Written Things

Fiction

SIGNAL | short story

Eldritch monsters, children in mech suits, and why you don’t devalue the youth if you plan to have a future.

Fireside Quarterly July ’19 | Fireside (online)

Quick Sip Review | B&N SFF Round-up August 2019 | Nebula Reading List | Maria Haskins Best of 2019 | Quick Sip Recommended Reading List 2019

MOSES | short story

Moses has a terrible power and, with it, has done terrible things. Is there a way back? Or will she allow her vices to consume her if it means never having to live with her memories?

CONTENT WARNING // substance abuse, allusions to human trafficking

Anathema Magazine #7

Quick Sip Review | Tor.com Must Reads May 2019 | B&N SFF Round-up May 2019 | A.C. Wise Favorite Short Fiction 2019 | Maria Haskins Best of 2019 | Quick Sip Recommended Reading List 2019

FROM WITCH TO QUEEN AND GOD: A Sea Witch Vignette | Patreon

A vignette for her character in my current novel project, this is an origin story for Ursla, the witch who steps into the seas to fill the void the old gods left behind.

Far be it from her to give a damn, but if she wanted to become more than a witch, more than the sea queen, she needed the reverence of Men. Becoming a deity was a question of politics. So she would see them freed and they would have her and no other god to thank for it.

Free read on Patreon

THE DEAD WITHHELD | Serial on Patreon

Dizzy Carter is a deadwalker witch six years into the hunt for her wife’s murderer. A former blues-singer in San Guin, Dizzy’s lost her music and has shifted to work as a private investigator for the resources it allows her in tracking the apparent serial killer who took Lonnie from her. The first clue in years connects to a growing infestation of enterprising demons in the city. Aided by her violent nature, the madame of a succubus bordello, and dolls animated by captive souls she owes to the vengeful dead, Dizzy will take on anything to see Lonnie’s ghost freed.

Read Chapter 1 for free on Patreon

TAKE THE MIC: FICTIONAL STORIES OF EVERYDAY RESISTANCE | short story- The Helpers (October 2019, Scholastic/A.A. Levine)

On a Saturday night during an unprecedented summer heatwave, Allie Carmichael, 16, is waiting for her sister Sasha’s EMT shift at the firehouse to end when the city’s power goes out. Twenty-four minutes later, an explosion rocks a commercial section of downtown. She wonders if it has anything to do with the street protests that have ruled the summer, or the new war that’s on, or a transformer blowing, or whatever counts as terrorism these days. Allie and Sasha find each other in the dark and get to work helping whomever they can find in and around the rubble. The embattled community only has each other until the cavalry arrives at dawn as long as the power is out. The how’s and why’s of what happened are less significant than the lives that need saving. THE HELPERS is a short story inspired by Fred Rogers‘s idea of looking for “the helpers in times of crisis”, and finding one’s place in effecting change where it is needed.

Indiebound

A RUIN OF SHADOWS | novella

General Daynja Édo is a legend: head of the celebrated Boorhian Empire’s military and possessor of a mask of untold power. She has raised her Shadow Army of seven assassins from childhood. But mounting disillusionment over a life of brutality, a petulant emperor, and prodding from The Artful Djinni force her to defy orders for the first time in her thirty year career. When the empire decides they no longer need Édo if they can get the mask, she must face the monsters of her own making and the legacy they’ve turned against her.

April 2018. Dancing Star Press $3.99 – $9.99

Paperback and ebook available at: Dancing Star Press | Amazon [paperback] [kindle] | Barnes + Noble | Kobo

Goodreads | Review in Strange Horizons SEUSA Issue

CHESIRAH | novelette

A fenox cannot help but burn anymore than they can help the cage they emerge into when they return from ash. Even a gilded cage is still a prison. Chesirah has decided to fight for her freedom, and she’ll torch anyone who stands in her way.