by P. T. Phronk
Stan stood. Bloody joined him at the window. Linda got up and stood beside him. He patted the fine fur at the back of her neck.
“Fog,” Linda said in her gravelly attempt at speech.
“A lot of fog,” Annie said. There was a wall of it, grayish and moving fast. It overtook one building at a time, each becoming a faded ghost, shifted.
Stan looked from the tray of cheese back to the fog outside. “What are the chances that it’s a natural mist rolling off the Hudson River?”
“Slim to jack shit,” Annie said.
Terror gripped Stan deep in his gut. The fog almost entirely blocked out the sun.
Annie leaned forward until her forehead was touching the window. “We might be the only people who know what this is. If this is happening because of more of them—other monsters—we could be the only ones who can save this city. The whole world, maybe.”
Linda turned to Stan, her big brown eyes questioning. Annie turned from the window to look at him too. “What do you say? Up for heading out to save the world?”
Stan backed away from the window, where the fog had enveloped the mansion, darkening its interior once again. He sat back down in front of the fire. His hands started shaking again. “Save the world? No.” He took a sip of beer. “No, I don’t think I will.”
Linda looked disappointed.
But Stan didn’t want to save the world. He just wanted to spend time with his mom.
Stan and Annie will return
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A Note From P. T. Phronk
This book is about things that change and things that don’t.
Every chapter title comes from at least one small-town or high-school focused TV show’s episode title. I say “at least one” because many episode titles apply to more than one show. That’s something that doesn’t change: the same themes and conflicts come up in every piece of fiction. They come up in every life. And they don’t stop at high school.
“Coming of age” stories deal with a time of transition. Second novels are a time of transition too—for the characters in them, and for the writer who wrote them. This writer couldn’t have navigated these changes without some awesome people.
I’d like to thank:
Ronny Zoo, who edited this book and found every inconsistent hyphen, misused semicolon, and Canadian spelling. If there are any remaining, I probably put them there just despite him. If you’re a writer, Ronny’s impeccable yet affordable editing services are available for all at http://www.wording.ca or [email protected].
Dan, who, after helping with an early version of this novel, called Annie “the Data of this particular universe,” and proved us both big nerds because I immediately understood what he meant.
Ingrid, who helped the book take place in the U.S.A., even though I don’t live there. Like, what the fuck is Chutes and Ladders? She also urged me to trust the reader by not spelling everything out. As the reader, I thought you’d appreciate that.
And I wrote this in 2016, when due to statistics, my age, and bad luck, a whole bunch of famous people who influenced me made the ultimate change and died. RIP David Bowie, Alan Rickman, Gene Wilder, John Glenn, George Michael, Leonard Cohen, Angus Scrimm, Harper Lee, and Carrie Fisher. Fuck! Literally as I was writing this, George A. Romero died. RIP.
The Arborist
The tree appeared in the night. Wes’s perfect family doesn’t appreciate nature like he does, and they don’t care that their back yard has become a site of unearthly mystery.
But Wes cares. He needs to know what it is, and where it came from, because this is no ordinary tree. It’s growing far too quickly.
Then there’s the concerning matter of the pale entity standing by the tree, watching the house, in the dead of night. If Wes doesn’t figure this out soon, his perfect family won’t be so perfect anymore.
P.T. Phronk presents a short novel of quiet horror that will make you rethink the things growing just outside your door.
“This short novel has a way of sucking you in and never letting you up for air.” ★★★★★
Get it here: https://forestcitypulp.com/books/the-arborist-by-p-t-phronk/
About P. T. Phronk
P. T. Phronk (sometimes known as just “Phronk”) writes about things that don't exist, things that might exist, and things that shouldn't exist. That’s a supposedly clever way of saying he writes fantasy, science fiction, and horror.
He received a PhD in psychology after writing a dissertation about what makes horror films frightening. So he literally wrote the book on horror, and continues to create frightening things by cover of night, while by day, he explores the nightmares and dreams of the human brain by writing about neuroscience.
P. T. Phronk lives in London, Ontario, and no longer has a dog.
He’s on Twitter, Facebook, and the world wide web.
Putting Weird Things in Coffee—a blog about putting weird things in coffee—is another thing P. T. Phronk did.
More From Forest City Pulp:
All the Fine Hungers, by cal chayce
An old man—a monster—with power and privilege beyond imagination, preys on the weak, the innocent, the oppressed. One insatiable desire compels him above all others, and he’ll stop at nothing to achieve it.
A timid girl who fears everything—having struggled since the day she was born against poverty, racism, colonialism, and misogyny—must decide to continue living in fear, or fight for what she deserves.
Each owes the state of their existence to factors compounded by the generations—factors that have left them at extreme opposite ends of the social divide.
When they cross paths, only one will survive.
Get All the Fine Hungers: https://forestcitypulp.com/books/all-the-fine-hungers-by-cal-chayce/