There are moments as a writer when the work feels like a tide, pulling in every direction at once. Lately, I’ve been swept up by multiple stories—each loud, each demanding, each worthy of attention. And now, with my acceptance into WriteShare’s intensive fall writing program, I have to make a choice.
This is both a gift and a challenge. WriteShare is the kind of program that pushes a story to its limits—shaping it, breaking it open, polishing it raw. But I can only take one story with me.
The decision isn’t easy because each of these projects carries a piece of me:
Civil War #7
Think of a dystopian future where entertainment, control, and survival are hopelessly entangled. Civil War 7 isn’t just about war—it’s about a society where conflict is packaged as content, and people are pawns in a deadly game of loyalty and image.
The story follows Ash and Corwin, two brothers caught in the clash between obedience and rebellion. Ash is the stubborn spark who can’t stay silent. Corwin, sharper and more calculating, walks the line between survival and complicity. In this world, you’re either creating a narrative that keeps you alive—or you’re disposable.
This project excites me because it feels like a mirror of the world we’re sliding into: algorithm-driven, media-obsessed, and quick to sacrifice truth for spectacle. Civil War 7 asks what it really means to stand up when the whole system is designed to turn resistance into entertainment.
Unto a Golden Dawn
This is my most ambitious and haunting work. Unto a Golden Dawn: The Recursion Dossier isn’t just a novel—it’s a layered, metaphysical experiment. Part Poe, part Crowley, part fever dream, it’s a recursive story about memory, authorship, and the strange ways we try to make sense of grief and chaos.
The book’s structure breaks the fourth wall, weaving letters, field reports, and fragments of reality into a narrative that almost feels alive. Caldwell (one of my central characters) begins to suspect that he was created by the author—me—and this meta-thread runs deep, asking uncomfortable questions about control, identity, and the blurry line between fiction and truth.
This is the story that scares me the most to write, because it feels like I’m dissecting my own mind on the page. But maybe that’s exactly why I should take it into the program.
Think Stoopid
This one is pure satirical fire. Imagine a world where intelligence is criminalized. Kids who test too high on the state’s “Stupidity Scale” get hauled off to prisons designed to break their spirit—or worse, turn them into useful pawns for the government.
Enter Elber, a quiet but brilliant boy who refuses to play dumb during the test. He’s shipped off to a facility where, to his shock, the kids are running the place. It’s part rebellion, part survival, part absurdity. Along the way, Elber bonds with a loud, reckless love interest, navigates the prison’s underground hierarchy, and plans a desperate escape to a rumored free-thinking zone (probably in the ruins of Canada).
Think Stoopid is a fast, funny, biting novella about the war on curiosity, about what happens when we fear people who think differently. It’s my sharpest social commentary wrapped in dark humor, and it’s begging to be finished.
Nice Guys Finish First
This one is different—less dystopia, more raw human mess. It’s about love, heartbreak, and the myth of the “nice guy.” It follows characters who mean well but get tangled in their own insecurities, bad timing, and self-sabotage. It’s funny in places, dark in others, and painfully honest about what it means to be “good” in a world that doesn’t reward vulnerability.
This story feels like a blend of memoir and fiction—a kind of anti-romantic comedy that digs into why relationships fail, and why we cling to broken narratives about love. I don’t know if this is the story I’ll take to WriteShare, but it’s been whispering to me in the background, asking for its moment.
The Lying Years (Wildcard)
While I doubt I’ll take this one to WriteShare, it’s worth mentioning. The Lying Years is my follow-up to The Cancer Diet, an essay-driven book about health, fatherhood, and learning to live honestly. It’s less about survival and more about building a life worth living, but it’s still in its early stages.
The Decision
So here I am, standing at the edge of fall, trying to choose which of these stories deserves the focus, the sleepless nights, the creative energy. WriteShare will be an intensive space—one that could make or break the trajectory of whichever project I bring.
And maybe you can help me decide.
Which story should I take into WriteShare’s program?
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