Cover art for The Conduit, a new horror story featured in the Ink & Shadows Blog. Pointe au Baril, 2023 Dean watched her creep toward that shitty little townhouse. He drowsed. Alarms in his head blared he was sending his baby off to the gallows. How can you just sit there while she goes in? He tried to lift his head. He listened. The whispering started quietly. They sounded like a man’s voice until he really tried to focus on them. The tone would shift and evade him compreh

North Bay 2023 Lori shifted in her seat. Rain drizzled against the windshield. She bit her fingernail, picked it out of her mouth, moved on to its neighbour. “Tell me one more time.” she said. Her voice barely holding back the tension she felt inside. Dean sighed. “C’mon Lor. What more is there to say? ” “There’s a hell of a lot to say Dad, considering I just found out I’m related to a murder victim.” Lori turned her wide eyed stare on him as the silence between them slowl

North Bay 2023: The beam from her Iphone flashlight did little to penetrate the darkness. Lori walked out of her sandal twice before stopping and taking a shaky breath of the cool night air, mirroring the one her father was taking on his small porch at that same moment. She looked skyward. Stars blazed quietly above and she took her usual solace in their presence. Lori searched out the familiar constellations as her heart rate slowed. Under Orion's gaze she felt her ange

North Bay, 2023. It took most of the trip out to her dad’s place, but around Laurier Garden Centre the crowd on the bus thinned out enough for Lori to find a seat at the back. Mercifully, the fan blew tepid air against her blazing hot skin. She rubbed her eyes, shifting the reusable bag from the seat next to her to between her legs as a heavy-set man in a suit wedged his way into it, nodding appreciatively to her while he dabbed his forehead with a folded handkerchief. Lor

North Bay, ON: 1953 The city bus threw its occupants against one another in unison. Heads lolled on shoulders as some fought the motion to stay awake. The metal fan mounted above the exit doors had developed a small tick that did nothing to sooth the air of exhausted tension in the small space. Perfume and cologne fought a losing battle against some of the more animal smells the human body could produce. A woman in red high heels almost lost her footing before a man in a fe

No rth Bay, ON: 2023 Tiffany Sellers raced down the street calling after the last bus that would take her home. She waved her hands trying hard to hold on to the loose leaf sheets that threatened to leave her grasp in the wake of exhaust fumes. The bus gained speed and an errant Ruffles bag tumbled down the sidewalk. She slowed, her flip flops slapping the pavement as her hope for getting home on time merged with afternoon traffic. “Ah shit,” she said, doubling over to catc

Sunset speared the horizon as Nelson Lancaster stumbled through loose shale. The blood red orb was a constant compass pushing him...

Horace Franklin is a sick man, and he's about to get away with murder Subscribers to my newsletter will receive sneak peeks of the chapters before they hit the blog. They will also get bonus content that will not be available anywhere else. You should be prompted to submit your email to receive the newsletter when you enter the blog post section of my website. If you missed that and want to be a part of the subscribers that get early access and bonus content including exclusi

I took an ice bath yesterday. I watched the tub fill, and didn't want to do it. I dumped the ice in, and didn't want to do it. I stripped down and stepped in, still didn't want to do it. But I did it. After the ice melted and the tub was drained I felt amazing. I was happy I did it. Writing for me works the same way. I know it's good for me, but the lead up to it (and sometimes the actual act itself) makes it seem like I could do literally anything else and feel just as accom

I have wasted my time writing. Here's what I mean; I have wasted months on going through draft after draft of my work and fine tuning it and trying to fix it. I needed to admit something to myself: I'm not an editor. By trying to craft the perfect draft I have wasted my time. I'm in the weeds, I can't see the forest for the trees (insert your favourite analogy on not being able to see the bigger picture here.) So I hired an editor. One of the most frustrating yet relieving fe

Cover of "Gifted: Arrogance Punished," a short story by Mark French, featuring an intense pair of animal eyes amidst a cave setting. A...

This chapter contains graphic subject mater, reader discretion is advised Heat shimmered off the blacktop as Helena made her way down...

I’ve always shied away from writing characters that weren’t, on some level, related to me. What I mean by this is any character that wasn’t a straight white male. I learned quickly that this leads to very one dimensional stories (or worse, retelling the same story just repackaged.) I realised that writing diverse characters is not only essential to my success as a writer, but it’s crucial to my actual growth as an author. But I was faced with a daunting question: what gives

The trees enveloped Tyson as he climbed the hill like he was walking into a great green maw. He watched as tan coloured moths flitted...

When Tyson woke up the darkness seemed alive. Shapes formed and dissolved in the darkness and for a moment he felt like there was someone...

“Your unit is dead Tyson, suicide.” Humphry’s tone softened a note at the last bit, an honest attempt at sympathy.

Mysterious and chilling, "The Wraith" poster evokes a sense of foreboding with its dark imagery and sinister tagline, "Give in to Eternal...

This was the mindeset I held for YEARS, and it's a mindset that held me back. It's what stopped me from creating a website already, and it's the main driver of my impostor syndrome. But I've decided to start battling that syndrome, to pull a seat up to the table and tell my stories. How did I begin to shake this thought distoriton about myself? A simple ask. I asked a local online newspaper if they would be interested in a bi-weekly column where I shared fiction installments