It's a Jumble

It’s that time of year again! No, I’m not talking about Thanksgiving and Christmas trees and holiday shopping and carols. I’m talking about award nomination season in the science fiction/fantasy field, of course! I was pleased to publish six stories this year, and I truly believe that several of them are among the best I’ve ever written. I’d be honored if you took a look. For Special Consideration These four stories are already on the Nebula Reading List (thank you thank you to whoever put them there!) and they are special pieces of my heart. Also, please check out all the other stories on the Nebula Reading List; it’s a wonderful resource for us all. "Wild Ones" in Bracken Magazine (fantasy, 2407 words) A mother, a daughter, and the Wild Hunt. --Featured in the Barnes and Noble Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog,  Sci-Fi and Fantasy Short Fiction Roundup: February 2018   by Maria Haskins. “A beautiful and poignant piece of short fiction that deals with longing and ...

Days later, I am still processing this book. You’ve probably heard of it by now; Educated was recommended by former president Barack Obama himself and continues on the New York Times best sellers list. It’s the story of a girl raised on a mountain by parents who were religious extremists and survivalists. Tara Westover was born at home and never saw a doctor or nurse. She had no birth certificate. She never went to school. Her father stockpiled rifles, food, fuel, and military gear on their property, preparing for the day that he and his family would have to stand up to the “the Feds” and also survive the apocalypse (or “Days of Abomination,” as he called it). The father preached an extreme, fundamentalist, and decidedly idiosyncratic personal version of Mormonism which his wife and children all accepted. And yet in spite of violence, neglect, and ignorance, Tara Westover decided to go to college. She studied for the ACT on her own, from a book, and when she walked into the test...

"Everything I had worked for, all my years of study, had been to purchase for myself this one privilege: to see and experience more truths than those given to me by my father, and to use those truths to construct my own mind." --Tara Westover, from her memoir, Educated . 

October is here, first drizzly and gray, now bright but sharp with cold. It’s time to bundle up in sweaters, make stews and soups, and cuddle with good stories and a cup of tea. Here to keep you company are some stories I loved from late summer and the earliest fall. Stories of darkness, healing, love, and passion “The Last Epic Pub Crawl of the Brothers Pennyfeather” by L. Chan in The Dark Chan is one of the most wildly inventive writers I know, and this story shows off his pyrotechnics of imagination, his poetic language and humor. . . as well as a delicacy of emotion that is all the more powerful for its restraint. Bob and Bill are the Brothers Pennyfeather, a duo of ghost hunters/exorcists who have been trained in their Work by their mother. After a job gone terribly wrong and mutual absence, the brothers reunite for one last epic pub crawl. Creepy ghosts abound at each pub they visit, and brotherly snark and banter enliven the night. But there’s something much ...

My story, "The Things That We Will Never Say" was translated into Vietnamese! The translation is now out in the Vietnamese science fiction fanzine, SFVN, translated by Long Nguyen, and you can check it out here . This is perhaps one of the coolest things I've yet had happen as a writer. I can't read or understand a word of Vietnamese, but it's thrilling to know that my story is now available to readers in a different language. The layout of the magazine is just gorgeous--check it out! In other self-promo news: My latest story, “The House of Illusionists” in Liminal Stories , has been getting some very kind comments. It was featured in the Barnes and Noble Science Sci-Fi & Fantasy blog , and it has now also been listed on the Nebula Reading List! “The Things That We Will Never Say” is on the Nebula Reading List list this year, as well! And finally: The lovely writer Francesca Forrest has a new novelette out today, The Inconvenient God, p...

      "I'm not wise at all. I told you, I know nothing. I know books, and I know how to string words together--it doesn't mean I know how to speak about the things that matter most to me."      "But you're doing it now--in a way."      "Yes, in a way--that's how I always say things: in a way."                 -- from Call Me By Your Name, by Andre Aciman

Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Water Knife is a smart, fierce, propulsive thriller and an unsparing look into a future that seems all too real. In this book’s timeline, drought and climate change have devastated the American Southwest; Texas has basically gone to hell, and other states are waging something close to literal war over access to water from the Colorado River. The borders are shut down—state borders, that is. Nevada doesn’t want drought refugees from Arizona, Arizona doesn’t want refugees from Texas, and California (powerful and still water-rich) doesn’t want the poor from anywhere else. Borders are enforced with fences, checkpoints and state militias. The lucky rich live in enclosed “arcologies”—self-sustaining luxury towers with greenery and waterfalls, fed by recycled water and sealed off from the outside world. In this gritty, dust-blown future, the stories of three characters intersect. There’s Angel Velasquez, hired gun for the corrupt Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA...