C.S.E. Cooney's Blog, page 4
January 21, 2025
Pinging all Friends: Friend Looking For a Job
Dear friends,
A little while ago, our buddy Deborah J. Brannon went in for major surgery: a hysterectomy for endometriosis.
GREAT GOOD NEWS: she has been RECOVERING WELL!!! As they say in Oz, “THANK GOODNESS!”
However, job security is a thing, and our darling Deborah is looking for it. Her skills are thus–dear friends, DO YOU KNOW ANYONE WHO NEEDS THEM? Please leave a note for Deborah in the comments here or contact her directly on Bluesky as @ourladyjack.bsky.social
“My primary skills are in writing and editing. I have experience writing features, for blogs, copy for social media or products, ghostwriting, etc. I’ve edited both fiction and nonfiction books. I also have experience as a social media manager. Farther afield, I also have experience in operations and education.”
What she’s looking for:
“Short-term freelance, one-off assignments, proper work-from-home employment, all welcome.”
If you know of anything that might suit, please let us know! And if you want to help another way, here’s her GoFundMe for recovering from surgery.
January 10, 2025
A sale! And some submission opportunities you might love!
First of all:
Solaris Books has a “start a series” book sale—featuring books that have series continuations coming out THIS YEAR! My first book SAINT DEATH’S DAUGHTER is now on sale, in anticipation of the APRIL release of SAINT DEATH’S HERALD! If you’re interested: https://rebellionpublishing.com/sale/
Second of all, I heard about these awesome submission opportunities you might be totally interested in:
For playwrights: RED BULL THEATRE’S SHORT NEW PLAYFESTIVAL 2025:
https://www.redbulltheater.com/submissions-open
Friends, the theme is DEFIANCE! Read the guidelines carefully, do your Red Bull research, and submit!
The world needs your art!
For writers in general, F(r)iction Lit is holding their Spring 2025 writing contest at https://frictionlit.org/contests/
For my fairy tale writers, poets, and essayist, the next issue of F(r)iction is themed BROTHERS GRIMM. Sub your fairy tale stuff here! https://frictionlit.submittable.com/submit/294821/friction-fairy-tales-submissions
GO FORTH! BE BOLD! BE BOLD! AND YES, TOO BOLD! (Except in the use of AI. Just don’t.) (Also please read the guidelines and be polite to the nice editors! They’re working their tushes off!)
December 13, 2024
Song for Amal’s birthday: “Old John Hollowback”
To my dear Amalface!
This year, your birthday poem is actually a SONG!!! Actually, it’s the song I began sort of singing as a joke when a fan of yours asked you to sign their copy of Book of Witches at Can*Con in the lobby, on the title page of your story “John Hollowback and the Witch.”
I started joke-humming something like, “Old John Hollowback, better beware…” and you glanced over at me with your mighty Dark Elf Prince look and said, “I’d be so honored if you wrote a song about it.”
LOL CHALLENGE ACCEPTED, DARK ELF PRINCE!
So I did write it—when I was staying over at your house that week! I asked to borrow your copy of Book of Witches, and then spent my morning writing hours at your kitchen table, in a silent Google Meet chat with Patty Templeton, scribbling out the lyrics.
THEN I wrote to my friend, the amazing filk artist Dr. Mary Crowell to collaborate on it with me to make it a fully realized song for your birthday!
Mary, as you probably remember from me telling you (oh! And I think you met her this year at WORLDCON!), is a Doctor of Music, specializing in opera and jazz. She’s a piano teacher, as well as performer in several musical groups that play at cons and concerts across the world, and she plays ever so many instruments, AND SHE SINGS, and she often writes songs about D&D and the books she likes to read!
She wrote the album Scattering Seeds on the Pomegranate Tour, as well as others that you can find on her Bandcamp page. Her Patreon is TOPS!
Last year, when Carlos and I Kickstarted for Negocios Infernales, Mary wrote an entire EP’s worth of songs based on our Baraja del Destino cards. She calls them her “Octimbre” songs! All nine are collected here on Soundcloud if you want some fun listening.
For the last few years, I’ve been collaborating with Mary and Tina Connolly on a long-form podcast musical called The Devil and Lady Midnight. Mary’s constantly posting thoughtful essays and new musical material on her Patreon, some of which come from our collaboration.
Mary so kindly wrote the melody for “Old John Hollowback” and ALL those eerie harmonies. What’s more, her daughter Lily joined us when we recorded it, so we have three very distinct voices singing the verses and the harmonies!!! (Lily is also a fantasy writer, among her other talents! Here’s some of her writing!) Then Mary did ALL THE MIXING on top of everything else! Truly, she worked harder on your birthday present than I did! (She also loved your story!)
Well, that’s my birthday letter to you. Without any further ado, here are the tune and lyrics to “Old John Hollowback.”
And over at Mary’s Patreon, she provides the recorded music, lyrics AND CHORD CHARTS!
Listen to the song HERE!
So much love,
Claire
Old John Hollowback
Lyrics by C. S. E. Cooney
Music by Dr. Mary C. Crowell
Performed by C. S. E. Cooney, Dr. Mary C. Crowell, and Lily Crowell
For our darling Amal, on her 40th birthday, off her story “John Hollowback and the Witch” in The Book of Witches
1.
Old John Hollowback, better beware
Caught by a witch
In her wicked witch lair
What will you give her?
What will you dare?
To grow a skin (grow a skin)
Be whole again (be whole again)
So fine and so fair?
2.
Old John Hollowback, what is your scheme?
Is this a nightmare—
Or is this a dream?
Don’t see no stitches,
Don’t see no seam
But in your back (in your back)
There is a lack (is a lack)
That you must redeem
REFRAIN
Oh, so—
You think you’re a hero?
Oh, no
It doesn’t appear so
Fellow,
You’re starting from zero
Blank as a hollow
Shaded and shallow
3.
Old John Hollowback, what will you give?
What will you trade
For this life you would live?
Pluck what remains
From your memory’s sieve
You brought a book (brought a book)
It’s blank, but look!
Regenerative
4.
Old John Hollowback, what did you snitch
Scalded by envy
Your hate fever-pitch?
You stole from a woman
To make you feel rich
But the more you raid
The more a maid
Becomes a true witch
REFRAIN
Oh, so—
You think you’re a hero?
Oh, no
It doesn’t appear so
Fellow,
You’re starting from zero
Blank as a hollow
Shaded and shallow
Coda
Old John Hollowback
Here, let me help you
Old John Hollowback
Mark you and mend you
Old John Hollowback
Heal you and send you
Far far away
Far far away
Old John Hollowback
Here, let me help you
Old John Hollowback
Mark you and mend you
Old John Hollowback
Heal you and send you
Far far away
Far far away
Never to darken the bright of our days
Far far away
Far far away
Never show your face again
Go on, be a better man
Far far away
Far far away
Far far away
December 5, 2024
Updates! New Collection INFERNAL BARGAINS is Out! SAINT DEATH’S HERALD Going to Print!
Hallo, hallo! So many things! Gasp! And lots of new things over at my latest newsletter as well! Read “A Life’s Age of December” here!
Infernal Bargains, the short story and poetry collection that Carlos and I wrote, all of it inspired by the “Deck of Destiny” cards, and made possible by the Kickstarter backers of Negocios Infernales, is now available in print and ebook!
Friends, if you backed our game Negocios Infernales last year, you should have gotten an e-mail update from our publisher Jeremy at Outland Entertainment for downloading your very own copy.
If you backed and didn’t get the email (check your spam!), leave me a comment with your email and I’ll forward you the epub or pdf!
For the rest of you: OUR BOOK IS OUT NOW! Find it where you find books!!!
Outland Entertainment
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Kobo
Apple
Saint Death’s Herald is going to PRINT in a few weeks! I have seen the PDF! And the FULL JACKET! Multiple ways and venues to pre-order it at this link!
Also (this is also in the newsletter), Carlos and I will be at PAX UNPLUGGED this weekend. We’re running FOUR WHOLE GAMES of Negocios Infernales. Two on Friday, two on Saturday, from 10 AM – 2 PM, and again from 4 PM – 8 PM!
December 1, 2024
Awards Eligibility Post 2024
I did have a few things published in 2024. But mostly I was… “finishing the hat.” I mean the novel.
Some pieces were exclusive releases, like my story in the Origins Game Fair Anthology Trove of Legacies, as well as the memorial anthology All in Among the Briars that Julia Rios edited in order to help a dear friend in our SFF community with her mama’s funeral expenses. Fathoms in the Earth is a gorgeous print anthology, but Orange and Bee Issue 2 is online!
I would love to find a reprint home for “With Wings of Crystal” one day. It was one of my stories–like “Catharsis” from Rogue Artists, soon to be re-released in Carlos’s and my collection Infernal Bargains–inspired by the world of Negocios Infernales. I didn’t write “With Wings of Crystal” in time to include in our collection, alas! It inspired a romantasy novel idea that my friend Caitlyn really wants me to write.
“The Book of Games” from Fathoms in the Earth (Air and Nothingness Press)
“With Wings of Crystal” from Trove of Legacies (exclusive to Origins Game Fair)
“We Fairy Tale Girls Are Growing Older” from All In Among the Briars (memorial anthology)
“The Eighth Blessing” from Orange and Bee, Issue Two
November 25, 2024
Clickbait
one person’s challenge
is another’s Armageddon
but some mudslides are worth
your Mima’s lasagna
I went to O’Hare once
Thanksgiving weekend
it made me an atheist
(just kidding, I was one)
but also, I miss them
wish we weren’t scattered
would eat with my brothers
every week if I could
and to cook with my mama
or for my fine aunties
praise my stepmother’s french toast
eat my papa’s fish dinners
and as for you strikers:
keep warm, hold the line there
I’m hoping they’ll pay you
a true living wage
a true living wage
and the safest conditions
that you too might go feasting
on your holidays
sickness is found
in the strangest locations
passing invisibly
plotting thoughtlessly
justifying paranoia
it’s as if
January 6
is a burning eye
on a burning mountain
about to make craters
of us all
there are mysteries to which
I have never been inducted
somewhere, a sibyl dressed in dollar bills
is dancing for a grinning god
and if he ever turns to look at me,
may I turn into a tree
Inside every John, there is a Jim
Outside every Jim, a John
And if this headline means aught else
I really don’t know what’s on
once upon a time,
the queen read this wirecutter article most carefully
before putting in her order for twenty, thirty of the finest mattresses
I forget the brand name now; doesn’t matter, really
Dora the pig girl told me to look under the bottommost one
to find my fortune, so I did–
though my future mother-in-law used lentils, not peas
Kendrick Lamar
has a name like a siren
belongs in an ocean
a merman, a salt-song
Kendrick Lamar
is a name full of music
but what is this diss track?
I guess I should listen
yes, the meat sweats are real
the fruit faints, the bread quakes
the crust cuts, the cream aches
the bean bets, all real
you want to avoid them?
far better befriend them
the leaf shock, the root lock
the food frets, all real
read the headlines. look no further.
~ C. S. E. Cooney, Nov 25, 2024
Oh, it was just a weird little exercise. A whim.
Incidental
the death of appetite is crock-pot cabbage
slow-cooked with beer and bay leaf.
this endless leech of purple into broth,
that sweet onion I subbed in for the leek.
my husband’s trusty crust of peppercorn
fireworks-fugging the closed-window air.
(he loves a big burst from a small thing,
a luchador bottle opener with blue plastic thighs.)
me, I like a red cabbage. I like a gold potato.
the carmine carrot with the yellow center. Tiny skulls of garlic.
this smell, of apples and cider vinegar
might be the death of me. I mean, pleasantly.
I don’t know why I made it. I wasn’t hungry.
I just need to chop things, sometimes.
tomorrow, it will be over. nothing to smell, to do.
only leftovers, waiting for the resurrection of want.
C. S. E. Cooney, Nov 25th, 2024
November 21, 2024
December 17th at Brooklyn Books and Booze
News from the “Brooklyn Books and Booze” newsletter of the great Randee Dawn:
Book and booze with us at Barrow’s Intense Ginger Tasting Room this month with:
C.S.E Cooney
Mary G. Thompson
Matt Talucci
Richard Sparks
Date: December 17, 2024
7 p.m. – 9 p.m.
Location:
Barrow’s Intense Tasting Room: 86 34th Street, Brooklyn, NY
Subway: D, N, R train to 36th Avenue, then about a 4 minute walk.
(This venue is inside what’s known as Industry City, a series of former industrial workspaces turned into food, drink and shopping venues. See this mapfor assistance, as it can be confusing the first time you go.)
The evening is free, but you’re encouraged to purchase at least one drink (they have non-alcoholic options) and tip your bartender. Barrow’s also serves some food.
Meet your authors!
C. S. E. Cooney is a two-time World Fantasy Award-winning author for novel Saint Death’s Daughter and collection Bone Swans, Stories. Other work includes The Twice-Drowned Saint, Dark Breakers, and Desdemona and the Deep.As a voice actor, Cooney has narrated over 120 audiobooks, and quite a few podcasts. In March 2023, she produced her collaborative sci-fi musical, Ballads from a Distant Star, at New York City’s Arts on Site. She co-designed the GM-less TTRPG Negocios Infernales with her husband, writer and game-designer Carlos Hernandez, available from Outland Entertainment.
Mary G. Thompson is the author of The Word, Flicker and Mist, and other novels for children and young adults, as well as the forthcoming sci-fi novella A Small Universe. Her contemporary thriller Amy Chelsea Stacie Dee was a winner of the 2017 Westchester Fiction Award and a finalist for the 2018-2019 Missouri Gateway award. Her short fiction has appeared in Apex Magazine, Dark Matter Magazine, and others. She holds an MFA in Writing for Children from The New School and lives in Washington, DC.
Matt Talucci was raised in South Jersey right outside Philadelphia. He’s had a lifelong obsession with fantasy literature, and published his novel The Sword and the Tree in April. He graduated from the College of the Holy Cross as an English Major. He also holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College, and an MA from Teachers College, Columbia University in the Teaching of English. He is currently a High School English Teacher and lives in Bridgeport, CT with his wife, son, and dog, Otis.
Richard Sparks is an English-born comedy writer, lyricist, librettist, author and director now living in Los Angeles. He has written extensively for television, film, radio and the stage as well as theatre and the opera. His opera libretti include original works, mostly commissioned by the Los Angeles Opera, and translations/adaptations of Classic operas. Richard wrote the Schoolmaster sketch for Rowan Atkinson (The Secret Policeman’s Ball). He was also a staff writer on Not The Nine O’Clock News. He had previously written two Edinburgh Fringe Oxford Revues starring Mel Smith. Richard has now turned his hand to fantasy fiction after falling in love with RPGs. The first book of a five part series, New Rock, New Role, was published in 2023 and the second book, published in November. Richard is also the owner of Sporting Life Bar in Las Vegas, a multi-award winning Nevada tavern that has been named Sports Bar of the Year every year since it opened in 2014.
Host/curator Randee Dawn will not be hosting in December; instead, Amy Goldschlager will take up the reins.
Arrive early to secure a good seat. There are lots of comfy places to situate yourself, but the best go fast. Additionally, some authors may have books there to sell, so be prepared to take home some copies!
Are you an author who might want to read? Our 2025 sign-up sheet is now available here.
See you Tuesday the 17th! It’s gonna be INTENSE!
— Randee Dawn
November 11, 2024
Mythic Delirium’s 26th Anniversary Reading!
Dear friends of Speculative Fiction, Indie Presses, the Weird, the Wild, and the Wonderous, greetings!
It is the 26th Anniversary of Mythic Delirium Books, a micropress run by Mike and Anita Allen, that specializes in speculative fiction and poetry, with a penchant for writing that’s challenging to classify.
In the past, the imprint provided homes to Mythic Delirium, a digital journal of fiction and poetry, and Clockwork Phoenix, a critically-acclaimed anthology series that showcased stories that don’t easily fit within standard market boundaries.
Please join us! Free tickets available on Eventbrite for our Celebratory Zoom Reading! Free! Virtual! 2 years with an Indie Press specializing in the Beautiful and Strange!
Sign up at our Eventbrite page below to receive reminder emails and the Zoom link!
Register on EventbriteGuess who’s reading? Nah, JK. You don’t have to guess! I’ll just tell ya!
Mythic Delirium 26th Anniversary Author Bios!
Born and raised in upstate New York, Amy Aderman enjoys fairy tales, research, and tea. Her fantasy short stories have most recently appeared in the “From the Lockdown” contest by Rochester Speculative Literature Association, Mythic Delirium, and the anthology “Ain’t Superstitious.”
Anita Allen is an enigma. She is a small Press publisher, editing books and short stories with her husband for Mythic Delirium books. She has a handful of writing publications. She is also an artist who has had her own shows and sold work internationally as well as done illustrations and cover art for several small press magazines. She is a semi retired competitive costume designer holding the rank of craftsman.
Given her druthers she would prefer to spend her days listened to rain on a tin roof or breezes through the pines, painting, sculpting and creating things with fabric all while living in a stone cottage deep in the woods growing moss, studying philosophy, drinking tea and playing with her pets. Instead, she lives in a tiny house beneath giant oak trees in the heart of the city. Somehow managing all of the aforementioned things while occasionally filling in as an adjunct reader for various writing projects her beloved is working on.
Mike Allen has written, edited, or co-edited thirty-nine books, among them his new horror collection, Slow Burn. His first two volumes of horror tales, Unseaming and Aftermath of an Industrial Accident, were finalists for the Shirley Jackson Award for Best Story Collection, and his dark fable “The Button Bin” was a nominee for the Nebula Award for Best Short Story. As an editor and publisher, he has twice been a finalist for the World Fantasy Award. Ruadán Books intends to publish Mike’s sidearms, sorcery, and zombies sequence The Black Fire Concerto and The Ghoulmaker’s Aria in 2025 and 2026, respectively. With his wife, Anita, he runs Mythic Delirium Books, based in Roanoke, Virginia. Their cat Pandora assists.
Marie Brennan is the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Award-nominated author of the Memoirs of Lady Trent, the Onyx Court, other fantasy series, several poems, and over ninety short stories. As half of M.A. Carrick, she’s also written the Rook and Rose trilogy. Find her at swantower.com and on Patreon.
Edith Hope Bishop writes fiction, poetry, and music. She grew up in South Florida and spent several years in the Northeast, but her home for more than twenty years now has been the Pacific Northwest. She proudly holds degrees from both Harvard and Columbia Universities. She’s worked as a public school teacher, curriculum developer, and school volunteer. She’s mom to two teens and one schnoodle. With her partner, Edie publishes music as Foulweather Bluff. She loves to make elaborate costumes for her whole family and is fond of photography, beachcombing, gardening, and live theater. When she isn’t making art, volunteering in her community, or spending cherished time with family and friends, she can usually be found on, in, or near a body of salt water. Edie is currently hard at work to launch Songborne & Seabound Press in 2025.
Novelist, poet, and community organizer Leah Bobet works where climate fiction, the counterfactual, and food sovereignty meet. Her latest novel, An Inheritance of Ashes, won the Sunburst, Copper Cylinder, and Prix Aurora Awards and was an OLA Best Bets book; her short fiction is anthologized worldwide. Her poetry has appeared in Grain, Prairie Fire, and Canthius, and has shortlisted for the Prix Aurora Award and the Muriel’s Journey Poetry Prize. She edited poetry for the Utopia Award-winning 2021 issue of Reckoning: creative writing on environmental justice, read for Grist’s Imagine 2200 contest, and is studying food security policy at Toronto Metropolitan University. She lives in Toronto, where she makes jam, builds grassroots infrastructure projects, and plants both tomatoes and trees. Visit her at leahbobet.com.
Beth Cato is the author of the Chefs of the Five Gods duology with 47North and The Clockwork Dagger series and the Blood of Earth trilogy with Harper Voyager. She was a 2015 Nebula Award finalist in the novella category. Her short stories and poetry can be found in hundreds of publications, including Fantasy Magazine, Escape Pod, Uncanny Magazine, and the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. Beth hails from Hanford, California, but now resides in beautiful Red Wing, Minnesota, with her husband and two feline overlords. For more information about her writing and to explore hundreds of free, delicious recipes, visit www.bethcato.com.
C. S. E. Cooney (she/her) is a two-time World Fantasy Award-winning author: for novel Saint Death’s Daughter, and collection Bone Swans, Stories. Other work includes The Twice-Drowned Saint, Dark Breakers, and Desdemona and the Deep. Forthcoming in 2025 is Saint Death’s Herald, second in the Saint Death Series. As a voice actor, Cooney has narrated over 120 audiobooks, and short fiction for podcasts like Uncanny Magazine, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Tales to Terrify, and Podcastle. In March 2023, she produced her collaborative sci-fi musical, Ballads from a Distant Star, at New York City’s Arts on Site. (Find her music at Bandcamp under Brimstone Rhine.) Forthcoming from Outland Entertainment is the GM-less TTRPG Negocios Infernales (“the Spanish Inquisition… INTERRUPTED by aliens!”), co-designed with her husband, writer and game-designer Carlos Hernandez. Find her website and Substack newsetter via her Linktree or try “csecooney” on various social media platforms.
Francesca Forrest is the author of the novellas The Inconvenient God and Lagoonfire, both from Annorlunda Books, the novel Pen Pal, and a number of short stories—most recently “Semper Vivens,” from Andromeda Spaceways magazine. For many years she was a copy editor for the Mythic Delirium zine and helped out with proofreading a couple of Mythic Delirium’s Clockwork Phoenix anthologies. She was super honored when Mike asked her to write the intro to Yukimi Ogawa’s short story collection Like Smoke, Like Light, which Mythic Delirium published. Mike, Anita, and Mythic Delirium are the center of a great writing community!
Theodora Goss is the World Fantasy, Locus, and Mythopoeic Award-winning author of the Athena Club trilogy of novels, including The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter, European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman, and The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl. Her other publications include short story and poetry collections In the Forest of Forgetting, Songs for Ophelia, Snow White Learns Witchcraft, and The Collected Enchantments, as well as novella The Thorn and the Blossom. She has been a finalist for the Nebula, Crawford, and Shirley Jackson Awards, as well as on the Tiptree Award Honor List. Her work has been translated into fifteen languages. She is currently a Master Lecturer in Rhetoric at Boston University. Visit her at theodoragoss.com.
New York Times best-selling author Carlos Hernandez wrote the critically acclaimed short story collection The Assimilated Cuban’s Guide to Quantum Santeria (Rosarium, 2016), the novel Sal and Gabi Break the Universe (Disney Hyperion, 2019), which won the 2020 Pura Belpré Award, and its sequel, Sal and Gabi Fix the Universe. He’s also written dozens of short stories, poems, and works of drama, usually in the SFF mode. Carlos is Professor of English at the City University of New York (CUNY), where he teaches Composition, Creative Writing, Science Fiction, and other courses at BMCC. His work at the CUNY Graduate Center in the Interactive Technology and Pedagogy Program, where his academic interests have centered around game-based learning in postsecondary environments, has led him to work extensively game writing and game design. He has served as lead writer and a game designer on the CRPG Meriwether, as a writer and designer for the installation art of Mary Miss, and as literary curator on the Apple Arcade game Dear Reader, among other video games. As a co-founder of the CUNY Games Network and of the Board Game Designers Group of New York, he’s contributed to the development of many board and card games, both educational and commercial. Negocios Infernales, a GM-less roleplaying game designed by Hernandez and his wife, author C. S. E. Cooney, will be published by Outland Entertainment later this year. You can find him on socials at @writeteachplay.
John Philip Johnson has published literary and spec poetry in numerous journals and reviews. In 2021 he won a Pushcart Prize for a spec poem he had dedicated to Mike Allen, who had inspired the poem in 2011. His comic book of graphic poetry, The Book of Fly, won an Elgin Award. He’s proud to report he’s still off drugs and out of jail. He hopes to live long enough to see people on Mars and would go there himself if he could, but only if his wife, Sue, went with him.
David C. Kopaska-Merkel, a retired geologist, won the 2006 Rhysling award for best long poem (for a collaboration with Kendall Evans), and edits Dreams & Nightmares magazine (since 1986). He has edited Star*line, an issue of Eye To The Telescope, and several Rhysling anthologies, co-edited the 2023 Dwarf Stars anthology, has served as SFPA president, and is an SFPA Grandmaster. His poems have been published in Analog, Asimov’s, Strange Horizons, and more than 200 other venues. Some Disassembly Required, a recent collection of dark speculative poetry, won the 2023 Elgin award. Unwelcome Guests (2024) is his latest book. Find his blog at https://dreamsandnightmaresmagazine.blogspot.com/
Barbara Krasnoff has had over 40 short stories appear in a variety of publications. Her story “Sabbath Wine,” published in the anthology Clockwork Phoenix 5, was a Nebula Award finalist, while “Baby Golem,” from the anthology Jewish Futures: Science Fiction from the World’s Oldest Diaspora, was a finalist for the 2024 WSFA Small Press Award. She also has a mosaic novel, The History of Soul 2065, published by Mythic Delirium Books. A full list of publications can be found at BrooklynWriter.com. When not writing genre fiction or hanging out with her partner, WBAI radio host Jim Freund, Barbara earns a living as Reviews Editor for The Verge.
Rich Larson was born in Niger, has lived in Spain and Czech Republic, and is currently based in Canada. He is the author of the novels Annex and Ymir, as well as collections Tomorrow Factory and The Sky Didn’t Load Today and Other Glitches. His fiction has been translated into over a dozen languages, among them Polish, French, Romanian and Japanese, and adapted into an Emmy-winning episode of LOVE DEATH + ROBOTS.
Sandi Leibowitz writes fantasy fiction and poetry, often based on myths and fairy tales. Author of the poetry collections Eurydice Sings, Elgin-nominated The Bone-Joiner, and Ghost-Light, her speculative poems have garnered second- and third-place Dwarf Star awards and been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Rhysling and Best of the Net awards. Her poems and stories for children appear in Cricket, Highlights, Ember, Spellbound, Orbit and other magazines; Her picture book for older children, Magotu and the Leopard, illustrated by Christiane Krömer, has been published by Library for All. A native New Yorker, Sandi also sings classical, folk, and cabaret music. Don’t ask her to dance for you, however, as a recent vigorous cha-cha ended with her breaking her wrist. If you ask nicely, she will say something to you in Gaelic.
Virginia M. Mohlere was born on one solstice, and her sister was born on the other. Her chronic writing disorder stems from early childhood. Other than Mythic Delirium, Virginia has emerged infrequently from her fort built of yarn and fountain pens to publish works in venues such as Jabberwocky, Fireside Fiction, Goblin Fruit, Strange Horizons, Cicada, and Through the Gate. She was the 2019 winner of the WSFA Small Press Award for her short story, “The Thing in the Walls Wants Your Small Change,” which appeared in Luna Station Quarterly.
Yukimi Ogawa lives in a small town in Tokyo, where she writes in English but never speaks the language. She still wonders why it works that way. Her fiction can be found in such places as Clarkesworld, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Strange Horizons. Her debut collection, Like Smoke, Like Light, was selected as one of Publishers Weekly‘s best Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror books of 2023.
Cameron Roberson, who writes under the pen name Rob Cameron, is a teacher, linguist, and lead organizer for the Brooklyn Speculative Fiction Writers. Poetry. Hia stories, essays, and poems have appeared in Star*Line, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Foreign Policy Magazine, Tor.com, Apex, Bestiary of Blood horror anthology, and Clockwork Phoenix 5!!! Daydreamer, his debut middle grade novel, came out from Random House in August and his solarpunk noir novelette Ice Like Honey comes out in Lightspeed magazine in early 2025.
Kenneth Schneyer’s short fiction has been nominated for the Nebula and Sturgeon awards, found its way into various Years Best anthologies, and been translated into five other languages. His second collection, Anthems Outside Time and Other Strange Voices (featuring an introduction by Mike Allen!) received starred reviews from both Publishers Weekly and Library Journal in 2020. His most recent stories are “Tamaza’s Future and Mine” (Asimov’s Science Fiction) and “Winding Sheets” (Lightspeed Magazine). By day, he is a professor of humanities and legal studies, teaching courses as varied as advanced Shakespeare, criminal procedure, and introductory logic. Born in Detroit, he now lives in Rhode Island with his spouse, occasionally his grown children, and something with fangs.
Sonya Taaffe reads dead languages and tells living stories. Her short fiction and poetry have been collected most recently in As the Tide Came Flowing In (Nekyia Press) and previously in Singing Innocence and Experience, Postcards from the Province of Hyphens, A Mayse-Bikhl, Ghost Signs, and the Lambda-nominated Forget the Sleepless Shores. She lives with one of her husbands and both of her cats in Somerville, Massachusetts, where she writes about film for Patreon and remains proud of naming a Kuiper Belt object.
Jessica P. Wick is a writer, poet, and editor. She co-founded Goblin Fruit with Amal El-Mohtar, a quarterly e-zine of fantastical poetry, and is a passionate advocate for the reading aloud of poetry and fiction. Her poetry has been nominated for the Rhysling Award and received honorable mentions in Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror anthologies. Her short fiction can be found scattered across the internet; recently, her novella “An Unkindness” appeared in Mythic Delirium’s A Sinister Quartet. Jessica’s experience as an editor runs the gamut, from full-length novels to short fiction, poetry collections to magazine articles, academic papers to audio works. She also reviews books for NPR.
November 5, 2024
Poem for Patty Templeton on Her Glorious 42nd
For my Patty, obviously—a bit of doggerel to make you laugh
you’re a rich bitch, book witch
archivist, punk artist
rebellion librarian
poet of this world
nineteen years we’ve lived as peers
though debt and doubt and drought and fears
riot, triumph, treason, tears
we chafe as sand to pearl
Don’t know ‘bout the vote tonight
what song to sing, what note to strike
my heart is shrieking like a shrike
impaled on my bones
but there you are, my desert star
my pattyhawk, my mollymawk
midst monster trucks and splattershock
to pacify our jones
Hyperbolize or idolize:
Your carny-core, your cat-lined eyes?
Your Halloween-embodied being?
You goofy scarecrow clown!
Gothic, mythic, goblin, sapphic
Rhythmic, scary, sexy, graphic
Miss America/na Murderfolk
O hag-rose of our town
When shall we two meet again?
In Malpais or New England?
The Zoom, the Meet, the Chat, DM?
The Street of Many Porches?
Wish I could be there some-way
En-nachoed, tacoed, low-key yay
Light candles for you on this day
That really should be torches
