Ghost Mode - Free Ebook

I had a tremendous burst of creativity back around 2007, in response to unfortunate events at work.  Unfortunate for me that is, but not for my readers, because I ended up with an overpowering urge to speak up, to assert myself as worth attention.  And so I wrote.

Are those experiences related here?  Of course not, a guy behind a desk is nothing to write about.  Are those experiences reflected here?  Of course, just like with all fiction.

The first seven of these connected stories were written between 2007 and 2011, and the other two in 2011 and 2013, but all were put aside eventually.  I'd come up with the title for this volume in an attempt at a novel all the way back in 1991.  But I wasn't good enough then…and even in 2007 I still wasn't quite there.

Well, I'm not as good as I want to be even now; then again, I never will be.  But I hope I'm good enough, and so I finally got back to these stories, mainly because pandemic stress has kept me from drafting as much new, and instead has me revising what I already wrote.

The stories (chapters) are set between 1934 and the early 2010s, and explore a common idea, with technology and society changing along the way.  But I'll let you discover that for yourself.

Meanwhile, I have a world for you.  Worlds:

"[I]f the scientists are correct, the worlds out there are parallel to ours.  Well, not parallel, but branches from the same tree, from the same history. …

"Worlds where Tesla never heard about Yellowstone while visiting Colorado in 1903, never had his imagination fired by descriptions of 'Coulter's Hell,' never had the fundamental inspiration for the Tesla Field."

The 1991 version of this volume started from the idea of a character with the power of Nikola Tesla's invention arriving in a parallel Earth and running around getting into and out of trouble.  The climax of the story would involve getting out of trouble, finally, and settling down with the girl he met on the way.  I hadn't thought it through, though, and the story predictably went nowhere.

When I got a little more life experience I realized that the power of that invention was the crux.  What did power like that entail?  What are its ramifications?  Where does it lead?

Hence the novella.  See what you think.

All my ebooks are free: https://self.gutenberg.org/Authors/KevinWadeJohnson.  You can also see my entry Ebooks Update for a full list.

(Free) Ebooks Update

Updated June 14, 2026

My ebooks are on Project Gutenberg Self-Publishing Press, at https://self.gutenberg.org/Authors/KevinWadeJohnson, complete with descriptions and excerpts.  They're pdf ebooks, all free, and always will be.

Note: To read or download a book from Gutenberg, it appears you'll have to create an account there now.

Non-Fiction

First, the published (not self-published) biography I wrote (free pdf):

The Neglected Giant: Agnes Meyer Driscoll
 

 

 

 

 

 "How to Write" - An Approach That Worked for Me

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

300-Plus Problem Words and Phrases

 

 

 Parallel Worlds and Skew, Essays and Reflections

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fiction

Aunt Gabby Saves the Universe (novella)
 

 

 

 

 

Ghost Mode (novella)
 

 

 

 

 

Roads Between Worlds
 

 

 

 

 

Shadows Between Worlds
 

 

 

 

 

T-Man
 

 

 

 

 

Across the Worlds with Aimee and Phineas

 

 

 

 

 

Department G

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ice Cold and Other Stories: Expanded Edition

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

US Gummint Cunning Man

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eleven Nonsense Rhymes and a Handful of Poems
 

Rivers Between Worlds

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Solstice and in Peril

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Faker

End of the Line

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fallen in with Shadows: A Novella

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shadowed

The Adventures of Princess Onesie and Fairy Friend

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Souls Between Worlds

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Trouble Magnet: A Novella

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Traveling the Transdimensional Highway

Making It Home

Second-Best with a Sword and Other Stories

Thresholds

 

 

In the Service of the Queen

 

 

In the Service of the Prince

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the Service of the Heir 

 

A House Between Worlds

 

 

Traders

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Cursed

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'll continue to update this entry as I write, revise and ready new works.

(Reminder: no AI was used in producing any of these, just as no AI has been used in producing this blog.  Like the blog, all my works are under copyright, and are there for you to read, download, and share, if you like, but not for piracy or for AI training.)

US Gummint Cunning Man

Since posting this, I've removed my books from Amazon, and am moving them to Project Gutenberg Self-Publishing Press.  They're all pdf ebooks, all free, and always will be.

See my entry Ebooks Update for links to all of my free ebooks.

Shade mammoths, iron buffalo, and dodos; honeyberries, lightning pines, and mistle…

It's 1840 in the United States, but a different country from the one we know.  Magic has been known for tens of thousands of years, and the only reason the colonies freed themselves from British domination is that Pennsylvania Rifles outrange the tyrannical power of Mastery.

The colonies haven't gotten far into the interior yet; a different man from Thomas Jefferson was born in this different world, no one sent a Lewis or Clark to cross the continent, and any such expedition would have had to fight their way through undervines and dust wolves and more.

Zebulon Japheth Wright finds himself in a pivotal position.  Even though he grew up just another hunter-farmer, he knows about yet another danger: society's suspicion of people who might be witches, especially slave liberators, gets those people attacked.

What Wright will do with the power he finds he has, how he will use it in a society of individuals that distrusts individual power, and how his use of it will shape both him and his society, underlies a tale of magic, exploration and adventure.

* * *

I'll explain in a minute how this novel came to be, since it's pertinent.  Meanwhile, do I wish I hadn't let this one sit the way I did, because underlying the adventure is the issue of personal power, because of course that's what magic is.  #Metoo, BLM…this novel is more timely now than ever before, and I wish I'd put it out a year ago.  But better late…

* * *

The original draft of this novel started in October 2011, and got to novella length by June 2012.  At which point I realized that, despite an immense amount of world-building, I'd made a fundamental error as far as story was concerned, and so what would have been my second novel got put aside.

Flash-forward to May 2018, when I decided to tackle this again.  I fixed my world-building mistake (witches no longer require familiars), and started over.  I got a draft I was happy with done in November…at which point Department G seized my imagination, and this got put aside again.

We get to this year, and pretty much all summer covid blues had me not wanting to write…but willing to revise.

All of which is a long-winded explanation for how I can put a novel out only two months after my last one.  No, I can't write one that fast (or at least I never have), and, no, I didn't slap together something slipshod.  But if I take time off from writing, I've got stuff stockpiled.  And if I need to take that time off, well, that's why I have a stockpile.

* * *

The ebook is here.