I took two-ish years off on this platform, 1) to get better at writing, and 2) figure out what I’m trying to do here. I did both of those things and now I’m working towards a short story collection that will be released hopefully later this year. While I was away I picked up a pseudonym. No longer am I Barry C Burton. I killed that mug and hung him up to dry in the basement. But seriously, no, I just decided I did not want my professional name to be associated with my writings, because they are going to get a lot more disgusting and horrifying and I don’t want to have any second thoughts about how my born name might be affected by writerly choices. So now I’m B.C. Grayer.
I started a website. Www.bcgrayer.com. It’s not much to look at but it has two stories on there, one of which is about 45 pages. An action-packed science fiction journey of one sociopath’s comeuppance. Another is philosophical - what would you do if you encountered a creature who could tell you any truth you wanted, on the condition that the answer would be unsatisfactory? Some on here may have read it before, but I gave it a nice overhaul and I feel it is one of my stronger pieces. I will be posting HALF of each story on here, and if you happen to catch either on here first and want to read on, there will be a link to the rest of it on my website. Why am I doing it that way? Because they’re my stories, not Substack’s, and I own my website whereas I do not own this page on here, I merely use it under their conditions.
More stories are to come, all that will be in the collection will be available for free online. Why? Because I’m just one guy who is not well known, but perhaps that will change. Not only have my stories gotten better but I have some plans to make them (gasp) even better with extensive outlining and what I call mainstream formatting. So get ready for that.
Of course there will continue to be science fiction, speculative stories, weird stories. But in the future, also expect: small town horror, mystery, and drama. All in time, my friends.
In the meantime, slide on over to my website if you wish, or give me a day or so to upload the first half of Mind-Share, a story with plenty of exciting, dramatic science fiction while maintaining my usual level of weirdness