Welcome to Whatever Blues!
Reader beware- here be faeries, rogue planets, and dinosaurs. Beyond this point, you journey to the land of legend and fable, past all the frontiers of science, and into the mists of time itself…
This is a place where I write fiction and poetry. Most of my work falls under the wide umbrella of “weird” fiction, though I do sometimes wander into other genres such as alternate history and straight fantasy.
My stories are all commonly united by overwhelming undercurrents of melancholia, biophilia, and longing for the past, and themes of the fortean, mythological, and prehistoric.
Story lengths range from vignettes to full novellas, with no particular rhyme or reason to it besides telling the story in as many words as necessary.
Select examples of my work:
Perihelion- a sci-fi novelette about a grieving man and his dog going for a final walk in the face of an imminent cosmic cataclysm.
Our Love Is Like A Star- a heartfelt poem on remembering our loved ones after they’ve passed away.
Thunder Horse- the ballad of a primordial rhinoceros-deity whose ghost still haunts the Great Plains.
Chicxulub- a collection of somber vignettes chronicling the last few days and hours of the dinosaurs.
Dispatches From 2027 A.D.- a glimpse into a typical Twitter timeline in the near future.
The Veldt- a magical realist novelette about a young English lady on safari who struggles to navigate the imperialist landscape and the maze of her own mind.
Stheno- a five-part urban fantasy suspense thriller centering on a young woman named Kylie McKenna after she has an unfortunate encounter with a gorgon while walking her dog on the streets of Philadelphia.
Incarnate- the transcript of a 911 call made by Charlotte Keating, a scared and desperate college student who tries to survive the night in a haunted mansion with her demonically possessed boyfriend.
Proriger- a group of high school students swim out to the wreck of the S.S. Atlantus, off Cape May, New Jersey, where they are hunted by a prehistoric abomination.
The Severed Head- a gothic fairy tale about a young girl in the wilderness of colonial-era northern Pennsylvania who is tormented by her wicked Stepmother and the cursed Severed Head in her possession.
What to expect
I offer no guarantees of regularity with posting. There is no “Monday poetry, biweekly short story” scheduling here. My creative process simply doesn’t allow for such tidiness, unfortunately.
Thus, posting is irregular, at whatever hour my muse decides to strike. You can expect something at least once a month, but beyond this I offer no promises, except that when something is posted, it will only be the highest-grade writing.
Occasional analyses of my stories and other nonfiction essays are posted on my other blog, Poquessian:
Also, all of my writing is FREE. There is not, nor will there ever be, a paywall.
Who I Am
Short answer- I am Pongo. Pen name, not legal.
Long answer- I am a native Philadelphian, having spent most of my life tucked away in the little Poquessing watershed in the far northeast corner of this old, old city. I am the oldest of four siblings- five if you count Colt, my four year old German Shepherd who is like a little brother to me.
I am deeply passionate about ecology, folklore, paleontology, and history, and all of my writing lives and breathes with these interests. In my estimation, if a story doesn’t at least mention something mythical or extinct, it’s hardly worth writing.
After many years of start-and-stop writing projects, I finally decided to make this site to force myself to finish some stories.
How’s it going so far? Well, it’s going somewhere, at any rate!
A.I. Policy
As the internet enters the A.I. era, it’s vital that readers know whether art and literature published online is the result of human creativity or mere prompt-smithing. In the spirit of defending the human imagination against this looming mechanical threat, I add this disclaimer:
I do not use A.I. to write or assist in writing my stories. Ever.
Though I vastly prefer to use art made by human hands for this noble function, I may occasionally use A.I. generated images to illustrate a story. In such instances, there will be a disclaimer at the bottom of the post noting that it was illustrated or partially illustrated with A.I.
Contact
Questions, concerns, recommendations, and anything else can be emailed to whateverblues@protonmail.com
