More than 400 people attended StokerCon in Grand Rapids, securing its spot in HWA history. It was a whirlwind of panels and events, and I loved every minute of it. As part of my schedule, I presented my paper “Mapping the Collective Body of Frankenstein’s Brides” at the Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference coordinated by Nicholas Diak‎ and Michele Brittany. And Friday afternoon, I participated on a panel with Marge Simon and Lisa Morton on the HWA Scholarships. When I won the HWA Scholarship in 2016, it literally changed my life. I constantly urge others to apply for the amazing educational opportunities offered by the HWA, which made this particular panel especially meaningful.

I also had the good fortune to meet Gwendolyn Kiste, author of The Rust Maidens and the winner of the Stoker for Superior Achievement in a First Novel. Along with Donna Munro and April Grey, Gwendolyn participated in the discussion on Fairy Tales: A Child’s Introduction to Horror, which I moderated. Hansel & Gretel, Baba Yaga, and Tam Lin were the favorites by far; Gwendolyn and I even snuck in a side discussion on Angela Carter’s fairy tales, which are definitely not written for children.

Although poetry is normally an outlier in these events, there was a strong interest in the form evidenced by full rooms of poetry reader and writers attending the panels Writing to Prompts: Prose, Poetry, and Sources of Inspiration and the Weird Poetry Panel: Weird, Horror & Otherwise Speculative Poetry. Buy my favorite poetry-related event at StokerCon was the Poetry Open Mic on Friday night. Poets of all levels were able to share their work. Highlights included readings by renowned poets Linda D. Addison, Karen Bovenmyer, Kyla Ward, Randy D. Rubin, Angela Yuriko Smith, and David E. Cowen, who was also a nominee for Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection and my dining companion at the banquet on Saturday night.

The awards banquet is always a stunning affair, and this year was no different. I celebrated in style with Marge Simon, Linda D. Addison, Stoker nominees David E. Cowen, Angela Yuriko Smith, Kyla Ward, and other new and old friends alike. It was a thrill to watch the Bram Stoker Awards handed out and to see the changing of the guard as John Palisano stepped into the role as HWA President. But perhaps even more exciting than that was the announcement that StokerCon 2021 will be held in Denver, Colorado. I look forward to welcoming all of the wonderful people involved in HWA to my home state alongside the other Colorado committee members Hillary Raque Dodge, Dean Wyant, and Lawrence Berry, who is also the president of the HWA Colorado Chapter. We can’t wait to share what we have in store for you!

 

 

 

On April 27, I will be participating in the annual Mountain of Authors event hosted by the Pikes Peak Library District. The event will be held at Library 21C (1175 Chapel Hills Drive) in Colorado Springs from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Stop for a fairy tale poetry prompt, limited edition chapbooks, and more. Friends of the Pikes Peak Library will have a few anthologies featuring my work available for purchase including Gorgon: Stories of Emergence, Stonecoast Review Issue 9, HWA Poetry Showcase Vol. V, Dreamspinning: Award Nominees from Nonbinary Review, and Birthing Monsters: Frankenstein’s Cabinet of Curiosities and Cruelties.

In May, I will be at StokerCon. This annual event, presented by the Horror Writers Association, will be held in Grand Rapids, Michigan from May 9 to May 12.  I will be presenting “Fragmenting the Female in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein” on Friday, May 10 at the Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference on the Myth and Femininity panel, which is scheduled from 9-10:30 am. I will also be on the HWA Scholarship Panel (with Marge Simon and Lisa Morton) from 12-1 pm. On Saturday, you can find me moderating the panel Fairy Tales: A Child’s Introduction to Horror from 10-11 am on Saturday with panelists April Grey, Gwendolyn Kiste, and Donna Wagonblast Munro. And I will be reading in Block 27 with Lucy A. Snyder and Janice Leach from 5-6 pm. See you there!

My poem “OH MAD ARACHNE: A Folle in Three Acts” is included in NonBinary Review #19 Dante’s Inferno, which was published by Zoetic Press in December 2018. This one came out in a wild rush of words, quite unlike my normal process of writing poetry. It’s based on the story of Arachne, just a tale of a woman tearing another woman down. Let’s just say I have no love for Artemis.

Arachne is mentioned in “Inferno” in relation to Geryon (Canto XVII). On a side note, Geryon is Medusa’s grandson and Medusa is yet another woman who was cursed by a goddess, only this time it was Athena. (Go figure.) My inspiration came from the Gustave Doré’s image of “Arachne,” from the 12th Canto of Dante’s “Purgatory” (see below).  However, when I realized Arachne was actually in Purgatory, not Inferno, I’d already written this poem. Luckily, my editor Lise Quintana loved it anyway and decided to include it in this marvelous issue. Enjoy!

Today is #NationalPoetryDay, so it seems like the perfect time to share the news that my poem “C8 : A Tessellation of Faces, Wings, and other Obscure Things,” was nominated for Best of the Net 2018. This piece appeared in the NonBinary Review issue featuring A Wrinkle in Time. Thank you, Lise Quintana and Zoetic Press!

A month ago, I graduated with my MFA in Creative Writing from Stonecoast at the University of Southern Maine. It still seems somewhat surreal, and I’m working out the kinks of adjusting to a life without the idea of school deadlines looming. In addition to my personal writing pursuits and running workshops at The Storied Imaginarium, I will also be teaching a couple of English classes at Pikes Peak Community College. And, just to stay on top of my own goals of being a life-long learner, I will be taking Advanced Creative Writing with Richard Thomas. It’s going to be a busy Fall!

Commencement Speech (Stonecoast, Popular Fiction, S’18)

Just as I expect was the case with many of you here today, I discovered the magic of books at young age and by the time I hit grade school, I realized I could not only read other people’s stories, but that I could write my own. Although the map of my life reveals haphazard progress hindered by numerous wrong turns, dead ends, and detours, my desire to write never waned. When I received my acceptance to the creative writing program at Stonecoast, I thought my path had finally straightened out. I could clearly see my destination, and I thought there was nothing that could slow me down. I was wrong.

Three weeks before my first residency, I was speeding down a hill when the front tire of my bike caught gravel. When I fully regained consciousness 18 hours later, I slowly began to process the damage. The trauma doctors had done their best to put me back together, but I was never going to look the same as I had before the accident. Worse, the traumatic brain injury meant I’d never think the same either. The first flower arrangement to show up in my hospital room was from Stonecoast, which added to my determination to be a part of this community despite my injuries. I received the offer to wait, to push my start date back, but I was terrified that if I didn’t press forward, the opportunity would slip through my fingers. I stuck to the plan, and limped onto a plane with a bag full of medications two weeks after being released from the hospital. This was not my best idea.

There’s a saying that first impressions are everything. So I knew I was in trouble when Robin and Justin staged an intervention in the middle of my first residency. I was a walking physical and emotional disaster. I tried to persevere, without the greatest success. Intervention, remember? Those of you graduating tonight are the last class to remember my disastrous first residency. You are also the ones who helped me to continue forward to this moment.

Although it has been a difficult two years, it’s been rewarding also—in ways I never would have expected. I still suffer from chronic pain and impaired cognition, but upon reflection I think the accident served to make me a better writer; it definitely made me a better person. All of my protective shields were shattered, my pride and arrogance stripped away. Without this having happened, I might not have been in the position to learn the lessons Stonecoast has to offer. For instance, I learned that you can be self-reliant, yet still be able to ask for help when you need it. I learned that you can be an outsider yet still belong to this vibrant community of writers and mentors. And above all, I learned that earning my MFA is just one of the signposts along the ever-evolving journey in becoming a writer.

I urge you all to keep moving despite the obstacles that will invariably come your way. Slow down. Take advantage of unexpected side trips. Explore the roads off the beaten path. And remember to stay connected to the Stonecoast community: if you reach out and stay involved, your time here will never come to an end. There’s a quote by E. L. Doctorow that kept me moving forward even in the darkest times, and I’d like to share it with you now: “[Writing is] like driving a car at night: you never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”

Even though we are all travelling in different directions, I will keep my eyes open in hopes our paths will cross again soon. I know from experience, my life will be better for it. Thank you.

I’ve had several pieces published recently, so I figured it was time to share the news. Today, my story “The Landscape of Lacrimation” came out at The Hunger. It’s a strange swirly tale written as an experimental piece. I often feel as though I don’t quite fit in, and I wanted to attempt to recreate that feeling in this story. The lyricism is over the top, and it’s written in second person. Both of these things are meant to keep the reading left feeling a little unmoored. It also contains dozens of slur words, which I’ve used outside of context, another technique meant to increase the sense of unease. As you might imagine, it’s not easy to place a story meant to make the reader uncomfortable, so I’m especially pleased that the editors at The Hunger took a chance on it.

The publication of Hath No Fury, which features my weird, futuristic mash-up of “Jack and the Beanstalk” and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Rappaccini Daughter,” has been pushed back again. It’s now listed with a July release date. However, I have seen the epub of the anthology and it’s a thing of beauty. Worth the wait, I promise.

Another piece scheduled to come out soon is my poem “C₈ : A Tessellation of Faces, Wings, and other Obscure Things,” which will be featured in Alphanumeric, the online portion of the NonBinary Review Issue 17: A Wrinkle in Time.  I also have a poem, “The Savory Taste of Temptation,” in The Necro-Om-Nom-Nom-Icon, which was released in April. My contribution to this Lovecraftian-inspired collection came in the form of an amuse-bouche.

I have several other stories and poems currently out on submission, so I hope I will have more good news to share soon. In the meantime, I’m working on the final stages of my thesis, a short story collection titled The Anatomy of Melancholy.  Graduation is right around the corner, and I should have my MFA in hand July 16th. Stay tuned!

I’m giving away two poetry volumes for Big Poetry Month at The Storied Imaginarium. The first book up for grabs is In the Forest of Forgetting Paperback by Theodora Goss, and the second book is Poisoned Apples: Poems for You, My Pretty Hardcover by Christine Heppermann. Check out the link at The Storied Imaginarium for details.

Note: The giveaway ends on April 30th at midnight, so make sure to sign up soon.