Lucas Gandola
Fantasy and horror writer
About
Lucas is a fantasy and horror writer with a particular obsession with quippy dialogue and worlds built on logic vastly different from our own. He’s participated in workshops like Futurescapes and Brandon Sanderson’s writing workshop at BYU. He recently won first place in the Storymakers First Chapter Contest, YA Contemporary Fantasy category.By day, he’s a software engineer with a master’s degree in Information Systems from Brigham Young University. His chosen caffeine addiction is yerba mate, and when he isn’t writing, he’s most likely car camping on the way to a new national park.Sign up for his email list to stay up to date with upcoming releases.
My Writing
Completed Manuscripts
Currently, I have two YA Contemporary Fantasy manuscripts I'm working towards getting published. Here's a one sentence blurb about each. Feel free to email if you'd be interested in being an early reader for eitherThe Wayfarer
A smart-mouthed teen raised on the road has to prove he deserves a place within the deadly world of supernatural vanlifers. MoreThese Ruthless Lies
A heartless con girl with no creative talent must lie her way through a murderous art competition run by twisted, immortal beings. More
Short Stories
I regularly post short horror fiction on Reddit. Check out some of my stories
Contact
To stay up to date with news on my current projects, story drops, and free “Do Not Fear Death” story, sign up for my email list. I solemnly swear not to spam (also that I am up to no good).
541 North 20 West,
Vineyard, UT 84059(916) 755-9520
[email protected]
The Wayfarer
A smart-mouthed teen raised on the road has to prove he deserves a place within the deadly world of supernatural vanlifers.Overview
Reed and his parents are wayfarers, nomads who travel unseen across modern-day America, patching up rips in reality, refilling at paranormal gas stations, and generally trying not to get maimed, devoured, or the usual: gruesomely murdered. Reed is used to near-death experiences. In fact, the thing that scares him most is the idea of being forced to live a normal suburban life. This isn’t something he should have to worry about… until his sixteenth birthday rolls around, and he isn’t chosen as a wayfarer.Instead, he meets Scarlett, a girl both infuriating and adorable, with a map that holds the secret to fixing this reality permanently. Determined to prove he does deserve to be a wayfarer, Reed recklessly convinces his family to road trip across America, following the directions on Scarlett’s map. With every mile, Reed hurtles closer to a terrible, inevitable realization: if he can’t give up his dream of being a wayfarer, he’ll have to watch wayfarers everywhere die.
First Chapter Excerpt
The last time I almost died was when my first kiss sprouted claws and tried to kill me.But hey, these things happen.They especially happen when you were born on the road―no, not literally born on the road. Mom bullied Dad into taking her to a hospital like a normal, boring adult, but I grew up having diapers changed at junky gas stations and watching bugs turn into paint splatters against the windshield.Most kids have a first time they ride a bike. I have a first time I jumped the battery. Most kids learn to draw in kindergarten. I learned while bumping along Highway 66, chased by a pack of winged monsters bent on flipping over our car and devouring the tasty morsels of flesh inside.Like I said, these things happen.But I’m getting off track. Back to my kiss. It was a Wednesday night at the start of May, about two months before my sixteenth birthday, and my parents decided to stop at a crappy Motel 6 outside Miami, Florida. The second we slid open our van doors, my arms were sticky with sweat like they’d been rubbed up and down with glue sticks.My younger brother, Peter, sprinted straight for the pool, but Mom spotted him immediately. “School night.”“We live in a car, Mom,” Peter called back. “Our schedule is flexible.”“It’s Wednesday. That’s a school night.”“Mom,” Peter moaned, which was a dumb argument as it had never worked before.“Peter,” she said back, which was a pretty good argument, because it somehow always worked.“Let’s all calm down and look at this rationally,” I said. Whispered more accurately, since my little sister had fallen asleep on my lap, and I was trying not to wake her as I climbed from the van. Up until this point I’d been planning to go set her in bed, but Peter was currently in greater need of my assistance.“No fighting, Reed,” Mom said.“Reasoning through a dilemma isn't fighting, Mother Dearest.”“Point one, it’s eleven at night. Point two, this isn’t a logical debate. Go to bed.”“Point three,” I said, “we’ve been in a burning car all day and we’ll drown our motel room in sweat. Point four, I’m entirely sure my knees have forgotten how to unbend.”“Reed―” she started.“And did I mention how much we admire your progressive maternal ideologies in regards to circadian sleep-cycle alternatives?”“Flattery won’t change my mind, Reed.”“It really might.”She tried to purse her lips, but they twitched into a smile. Bingo.Seconds later, Peter and I had thrown open the gate, ripped our shirts off, and cannonballed in, shorts and all.That’s Mom. Don’t get me wrong. I love her and all, but I figured out long ago most of her rules are just ways to force us, the Wylders, into pretending we’re a regular family in a regular suburban neighborhood with a regular white picket fence, like she had growing up. Like if we play normal for long enough, we somehow will be.After a full day in a car with A.C. abolitionists―my older and younger sisters hate anything cooler than boiling―the pool water was perfect, the cold version of a warm hug. If you ignored the continents of floating leaves, the greenish tint of untreated algae growth, and the flickering street lights of a slasher film, we were basically at a Ritz-Carlton.Peter and I raced each other a couple laps. We spent a few minutes seeing who could hold their breath longer (don’t worry, I let him win once), before ending our cool-down session in, of all places, the hot tub.I’m nothing if not inconsistent.“We shouldn’t stay in here long,” Peter said.“Those Jacuzzi sharks really sneak up on you.”“If you stay in a hot tub too long, you can go sterile.”To the side of the pool, the light to room five switched off, the last room-light in the entire building. “I think this whole motel is sterile,” I said. “This place is empty.”“That’s not how you use the word ‘sterile.’”"Language rules are determined by language usage, not the other way―"“Don’t look behind you!” He sucked in his breath, and the blood drained from his face.Adrenaline flooded me. My every sense sharpened, and my every muscle tensed. "There's a gate just behind you. If we go now, we can get out before it realizes we’ve seen it.”“What? No. Nothing’s trying to kill us, Reed.”I turned to see what had his eyes so wide and saw―A teenage girl.It was a real mark of Peter's priorities that his face went paler at seeing an attractive female than they ever had at facing a supernatural killer. In his defense, there's really only one specific category of things my brother is utterly afraid of― the category in question being every noun in the English dictionary.“Hey, Petey,” I said through gritted teeth. “Next time let’s preface with the not-something-that-wants-to-kill-us part, seeing how things regularly do want to kill us. Yeah?”“I told you not to turn around!”I twisted again to prove a point, but this time, she was staring directly at me. The girl curled a single finger for me to come over. Heat rushed to my cheeks, and I whipped back to Peter. “You’ve suddenly convinced me. Let’s leave.”He stuck out his chin. “Hypocrite.”"I'm not― That isn't―" I flustered around for words, then―"fine. Fine." Because I'm not nervous. I slid out of the hot tub and back into the pool. Because why should I be nervous?I made a show of swimming a few laps before I drifted over to where she dangled her feet in the water. An enormous shirt covered her to midthigh―probably from some possessive boyfriend―but its collar was frayed, so no need to worry about him.“Um, hey," I said from the water. Just a girl. Just a girl.“I’m Lydia,” she said.Names. That's good, isn't it? Who says homeschoolers are awkward?“Reed Wylder,” I said, pulling myself up onto the cement next to her. “I’d invite you to join us in the hot tub, but my brother’s currently using it to become deceased from a heart attack. Your fault actually.”“My sister and I are on our way to New York,” she said. I waited for her to elaborate. She didn’t.“So Miss Lydia,” I started. Behind her, the illuminated Motel 6 sign flickered against the light-polluted sky. “Where is it you and your sister are coming from? Wait, I know. You’re driving home from a modeling gig?”She giggled. “I’m Lydia,” she said.Okay then. “Cool. That’s―well, it's a nice name.”She inched nearer towards me, and my heart sped up. “My sister and I are on our way to New York.”Huh...I glanced back up at the flat wall of motel rooms. Still all the lights were off. When was the last time an entire motel was asleep before eleven?Lydia giggled and leaned her face towards mine.Still smiling, I scanned the parking lot. It wasn’t empty like I’d expected, which was a good sign... but crap, I realized. Crap. There was a pattern to it. Why hadn't I realized it before? White car, black car, red car. White car, black car, red car. The three same cars, same color, same model, same everything, repeated over and over around the entire lot. How had my parents missed it?Lydia was close to me now. Very close. I glanced over her shoulder again at the streetlamp-tall Motel 6 sign, and sure enough, I’d breezed over it the first time. As bright as the ‘6’ was, that was all that was lit up, no 'Motel' anywhere, not to the side, not at the bottom, nowhere. Which meant this wasn’t a MOTEL 6. This was just a 6.The place was a forgery.“I’m Lydia,” she said again.No wonder she was so pretty.“Well good to meet you Lydia,” I said and started easing away. “Our shared relationship has been a pleasure for its cursory duration, but it's a school night so I’ve really got to―”She pounced at me.
These Ruthless Lies
A heartless con girl with no creative talent must lie her way through a murderous art competition run by twisted, immortal beings.Overview
Every citizen of the Pantheon was once one of Earth’s greatest artists―until the gods kidnapped them. Now they compete each year in a murderous battle of the arts for the slim chance to return to their stolen lives. Briar has spent every second of her imprisonment trying to join one of the exclusive patronages required to compete. The only issue? Briar is no artist.She is, however, a master liar.When one of her schemes to join a patronage goes horribly wrong, she’s thrown on trial in front of the gods and sentenced to execution. To escape, she does the impossible. She fools them into believing she’s a member of a patronage that doesn’t even exist. With only a month before the yearly competition begins, Briar must lie, cheat, and fake her way to the top of a world she doesn’t belong to. To fail means a bloody death. To succeed means becoming something even more wicked than the gods themselves.
First Chapter Excerpt
The trick to any good lie is simple. Make the other person believe they’re the one tricking you.Take the woman in front of me. As far as painters go, she’s one of the best, which says a lot considering everybody else stuck in the Pantheon also happens to be an artist. Fools have come crawling to her door for decades, possibly centuries, to beg, threaten, and sweet-talk her in hopes of leaving with even the simplest of paintings. She could have handed them a plain white canvas featuring a single white brushstroke. They would have gifted her a sack of gold, fully convinced they got the better end of the deal.Never once, not for any cost, or bribe, or promise, has the woman so much as lent one of her paintings to another breathing soul. I haven’t come here today to repeat their mistake―I don’t plan to ask her for a piece of art.I do plan, however, that by the time I leave, she will be begging me to take my pick.Through the panes of her front studio window, she works at an easel without any idea she’s being watched. An open side door lets in a rectangle of light that perfectly illuminates her canvas. Flecks of gray and green speckle her shirt and face, and a streak of wet blue glistens from the bangs of her graying hair.It’s purposeful. All the painters here walk around with splotches of paint on their sleeves and dried bits under their nails―not because they’re awful at washing up but more the way a billionaire philanthropist might accidentally let slip that they just donated a new roof to an orphanage.Oh, paint on my chin, you say? How embarrassing. You caught me. I’m a painter. It’s true. Oh, and by the way I’m wonderfully brilliant, and did I mention talented, and notice me, please, I need attention, please, look at me!Except they aren’t talented, not here. Brilliant kids who slave away their entire life to get accepted into Harvard, show up to their first class and realize they’re no more special than anybody else. Sure, everybody who gets abducted to the Pantheon has perfect pitch or such a natural instinct for color theory that their drawings look like photos, but so what? So does everybody in this place.You can’t just have been famous―most people here never actually were―and you can’t just be an artistic genius. You have to be an artistic god, and I doubt even Monet would have met that standard. He wasn’t whisked here after all. Almost nobody is, and out of that ‘almost nobody’, practically none of them are special compared to everybody else.Excluding, of course, the woman I’m watching through the window.I straighten my spine, flatten my dress, and twist my mouth into a blank, professional smile. Show time.The bell above the entryway jingles. I squeeze my way between two stacks of dusty canvases, and step up to a counter that divides me from the rest of the studio. The woman doesn’t look up.“You’re busy,” I say. “Did you forget?” I’m pleased to hear it come out perfect: politely arrogant. Arrogant is the default here―you don’t have to actually be special to think you are.The painter, Frieda is her name, hesitates between strokes to peer at me from behind her latest masterpiece and glare. Imagine every strict librarian you’ve ever been shushed by. Now multiply that by a vulture, add a dash of serial killer, and voilà. That’s Frieda.“Well,” I say impatiently. “My next appointment starts in twenty minutes, and I can’t―”“I’ve no idea who you are or what you want, but you’ve just broken my concentration.”“You really weren’t expecting me?” I allow a quaver of uncertainty.“I’ve met strangers that look more familiar than you.”“I...” I lift my chin like a flustered little girl trying to act defiant. “I would hope so. Mine’s not a face you just see in the streets. The Crow sent me.”Finally, Frieda pauses.It isn’t that she’s impressed, but even if you voted for the other candidate, you’re still going to stare if the president walks into the room. Besides the patrons―who are entirely immortal and zero percent human, so they don’t count―the Crow is the most well-known collector here. There are plenty of others, people who have accepted their comparative mediocrity and focused instead on collecting the art of others, but the Crow has been around the longest. More than four centuries, I’d guess. Even Frieda, who never leaves her studio and when she does, makes a point of glowering at everybody until they give her a ten foot radius, has heard of him.I smirk imperiously at her expression. “That’s right.”“The Crow sent you here?”“I’m his personal assistant.” Which is, in fact, true and not part of the lie.“His personal assistant? What a big role for such a young girl.” Her voice drips with sarcasm, but I puff my metaphorical feathers, as if I think the flattery is genuine. “And what does the Crow find so important that he is wasting my time?” she asks.“A trade.”Frieda narrows her eyes. She sets her brush in a vase of brownish water, then finally, approaches me.It’s not an easy task. We stand just inside the entrance to her studio, but even here, paintings upon paintings fill the room, arrayed in vertical stacks like books, and hanging from anything even faintly resembling a hook. They crowd every step of walking space. In one piece, a soulless child stares straight at the viewer. In another, a regal queen smiles and sips at wine the color of fermented blood. They’re each evil in their own way, but it’s an evil that slithers beneath the waves rather than on the surface.That’s the trick of it, I suspect, the reason Frieda is such a renowned artist: no one else can capture malice quite like her. You can tell each painting is insidious, but you’re never positive how. I’m sure, for example, that the soulless child has just finished drowning his parents in the bathtub, even though his hands are dry, and his smile sparkles with sincere innocence. Anyone who saw it would say the same thing.“I’m curious,” she says when she reaches me. “What does the Crow possibly think he can offer that would tempt me to give up a painting?”“This next month is his Decennial, the Gala of his rarest pieces. He only puts it on―”“Every ten years,” she says. “I have a century on you, girl.”“He’s looking for a centerpiece, something that’s never been seen before that has to do with flowers. Roses are the preference. He’s going to place it at the head of the banquet table. It will be displayed in the place of honor, the first thing everyone sees when they arrive.” I lean in conspiratorially and lower my voice. “There will be a lot of important people there who will want to know who the artist is. Primuses and their acolytes will even attend.”Frieda presses her hand to her chest in mock awe. Her veins throb through her withered skin like starving worms. “Acolytes? The Crow would offer me such an honor? How generous.”She leans across the counter and slaps me...