mail article here: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/…/Earth-shrink-330ft-particle-a…To download a free copy of the short story today, you can click on the following link through October 31: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/428812. It may also be free within a day or two through the end of October at Amazon, WalMart, Apple Books, Barnes and Noble and other retailers where the electronic versions of my books are sold. The short story is one of ten featured in my Mindscapes short story collection available at Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HBW3A02/ref=dp-kindle-redirect…), Audible (https://www.audible.com/pd/Mindscapes-Audiobook/B00MXE2QSK) and most other retailers in digital, print and audiobook versions.
The end is very, very near--and there is not thing one we can do about it. On the plus side, it will put an end to the nasty vitriol and hopeless political partisanship that has itself reached apocalyptic levels all its own. :)
