Beyond The Rainbow's End

By James Pitter

A collection of five short stories including a light-hearted and humorous critique of celebrity culture seen through the eyes of an acerbic journalist. A sinister tale about mind uploading and the consequences for those willing to risk everything in return for eternal life. A witty exposé about infidelity and excess within a pampered expat community. An amusing road trip that turns into the journey from hell. The dark narrative of a woman who's troubled past returns to haunt her and destroys the one she loves.

• Language: English
• Publisher: James Pitter
• Release date: Nov 16, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311944979

James Pitter

James Pitter was raised in the United Kingdom and began writing poetry, song lyrics and musical composition in his early teens.He works in the creative industry and earlier studied screenwriting, writing for theatre and creative writing in his spare time to develop his writing skills. Among his early credits were an invitation from Television Arts Performance Showcase (TAPS) to attend a script workshop to critique his first screenplay and his first theatre play was performed on the London Fringe.James has since self-published an ebook of his short stories called Beyond The Rainbow's End and recently had a further short story published as part of an anthology with fellow authors called No Bounds: An Anthology of Short Fiction. All proceeds go to Medecins Sans Frontieres: Doctors Without Borders. Both books are available for purchase on Amazon.His current projects include the development of screenplays for TV and drafting his first novella. To learn more about James Pitter, please visit his author website at http://www.jamespitter.com.

Book preview

Beyond The Rainbow’s End

Copyright 2015 James Pitter

Published by James Pitter at Smashwords

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your enjoyment only, then please return to Smashwords.com or your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents

About this collection

The Morris Winthrop Reports: Fashion Week

A Digital Immortality

The Brunch Brats

Opposite Directions

The Secrets We Hide

About James Pitter

Other articles by James Pitter

Connect with James Pitter

About this collection

Beyond The Rainbow's End is a collection of short stories written by James Pitter about the pathos of life and the author's observations of the people and places that he has come into contact with.

His playful commentary on such diverse subjects as celebrity culture and the quest for eternal life characterise his interest and fascination with man's relationship between his intellectual self and the environment.

Themes of love, culture and identity are explored in a searching critique of what it is to be human in an age of unprecedented change.

The Morris Winthrop Reports: Fashion Week

That’s lovely, okay, look this way, marvellous, hold it right there. I look around me to locate the source of the words ringing in my ears as I approach the grand, stately venue of this year’s biggest event in the fashion calendar. It crosses my mind that I might be about to stumble upon a fashion shoot as I enter the piazza, only to discover a group of amateur photographers jostling for pole position to get pictures of anyone among the cluster of people crowding the entrance who might be wearing something vaguely fashionable or different.

I stop and watch with amusement the parasites with their rocket-fuelled egos, posing and posturing for the camera-wielding onlookers and their ever-extending and retracting lenses. Suddenly, I’m approached by a rather brassy-looking character who enquires as to whether I’d like to take their photograph after having observed the redundant camera hanging around my neck.

Sorry, but, who are you? I remark, which appears to strike a rather discordant note with the inquisitor who proceeds to scuttle off into the crowd in a somewhat subdued manner never to be seen again.

I tend to meet all kinds of people in my line of work. You see, I’m a journalist for the Fashion and Entertainments section of one of the more respectable tabloids. It probably sounds exciting to you, but in truth it can be a frightful drag – particularly when having to suck up to well-known personalities whose only interest is in protracting their own self image to get a mention in the fashion columns. Still, someone’s got to do it, so I guess it may as well be me.

But there are definite advantages to what I do, such as the complementary ticket to the catwalk show today in the VIP tent. Though why they call them VIPs I do not know as it’s more often a case of who’s that, than who’s who. Access to the show is by invitation only which is always guaranteed to bolster the ego of some of the expected attendees.

Journalism was never my first choice of career. It was an old school friend of mine who writes for a popular journal who managed to get me an interview after calling in a few favours. To my surprise I’ve found I’m actually rather good at it – ‘a natural born writer’ my friend says, although I’m not sure those on the receiving end of my critiques would agree.

I make my way to the VIP tent for the show just as the doors open. In recent years I’ve got into the habit of getting seated early so I can observe the arrival of the glitterati and plot my scoop. Nobody’s more aware of the fragility of celebrity than me with my remit to report on the latest trends in the fashion industry as well as the whims and foibles of celebrity social climbers and the associated hangers-on. An article involving a compromised celebrity can be a progressive career move for a journalist