Writing Excerpts
While whispering to a friend during an assignment, my frustrated high school English teacher once looked me in the eyes and said with a quiet, deadly seriousness:
I curse you to be an English teacher.
At the time, I laughed at the ridiculousness of his statement; I hated writing. Now though, its hard not to laugh at it's prescience. I have been teaching English for 15 years, and happily spend my free time writing and designing for roleplaying games in fantasy and adjacent genres to play with friends, family, coworkers, and even strangers on the internet. I place an emphasis on evocative descriptions and empathetic storytelling grounded in realism, with a dash of silliness here and there. I also have a penchant for the intersection of the comedic and the horrific. Below are some excerpts from my work.
A short story demonstrating skills in blending character, dialogue, exposition, and theme.
"Now, for five silver I can answer the questions I can see ya got rattlin’ about yer brainbox. Ain’t got the coin? Tell ya what, I’d hate to see ya get peeled by the first conny to come along, so how about the copper ring on yer right hand and we’ll call it square? Bound to lose more without the help of a blood like me anyway. Whaddya say?"
Character Synopses demonstrating skills in writing compelling traits and connections that invest and inspire curiosity in players..
...it has only recently dawned on you that you likely died. You feel fine, but ever since you woke up in after hitting your head in that abandoned village, you’ve had questions. Why has a year passed? Why are you obsessed with death? Why is your left index finger missing? Why do you find pieces of yourself on the floor? They reattach easily enough, but that can’t be normal...
Introduction text from a comically grim-dark adventure demonstrating thematic prose, set-up, and tone.
...hunched, hairless figures spill through from beyond. Tattered rags hang loosely from their taut azure skin; pointed faces and unnaturally long fingers covered in smears of bloody crimson and cake frosting... As they dart forward, the sanctuary incense is overpowered with the stench of decay and...is that vanilla buttercream?
A subclass written to demonstrate flavorful description and mechanics within a given system.
A flight of butterflies. A nest of centipedes. A cluster of spiders. A cloud of fireflies. Druids of the Swarm choose to eschew the bestial call of their brethren and instead focus on the smaller spectrum of nature's creatures, offering up their physical bodies to become nest, host, and hive. Through this intimate relationship, they practice and observe, eventually learning how to dismantle their physical being into becoming not just one, but several with the land.
Item descriptions demonstrating concise flavor and mechanical text.
The Ewer of Endless Milk​
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Created by the inept hedge-wizard Hazmut in an attempt to monopolize the local dairy trade, the milk that pours from this copper ewer has long soured. Now only sludge spills forth in irregular chunks.
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When this ewer is opened and its contents thrown...
Excerpts from a blog documenting my first two years in Japan, demonstrating a general personal narrative style.
The Hurdles & Pitfalls of Modern Education
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Excited whispers rippled through the class as I walked out to the field, and I felt my confidence surge. We set up the first race, the buzzer went off, and I took off with everything I had. Dash, dash, jump. Dash, dash, jump. I was doing OK, but wasn't in first. I had to win. So I pushed... way too hard. I used butt muscles never used before, by anyone. My body, shocked, shut down all processes until it could figure out what happened, even the part that kept my legs going. I stumbled into a hurdle and crumpled to the dirt...