Indianapolis
Jaxon Carter
Jaxon keeps both hands on the wheel as Indianapolis wakes up around him.
A Queer Kind of Magick · Book One
The Sabbatical
Created by Wm. “Chip” Pence
Seven interconnected stories, told through seven strangers on the same impossible day — a day when the dying won’t die, and the unborn won’t be born.
They don’t know each other yet. You will.
Read Chapter One in your browser →Book One
The audiobook
Opening credits through closing credits, in 11 tracks.
Your place is saved on this device. The next track plays automatically.
Meet the Seven
Houston
Dr. Anton Lacasse
At the hospital, Anton counts the seconds. Today, the numbers stop making sense.
New Orleans
Jean-Marc DeBaptiste
From his Garden District office, Jean-Marc keeps one eye on the markets and the other on his community.
Pittsburgh
Tyvin Vanpelt
Tyvin wakes to a burning sensation that follows the lines of his tattoos.
Meet Tyvin and Finrir →
Manchester
Torin Arman
Torin knows every bar in the Village. Tonight, Canal Street is empty.
New York City
Merrick Salvador
Merrick has sixteen people gathered for a lesson in the back room of The Crooked Candle.
Albuquerque
Ryan “Cypher” Tulley
Cypher is hunting a syntax error when the world outside his bedroom starts to change.
Beyond the Seven · Albuquerque
Caelix Allgood
On the monitors in Cypher’s room, Caelix sees a pattern in the hospital records.
Narrative Architect
Wm. “Chip” Pence
Chip created the characters, their histories, and the impossible day that ties their lives together.
LGBTQ representation
Regarding a Queer Kind of Ensemble
I created the A Queer Kind of Magick Universe, or QKMU, for several reasons. One of the most important is my belief that the LGBTQ community deserves to stand front and center in a fantasy series. I wanted to give us characters whose lives, choices, and struggles drive the story.
We deserve more than the sassy friend who offers fashion advice while helping someone else’s story move forward. We deserve characters with their own ambitions, convictions, relationships, and flaws. Their sexuality and gender matter, but so does everything else that makes them who they are. Being queer is part of their lives; it is not the whole of their personalities or the limit of their stories.
That is part of why this universe has so many LGBTQ characters. No single character should have to carry the weight of representing an entire community. A broad ensemble gives each person room to be different. Nobody has to be perfect to earn their place in the story.
An LGBTQ character can be compassionate, courageous, and deeply loving. They can also be selfish, manipulative, cruel, or dishonest. Sometimes those qualities exist within the same person. Being queer does not determine someone’s character.
My goal is honest representation. I want these characters to make mistakes, accomplish extraordinary things, hurt people, love fiercely, and live with the consequences of their choices.
We deserve the full range of humanity in our stories. I have worked hard to give these characters that freedom.
How I used AI
Regarding A Queer Kind of Intelligence
I created the universe of A Queer Kind of Magick, from the characters and their histories and relationships to the scenes through which their stories unfold. I conceived every chapter. I determined what happened, why it happened, and what consequences followed.
These pages contain both prose I wrote myself and AI-generated prose that I reviewed and edited. I used GLM‑5.3 Flash through Venice to draft prose from scenes I had developed. I also worked with ChatGPT, Claude, Muse, and Gemini. Across the writing process, I used these tools to explore ideas, try different wording, edit passages, and check continuity.
One of AI’s largest contributions was helping me work out how magick operates in this universe. I supplied nineteen laws of magick, then used AI to explore how those laws could work together as a fictional system of physics. I established the rules. AI helped me think through what those rules would mean in practice and put those explanations into words. I also used AI as a research aid as I explored subjects ranging from thermodynamics to religious traditions and Romanian folklore.
AI helped edit the manuscript, and I also had to edit the AI. I checked generated passages against what I had established about the characters and their world. I corrected errors, removed passages that didn’t belong, and rewrote material that failed to express what I intended. I made the final decisions about what belonged in this book, and I take responsibility for the finished manuscript and any errors that remain.
More than anything, I hope you find people within these pages whose stories you have waited too long to see.
Welcome to my world.