What does it mean to tell stories in 2025?

A state of the union for Altered Narrative and a look forward at what's to come

I started Altered Narrative back in 2022, publishing my first post (a short story called 28 Dates Later) almost 3 years-ago. A lot has happened in that time both in my own life and in the wider world.

First off, I got married (yay!). Then I went through a period of intense burnout (boo!). I was lucky enough to go on an amazing honeymoon with my wife to LA (yay!). But, because of said burnout, I had stopped writing and publishing fiction (boo!). And this is just in my personal life, lets not even get into the roller coaster we’ve been on globally.

The main thing that hit me over the course of 2024 was a complete sense of creative emptiness. I was fighting focus, distraction, not knowing what I actually wanted from my creative pursuits and a general feeling of disembodied listlessness.

Enter the new year.

For someone with my particular cocktail of mental health conditions (OCD, anxiety etc), a new year can be a great catalyst for reflection and change in my life. Sure, its an arbitrary point in time but it works for me. And this year, I was determined to make it stick. 2025 was going to be my year.

So I started by thinking about the why of it all. Why do I want to create? The answer to this question, it turned out, was simple. I want to tell stories across new and emerging artistic mediums so I can figure out how I think and feel about the world around me. This was the key to unlocking what had been bothering me. I was focused on what I should be writing and creating and not on what meant something to me.

Is this bad business? Who knows? Probably. But I wholeheartedly believe that to build anything meaningful, it has to come from a place of deep personal connection and understanding. I create because I have no idea what I’m doing in life and creating helps me figure it out. In a world of AI and the consistent de-funding of the arts, I find this deeply personal connection to creativity empowering and comforting.

All of this brings me onto the future of Altered Narrative.

A New Narrative

This place was kind of a chaotic attempt to build a platform when I launched it back in 2022 which, I guess, is pretty much the same for most people. I was constantly chasing what I thought I should be writing as opposed to trying to build something meaningful to me that I hope will connect with people.

That’s the core of Altered Narrative 2.0. Stories and essays that, at their core, are expressions of ideas and concerns and passions I have that I’m banking at least one personal will share.

This begins with the two pillars upon which this new era will be built. Or something less wanky than that. These pillars are mythic science fiction and cosmic horror. When I considered the kinds of stories I loved, the vast majority fell within these two sub-genre’s and so I decided to make them the heart of AN 2.0. My niche, if you will.

Mythic science fiction (or Mythopoeic science fiction if ya being fancy) is a blend of sci-fi and fantasy. Think Star Wars or Foundation or Destiny. Cosmic horror is weird, unknowable horrors beyond the scope of human comprehension. Think Lovecraft or John Carpenter’s The Thing. These are the stories I love and these are the stories I want to tell.

“But what will those stories be!” I hear you shout.

Simply put, the nuts and bolts of Altered Narrative will involve at least 1 post per-week mostly alternating between short stories and essays.

The plan is to mix stand-alone short stories like Knocking, which I published on Monday, with short fiction set within my fictional Scikera Universe. Alongside these stories, expect essays exploring cosmic horror and mythic SF including what I’m loving, thoughts on the state of each genre and more pontificating from a bespectacled optimist.

The key here is that every story will sit within either the mythic SF or cosmic horror genre.

Which brings me back to…

What the actual heck is Scikera?

I hear you. Let me explain.

Scikera is a world-building project. A setting for a wide array of fiction across various mediums. More specifically, Scikera is the name of the star-system within which said stories take place.

Here on Substack, this will manifest in a few ways.

Firstly, you’ll be getting a constant stream of short fiction. These short stories will each be contained and designed to be read without any prior knowledge of the universe at large. But they will form ‘seasons’ or ‘cycles’ or ‘volumes’ (I haven’t landed on the terminology just yet), which will group these short stories by theme, mythology and world-building. The first of these seasons, which began way back in 2022 with the short story Birth, is called ‘Worlds’ (again, a working title).

I want to stress that this isn’t a serial in the traditional sense (though I may explore something in that vein in the future). This is more akin to an anthology or a composite novel. This first phase or volume is designed to offer a foundational look at the core worlds that make up Scikera.

Future phases will be organised in a similar way around other aspects of the world.

The idea at the heart of it all, though, is that you can jump in at any point. Only like horror? Then just read the cosmic-horror stories? Prefer a little more sci with your fi, then there’ll be plenty of that for you to chew on.

This is just the beginning, though. The spine of this project will take full shape when we start digging further into the world-building (something I’m planning on doing through short stories as opposed to traditional lore/world-building posts as inspired by Parker Settecase). I also have about two-thirds of three Scikera set novels in progress so I do plan on releasing them at some point in the future.

Stand-alone fiction, essays and more

I love a good waffle (as you’ll no doubt be aware from this (checks notes) 1000+ word post). I also have a lot of stories set outside of my Scikera Universe that I want to write (still cosmic horror and mythic SF, ofc). That’s why I’ll also be writing essays and stand-alone short fiction (or one-shots? Not sure what to call these just yet).

The essays will be a mixture of deep dives into specific stories and worlds (currently working on something about Watchmen, for example) and me waxing lyrical about some of my favourite mythic SF and cosmic horror. And the stand-alone fiction will be, well, anything really.

I look at these as my shop window displays. Hopefully, if you’re picking up what I’m putting down then you’ll check out my other stuff. If not, that’s cool too. On that note, this seems like a good spot for a…

I want to build something here. A home for people who love mythic SF and cosmic horror. For us to talk about our passion for everything from space wizards to goopy tentacle monsters with a thousand eyes who want to feast on your dreams. I want this house to grow bigger with more elaborate projects like comics and artwork made by real flesh and blood artists (sound off in the comments if you know any who are open for commissions).

And on that note…

Paid subscriptions to Altered Narrative

The short fiction, both stand-alone and Scikera-set, and most essays will always be free. What good is a shop window if I charge folks just to take a look, right?

Where the paid tier comes in is with bonus content for those who want to dive even deeper. For those hard-core fans who love special edition blu-ray’s because of the commentary tracks or making-of documentaries.

That’s what the paid tier of Altered Narrative is all about. More specifically, here’s what you’ll get for your coin:

• Access to monthly bonus essays on anything and everything mythic SF and cosmic horror

• Bonus commentary on every short story including details about my inspiration, process and craft

• Access to a comprehensive book of world-building in the style of classic sci-fi compendiums and encyclopedias that will expand with The Scikera Universe (Coming Soon)

• And lots more coming soon!

It’s basically a way for you to support my work and get more of it.

It’s £5/month or £45 per year.

I’ll be refining this offering over time so please do let me know what you want to see more of going forward.

What does it mean to tell stories in 2025

That’s the title of this post and its a pretty lofty (wanky) one at that. The answer to this question is deeply personal. For me, my reason to create is centred around this idea that I’m figuring out how I think and feel about the world through the art I create.

I know that sounds pretentious and that’s probably because it is. But, for me, my creativity is a core part of my identity and not being creative (as was the case in 2024) is a major cause of my burnout. The whole renewed focus here on Altered Narrative and beyond is specifically focused around feeding the central notion that telling stories in 2025 means, for me at least, figuring my shit out one word at a time.

So, if that sounds like a journey you fancy going on with me please consider a subscription (paid or free) to help me build something cool (and because, despite what I say, I’m still a slave to the approval of the internet). Things are going to get mythic and cosmic and all kinds of weird over here. Expect diverse stories full of strange characters and worlds, from the farthest reaches of space to the innermost territories of the mind.

If you like Lucas, Lovecraft or Le Guin then you’re in the right dimension. Don’t adjust your set, don’t blink your eyes and don’t fall asleep. The journey into this strange Altered Narrative is about to begin.