Flights of Fancy

Welcome, traveler. Pour a cup and make yourself comfortable. You’ve arrived at a site created by an old writer for writers and readers alike. Let me begin by explaining who you’ve fallen in with.

First, my name is Jack. Jack Tyler to be thorough, and you’ll find it on four books plus stories in several anthologies on Amazon.com. Some of you may know me as “Blimprider” for my tales of steampunk. I’m 77 years old at this writing. I began writing to entertain others at the age of ten, and continued until I was about seventy. The “muse,” whatever you perceive that to be, left me around then, so the simple statement is that I wrote for sixty years. The things I wrote for the first few decades were dreck, plain and simple, but I learned. I never learned well enough to convince a publisher that I was the Next Big Thing, but self-publishing netted me a small following and a few hundred bucks.

So, what is this blog for? Mainly, it’s for my grandchildren and those who come beyond, but it’s also for friends, current and future. Like you, perhaps. This will eventually grow to be a repository of my work, at least my good work, for those with the interest to read. I’m thrilled that you found my blog, and that you found it interesting enough to look into what it’s about. I hope you’ll make it a regular stop to read my stories and engage with the topics I blog about, and to help you decide, let me come clean on a couple of points.

First, I’m no artist. I’d like to be, but I must rely on my Adobe Stock account to fill that void. Second, that picture isn’t current. It’s from around the time I quit writing. Finally, I have never used, and never will use AI (ChatGPT or its clones) to augment my skills. Perhaps if I had, I would have gone further, but it feels dishonest, and what you see presented under my name is all me. But I can’t hate AI as so many of my fellow authors do. The effect it will have is to force those of us who consider ourselves to be true creatives to raise our game. Writers on the edge will be swallowed by it, and drown in its sea of mediocrity. Will I keep my head above water? Subscribe to the blog and find out with me. It’s going to be a ride . . .