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This page is an archive of abandoned literary efforts by Lon Ryden (me). Which is to say I am both: 1)
applying the word literary in a very loose way -- even I call myself a hack -- and 2) no longer concerned
about finding a publisher for this material... since writing is about writing and not constantly dwelling on
finding someone to appreciate the piece of work you have finished (writers and artists are known for having
notoriously bad marketing skills). This is not to say I'm not happy with these works... only that they are in
the past and I have moved on. And I hope these stories without readers can bring a shred of entertainment
value to someone's life.

Most of the work you will find here is of the horror or fantasy sort. Having said that, I will also say it
typically contains more sex than horror and fantasy readers are used to (I would often hear: "This is good,
but does it need to have so much sex?"; to which the answer is, "Yes, just so long as there's no procreation
involved."), and so it exists in a fuzzy gray area where an audience is hard to find. But writing with a
specific audience in mind was never my strong point, I always wrote to entertain myself... and the pieces I
have posted here entertained me quite a bit.

Where are my poems? Not here. I haven't abandoned the hope of finding an actual paying outlet for those.

I hate ending stories. No matter what you do, in the end it all falls apart. And
I don't just think that about my work, I think that about your work too. I don't care who you are, I've never
read a book that ended successfully. With that kind of set-up, I know you can't wait to invest time in this
piece. Still: a lot of good stuff happens in the middle, as the good stuff is inevitably always in the middle (if
I could, I would write nothing but middles). I think that about your work too. Premise: A man unknowingly
marries into a family of witches (doesn't every man feel that way some days?). This ain't Bewitched, folks.
This is years after Wrath, but I was still pretty young.

I wrote tons of short stories when I was in high school, much to the lament of all my
friends, who had to constantly give feedback. And you know what high school writing has in common all
around the world? It sucks. Well, lucky for you, Wrath was the first thing I completed after high school.
What does this mean? It means it has a lot of raw enthusiasm, but lacks the polish of something I would
write now. I do, however, still adore the premise: A man figures out how to cheat Death, so Death sends his
eternal champions to attempt to collect his soul, and one by one, they are defeated. I was very into Clive
Barker. There might be a shred of Damnation Game in this, but only in concept. The introductions to
Death's Champions are short stories which pretty much stand on their own, and the introduction to the
Shapeshifter in particular is a fine, fine story. If you have no interest in investing the time in the whole
novella, you should at least read the chapter "The Shapeshifter", because it still makes me smile.