Shedding Skins (Paperback or Softback)

A Brain Jar Press Short Fiction Lab story, Peter M. Ball’s Shedding Skin is a dark fantasy about snakes, old wounds, and isolation in the heat of the Queensland outback.

Things haven’t been right with Mariah ever since the car accident, but Harley knows the problems were seeded long before they drove off the road. Things come to a head when they retreat to an old house in the outback to spend time together, far away from the bustle and watching eyes of worried friends and family.

But things watch from the shadows beneath the house too, and Harley’s own reservations come to a head when they discover a snake in their midst…

Peter M. Ball s an author, publisher, and RPG gamer whose love of speculative fiction emerged after exposure to The Hobbit, Star Wars, David Lynch's Dune, and far too many games of Dungeons and Dragons before the age of 7. He's spent the bulk of his life working as a creative writing tutor, with brief stints as a performance poet, gaming convention organiser, online content developer, non-profit arts manager, and d20 RPG publisher. Peter' passionate about fiction, gaming, and helping aspiring writers develop their business and craft, which which led to a five-year period working for Queensland Writers Centre as manager of the Australian Writers Marketplace and convenor of the GenreCon writing conference. He is now pursuing a PhD in Writing at the University of Queensland, exploring the poetics of series fiction. He's the author of the Miriam Aster series and the Keith Murphy Urban Fantasy Thrillers, three short story collections, and more stories, articles, poems, and RPG material than he'd care to count. He's the brain-in-charge at Brain Jar Press, and resides in Brisbane, Australia, with his partner and a very affectionate cat.